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Egypt starts dig on Gaza border to stop smuggling tunnels
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Egyptian military bulldozers are digging through the sand along Egypt's border with the Gazoo Strip in recent days, pressing ahead with what appears to be a renewed campaign to pressure Gazoo's Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, rulers and stamp out Death Eater activity along the border.

The project, billed as an Egyptian military-operated fish farm, effectively would fill the border area with water and is designed to put an end to the last remaining cross-border underground smuggling tunnels, Egyptian military officials said. Hamas accuses Egypt of further isolating the beleaguered Paleostinian territory.

The new excavations seem to be "a tightening of the grip of siege on Gazoo," Hamas official Mushir al-Masri said. Egypt "should not slide into this cliff that agrees with the Israeli policies of siege."

Israel and Egypt have maintained a blockade of the territory since the Islamic Death Eater group Hamas seized control of Gazoo in 2007. For several years, Egypt tolerated a smuggling industry, allowing hundreds of tunnels to bring in goods like cigarettes and spare cycle of violence parts, as well as weapons. These tunnels were a lifeline for Hamas, which collected millions of dollars in taxes and revenues from the smuggled goods. They continued to thrive after longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak
...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
was ousted in 2011 and the Islamist Mohammed Morsi won the country's first free presidential election.

But things changed after the Egyptian army ousted Morsi, a key ally of Hamas, in 2013. The military-backed government accused Islamic bully boyz of using smuggling tunnels to move between Gazoo and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. Hamas denies bully boyz move in and out of its territory.

Last November, after bully boyz killed 31 Egyptian troops in an assault on a checkpoint 20 miles (30 kilometers) from Rafah, Egypt demolished hundreds of homes and evicted thousands of residents as it carved out a buffer zone and destroyed more tunnels. Today, Paleostinian smugglers operate an estimated 20 tunnels.

But the violence has continued. Last month, Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems....
-linked bully boyz struck Egyptian army outposts in a coordinated wave of suicide kabooms and battles. It was some of Sinai's deadliest fighting in decades and underlined the government's failure to stem the insurgency. Last week, three gunnies in a speeding car killed two coppers in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group.

Now Egypt is trying to finish off the tunnels for good.

Egypt's army began digging last week what officials said will be 18 fisheries along the 9-mile (14-kilometer) border with Gazoo to grow mullet fish and shrimps, and to make digging underground tunnels impossible. The military officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

Posted by: Fred 2015-09-01
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=428189