Sinai updates

Posted on By 3arabawy

One day after Mubarak’s regime celebrated Sinai Liberation Day:

Hundreds of Egypt Bedouin seeking entry to Israel
By Yusri Muhammad
AL-ARISH, Egypt, April 26- Hundreds of Egyptian Sinai Bedouin massed at the border with Israel on Thursday seeking entry into the Jewish state a day after two Bedouin men died in a police chase, security sources and witnesses said.
The security sources said Egyptian police were monitoring the tribesmen from a distance but had not approached them, as a significant number of them were armed.
The massing at the border came a day after many Bedouin took to the streets and set fire to dozens of tyres in anger over the death of two Sinai Bedouin men on Wednesday in a chase with Egyptian police.
Security sources said the two men had exchanged fire with police after driving through a checkpoint in a pick-up truck with no license plates.
Tribal sources said the Bedouin headed to the border fearing a police crackdown and a wave of arrests after Wednesday’s deaths and protests. One tribal sheikh who asked not to be named said the Bedouin came from several tribes and had been seeking entry into Israel since dawn.
DIPLOMATIC EMBARRASSMENT?
Security sources described the decision to try to seek entry into Israel as an attempt by the Bedouin to embarrass the Egyptian government.
Bedouin in 1999 managed to illegally cross the border into Israel after disagreements with other tribes and requested political asylum there, but were returned to Egypt.
Egypt blamed a series of bombings in Sinai, the last of which took place in April 2006, on a local Islamist group called al-Tawhid wal Jihad (One God and Jihad), and says the group is made up of Sinai Bedouin with militant views.
Security sweeps have since focused heavily on Sinai’s Bedouins. Human rights groups say Egypt detained up to 2,500 people for questioning after the bombings, and that many were subjected to torture. Egypt denies this.
In January, the International Crisis Group said Egypt must tackle political and socioeconomic problems in Sinai if it hopes to end militancy there.

And here’s another Reuters report on border armed clashes with a Palestinian suspect:

Palestinian throws grenade at Egypt border police
AL-ARISH, Egypt, April 26 – A Palestinian man lobbed a grenade at Egyptian police who confronted him near the Gaza border on Thursday as he tried to smuggle a suicide bomb belt into Egypt, security sources said.
None of the police officers were injured but the 26-year-old attacker was seriously hurt by shrapnel.
The sources said Abdel Shafie Jabr Maraheel was suspected of having entered Egypt illegally via a smuggling tunnel on the border with the Gaza Strip. They could give no information on what he may have been planning.
Bombers have hit Red Sea resort areas in the Sinai peninsula three times since 2004, killing more than 100 people in attacks Egypt blames on a group of Islamists from the Sinai Bedouin community with militant views.
The Egyptian sources said police had tried to stop Maraheel north of the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza, but he fled and then threatened to detonate a grenade he was carrying.
Police fired warning shots in the air, and Maraheel threw the grenade, a source said. Maraheel was in hospital with internal bleeding.
Egyptian police regularly seize explosives and ammunition in Sinai, sometimes hidden in tunnels near the Gaza border. In March, Egyptian police arrested a suspected Palestinian suicide bomber they accused of planning an attack in Israel.

Amnesty International denounce closure of CTUWS

Posted on By 3arabawy

AI expressed its solidarity with Egyptian labor activists who are coming under attack from Mubarak’s dictatorial regime:

Amnesty International condemned the Egyptian government’s closure of a leading workers advice centre yesterday, on the eve of the country’s Labour Day, and said it undermined President Hosni Mubarak’s claims in a speech today that his government is committed to protecting workers’ rights. As a result of the forced closure of the Centre for Trade Union and Workers’ Services (CTUWS) office in Helwan, Cairo, the organization said Egyptian workers will be impeded from accessing information and advice about labour rights.

HRW denounce Mubarak’s crackdown on CTUWS

Posted on By 3arabawy

I received the following statement from Human Rights Watch:

The Egyptian government should immediately reverse its order to close the headquarters and two branch offices of the Center for Trade Union and Workers’ Services (CTUWS), Human Rights Watch said today.
Security officers on Wednesday closed the headquarters of the CTUWS, which offers legal aid to Egyptian factory workers, educates them as to their rights, and reports on labor-rights issues in the country. Police had closed two of the group’s branch offices in recent weeks. The Ministry of Social Solidarity has blamed the CTUWS for inciting labor unrest around the country.
“The government decision to shut down the Center for Trade Union and Workers’ Services is a serious blow to Egyptian civil society and workers’ rights,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “The Egyptian government should address the causes of widespread labor unrest instead of going after workers’ rights groups.”