Egypt Quashes Hamas Terror Blacklisting

Local Editor

An Egyptian court on Saturday quashed a February decision by another tribunal branding the Palestinian Resistance movement Hamas a "terrorist" group, a court official said.

He announced that the earlier ruling was thrown out because the court that issued it was not "competent" to make such verdicts.
The February ruling came after a lawyer petitioned the court to classify Hamas as a terrorist organization, accusing it of using underground tunnels to smuggle weapons into Egypt.

But in March the government appealed against the ruling, which took ties between Hamas and Egyptian authorities to a new low.
The movement had strongly condemned the February verdict -- which came a month after another court ruled Hamas's armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, a "terrorist group".

Relations between Cairo and Hamas deteriorated, however, after the 2013 ouster of the Brotherhood president Mohamed Mursi by then army chief and now President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

Ties further worsened after the authorities outlawed Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood movement, of which Hamas is an affiliate.

Egyptian authorities have accused Hamas of backing extremists who have carried out deadly attacks on security forces in the Sinai Peninsula the Gaza Strip.

The army says it has destroyed hundreds of tunnels used for smuggling supplies and arms between Sinai and Gaza, and also used by militants to infiltrate into Egyptian territory.

In March 2014, Egypt banned all Hamas activities on its soil and froze its assets.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team