After five suspected armed militants were killed in Sinai on Friday, the spokesperson of the Egyptian army denied claims that the incident was due to air strikes by an israeli drone. Meanwhile, Associated Press reported that sources inside the army, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Israeli drones were involved in the incident.
The incident came not long after Israel announced the closure of the airport in Eilat, which followed an Egyptian tip-off of possible attacks against the area from Sinai. Shortly after the strike, the airport was reopened.
"Our borders and airspace are a red line," the spokesperson said in a statement that soon followed AP's report. "They shall never be crossed." He summoned on media to be careful with the information they publish and scrutinize every detail because "it is a matter of national security."
While the Egyptian army's statement stressed on the sanctity of the Egyptian airspace and borders, a look back at incidents when Israeli planes were reported to have in fact violated the Egyptian airspace with little to no response, challenges the extent to which Egypt's borders and airspace are deemed "sacred" and protected.
26 January 2006
Salah Al-Sayegh, parliament member at the time and member of Al Wafd Party, raised a complaint before the National Security and Defense Committee when an Israeli plane was reported to have violated the Egyptian airspace and flown specifically above the Suez Canal.
"This is a ferocious attack on Egyptian jurisdiction," Al-Sayegh said. "Israel is outrageously violating all international treaties and laws."
12 January 2009
In the wake of the war on Gaza, numerous local and foreign news reports have confirmed that despite claims by Cairo, Israeli warplanes have been entering Egyptian airspace. Reuters has cited eyewitnesses as saying that Israeli planes involved in attacks on Gaza have flown into Egypt on several occasions.
According to Reuters, Israeli planes often fly at such low altitude that it leaves no doubt that they are over Egyptian territory.
At the same time, CNN reported that two pairs of Israeli F-16 fighter jets that were on bombing missions in southern Gaza violated Egyptian airspace.
“We can tell they’re coming through Egyptian airspace because they’re over the far side of the building where we’re standing,” CNN’s Karl Penhaul reported from Rafah, Egypt in 2009. He was atop a building about 500 meters from the Gaza border.
4 November 2011
Israeli newspapers reported that an Egyptian military helicopter had violated the Israeli airspace and stayed there for 25 minutes. The reports said that the helicopter did not leave the Israeli airspace except after the Israeli air force fired warning bullets.
According to the newspapers that day, four F-16 fighter jets went in the direction of the Egyptian MI-8 helicopter once it entered the Israeli airspace and tried talking to the pilot and warning him.
Shortly after the incident was reported, sources at the Israeli air force stated that the incident is "highly alarming and is a first of its kind," briefly mentioning the fact that an Israeli UltraLight plane has "mistakenly entered the Egyptian airspace two weeks before," and that the pilot "exited the Egyptian airspace immediately" after he realized the mistake.
10 August 2012
According to a report by Egypt Independent, an Israeli reserve duty soldier wrote in an affidavit received by Israeli attorney Anat Ben-Dor, who works on migrant issues, on 27 July 2012, saying that "the catching of three [infiltrators] occurred in the early morning…inside the Egyptian territory. We guarded the three and marched them along the border, on the Egyptian side, a few kilometers until the point where we were supposed to hand them to the Egyptian forces."
Egypt Indepenent had received the affidavit on 9 August 2012, which came on the heels of a campaign by Israeli human rights organizations against Israel's practice of rendering asylum seekers to countries where their lives are at risk.
The letter and the campaign revealed not only a new chapter in Israel's human rights violations against migrants, but also that Israeli forces have been entering the Egyptian territory regularly on the pretext of detaining migrants and asylum seekers before they reach the border.
October 2012
Residents and eyewitnesses in Sinai reported seeing and hearing an Israeli plane flying at "extraordinarily" low altitude causing unusual noise.
Retired air force General Islam Abu Shabana told Al Badil news website that Israeli planes were "accustomed to entering Egyptian airspace" during the reign of ousted President Hosni Mubarak and his Defense Minister at the time, Mohamed Hussein Tantawy.
"They violated the Egyptian airspace almost daily," he told Al Badil. "They only entered Sinai and never went deeper than that and the Egyptian army used to reciprocate such violations at times by entering the Israeli airspace."
He added that this time the planes went deeper than any other time, and suspected that Israel is "testing waters" to see the response of the new Egyptian leadership under Ousted President Mohamed Morsy and his Defense Minister, at the time, General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
26 July 2013
Israeli television's Channel 7 aired that eyewitnesses have reported seeing Israeli planes flying in Egyptian airspace Friday at dawn. The channel reported that the Israeli government and IDF are expecting an increase in violence and terrorist attacks as the 30 June mass protests were fast-approaching.
"Terrorist attacks have already started to gain momentum in Sinai," the channel reported.
