ICC Note:
Islamic extremist militants operating out of the Sinai have widened their attacks from security personnel to Christians in urban areas. The government’s response has been weak and ineffective at combating the spread of their terrorism. The reason is that the government has failed to take responsibility and change their strategy. Amr Khalifa has potential solutions that would end the government’s need for a Band-Aid and would fix the heart of the problem, ending the militants grasp in the Sinai once and for all.
07/20/2017 Egypt (Middle East Eye) – When it comes to the Sinai insurgency, the Egyptian army has had about as much strategic thinking as Abdel Fattah al-Sisi does in his management of the country’s imploding economy.
With more than 50 Egyptian soldiers killed or injured earlier this month in the latest Islamic State (IS) attack, the governing calculus must be revisited.
Known originally as Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, the group emerged after Hosni Mubarak was ousted among tribes that claimed they had been oppressed by the Egyptian government. Early on, the group focused on attacking Israel and gained notoriety after attacking the Egyptian pipeline exporting gas to Jordan and Israel.
But in recent years, the group has turned its attention to attacking the Egyptian security forces. In November 2014, the group pledged allegiance to IS becoming Wilayat Sinai. For four years now, an insurgency has raged on in Sinai’s northern reaches.
Again and again, the organisation has executed terror acts. Every time a major attack is executed, an effective response is expected, but it never unfolds.
But there are solutions for this insurgency that has, particularly in recent months, surged to the Nile Delta. An eye towards military history, ideology, geography and, above all else, logic is key.
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