In this Thursday, Aug. 9, 2012 file photo, army trucks carry Egyptian tanks in a military convoy in El Arish, Egypt’s northern Sinai Peninsula. Islamic militants on Wednesday, July 1, 2015, unleashed a wave of simultaneous attacks, including suicide car bombings, on Egyptian army checkpoints in the restive northern Sinai Peninsula, killing at least 50 soldiers, security and military officials said. AP
CAIRO, Egypt – Dozens of people were killed Wednesday in a wave of unprecedented attacks by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group on Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai Peninsula, in a major challenge to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
F-16 warplanes bombarded the militants as they fought security forces on the streets of the North Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid after striking military checkpoints in a surprise attack after dawn.
Medical and security officials said at least 70 people, mostly soldiers, were killed in the attacks and hours of clashes, along with dozens of jihadists.
The military said 17 soldiers and 100 militants had been killed. It was not immediately possible to explain the discrepancy.
The militants withdrew from Sheikh Zuweid after almost eight hours of fighting, the officials said.
The violence came two days after state prosecutor Hisham Barakat was assassinated in a Cairo car bombing. He was the most senior government official killed in the jihadist insurgency.
In the capital on Wednesday, police killed senior Muslim Brotherhood member Nasser al-Houfi and eight others during a raid on an apartment, security officials and a member of the Islamist movement said.
The Sinai attacks, in which car bombs were used, were the most brazen in their scope since jihadists launched an insurgency in 2013 following the army’s overthrow of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.
“It’s unprecedented, in the number of terrorists involved and the type of weapons they are using,” said a senior military official.
Militants took over rooftops and fired rocket-propelled grenades at a police station in Sheikh Zuweid after mining its exits to block reinforcements, a police colonel said.
F-16 jets struck the militants in several locations, officials and a witness said.
“There are gunmen on the streets. They have planted mines everywhere,” said the witness.
Explosions were heard and plumes of smoke seen over Sheikh Zuweid from the neighboring Gaza Strip, witnesses there said.
ISIS said its jihadists surrounded the police station after launching attacks on 15 checkpoints and security installations using suicide car bombers and rockets.
Troops regularly come under attack in the Sinai, where jihadists have killed hundreds of policemen and soldiers since Morsi’s overthrow.
In a statement released online, ISIS said the assault had involved three suicide bombers.
“In a blessed raid enabled by God, the lions of the caliphate have simultaneously attacked more than 15 checkpoints belonging to the apostate army,” the group said.
Sisi pledged to toughen laws and suggested fast-track executions following the state prosecutor’s assassination.
The cabinet on Wednesday passed a controversial anti-terror law and requested the appeal process be shortened, in measures it said would “achieve swift justice and revenge for our martyrs”.
Sisi, the former army chief who toppled Morsi before winning elections last year pledging to wipe out militants, is expected to ratify the decisions quickly.
The government designated Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood a “terrorist group” in December 2013 as part of a crackdown on the opposition that has left hundreds of his supporters dead and thousands in jail.
Courts have sentenced hundreds to death, including Morsi, who was convicted of involvement in attacks on police stations.
His sentence is being appealed.
Months of bloodshed
The government often blames the Brotherhood for attacks, but the deadliest have been claimed by the IS affiliate in Sinai.
Wednesday’s attack was similar to a series of ambushes on April 2 in which dozens of militants attacked checkpoints, killing 15 soldiers.
The militants kidnapped a soldier and later killed him.
In January, a rocket and car bomb attack on a military base, police headquarters and residential complex for troops and police killed at least 24 people, most of them soldiers.
The attacks have come despite stringent security measures in the Sinai, including a night-time curfew and the creation of a buffer zone along the Gaza border.
The dominant jihadist group in the Sinai, previously known as Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, or Partisans of Jerusalem, pledged allegiance to IS in Iraq and Syria last November.
The militants have mostly focused their attacks on soldiers and police, killing hundreds since Morsi’s overthrow.
They previously said they avoided targeting civilians but claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing on a tourist coach in February 2014 that killed three South Koreans and their driver.
Police foiled an attempted attack at a pharaonic temple crowded with tourists in Luxor last month.