CAIRO: Tens of Cairo University students protested Wednesday in front of the Israeli embassy demanding the expulsion of its ambassador and breaking ties between Israel and Egypt. Students were later joined by other protesters and passersby as their numbers grew to a couple of hundred. Protesters burned the Israeli flag and chanted slogans supporting Palestine, accusing Arab governments of "treason." "Israel is a Zionist racist state and opposing it is a must for every free man; we want the Israeli embassy closed, the ambassador kicked out of Egypt and stopping the exportation of gas to Israel," said Osama Ahmed, a member of the Socialist Revolutionist Students movement. "The Israelis are in panic now after the overthrow of Mubarak's regime, their biggest ally in the region," he added. Protesters' demands included ending normalization with Israel, cancelling the Camp David peace treaty and other economic cooperation treaties, opening the border crossing with Gaza and treating Palestinians as Egyptians. The protest was organized by Palestinian Revolution Supporters group, a group that was launched during the 1970s and was disbanded by former president Anwar Sadat. The group was revived this week by six student groups in a number of universities and the protest was its first event. Protesters lauded the explosion of the gas pipeline between Egypt and Jordan and Israel Wednesday but denied any involvement in the incident. They called for unity between Palestinian factions. Israeli officials expressed concerns over "a growing anti-Israel sentiment" in Egypt and said that Israel should prepare to "dispense" Egyptian gas.
