One police officer was killed in Ismailia on Thursday evening when two militants on a motorbike attacked a security checkpoint in the city’s downtown.
A statement released by the Ministry of Interior revealed that the militant attack on the checkpoint led to a firefight between police and militants. Officer Ahmed Radwan Abdel Gawad was fatally injured by a bullet wound to the chest.
State-owned Al-Ahram reported that one assailant was arrested after he was injured in the clash and is currently being interrogated.
Law enforcement forces have been exposed to repeated attacks in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia recently. Two police conscripts were killed on 3 November, an army colonel was killed on 4 November, and two other army soldiers were also gunned down on 11 November.
In North Sinai, law enforcement on Thursday arrested 29 people including Ezzat Al-Gharib, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Guidance Bureau, on charges of “inciting against the army and funding terrorist organisations,” according to the army spokesman.
Al-Gharib was arrested in Sheikh Zuweid village.
10 houses were also destroyed; the army spokesman announced that two of them belong to Adel Habara, who is the alleged perpetrator of the killing of 25 CSF soldiers on 19 August.
A fuel transportation truck was also destroyed in Al-Mahdeya village.
The security campaign comes a day after a car bomb explosion in Sheikh Zuweid left 11 army soldiers dead and 37 injured.
The situation remains volatile in the Sinai Peninsula, with Defence Minister Abdel Fatah Al-Sisi vowing on Wednesday night to “continue to fight those who attack us and raise their weapons at the army, the police and the state.”
