- Taba (Arabic: طابا‎
is a
small Egyptian town near the northern tip of the Gulf of Aqaba...
- Israel–Egypt- A Review of Bilateral Ties
1 Jan 2003
The peace treaty established the termination of the state of war between the two countries and the withdrawal of armed forces and civilians from the Sinai, behind the international boundary, and determined the permanent boundary between Israel and Egypt, with the exception of the border in the Taba area, whose status was eventually determined in 1988.
- 45 Interview with Prime Minister Peres on Israel Television-
13 February 1985
- 134 Inner Cabinet Decision on Taba- 12 January 1986
12 Jan 1986
- 393. Reaction of Prime Minister Shamir to the Taba ruling,
29 September 1988.
- THE PORTRAIT OF A "LINE"
(Commentary by Amos Harel, "Ha'aretz", Dec 19, 1995, p.B3)
Brawer is worried primarily about a recurrence of what he calls the "Camp David blunder" that is, the mistakes made during the negotiations with Egypt, ultimately leading to Taba being returned to Egypt. The border between Eretz Israel and Egypt, he explains, was determined in 1906. "The British then imposed the border marking on the Turks, after which it was meticulously demarcated by British and Turkish military delegations. This is the line running from Rafiah in the north to Taba in the south."
But the border was shifted northward seven years later. "When the British again marked the border in 1913, they arbitrarily made border alterations that benefited Egypt which was then in British hands at the expense of Turkish Palestine...
...
"The Taba dispute derived from this. According to the map signed at Camp David, Taba is on Egyptian soil but, after the signing, Israel was unwilling to give up Taba. They found the original map of the 1906 agreement in the map library at Tel Aviv University, and discovered that it was different from the map signed at Camp David. Only then did they express any interest in experts. They spoke with geographers who showed them the differences, and then went to arbitration, where Israel lost. Had all this been done before Camp David, there would have been changes in Israel's favor in the Rafiah area as well, and certainly in Taba."