Terror group ISIS claims attack on Egypt police that killed 4

Cairo [Egypt], January 1 (ANI): Terror group Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) on Sunday claimed responsibility for an attack on a police checkpoint in Egypt’s Suez Canal city of Ismailia that killed at least four people, including three police, reported Anadolu Agency.

Two gunmen on a motorbike attacked a police checkpoint in the canal city of Ismailia on Friday. Local media said an attacker was killed in the attack, without giving any information about casualties among police forces. The terrorist group claimed the attack in a statement on late Saturday carried by its Amaq news agency.

It said that a “cell of its soldiers” had attacked a police roadblock with a machine gun, adding that policemen were killed and injured in the attack, without providing further details, reported Anadolu Agency.

Friday’s attack was the first in nearly three years in mainland Egypt. The Welayat Sinai group, affiliated with the ISIS, has staged an insurgency against Egyptian security forces since 2013, particularly in the Sinai Peninsula, killing hundreds of security personnel.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia on Saturday condemned an attack on an Egyptian police checkpoint in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, reported Arab News.

A Saudi foreign ministry statement expressed the Kingdom’s solidarity with the government and people of Egypt, offered its sincere condolences and sympathy to the families of the victims, wishing a speedy recovery to all the injured, the Saudi Press Agency reported.

In the past few years, attacks against Egyptian security forces have been concentrated in the Sinai, where ISIS operate.

Eleven soldiers were killed on May 7 in an attack in western Sinai. Days later, another five soldiers and seven jihadists died when the army was attacked in the peninsula, reported Arab News.

Ismailia is one of the key cities overlooking Egypt’s Suez Canal, a vital waterway between Asia and Europe that sees about 10 per cent of the world’s maritime trade.