Egypt Attempts To Liberate Sinai From ISIS

by JASmius



Amazing, isn't it, what a country that takes the Islamic State seriously can do to actually "degrade" the self-proclaimed Caliphate?:

Egypt's army said on Wednesday more than a hundred militants and seventeen soldiers were killed after simultaneous assaults on military checkpoints in North Sinai, in the deadliest fighting in years in the restive province. After a day of fighting, which involved F-16 jets and Apache helicopters, the army said it would not stop its operations until it had cleared the area of all "terrorist concentrations".

By late Wednesday, an army spokesman said the situation in North Sinai was "100% under control". Security sources and witnesses later said aerial bombardments on militant targets had resumed.

The Islamic State's Egyptian affiliate, Sinai Province, had claimed responsibility, saying it attacked more than fifteen security sites and carried out three suicide bombings.

The militants' assault, a significant escalation in violence in the peninsula that lies between Israel, the Gaza Strip and the Suez Canal, was the second high-profile attack in Egypt this week. On Monday, a bomb killed the prosecutor-general in Cairo.

It raised questions about the government's ability to contain an insurgency that has already killed hundreds of police and soldiers.

The insurgents want to topple the Cairo government and have stepped up their campaign since 2013, when then-army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi removed President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood after mass protests against his rule.

Oh, I don't know; it sounds to me like the Egyptians are doing a lot better job of "containing" ISIS than Barack Obama is "degrading" them in Iraq and Syria:

Under the terms of Egypt's 1979 peace accord with Israel, the Sinai is largely demilitarized. But Israel has regularly agreed to Egypt bringing in reinforcements to tackle the Sinai insurgency, and one Israeli official signalled there could be further such deployments following Wednesday's attacks.

"This incident is a game-changer," an official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Remember when Egypt and Israel were enemies?  I think I like this quasi-cobelligerency a lot better.  And when Cairo has the seal of approval of and compliments from the IDF....well, could we not call this the REAL Arab Spring?