Israeli soldiers' bus comes under fire from Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula

An Israeli army bus traveling on a road near Mount Sagi, close to the Israel-Egypt border came under fire, causing no casualties but damaging the bus, an Israeli military spokeswoman said.

So far no group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Meanwhile, a powerful explosion ripped through the Egyptian pipeline in northern Sinai Peninsula, which carries gas supplies to Israel for the 15th time.

The explosion occurred in the early hours of Sunday morning at al-Tuwail, east of the coastal Sinai town of al-Arish, at a point before the pipeline splits into separate branches to Israel and Jordan, security officials said.

Gunmen in a small truck drove up to the pipeline, dug a hole and placed explosive charges under the pipeline that they detonated from a distance, according to a security official.

A large boom echoed across the area and residents up to 30 kilometers away said later they could see flames of burning gas lighting the sky. No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks on the installation that crosses the Sinai Peninsula.

Residents in al-Arish said that gas shipments had resumed three days ago through the pipeline, which at one point supplied Israel with about 40 percent of its natural gas.

In another attack, two Egyptian soldiers were killed in the town of Sheikh Zuwaid when they were shot at by two unidentified Bedouin tribesmen riding a motorbike with their faces covered.

Based on the above, we can tell that the security situation in Sinai Peninsula is very much deteriorated in this period, especially after the fall of the Hosni Mubarak regime. The Israeli side threatened several times to go for a military operation to protect Israeli border security, but it seems that Egyptians didn't pay any attention to these threats.

In fact, many Palestinian and Islamic factions used the absence of security in many operations, such as smuggling weapons to the Gaza strip. Israeli security reports confirms the presence of anti-aircraft rockets and heavy weapons that have been smuggled through Sinai Peninsula from Libya or other neighbours.

I think the new elected president in Egypt must have on top of his agenda the security in Sinai Peninsula, not for the sake of Israelis only, but for the Egyptians too, so as to guarantee the tourism and economics side running well in this area, or else a new Afghanistan can be expected therein.

Sources: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/158104

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4258866,00.html