{"id":18744,"date":"2018-10-16T21:25:10","date_gmt":"2018-10-16T21:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=18744"},"modified":"2018-10-16T21:25:10","modified_gmt":"2018-10-16T21:25:10","slug":"egypt-says-security-forces-killed-450-fighters-in-sinai-peninsula","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=18744","title":{"rendered":"Egypt says security forces killed 450 fighters in Sinai peninsula"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Egypt<\/a> has said its security forces have killed 450 armed fighters since the beginning of its eight-month offensive against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant<\/a> (ISIL, otherwise known ISIS) in the Sinai Peninsula<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Army Spokesman Tamer al-Rifai said the large scale operation, dubbed “Sinai 2018,” has also resulted in the\u00a0dismantlement of some 1,200 explosive devices and the destruction of about 1,900 vehicles and mortorcycles.<\/p>\n

The military launched<\/a> the operation in February to rid the arid and sparsely populated area – an attractive region for armed groups waging a war against the government – of ISIL fighters after an attack<\/a> on a mosque in late 2017 that killed more than 300 people.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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WATCH: The world reacts to mosque bombing in Egypt<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

Rifai said the government had spent $1.38 bn to compensate residents forced to relocate from the country’s northern Sinai.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to army figures, around 30 soldiers have been killed during the operation.<\/p>\n

Armed groups began staging attacks against state security forces after the 2013 ouster of President Mohamed Morsi<\/a>, the country’s first democratically elected president.<\/p>\n

Morsi was forced out by the military in the face of mass protests against his rule.<\/p>\n

The army on Tuesday rejected criticism from rights groups over the impact on civilians of its campaign in Sinai.<\/span><\/p>\n

It said that people in the peninsula support its operation and receive humanitarian aid.<\/span><\/p>\n

“All air strikes are carried out by the army outside residential areas,” Rifai said on Tuesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

Journalists are barred from going to areas targeted in the Sinai 2018 campaign, although the army organised a rare visit to the North Sinai capital El-Arish in July.<\/span><\/p>\n

A countrywide state of emergency was imposed in April last year, following two suicide bombings at churches which were claimed by ISIL.<\/span><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi<\/a> extended the measure by a further three months.<\/p>\n

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WATCH: Inside Story – Is Egypt’s security approach failing in Sinai?<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Egypt has said its security forces have killed 450 armed fighters since the beginning of its eight-month offensive against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, otherwise known ISIS) in the Sinai Peninsula.\u00a0 Army Spokesman Tamer al-Rifai said the large scale operation, dubbed “Sinai 2018,” has also resulted in the\u00a0dismantlement of some 1,200…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":18745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18744\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}