debkafile: Three uniformed al Qaeda infiltrators from Egypt lose two men in first direct clash with Israeli troops in the Negev. One Israeli sold

debkafile‘s counter-terror sources tie the incident to a battle staged Wednesday night, May 31, between an Egyptian special unit and a large al Qaeda band bound for another attack on the Multinational Force base at Al Gora near El Arish in northern Sinai.
The terrorists carried rifles, explosives and grenades for a mass strike against the mostly US and Canadian peacemakers. The Egyptians captured 35 of the assailants. Many of them were Palestinians recruited to Musab al Zarqawi’s Sinai network. Two of the Palestinians were named as Hamad Abu Kabal, 27, a student at the El Arish branch of Cairo University, and Yusuf Mohsein.
Their initial interrogation by Egyptian intelligence revealed that Zarqawi’s Sinai-Gaza network is in the first stages of a new offensive in Sinai, aimed at seizing and massacring a large number of Israeli and Western holidaymakers as well as strikes inside Israel. It now operates as “Al Qaeda-Palestine,” dedicated according to its communiques to attacks on “The Children of Zion.”
Israeli security heads are disturbed by the growing number of Palestinians joining al Qaeda.
The triple bombing attack at the Dahab resort of April 24, the repeated attempts to hit the MFO and the infiltration of Israel Thursday night come together to indicate al Qaeda’s numbers, infrastructure and reach are expanding and attacks on Israel are integral to its targeting aims. debkafile‘s military sources report that the tasks of breaking up al Qaeda’s Sinai operation, curbing its penetration of the Gaza Strip and holding back its border incursions into southern Israel are way beyond the capabilities of Egyptian security.

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