The Tower has learned that just days before President Barack Obama arrives in Israel for discussions on sensitive regional issues, a high-ranking group of Egyptian army intelligence officers has made a quiet trip to Israel to meet counterparts. The discussions this week come at a time of increasing strain between Hamas, the Iran-backed terror group based in...

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Israeli sources who spoke to The Tower today described a “Cold War” being fought in the media between Egyptian authorities and Hamas, as Hamas announced that it was suing [Arabic] an Egyptian news outlet over a report linking the group to a Sinai Peninsula attack that killed 16 Egyptian soldiers. Hamas...

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Hamas is complaining over a February arrest sweep in the West Bank, conducted by the Palestinian Authority, that netted 66 of the Iran-backed terror group’s operatives. Those detained included 32 who had once been held in Israeli prisons. An additional 38 Hamas members and supporters had been summoned for interrogation....

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The United Nations Relief and Works Agency announced this morning, regretfully, that an annual marathon conducted in the Gaza Strip to raise money for U.N. children’s summer camps would have to be cancelled. The statement issued by the organization linked the decision to a Hamas prohibition on the participation of...

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Egyptian, Palestinian, and Israeli sources tell The Tower that the Iran-backed terror group Hamas is now believed to have been responsible for Tuesday’s rocket strike on the Israeli city of Ashkelon, the first and so far only violation of the ceasefire that ended Operation Pillar of Defense in November 2012. Egyptian media,...

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Palestinian jihadists from the Gaza Strip are traveling to Syria to fight, putting themselves on one side of the three-sided, two-year proxy war that has pitted Sunni opposition forces against the Iran-backed Damascus regime against regional Kurdish groups. Their fight is currently against the Bashar al-Assad regime, but their actual...

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On-again off-again Palestinian unity talks between the rival Hamas and Fatah factions are off again for the near future: Hamas has asked to postpone its next meeting with Hamas to ensure the talks will be positive, the party’s deputy politburo chief said Sunday. Mousa Abu Marzouq said in a statement...

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An Al-Qaeda affiliate in Iraq has claimed responsibility for a series of deadly bombings that killed 21 people and wounded more than 100 last Sunday in Baghdad. The group, calling itself The Islamic State of Iraq, described the attack as a sectarian strike: “The operation was in response to the repression...

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Egypt is sending a security delegation to Israel this week to discuss a range of security issues including the ongoing implementation of the Egyptian-brokered truce between Israel and Hamas that ended last November’s Operation Pillar of Defense. The Israeli campaign came after weeks of escalatory rocket and missile fire by Hamas-led...

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Egypt has seized two tons of explosives headed toward the Sinai Peninsula just days after military forces began flooding tunnels that connect the strategic area and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. The operation will deepen concerns over the extent to which smuggling remains prevalent on the Peninsula. Israel and Arabic analysts have expressed concerns that...

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