Egypt says it is working with Israel to investigate the incident
which occurred on Saturday.
"Israel relayed a clear message to the Egyptian government. We
expect that the joint investigation will be exhaustive and
thorough," Netanyahu told his cabinet in televised remarks.
"We will refresh procedures and methods of operations and also
the measures to reduce to a minimum the smuggling and to ensure
tragic terrorist attacks like this do not happen again."
More details of the rare incident along the border emerged on
Sunday. The frontier is usually peaceful, as the neighbours
share close security cooperation, though there are frequent
reports of drug smuggling, including one that took place prior
to the deadly violence.
Israel's military said that two of its soldiers were shot dead
early on Saturday by an Egyptian security services member who
crossed through the border fence. Their desert post was remote
and it took a number of hours before their bodies were
discovered.
"From that moment a terrorist event was declared, leading to
sweeps of the area," Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari
said in an interview with Israel's YNET news. "A drone was sent
up and 1.5 kilometres inside Israel a suspicious person was
identified."
Soldiers then made contact and during an exchange of fire the
Egyptian guard and a third Israeli soldier were killed.
On Saturday, the Egyptian military said the three Israelis and
Egyptian guard had been killed in an exchange of fire as the
guard chased smugglers across the frontier.
Two Egyptian sources said on Sunday that a team was examining
the scene and the guard's body to determine how events
transpired. Coworkers and family members of the Egyptian guard
have been interviewed to figure out if he belonged to any
political groups or suffered from mental illness, they said.
Egypt in 1979 became the first Arab country to sign a peace
treaty with Israel and they share a more than 200-km (124-mile)
long border.
(Reporting by Dan Williams and Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by
Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
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