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| From a Sinai Treks vacation site [Source] |
Wikipedia says the Sinai Peninsula
is "a tourist
destination due to its natural
setting, rich coral reefs, and
biblical history. Mount Sinai is
one of the most religiously significant places in the Abrahamic faiths." It's an optimistic assessment,
looked at through the eyes of 2012.
The head of Israel's Military
Intelligence, Aviv Kochavi, told the Foreign Affairs and Defense
Committee of the Israeli parliament - the Knesset - this
morning (Tuesday) that the IDF has
so far been instrumental in recent days in uncovering and stopping no fewer
than ten separate terror cells based
in Sinai. He says it has multiple additional terror groups under
surveillance at the present time. Ynet
says the new Sinai reality
came up in the discussions Sunday and yesterday among the Israeli leadership
(Netanyahu and Barak), and Hillary Clinton, the visiting US Secretary of
State.
Sinai terrorists have deployed rockets,
machine-guns and explosives against Israelis on several occasions in the past
several months. They killed
an Israeli working on the new Israel-Egypt border security fence, and
nine additional Israelis in the Islamic Jihad terror
attack on a bus traveling on Highway 10 last summer of 2011. The
terrorists destroyed sections of the Egypt-to-Israel gas pipeline more than a
dozen times in the past year. That pipeline is now no longer delivering gas to
Israel. Kidnappings and abductions of Americans, Europeans and other
foreign tourists and visitors are a daily reality, right up
until this morning.
Egyptian officials routinely blame Israel for "trying to spread panic with rumors and
irresponsible statements" and making efforts "to impede the
area's booming tourism industry" [source]
But sober observers know it's far from being an Israelis-only concern.
The traveler's advisory site of the UK Foreign
Office, as of this afternoon, warns visitors to Egypt that
"due to the significant increase in the risk of criminal activity in the
North Sinai area, we advise against all but essential travel to Sinai north of
the Suez-Taba road."
U.S. citizens who plan to visit the Sinai in spite of the persistent threat of terrorist attacks should exercise great caution. Travelers should remain alert to their surroundings and are reminded that crowded tourist areas have been the target of terrorist activities. Travelers should use caution when visiting destination resorts and hotels without significant physical setback and security procedures... U.S. Embassy personnel in Egypt are currently prohibited from traveling to the Sinai, except by air to Sharm El Sheikh. Overland travel by U.S. government (USG) employees anywhere in the Sinai outside of Sharm El Sheikh is prohibited. In addition, travel by road by USG employees west of Marsa Matruh on the north coast is prohibited. Travel between Fayoum, Asyut, Sohag, and Qena; and Fayoum is only approved on a case by case basis.No one is asking for our advice, but we say the presence of tourists is almost always a good thing, just so long as they are making a mature assessment of the risks they are taking by going there.
On a slightly more upbeat note, Kochavi
spoke about the growth in MI's capabilities, referring in particular to a
significant rise in the number of young service personnel joining the force.
The officers training cadre grew this year by 25%, though we are left with the
impression that the scale of the overall challenge, particularly in Sinai and in
light of the tectonic changes going on in Moslem Brotherhood-led Egypt, grew
more rapidly than that.
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