Egypt intel chief in Israel on low-profile visit

Egypt's intelligence chief Omar Suleiman was in Israel on Sunday to meet with top Israeli officials, including the head of Israeli spy agency Mossad, during a low-profile visit to the Jewish state.

Suleiman was to meet with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, as well as the head of the Mossad, Israel's foreign spy service, according to the official.

An Israeli government spokesman declined to comment.

Suleiman is Egypt's point man for indirect talks between Israel and the Hamas movement on a prisoner exchange of some 1,000 jailed Palestinians for an Israeli soldier captured by Gaza fighters in 2006.

The visit comes a day after Egypt's Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit implicitly confirmed that his country was building an underground barrier with the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip in a new bid to prevent tunnel smuggling.

A network of tunnels beneath the Egypt-Gaza border provide a crucial economic lifeline to Gaza, which has been sealed off from all but vital humanitarian aid by Israel and Egypt since Hamas was elected in June 2007.

"Lightning operations"

Also on Sunday, Israel said it had developed a comprehensive plan for destroying illegal buildings in the occupied West Bank in order to enforce a 10-month easing of settlement building.

The plan follows the declaration of the moratorium on the construction of new houses in the settlements announced by Netanyahu in November after months of United States pressure.

Israel's left-leaning Haaretz newspaper, citing a leaked army memo, said the illegal structures would be destroyed in "lightning operations" during which the army should seal off settlements from the media.

"The settlers view these evictions as the beginning of the disengagement and will strive to prevent demolitions in any way available," it quoted the document as saying.

"There is no concrete intelligence about intention to take up arms but this scenario cannot be discounted, along with attempting to extract a price tag," the document said, referring to the policy among some radical settlers of attacking Palestinians in response to military action against the settlements.

The settlers view these evictions as the beginning of the disengagement and will strive to prevent demolitions in any way available

Israeli press

The mass-selling Yediot Aharonot newspaper, citing the same document, said authorities would also accelerate legal action against rioting settlers following several recent confrontations with building inspectors.

The Israeli military declined to provide details about the alleged memo, saying only that it "acts according to the instructions of the democratically elected government."

The settlers have denounced the plan, with Danny Dayan, the head of the Yesha settler umbrella group, calling it a "declaration of war by the government against civilians."

Nearly a half million Israelis live in dozens of settlements scattered across the occupied West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem, all of which are considered illegal by the international community.

The Western-backed Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has said he will not relaunch peace talks suspended nearly a year ago during the Gaza war unless Israel freezes all settlement construction.