A senior Egyptian source said yesterday (Wednesday) that Israel has failed to eliminate arms smuggling from its territory to Gaza, indicating that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's promotion of arms smuggling from Egypt to the Strip is a "lie."

The Egyptian satellite channel "Cairo News" quoted the source as saying, "Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is spreading lies to cover up his failure in the Gaza Strip."

The source added, "The Israeli Prime Minister's promotion of arms smuggling from Egypt is another lie to justify his government's failure to control arms smuggling from Israel to the Gaza Strip."

He explained that "Israel failed to eliminate the arms smuggling mafia from Kerem Shalom to the Gaza Strip."

The source pointed out that "Netanyahu allows the smuggling of weapons from inside Israel to the West Bank and ignores the sale of weapons to the West Bank in order to find justifications for his aggression against the Palestinian people."

He considered that "the Israeli government has completely lost its credibility internally and externally and is still continuing to promote its lies to cover up its failure."

The source also pointed out that "Netanyahu is paving the way through his claims of smuggling weapons from Egypt to declare his security and political failure and failure to find the detainees or achieve any military victory in Gaza and the occupied West Bank."

He pointed out that "all parties are dissatisfied with the Israeli Prime Minister's continued failure to reach a truce agreement" in the Gaza Strip.

The source confirmed that Netanyahu's statements are a preemptive message to Washington that he rejects any proposals for a ceasefire and aborts all efforts to calm the situation and release detainees and prisoners.

Netanyahu said in a press conference earlier today that Egypt had failed to prevent the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip via the Philadelphi Corridor, and stressed that the Israeli army would not leave the corridor, before adding, "If we leave it, we will not be able to return to it."

The Philadelphi Corridor is a 14-kilometre border strip extending along the border between Gaza and Egypt, from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south.