This week’s rocket fire on the city of Eilat (April 17), the seventh such occurrence, illustrated once again the vulnerability of Israel’s most southern tip. The ability to defend Eilat is limited: There are physical limitations for using the Iron Dome anti-missile defense battery. Additionally, the peace accord with Egypt prohibits Israel from scuttling terrorist activity originating from the Sinai Peninsula. As a result, Israel has to rely on Egypt to prevent fire from its territory despite the knowledge that even one single rocket could deal a lethal blow to the city’s tourist industry.

Its proximity to the borders of Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt notwithstanding, the resort city of Eilat — the eternal land of the carefree, where the sun always shines — had been perceived by Israelis until recently as a haven of serenity and security. Operating almost uninterruptedly, the Sinai-based terrorist organizations have identified in recent years this Achilles’ heel. The two rockets that were fired this week from the Moon Valley area in Sinai were a stark reminder of how fragile security is and how the peace and quiet in Eilat can be easily broken. 

In 2010, before Mubarak’s fall, the terrorist organizations fired twice at Eilat, signaling that the Egyptian grip in Sinai was becoming increasingly tenuous. By 2012, four incidents of rocket fire had been recorded. Some of them were carried out by Palestinian organizations, whose headquarters are in Gaza, and some by global jihad groups that had taken hold in Sinai and recruited militants from among the local Bedouins. This was on top of the killing of Israelis by terrorists from Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, who had incurred into Israel from Egypt in August 2011, just a few kilometers off Eilat.

In view of the fact that Cairo was having a hard time exercising its sovereignty and enforcing security, it was in 2010 that Israel identified the vulnerability of its border with Egypt and the potential threat from the latter’s hinterland. Israel’s main thrust was to build a new fence along the Egyptian border and establish a surveillance infrastructure in order to collect intelligence information about terrorist activity in Sinai. As for the rocket threat, however, an effective solution has yet to be found.