Serious incident in Egypt: Two Israeli tourists were killed by an Egyptian police officer. The two countries immediately reaffirmed their cooperation. The attack comes amid the war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas.
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Two Israeli tourists and their Egyptian guide were killed this Sunday by a police officer in Alexandria, on the Egyptian coast. This is a rare attack that comes amid the war between Egypt’s two neighbors Israel and Gaza under the control of the Palestinian Hamas.
According to a media outlet close to the Egyptian security apparatus, “a police officer blindly fired his personal weapon at a group of Israeli tourists in Alexandria (north).”
The police officer who fired the shots was arrested.
The ministry now says it is working to repatriate the rest of the group of tourists at a time when many Israelis regularly travel to Egypt, particularly for Jewish religious holidays such as Sukkot, celebrated in early October.
After the incident, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi spoke by telephone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and the authorities of both countries rushed to reaffirm their cooperation.
A key mediator in any new outbreak of violence between Israel and the Gaza Strip, Egypt became the first Arab country to normalize its relations with Israel in 1979.
If the governments back then made peace on the streets, to the great dismay of other Arab states, Israel remains an arch-enemy.
In return for normalization, Cairo had recaptured the Sinai Peninsula, which had been occupied by Israel since the Arab defeat in 1967.
The peace agreement followed the October 1973 war, which was considered a major “victory” in Egypt.
Hamas launched its unprecedented offensive against Israel on Saturday, almost 50 years to the day after the 1973 war.