(VOVworld) – The Cairo Court for Urgent Matters decided on Tuesday to ban all activities by the Palestinian Hamas movement and confiscate its headquarters in Cairo.

Palestinian Hamas policemen march during a graduation ceremony in Gaza City on January 29, 2014 (Photo: edition.cnn.com)

The move was said to worsen the already tense relations between Egypt and the Gaza strip which is under the control of Hamas. The decision was made following a lawsuit designating the movement as a terrorist group and claiming that the movement had affected Egypt’s national security. Cairo accused Hamas gunmen of carrying out a number of attacks in Egypt over the past years and of backing the Muslim Brotherhood’s ousted President Mohamed Morsi.

Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahhar said the ruling was ineffective as Hamas has no headquarters or any activity in Egypt. According to a Hamas spokesperson, the ruling was wrong and wrongly aimed at Palestinian people, creating conditions favorable to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory.