Raphael Eylon, the Israeli sailor taken off an Israeli-chartered ship at the Suez Canal July 22 by Egyptian police, was released today to Israeli authorities at a Gaza Strip border checkpost.
While the Egyptians were preparing to release Eylon, another Israeli citizen with an Israeli passport went through the Canal on an Italian ship without being molested. He was the first Israeli to go through the Canal without interference from the Egyptians.
Eylon, who was taken off the Briggite Toft and detained for 23 days during which the Egyptians rejected all requests to allow an International Red Cross representative to check his condition, was handed over to Israeli police in the presence of United Nations observers. Israel had been informed of the impending release by UN officials but did not publicize the Egyptian decision until the sailor was safely across the border.
The Israeli citizen who traveled through the Suez Canal without interruption was Wolf Reichman, who arrived in Haifa yesterday on the Italian ship, “Australia, ” en route from Sydney, Australia, to Genoa, Italy. Reichman said that when the ship arrived in Suez, an Egyptian officer questioned him closely, seeking particularly to learn whether he was a member of the Israeli armed forces. He was kept under Egyptian guard in his cabin while the ship was in the canal. When the ship arrived at Port Said, the Egyptians returned Reichman’s Israeli passport and withdrew the guard.
An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said the Eylon detention should serve as “another warning of Egypt’s flouting of international law and human rights.” The official noted that the Egyptian Government had given no “plausible explanation” of Eylon’s detention, that vague charges of espionage were never substantiated, that Eylon was never brought to trial and that despite all efforts of the United Nations and the Red Cross he was not visited during his detention.
The spokesman asserted that the situation proved again “Egypt’s flagrant disregard for free passage in the Suez Canal and for compliance with the six articles of the maritime powers” on such passage accepted last year by Egypt.
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