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Israel-Egypt storm brews over PoWs
JERUSALEM: A major diplomatic row threatened to erupt between Israel and Egypt yesterday over claims that a crack Israeli unit killed Egyptian prisoners during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. The claims, aired in a public television documentary in Israel, have been vehemently denied by the unit commander Benjamin Ben-Eliezer now the Jewish states national infrastructure minister.But they have raised a storm of controversy in Egypt, where the affair has dominated the front pages for two days, sparked an angry debate in parliament and led the foreign ministry to summon the Israeli ambassador in Cairo. A Massacre, thundered Egypts mass-selling state-owned Al-Ahram newspaper. The affair is in the process of becoming a major diplomatic incident, a senior Israeli official said on condition of anonymity. The relations between the two countries are compromised. The row forced Ben-Eliezer yesterday to cancel a planned visit to Cairo this week, where he was due to discuss natural gas imports from Egypt, one of only two Arab countries to have signed a peace treaty with Israel. Following unfounded information published in Egypt on this affair and the current atmosphere not being favourable, the two parties decided to postpone to another date Ben-Eliezers visit, his press adviser Moshe Ronen said. The Shaked Spirit documentary broadcast a week ago claimed that the commando unit led by Ben-Eliezer during the June 1967 Six Day war had killed 250 Egyptian PoWs in the El-Arish area of the Sinai peninsula. Nice to see Israel's Media complex is up to international western standards of self-bashing and self-loathing, always probing that dark, dark past to ask for attonement and flagellation. Didn't uncle Gromgoru said that Israel's moonbats were the best, or the worst? On Sunday Ben-Eliezer a Labour party minister, reserve general and former defence minister denied the charges, saying his unit had killed Palestinian fighters in combat, not PoWs. In fact, in one clash during this war, soldiers of a battalion of Palestinian Fedayeen operating from the Gaza Strip against Israel, particularly against the unit I commanded, were killed, Ben-Eliezer said in a statement. These soldiers were not executed as it was said, they were killed in combat. Maybe the confusion is due to the fact that two days before this incident, the Shaked commando came across an Egyptian battalion that had stopped fighting, and men from the unit helped them by providing food and water, his statement said. But Ben-Eliezers denial has done little to ease Egyptian rage. On Sunday the foreign ministry in Cairo summoned Israeli Ambassador Shalom Cohen to protest, and called for clarification about the reported events. Posted by: anonymous5089 2007-03-06 |
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