Militant attack kills 11 Egyptian troops in Sinai
Five injured; troops try to thwart a ‘terrorist’ atack on a water pumping station east of Suez Canal
Eleven Egyptian soldiers were killed on Saturday atempting to thwart a “terrorist” atack on the Suez Canal zone abuting the Sinai Peninsula, a hotbed of militant activity, the army said.
The militants were targeting to atack a water pumping station east of the Suez Canal, the army added.
Troops were pursuing the militants in an isolated area in Sinai, it added.
No group claimed responsibility for Saturday’s ambush.
Two Northern Sinai residents said the attack took place in the town of Qantara in the province of Ismailia, which stretches eastwards from the Suez Canal.
The militants ambushed troops guarding the pumping facility, before fleeing to the desert in Northern Sinai, according to the residents who spoke on condition of anonymity for their safety.
Five soldiers were also wounded in the firefight on the eastern, Sinai bank of the canal, the army said, adding that security forces “are continuing to chase the terrorists and surround them in an isolated area of the Sinai.” It was the heaviest loss the army had suffered in years in its long-running campaign in and around the Sinai against militants loyal to the Daesh group.
Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has been gripped by an armed insurgency for more than a decade, which peaked ater the exit of Mohammed Mursi in 2013.
The militants have carried out scores of atacks, mainly targeting security forces and Christians.
The pace of militant atacks in Sinai’s main theatre of operations and elsewhere has slowed to a trickle since February 2018, when the military launched a massive operation in Sinai as well as parts of the Nile Delta and deserts along the country’s western border with Libya.
More than a thousand suspected militants and dozens of security personnel have been killed since the start of operations, according to official figures.
In November, Egypt agreed with Israel to boost its troop numbers around the border town of Rafah in order to quell Daesh militants.
Last week, suspected militants blew up a natural gas pipeline in Northern Sinai’s town of Bir Al Abd, causing a fire but no casualties.
In August, the army said 13 militants had been killed and nine of its soldiers were “killed or wounded” during clashed in Sinai, without indicating when the fighting had taken place.
In recent years, pipelines carrying Egyptian oil and gas to neighbouring Israel and Jordan have been the primary focus of insurgent atacks.
The fight against militants in Sinai has largely taken place hidden from the public eye, with journalists, non-residents and outside observers barred from the area.
The conflict has also been kept at a distance from tourist resorts at the southern end of the peninsula.
Recently, President Abdel Fatah Al Sisi had lited the state of emergency in Egypt.
“Egypt has become an oasis of security and stability in the region,” Sisi wrote in a Facebook post.
The North African country had been under a state of emergency since April 2017 bombings of two Coptic churches by a Daesh group affiliate that killed 44 people.
The atacks also injured more than 100 people and occurred a week before Coptic Easter.
The first bombing, in Tanta, a Nile Delta city about 100km, north of Cairo, tore through the inside of St George Church during its Palm Sunday service, killing at least 27 people and injuring at least 78.
The second, a few hours later in Alexandria, hit Saint Mark’s Cathedral, the historic seat of the Coptic Pope, killing 17 people, including three police officers, and injuring 48, the ministry added.
In a televised speech addressing the nation, Sisi declared a three-month countrywide state of emergency, subject to parliamentary approval, and called for national unity and urged the media to refrain from coverage that could be harmful.
Coptic Christians account for around 10 per cent of Egypt’s population.
Coptic Pope Tawadros had been leading the mass at Saint Mark’s Cathedral at the time of the explosion but was not injured, the Interior Ministry said.