Israel plans wall for Egypt border

11/01/2010| IslamWeb

Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has approved plans to erect a wall along part of Israel's border with Egypt.

Announcing his decision to include advanced surveillance equipment on the new barrier, Netanyahu said in a statement on Sunday it would keep "infiltrators and terrorists" out.

"This is a strategic decision to secure Israel's Jewish and democratic character," Netanyahu said.

Thousands of African and other migrants have come to Israel through its desert border with Egypt over the last few years, fleeing conflict back home or searching for a better life in Israel.

The PM added that while his country would continue to accept refugees from conflict zones, "we cannot let tens of thousands of illegal workers infiltrate into Israel through the southern border and inundate our country with illegal aliens".

The project will cost $270 million and take two years to complete, but the barrier will not be erected along the whole border - which is 266 km long.

Egyptian view

Egyptian security sources in North Sinai said Israel had not informed the Egyptian authorities of its plan.

One security source said the project was an internal Israeli matter "which Egypt has nothing to do with as long as the fence is built on Israeli soil".

Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Husam Zaki said the ministry would issue a statement on the plan on Monday.

Egyptian police have stepped up efforts in recent months to control the frontier with Israel following an increase in human trafficking through Egypt.

At least 17 migrants have been shot dead as they tried to enter Israel by Egyptian police since May 2009.

The wall along Israel's southern border is separate from a 670km barrier that cuts off Israel from large parts of the West Bank.

Rafah wall

The announcement of the wall at Israel's southern border comes after increased tensions among Palestinians over another wall, on the Rafah border with Egypt.

Egypt says it is constructing the wall along its border with the Gaza Strip ‘to defend against threats to national security’.

That barrier is believed to consist of a series of steel sheets and pipes that will be buried deep into the ground to prevent the construction of smuggling tunnels under the 14km frontier.

Al Jazeera's Ayman Mohyeldin, reporting from Gaza, said the construction of such walls "paint a grim picture" for the people in Gaza.

"Last week when the tensions on the Egypt-Gaza border began to rise as a result of the increased speculation of Egypt's construction of this wall, people here [became] extremely anxious," he said.

"You juxtapose that in terms of the humanitarian aspect coupled with the daily airstrikes and you get a very explosive situation in Gaza."

PHOTO CAPTION

A tourist from Italy sprays paint on the Israeli barrier in the West Bank town of Bethlehem December 23, 2009.

Al-Jazeera