Israel issues 'urgent' warning to its citizens to leave Egypt's Sinai Peninsula immediately

[n2doc]

MARK LAVIE
Associated Press Writer
6:50 p.m. CDT, April 13, 2010



JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel issued an "urgent" warning Tuesday to its citizens to leave Egypt's Sinai Peninsula immediately citing "concrete evidence of an expected terrorist attempt to kidnap Israelis in Sinai."

The statement from the Israeli prime minister's anti-terror office took the unusual step of calling on families of Israelis visiting the Sinai to establish contact with them.

The commander of the anti-terror office, Brig. Gen. Nitzan Nuriel, acknowledged that there had been rumors that Israelis have been kidnapped in the Sinai. "We don't work according to rumors," he Israel TV. "We work according to firm intelligence." He said it would "take some time" to disprove the rumors, which circulated all day Tuesday.

"It is very possible that at this moment, there is a terror cell that has the intention and has a plan in operation to kidnap an Israeli and bring him to Gaza," he said.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-ml-israel-egypt,0,7679682.story