Egyptian authorities have charged a local businessman and two Israelis for recruiting agents in Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon to spy for Israeli intelligence, a State Security prosecutor has said.
Prosecutor Hisham Badawi told reporters that a businessman named Tarek Hassan was arrested in August and has now been charged with harming the country's national interests. Two other Israelis have been charged in absentia.
Hassan allegedly received $7,500 dollars to search for potential agents working for telecommunication companies in the three countries that could spy for Israel.
Over the last few months, Lebanon has also repeatedly accused Israeli intelligence of attempting to spy on and infiltrate its telecommunication networks.
Israel said that it had no information about the case.
"We are not familiar with the charges," said Israeli Foreign Ministry Spokesman Yigal Palmor. "We will have to look into it in order to understand what this is all about."
Egypt was the first Arab country to sign a peace agreement with Israel in 1979, however, relations have been cool and Egyptian authorities have since periodically arrested and convicted people of spying for the Jewish state.
Earlier media quoted unnamed security officials saying that four Egyptians had been arrested for spying for Israel as well as gathering information about tourists in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. There were also two Israelis involved in this version of events and both involved infiltrating telecommunications companies.
The discrepancies between the two versions could not be immediately resolved.
News about the longstanding case came out as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak publicly criticized Israel for causing a stalemate in peace talks with the Palestinians.
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