Israeli Army Arrests Troops Suspected of Smuggling Drugs from Egypt

Israeli military police have arrested 15 people, most of them soldiers, accused of helping smuggle drugs from Egypt's Sinai peninsula across the southern Israeli border, the army said on Monday.

The military's website described the affair as ''one the biggest ever in terms of the quantity of hard drugs.''

It said that as a result of an undercover operation ''heroin, hashish and ecstasy pills worth 800,000 shekels ($205,000, 163,000 euros) were found.''

It added that soldiers gave information on breaches in the border fence and planned military surveillance operations to an Israeli Bedouin who tipped off Egyptian Bedouins across the border.

Israeli news site Ynet said that 12 of the suspects were soldiers.

Source:Agence France Presse