CAIRO — In the first such deployment in more than 25 years, Egypt has sent thousands of troops to its western border with the Palestinian Authority.

Egypt's official Middle East News Agency said the regime of President Hosni Mubarak has begun to deploy 5,000 Egyptian state security police along the Egypt-Gaza border. MENA said the operation began on Oct. 28 in wake of an Israeli report that the air force would bomb the border area.

"The security forces have deployed along the entire border following threats by Israel to drop smart bombs in the Philadelphi Corridor [Egypt-Gaza border]," MENA said on Sunday, according to Middle East Newsline. "The security deployment was to protect Egyptians living in the border area."

The Egyptian Interior Ministry said not all 5,000 troops, armed with light weapons, would be deployed along the 14-kilometer Egypt-Gaza border. The ministry said many of the soldiers would patrol roads and establish checkpoints along the route from El Arish to Rafah, the latter divided into Egyptian and Palestinian zones.

"We are ensuring that there is no smuggling of weapons to the Palestinian territories, and we are also protecting against the smuggling of drugs from Israel," Egyptian presidential spokesman Suleiman Awad said.

Israel's military has confirmed that Egypt was reinforcing its troop presence in eastern Sinai. Military sources said that at this point, about 1,000 Egyptian police arrived in the area.

"Beyond the 750 Egyptian border troops deployed in the area, there won't be any additions," Defense Minister Amir Peretz said on Sunday.

Over the last year, Egypt deployed 750 troops to help secure the border with the Gaza Strip. Israel's military has determined that the Egyptians failed to stop the increasing shipments of anti-tank, anti-aircraft and surface-to-surface missiles to the Hamas-led PA.

The military sources said Egypt did not seek Israel's permission for the Sinai redeployment. They said that under the 1979 peace treaty Egypt was allowed to unilaterally reinforce its police presence in eastern Sinai.