EILAT AND AQABA HIT BY “PEACEFUL” ROCKETS FROM SINAI
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100802/wl_afp/mideastconflictrocketjordanisrael
Red Sea ports of Eilat, Aqaba hit by rocket fire
by Hazel Ward Hazel Ward 1 hr 13 mins ago
JERUSALEM (AFP) – At least five rockets were on Monday fired towards the southern Israeli beach resort of Eilat, causing no casualties in Israel but injuring five in the Jordanian port of Aqaba, officials said.
Israeli police said the rockets struck at about 7:45 am (0445 GMT) but caused no damage or injuries around Eilat.
At about the same time, a Grad-type rocket slammed into Aqaba, less than 10 kilometres (six miles) from Eilat, injuring five people, one of them seriously, Jordanian officials said.
A Jordanian official close to the investigation said the rocket was fired from a location “southwest” of Aqaba — indicating Egypt’s Sinai desert.
“Investigations proved that the rocket was fired from southwest of Aqaba,” he told AFP. “Five Jordanians were injured.”
In Israel, Eilat police chief Moshe Cohen said initial reports suggested the rockets had been fired from “the south” — in an apparent reference to the Sinai peninsula, which lies some 10 kilometres (six miles) south of Eilat.
An Israeli military source said the same. “It’s probable that the rockets were fired from the direction of Egypt,” she told AFP.
A similar rocket attack hit Aqaba and Eilat in April although the source of the firing was never established. Another attack on the two port cities in 2005 was claimed by a group of militants operating from Sinai.
But an Egyptian security official Monday denied any attack had been launched from the sandy peninsula which flanks the Gulf of Aqaba.
“The rockets did not come from Sinai. To launch rockets from Sinai would need a great deal of logistics and equipment and that is impossible considering the heavy security presence in the Sinai peninsula,” the source told AFP on condition of anonymity.
“We have a heavy security presence in Sinai, particularly along the Egyptian Israeli border. No suspicious activity has been reported anywhere in Sinai.”
Israeli police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld told AFP that “four or five” explosions were heard in and around Eilat at around 7:45 am (0445 GMT).
“It seems they were caused by rockets,” Rosenfeld said, adding that two of the rockets had landed in the sea, while a third had apparently crashed into “open areas around Eilat,” although he was not able to specify exactly where.
Another two had apparently landed in Jordanian territory, the Eilat police chief said.
In Amman, Jordan’s Interior Minister Nayef Qadai told AFP that a rocket had wrecked two cars close to a large hotel and injured four people.
“A Grad rocket fell in the street in Aqaba, near to the Intercontinental hotel, destroying two cars and injuring four people, one of them seriously,” Qadai said.
Officials later raised the injury toll to five and said a third car had been destroyed in the attack.
Jordanian Information Minister Ali Ayed told AFP the rocket fell at around 7:45 am (0445 GMT).
Eilat, a coastal resort located at Israel’s southernmost point, lies around 10 kilometres (six miles) west of the border with Jordan, and a similar distance from the border with the Egyptian Sinai.
The Israeli military said it was investigating the source of the fire and was in constant contact with the authorities in Egypt and Jordan.
A similar attack occurred in April when two military-grade rockets struck Aqaba, one hitting an empty warehouse and the other landing in the Red Sea near the Israeli border, security officials on both sides said.
At the time, it was unclear whether Aqaba or Eilat was the target of the attack which appeared to have been launched from the Sinai peninsula.
Three Katyusha rockets were fired at Aqaba in August 2005, one of which hit a warehouse killing a Jordanian soldier, while a second landed in Israel in an attack claimed by a group linked to Al-Qaeda.
The two Red Sea ports lie on the northernmost point of the Gulf of Aqaba, a narrow stretch of water bordered on one side by the Sinai and the other by Saudi Arabia.
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