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'Israeli intelligence agents' charged in Egypt 'Israeli intelligence agents' charged in Egypt
(about 1 hour later)
Egypt's public prosecutor has charged two men said to be Israeli intelligence agents and two Egyptians with conspiring in Israel's interests, according to a statement from the prosecutor's office. Egypt's public prosecutor has charged four men with espionage on Israel's behalf, as it also condemned an apparent escalation by Egypt's jihadist insurgency against the country's new military-backed authorities.
"The public prosecutor ordered Ramzy Mohamed, Sahar Ibrahim, Samuel Ben Zeev and David Wisemen – two officers in the Israeli Mossad – to be sent to a Cairo criminal court for spying for the interests of the state of Israel," the statement read. In a statement, the prosecution office ordered the arrest of Samuel Ben Zeev and David Wisemen, both of whom were described as "officers in the Israeli Mossad". It was not clear whether the two men are in Egypt.
The two Egyptians are already in jail pending investigation, the statement said. The public prosecutor ordered the arrest of the two Israeli officers. It was not clear from the statement if the Israelis were in Egypt. There was no immediate reaction from Israel. Two Egyptians, Ramzy Mohamed and Sahar Ibrahim, were also accused of providing the Israeli pair with information about Egypt, "in exchange for money and gifts and sex".
The Egyptians are accused of providing information about Egypt to the Israeli officers with "the intent of damaging national interests in exchange for money and gifts and sex". Although Egypt's relations with Israel have improved since the Islamist president Mohamed Morsi was ousted in a 3 July military coup, accusations of foreign influence remain powerful in a country gripped by an aggressive resurgent nationalism.
The statement accuses Mohamed of sleeping with women who work in Israeli intelligence. He is also accused of recruiting the accused woman, Ibrahim, to work for Israeli intelligence. The interim authorities have repeatedly blamed the country's problems on the presence of foreign agents or "fifth columnists".
The statement said the two Egyptians had admitted during investigations that they had spied for Israel. Egypt has been wracked by violence since Morsi's overthrow. In the early months, the most high-profile incidents were led by the state against large gatherings of the former president's supporters. However, while the aggressive state-led crackdown on Islamist dissenters has pushed Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood largely underground, it is now emboldening more radical groups.
Earlier on Tuesday, a militant group claimed responsibility for a bomb attack on a Egyptian bus that killed three South Korean tourists and an Egyptian driver close to the border crossing into Israel in the volatile Sinai desert. On Tuesday morning, al-Qaeda-linked militants claimed responsibility for an attack on an Egyptian tourist bus, the first sign that Egypt's growing militant insurgency has set its sights on the country's fragile tourism industry.
Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, Arabic for Champions of Jerusalem, said in a statement posted on militant websites late on Monday that one of its "heroes" carried out Sunday's bombing in Taba as part of an "economic war" against the army-backed government. The attack on the bus, which was travelling to Israel from St Catherine's Monastery, a popular tourist destination in the Sinai peninsula, killed three South Koreans and their Egyptian driver.
Egyptian officials have called it a suicide attack, but the Ansar statement did not use any language that would suggest the perpetrator was dead. In a statement on Tuesday, Ansar Bayt el-Maqdis said it had "successfully sacrificed one of its heroes to detonate the bus headed toward the Zionists, and this comes as part of our economic war against this regime of traitors". Ansar Bayt el-Maqdis, the highest-profile and seemingly most capable of a number of jihadist groups in Egypt, has claimed responsibility for attacks across the Sinai peninsula and the Egyptian mainland.
The al-Qaida-inspired group has claimed responsibility for previous attacks, but has previously targeted primarily police and the military. Since Morsi's overthrow, there have been at least 308 attacks on security installations in the Sinai peninsula alone, according to figures from David Barnett, a research associate at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies.
The authenticity of the statement could not be verified but it was posted on al-Qaida-affiliated websites. The prime minister, Hazem el-Beblawi, said on Tuesday that those responsible for Sunday's bus blast had aimed to undermine the political timetable unveiled by Egypt's interim authorities in July.
Although militants have repeatedly promised to target the economic interests of Egypt's military-backed authorities, these had previously been confined to military-run gas pipelines.
Attacks on the tourism industry strike the government right in its soft underbelly – Egypt's faltering economy. Although Egypt has traditionally reaped significant financial benefits from its world-renowned heritage sites, 2013 was the worst year in the industry's modern history. In an interview with the Guardian last week, tourism minister Hisham Zaazou described once teeming heritage areas as "ghost towns".
He stressed, however, that the country's growing insurgency had not yet affected foreigners. "What you have seen in Egypt so far is an Egyptian-Egyptian issue," he said. "It's not an Egyptian-foreigner issue, it's not an Egyptian-tourist issue."
Images of Sunday's tourist bus blast proved a powerful rebuttal to the minister's claims.
Two of Britain's biggest tour companies, Thomson and First Choice, have now suspended day trips to St Catherine's Monastery, a Unesco world heritage site, from the popular Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
But jihadist expert Barnett cautioned against interpreting Sunday's attack as indicative of a new trend. While he described it as a "worrying development", he predicted that security installations will continue to bear the brunt of Ansar Bayt el-Maqdis' ire in the coming months.
On Tuesday, the uncertainty deepened further after a Twitter account, claiming to be affiliated to Ansar Bayt el-Maqdis, appeared to take advantage of the mounting fears, warning tourists to leave Egypt and threatening to attack those who remained in the country after 20 February.
Although Ansar Bayt el Maqdis has a plethora of what appear to be imitation Twitter accounts, the group has insisted in official statements that it does not have a social media presence.