Solemn funeral held for soldiers slain in Sinai
MURSI, WHO VOWED HARSH RESPONSE TO ATTACK, FAILS TO SHOW UP WITHOUT EXPLANATION
R a m a da n A l S h e r b i n i
President Mohammad Mursi did not attend a military funeral held yesterday for 16 soldiers killed in an attack in Egypt’s Sinai. Attending the solemn funeral starting from an army mosque in eastern Cairo were Defence Minister Field Marshal Hussain Tantawi, former Prime Minister Kamal Al Ganzouri and senior army commanders. There was no official explanation for Mursi’s no-show despite earlier reports by state media of his participation.
Hundreds of ordinary Egyptians attended the funeral. Some mourners chanted angry slogans against Mursi and his group, the Muslim Brotherhood, over their recent rapprochement with the Palestinian movement Hamas who is ruling the Gaza Strip.
Gunmen in Bedouin costumes attacked an army outpost in the border Rafah town near the Gaza Strip on Sunday at sunset when troopers were ending their fast, leaving 16 Egyptian soldiers dead and seven injured.
Bodies of the slain soldiers were put inside coffins draped in the national flag and carried by military pallbearers at the army’s memorial in Nasr City in eastern Cairo.
Mursi, who visited Sinai on Monday, vowed a harsh response to the attack, which state media blamed on Muslim militants.
The Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups accused Israel’s spy agency Mossad of involvement in the attack, the worst against the Egyptian army in decades. Israel has ve- hemently tion.
Egypt moved to bolster security in the Sinai and the Muslim Brotherhood called for a review of military limits in the area under the country’s peace agreement with Israel, after its 16 soldiers were killed.
The Brotherhood said Sunday’s attack, which posed one of the most serious tests for President Mursi since taking office, was aimed at driving a wedge between Egypt and the Hamas government in Gaza while also discrediting the newly appointed government of
denied
the
accusa- Prime Minister Hesham Qandil — the first Cabinet to be named after Mursi assumed office in June.
The bloodshed compounds a growing list of security challenges in the country. It also placed Mursi, who was nominated by the Brotherhood for the presidency, in the difficult position of dealing with two of the thorniest issues in Egyptian foreign policy — the push for closer ties with Hamas and relations with Israel.
The attack “draws our attention to the fact that our forces in the Sinai lack the personnel and the equipment to protect the region or guard our borders, which makes it imperative to review the terms of our accords with Israel,” the Brotherhood said in a statement posted today on the website of its political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party.
The 1978 peace accord between Egypt and Israel limits the number of troops Egypt can deploy in the peninsula. Mursi, who has repeatedly said that Egypt will honor its international agreements, ordered the military to take “complete control” of the region and send in helicopter gunships.