Israeli Army Concludes Investigation into Killing of Soldiers at Egypt Border: Reveals ‘Failures’ in Combat Readiness

The results of the Israeli army’s investigation into the killing of 3 of its soldiers by an Egyptian policeman near the Al-Awja or Nitsana border crossing with Egypt on June 3 concluded that there were what it called “several failures” in combat readiness on the border with Egypt.

The commander of the Southern Command of the Israeli army, Eliezer Toledano, stressed the need to correct these “failures” and draw lessons from them.

According to the Israeli army’s statement, “the investigation revealed that the main reasons for the incident were the security passage in the fence, which was hidden without being closed, and the non-quality practice of the principle of security and guarding in the border area.”

The occupation army decided to block the security corridors established at the border fence along the border with Egypt, and decided to reduce the period of rotation of soldiers at the observation points from 12 hours to 8 hours.

For his part, the Chief of Staff of the Israeli Army, Herzi Halevi, imposed sanctions on a number of army officers working in the Southern Command, and decided to hold the commander of the 80th Military Division operating on the border with Egypt responsible for the killing of Israeli soldiers.

The Israeli army stated that, as part of the investigation, it “conducted a joint investigation with the Egyptian army, against the background of the existing strategic security cooperation between the two countries, which included the visit of some Israeli army officials to Cairo and the joint investigation of the point where the accident occurred on Israeli territory.”

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3 Israeli soldiers were killed by an Egyptian soldier near the Al-Awja border crossing between Egypt and the occupied Palestinian territories on the third of last June, while the Egyptian who carried out the operation was martyred.

There was no comment from Cairo regarding the latest Israeli army statement, but the Egyptian army had said in a statement after the incident that the Egyptian soldier was chasing drug smugglers on the border with Israel, and during the chase the soldier penetrated the border security barrier and an exchange of fire took place, “leading to the death of 3 Members of the Israeli security force and the wounding of others, in addition to the killing of the Egyptian security guard.

Egypt and Israel have been linked by a peace treaty since 1979, and Tel Aviv has been occupying lands from Palestine, Syria and Lebanon since the June 5, 1967 war.

Out of 22 Arab countries, 6 countries, namely Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco, maintain declared relations with Israel. Normalization between Cairo and Tel Aviv was limited to the political level, amid widespread popular rejection that resonated with the recent operation.