Date: 03 Jun 2011
CAIRO SHUTS THE BORDER ON TERRORISTS AND INFILTRATORS:\\\\\\\\\\\\ Cairo shuts Gaza’s Rafah crossing to free passage at US insistence DEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 2, 2011, \\\\\\\\\\ Just four days after the much-heralded opening of the Rafah crossing between the Gaza Strip and Sinai to free passage, Cairo virtually shut it down Tuesday, May 31, by a series of tight bureaucratic restrictions on Palestinian exit and entry. \\\\\\\\\\\\\ debkafile’s military and Washington sources disclose that Military Council Chairman Field Marshal Mohammed Tantawi personally signed the new orders in response to an insistent US demand based on the information that since the Rafah crossing opened to free passage Saturday, May 28, Palestinian and al Qaeda terrorists had swarmed through and were roaming at large across Sinai and laying the Suez Canal and its coastal cities open to attack. Washington warned him that terrorists still unlisted by Western or Egyptian counter-terror agencies would be free to reach Egypt, carry out attacks and return to the Gaza Strip unhindered unless careful restrictions were imposed to weed them out. 000000000