Kushner - From Israel: The Philadelphi Corridor

Arlene Kushner..
12 July '12..






The Philadelphi Corridor is a narrow stretch of land, mostly sand, ten kilometers long and some hundreds of meters wide, that separates Egypt (the Sinai) from the Gaza Strip; it runs from the Mediterranean Sea to the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza.

The town of Rafah straddles this corridor and is the crossing point between Egypt and Gaza.

Credit: Israelmatzav

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The 1979 peace accords with Egypt allocated to Israel control of and the right to patrol the Corridor, even as Israel pulled back from the Sinai. That situation pertained until Israel's unilateral "disengagement" from Gaza in 2005, which -- if Israel were truly to "leave" Gaza -- required a self-imposed (and very unfortunate) withdrawal from the Corridor.

Jurisdiction for patrolling on the Gaza side of the Corridor was turned over to the PA. But any agreement with the PA in this regard no longer exists, as the PA was driven out of Gaza in 2007 by Hamas, which is in control there now.

IMRA - Take the Philadelphi Corridor Back Now

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
Weekly Commentary
25 August '11



Fact: The only way we can effectively put a halt to the terror operations organized from the Gaza Strip is to retake the Philadelphi Corridor with a workable width instead of 100 meters separating between Sinai and the Gaza Strip..

Some quick answers to the arguments for postponing the move:

Argument #1: We should not act before the elections in Egypt as it would undermine our relations with the temporary military regime controlling the country.

Counter argument #1: We should act before the elections in Egypt when the temporary military regime is still controlling the country since we are clueless as to who will be in charge in Egypt after the elections. It could very well be considerably more dangerous for Israel-Egypt relations to re-take the Philadelphi Corridor after the elections in Egypt.

Argument #2: We should wait until after September developments with the Palestinians.

Counter argument #2: Today the Gaza Strip is inside Israel’s security envelope and Gaza is not a sovereign entity. The potential diplomatic and other consequences of re-taking the Philadelphi Corridor after the declaration of a sovereign Palestinian state are magnitudes more dangerous and complicated than today.

Argument #3: We should wait until we have more Iron Dome batteries in place.

Counter argument #3: Already today the range and quantity of the Palestinian rockets is such that they can readily target areas not covered by the additional Iron Dome batteries slated. Postponing this operation only makes it easier for the Palestinians to try to keep pace with Israeli defense measures.

Retreating from the Philadelphi Corridor was a terrible mistake in judgment for which we have paid dearly, The time has come to correct this costly error.

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Fogel - An emerging terrorist state in Gaza

Zvika Fogel
Israel Hayom
19 August '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=358

[Former chief of the Southern Command, Zvi Fogel: Retake Philadelphi Corridor

Dr. Aaron Lerner  Date: 19 August 2011

Speaking in a live interview on Israel Radio Reshet Bet's noon news magazine program today, former chief of the Southern Command, Zvi Fogel said that "I was wrong when I said in the past that we could relinquish the Philadelphi Corridor and rely on Egypt."

Fogel called for Israel to retake the Philadephi Corridor that divides between Sinai and the Gaza Strip. IMRA]

Since the fall of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who fought against Hamas and understood the dangers it posed to his rule, the Sinai Peninsula has turned into a training ground and center for the development and transfer of weapons to Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The loose policies of the provisional Egyptian military government, along with the increased strength and influence of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, have opened the border crossing between Gaza and Sinai and increased the possibility of smuggling weapons through tunnels.

Since Operation Cast Lead in late 2008, Hamas has been under constant pressure in Gaza. On the one hand, it has not been able to fulfill its promises of providing a better socioeconomic future for its citizens. On the other hand, it has also not been successful in presenting ideological military achievements. The Palestinian Authority’s intention to seek a unilateral declaration of statehood at the U.N. in September presents a serious threat to Hamas’ legitimacy, as it is not a part of this historic process. Hamas is trying to build up its infrastructure as a terrorist state in Gaza by cultivating smaller organizations that enable it to escape culpability and help it create an image of a legitimate national organization.

All of this, combined with the fact that Hamas has lost its support and ability to operate from within Syria, are fanning the flames under the tinderbox that is Gaza. The coordinated terror attacks on Thursday do not constitute a singular event, but rather a landmark in the emergence of a terrorist state in Gaza, which relies on the support of terrorist organizations like al-Qaida, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah in Sinai. If we want to live, we must act immediately to eliminate this threat. The political heads of Hamas, led by Ismail Haniyeh, as well as the heads of the military wing of Hamas and other organizations, must pay the price for this attack on our sovereignty. The Philadelphi Corridor, which comprises the border between Egypt and Gaza, must return to Israeli control.

The writer is a brigadier general (res.) and formerly GOC Southern Command.


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Cairo denies reports of arms smuggling through Egypt [Same as old regime]

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
11 June '11

[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA: Egypt has always denied that arms were reaching Gaza through Egypt. At times, when Israel complained, President Mubarak would warn that if we continued to complain that there would be diplomatic consequences. The experience serves to illustrate just how great a mistake it was to abandon the Philadelphi Corridor [that separated between the Gaza Strip and Sinai] as part of PM Sharon's retreat.]

Cairo denies reports of arms smuggling through Egypt
Published Friday 10/06/2011 (updated) 11/06/2011 18:53
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=395509

EL-ARISH, Egypt (Ma'an) -- Military leaders in the Sinai Peninsula on Friday denied allegations that new smuggling routes had been established through Egypt into Gaza.

The Hebrew-language newspaper Maariv on Friday said Israeli security officials had received information that weapons were being smuggled from Libya to the Gaza Strip via Egypt.

According to the report, the uprising against Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi had allowed the flow of arms into the hands of arms dealers and "terror organizations" in Libya.

Grad rockets with ranges of 60 - 70 kilometers, rifles and ammunition were being smuggled through Egypt and into Gaza via underground tunnels, the report said.

Egyptian military sources denied the report, and said no weapons entered Egypt from Libya, noting that officers inspected all passengers entering from Libya through As-Saloum crossing.

The sources added that Egyptian security guards recently seized eight tons of drugs at the crossing.

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Weekly Commentary: Would you buy a peace plan from the 100 meter wide Philadelphi gang?

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
Weekly Commentary
07 April '11

The critical element of the Israeli Peace Initiative (IPI) launched today by a collection of ex-brass and former heads of the security services is the assertion that Israel’s security can be safeguarded via various international forces and arrangements that substitute for defensible borders and for Israeli security control of the West Bank and the inclusion of the Gaza Strip in Israel’s security envelope. ( Koby Huberman, one of the drafters of the IPI even told me today that the IAF won’t be able to fly over the West Bank without Palestinian approval under their plan).

The group behind IPI argue that we should defer to their records in active service in the military and intelligence and simply accept their assertion as a given.

But we know who these people are. We know their records.

They are indeed people who held key position in the military and intelligence services.

But while these Israelis have been involved in some very impressive and important operations for which they most certainly deserve our nation’s praise and gratitude we also know that these same Israelis were intimately involved in the design and implementation of a series of security arrangements in the last decades that cost us many lives.

Let’s keep this simple with an intuitive example that doesn’t require any particular expertise in military affairs to appreciate:

Israel set the width of the Philadelphi Corridor running between the Gaza Strip and Egyptian Sinai to 100 meters and declined to widen it when the opportunity presented itself to do so in the various stages of Oslo negotiations.

Many of the top people behind the IPI were directly responsible for this.

The 100 meter width made it child’s play for the Palestinians to turn the Corridor into an ongoing killing field and in turn an area where Israel found it extremely difficult to effectively prevent the digging of smuggling tunnels between Sinai and Gaza and their operation

The 100 meter wide Philadelphi Corridor is only the tip of the iceberg.

Again, while these Israelis have indeed been involved in some very impressive and important operations for which they most certainly deserve our nation’s praise and gratitude we also know that these same Israelis were intimately involved in the design and implementation of a series of security arrangements in the last decades that cost us many lives.

Caveat emptor.

This group is going to have a to a lot more than flash their brass to convince us that Israel’s security can be safeguarded via various international forces and arrangements that substitute for defensible borders and for Israeli security control of the West Bank and the inclusion of the Gaza Strip in Israel’s security envelope.

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Weekly Commentary: Addressing the Gaza challenge now

Dr. Aaron Lerner
IMRA
Weekly Commentary
24 March '11

http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=51531

It is a basically flat strip of land between 5 and 12 kilometers wide and 45 kilometers long.

Israeli forces are deployed to the north, west and east of the strip while Egypt sits on its 13 kilometer wide southeastern border.

Israel has complete control over the strip’s airspace.

Simply put: elite forces can reach literally any place in this 365 square kilometer (142 square mile) in a matter of minutes.

A few years ago when we retreated from the Gaza Strip Israel’s leadership adopted the bizarre stand that the terrorists in Gaza could do pretty much anything they want to in order to prepare to attack the Jewish State – as long as they didn’t shoot. Yet.

It was “silence for silence”.

Followed by a “tit for tat” approach according to which Israeli intelligence dutifully updated a constantly growing target bank from which commanders could pick from for Israel’s “tat” for the Gazan’s “tit”.

And when the situation was no longer politically tolerable the IDF was sent in.

There we were with the massive military resources of the State of Israel facing an enemy in a basically flat strip of land between 5 and 12 kilometers wide and 45 kilometers long.

But the orders were not to take over the Strip. The orders were not to topple the Hamas regime by detaining or dispatching to Paradise the Hamas leadership in this basically flat strip of land between 5 and 12 kilometers wide and 45 kilometers long.

Thanks to this policy, we now find ourselves facing an enemy in Gaza bolstered by Iranian training and equipped with rockets that now threaten Tel Aviv, Ben Gurion Airport and pretty much everything in the most heavily populated area of Israel.

That would be bad enough without the developments in Egypt that leave us clueless as to how Egypt will interact with the Gaza Strip in the future on security related matters.

What is the answer to this challenge?

Is it spending many billions of dollars on bomb shelters and anti-missile systems?

An anti-missile system that might be budgeted to bring down “X” rockets when there is nothing stopping the Gazans from deploying so many rockets that 10X, 50X or even 100X rockets actually strike their targets.

Again.

Today the massive military resources of the State of Israel face an enemy in a basically flat strip of land between 5 and 12 kilometers wide and 45 kilometers long.

And today Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons that it can threaten to punish the Jewish State with.

So is this really the time to hunker down and give the Gazans even more time to train their troops, build their bunkers and enhance their ability to shower Israel with rockets?

Or is this, instead, the time to take our destiny in our hands and decimate an enemy before the possibility of a nuclear retaliation enters the equation? And do it quickly enough that the world can’t stop us?

Exit strategy?

Back to the Philadelphi Corridor with a workable width instead of 100 meters.

Gaza Strip one big prison?

It is better for Israeli officials to break their heads coming up with ways to streamline the movement of people and goods via Israel than to risk finding ourselves in conflict with Egypt should a new regime opt to “support the struggle” by abusing the border it now shares with Gaza.

Restoring the Philadelphi Corridor is the best way to avoid this conflict.

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A new conflict with Hamas on the horizon?

FresnoZionism
10 January '10

News item:

On Sunday, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yom-Tov Samia, the former head of the Southern Command who continues to function as the current head’s deputy in the reserves, hinted at the possibility that the IDF will conquer the Philadelphi Corridor in the future.

In an interview with Army Radio, Samia said that in a future conflict, Israel would take over “specific territory” in Gaza that would help reduce Hamas’s “oxygen supply.” Contacted later in the day, Samia refused to specify which territory he had referred to.

“We are facing another round in Gaza,” said Samia, who during Cast Lead functioned as the deputy to OC Southern Command Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant. “I am very skeptical about the chance that Hamas will suddenly surrender or change its way without first suffering a far more serious blow than it did during Cast Lead.”

The blow, he said, would be “more focused with long-range results including the conquering of territory that Hamas will understand it lost as a result of its provocations. We need to create a situation which reduces its oxygen supply.” [my emphasis]

Note that Maj.-Gen. Samia does not discuss the option of overthrowing Hamas and destroying its leadership. I presume that there are two main reasons for this: the expected number of IDF and Palestinian casualties (who will all be claimed to be civilians) from the required penetration into the center of Gaza City — which probably would mean bloody fighting in tunnels and bunkers — and the need for Israel to take responsibility for filling the resulting administrative vacuum.

(Read full article)
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