Good job guys:

Egyptian authorities discovered a freshly dug tunnel leading under the border to the Gaza Strip and arrested an Egyptian man inside it, a security official said Friday. Moussa el-Mallahi confessed to police that he used the tunnel to smuggle explosives, money and weapons to terrorists on the other side of the border

Let's see - that's one tunnel and a few weapons out of dozens and dozens of tunnels and over 40 tons of explosives:

Public Security Minister Avi Dichter said that Egypt's failure to prevent arms smuggling implies that the country wants Hamas to prosper... Dichter said that "any right thinking person who witnesses the Egyptians' failure to act against arms smuggling can all but infer that strengthening Hamas is their interest. Egypt is capable of acting decisively against Hamas, but hasn't done that for more than seven years," Dichter added. "Their intelligence is as good as ours," he concluded.The deputy head of the Shin Bet security service told the cabinet at its weekly meeting on Sunday that 40 tons of explosives have been smuggled into the Strip since Hamas took over the coastal area in mid-June. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's associates have said they believe Egypt has stopped foiling smuggling operations, and are thus in violation of an agreement signed with Israel two years ago in which Egypt agreed to prevent the smuggling of goods from its territory into the Gaza Strip.

This is how it always happens. Israel is given assurances under international agreements, they make strategic concessions based on those agreements, and then the other sides blithely ignore their obligations. Israeli negotiators are told to give nonbinding "best offers" to see if there's anything to negotiate about - and then future American and Arab leaders insist that those have to be starting points for land transfers. Israeli military officials are promised that if they hand over crossings then international monitors will guarantee security - except they leave. Israeli politicians are promised that if they will back off from Palestinian criminals then international officials will watch over them - except they don't. And then there's this.

The weird thing is that everybody knows that agreements with Israel will never be upheld. All sides, all spectators, etc. But everyone acts as if the agreements were worth something. It's a very literal fetish, where going through the motions is supposed to substitute for the thing itself. Except over the years thousands of Israelis have had to die because of the charades. Agreements guaranteeing Israeli security aren't worth the paper they're written on. The only thing that matters are facts on the ground.

References:
* Egypt uncovers smuggling tunnel leading to Gaza Strip [JPost]
* Public Security Minister Dichter: Egypt wants Hamas to prosper [Ha'aretz]
* International Community Can't Understand Why Israel is Unwilling to Let Palestinians Violate International Agreements [MR]
* EU Again Backs Out of Monitoring Agreement, Endangers Israeli Security [MR]
* International Agreements Don't Really Apply To Israel [MR]
* The Joke That Was Sa'adat's Sentence - How the Palestinian Authority Meets Its Obligations When It's Not Busy Violating Them [MR]
* This is How It Happens [MR]

Previously:
* Hamas Decides to Be Helpful, Illustrates Many Ways International Law is Structured Against Israel
* Safeguards in International Law - Yeah, We Were Just Kidding About That
* The Denial of the Obvious By Reference to the Irrelevant: Center-Left Foreign Policy and Democratic Politics

Cross-posted to:
* Israpundit