Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, center, attends the inauguration of the East Suez Canal Counter-Terrorism command, in Sinai, Egypt on February 25, 2018. (MENA via AP)
The Egyptian army has doubled its forces in the Sinai Peninsula over the past year, with Israel’s blessing, to battle Islamic State jihadist cells in the area, Israel’s Kan television news reported Wednesday.
According to the Egyptian military’s chief of staff, 88 battalions with 42,000 soldiers are currently stationed in the peninsula, up from 41 battalions and 25,000 men a year ago.
The 1979 Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty places strict limits on the numbers of Egyptian and Israeli troops that can be stationed on either side of the Sinai desert border, but it does allow troop increases by one country if the other agrees.
An IDF spokesman said that the Israeli army constantly monitors Egyptian military operations in the peninsula.
Get The Times of Israel's Daily Editionby email and never miss our top stories
“The Egyptian army has increased its forces in Sinai over the past year in the face of the threat of Islamic State. This increase has been carried out in coordination with the IDF,” the spokesman said.
The IDF has in the past protested the rare occasions in which Egypt deployed additional troops to the peninsula without consulting Israel, the spokesman added.
Advertisement
It's not (only) about you.
Supporting The Times of Israel isn’t a transaction for an online service, like subscribing to Netflix. The ToI Community is for people like you who care about a common good: ensuring that balanced, responsible coverage of Israel continues to be available to millions across the world, for free.
Sure, we'll remove all ads from your page and you'll unlock access to some excellent Community-only content. But your support gives you something more profound than that: the pride of joining something that really matters.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
You clearly find our careful reporting valuable, during an ongoing war when facts are often distorted and news coverage of Israel often lacks context.
Your support is essential to continue our work. We want to continue delivering the professional journalism you value, even as the demands on our newsroom have grown dramatically since October 7.
So today, please consider joining our reader support group, The Times of Israel Community. For as little as $6 a month you'll become our partners while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you, David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel