Amir Avivi
Jerusalem Post, June 15, 2023
“Both the Sinai and the Negev suffer from weak sovereign governance and lawlessness, providing fertile ground for the narratives of various extremist groups aiming to recruit and deepen regional instability.”
This month’s disastrous killing of three IDF soldiers near the Egyptian border by an Egyptian border police officer was a systemic failure by the IDF that warrants the kind of soul-searching reserved for formative events.
Sadly, it is not the first time Egyptian border police crossed the border and assaulted Israeli soldiers, and there are tactical as well as strategic lessons to learn.
In 2009 I served as the brigade commander in charge of that specific area of the border – which stretches from the southern Gaza Strip all the way south to Eilat – and investigated a similar assault which fortunately ended without Israeli casualties.
The situation on the ground was different then, as Israel had yet to build the border obstacle that exists today, and most of the border was marked only by a crude barbed wire fence, which was occasionally buried in the shifting sands of the Sinai desert.
On a random summer night, three Egyptian police officers crossed the border and opened fire at a group of IDF soldiers who were on a mission to spot and avert smuggling attempts. The Egyptians alleged that they thought the Israeli soldiers were smugglers, a claim that even at that time was highly improbable.
Conflict along the border
The Israeli soldiers, from the same co-ed battalion that is deployed along the border today, responded poorly and failed to return fire against the Egyptian attackers. However, they were saved by a more experienced officer who eventually killed one of the attackers and caused the other two to flee.
Like today, the event was later investigated together with the Egyptian authorities, and operating procedures were adjusted to prevent future attacks.
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