Terrorists kidnap Christian man in Sinai
Police say they pursued the kidnappers after the incident, killing one and wounding two, but could not free the hostage
Egyptian security officials said Islamic terrorists have kidnapped a Christian man traveling in a communal taxi in the turbulent north of Egypt’s Sinai peninsula.
They did not identify the man, but said police pursued the kidnappers after the incident, killing one of them and wounding two others in a firefight, but could not free the hostage.
Two policemen were also wounded in the firefight, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
Terrorists led by the Islamic State group have been fighting security forces in Sinai for years. Since 2016, they have killed more than 100 Christians in attacks targeting churches and buses carrying pilgrims to remote monasteries.
Scores of Christian families have fled Sinai following attacks by militants.
Earlier this month, Egypt’s president confirmed that Israel is helping Egyptian troops battle jihadists in Sinai.
Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi told CBS News that cooperation between Cairo and Jerusalem was tighter than it had ever been.
“That is correct… We have a wide range of cooperation with the Israelis,” he told the US news outlet’s “60 Minutes” program when asked if military coordination between the countries was closer than it had ever been.
In February, The New York Times reported that Israel was covertly carrying out a full-blown aerial campaign against Islamic State targets in Sinai, with Sissi’s blessing. The Israeli aircraft are reportedly often unmarked and sometimes use indirect routes in a bid to cover up the origin of the strikes.
Israel and Egypt had never previously confirmed the existence of the campaign.
“Only the Egyptian army is authorized to and does conduct military operations in specific areas in northern Sinai, in cooperation with the civilian police,” Egyptian military spokesperson Tamer al-Rifa told Russia’s Sputnik news shortly after The New York Times report.
Since the army toppled Egypt’s Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013, hundreds of policemen and soldiers have been killed in attacks in the Sinai by jihadists and other extremist groups, including the Islamic State-affiliated Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis.
Sissi has ordered a series of devastating operations meant to return calm to Sinai’s restive north, carrying out large bombing campaigns that have killed hundreds, as well as razing homes to create a buffer zone with the Gaza Strip.
Jihadists regularly claim to have been targeted by Israeli aircraft.
According to foreign reports, Israel has conducted drone strikes in the peninsula on Islamic State targets. Cooperation has also reportedly taken the form of significant intelligence sharing.
More publicly, since 2013, Israel has also allowed additional Egyptian forces into the peninsula, beyond the level permitted under the 1979 peace accord between the two countries. Heavy weapons, like tanks, artillery and attack helicopters, have been brought into Sinai to fight the Islamists, a sign that Jerusalem is not concerned those big Egyptian guns could be turned against it.
