CAIRO: Egypt's foreign minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit warned that his country would ''retaliate'' diplomatically against Israel if it hurts US-Egyptian ties with its complaints over smuggling into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Tensions between Egypt and Israel have increased over the smuggling issue, with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni last month saying Egypt's failure to shut down smugglers' tunnels across the border were damaging the peace process with the Palestinians. At the same time, US congress members have spoken of withholding some of the $1.3 billion in annual military aid given to Egypt unless it clamps down on weapons smuggling and improves its human rights record. Asked on a state-TV program about the impact of Livni s comments on Egypt-Israeli relations, Aboul Gheit said, If they [Israelis] continue to push and affect US-Egyptian relations and harm Egyptian interests, for sure Egypt will retaliate and will harm their interests. We have claws capable of retaliating in all directions and through diplomacy, he said on the Al-Beit Beitak program late Monday. He did not elaborate. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Tuesday that he is grateful for President Hosni Mubarak s leadership of neighboring Egypt and prays for him daily, in comments apparently aimed at defusing tension between the two countries. When I even think of how things would be if we were dealing with people other than Mubarak, well, I pray every day for his well-being and good health, Olmert told the English-language Jerusalem Post daily in a New Year interview published Tuesday. Israel says that Hamas is using tunnels from Egypt s Sinai Peninsula to smuggle weapons and money into the Gaza Strip, where the Palestinian group took control in June. Livni said Egypt was doing a terrible job of stopping the flow, which she said was strengthening Palestinian insurgents. At the same time, Israel delivered to US officials a video showing Egyptian police officers helping, or turning a blind eye toward, Gaza weapons smugglers. Aboul Gheit said it was difficult to find the tunnels without an increase of Egyptian troops on the border and the provision of better equipment. Israel has rejected an increase in troops, which is regulated under the countries 1979 peace accord. Aboul Gheit said the tunnels existed long before the Hamas seizure of Gaza and that even Israel was unable to stop them when it occupied the Sinai from 1967 until the early 1980s. We are making a great effort to halt smuggling, he said, adding that Egypt uncovered 130 tunnels in 2007. Last month, US Senator Arlen Specter, on a visit to Jerusalem, said Egypt must crack down on the flow of the weapons into Gaza, and that if it doesn t, I think it would be appropriate to condition aid to them. Washington gives Egypt about $2 billion in annual aid, including $1.3 billion in military assistance. Last year, proposed legislation in the US Congress would have withheld $200 million in military aid unless Egypt clamped down on weapons smuggling and improved its human rights record. But the full aid package went through the US Senate.
