Egyptian jets press home attacks on Libya’s Derna: commanders

Smoke rises during heavy clashes between rival factions in Tripoli, Libya, May 27, 2017.

By Ayman Al-Warfalli

BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) – Egyptian jets carried out air strikes on the Libyan city of Derna on Monday, continuing days of attacks against Islamist militants Egypt says were responsible for ambushing and killing Egyptian Christians last week, Libyan commanders said.

Egypt’s air force began the attacks just hours after masked men boarded vehicles driving dozens of people to a monastery in the southern Egyptian province of Minya and opened fire at close range, killing 29 and wounding 24.

A witness said on Monday one attack hit the western entrance to Derna and two others hit Dahr al-Hamar in the city’s south.

“The air strikes are joint ones between the Libyan National Army and Egyptian army,” Ahmad Messmari, a spokesman for Libyan National Army, an eastern Libyan faction allied with Egypt.

An Egyptian military spokesman declined to comment. But Libyan operational commander Brigadier Abdulsalam Al-Hasi told Reuters the strikes targeted Majlis Mujahideen Derna and Abu Salim brigade, two local Libyan groups allied with al Qaeda.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said Egypt had targeted militant bases in Libya “to get rid of them and to limit their ability to threaten Egypt’s national security”.

Speaking at a news conference in Cairo with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Shoukry said Egypt looked forward to “Russia utilising all of its available capabilities to work together to get rid of terrorism”.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for last week’s attack in Egypt, the latest targeting the Christian minority there. Two church bombings also claimed by Islamic State killed more than 45 people last month.

According to Yasser Risk, chairman of state newspaper Akhbar Elyoum and a former war correspondent with close ties to Egypt’s presidency, 15 targets were hit on the first day of strikes, including in Derna and Jafra, in central Libya, where what he called “terrorism centres” were located.

He said the targets included leadership headquarters as well as training camps and weapons storage facilities. Sixty jets were used in the earlier raids, he said.

Egypt has carried out air strikes in Libya occasionally since its neighbour descended into factional fighting in the years following the 2011 civil war that ousted Muammar Gaddafi.

Islamist militant groups, including Islamic State, have gained ground in the chaos, and Derna, a city of about 150,000 that straddles the coastal highway linking Libya to Egypt, has a long history with Islamist militancy.

Islamic State first attempted to establish a presence in Libya in Derna, but it faced armed resistance from more locally affiliated militant groups including Majlis Mujahideen Derna coalition and Abu Salim brigade. It was driven out of the city in 2015 and later set up its main Libyan base in Sirte.

Egypt has been backing eastern commander Khalifa Haftar, whose Libyan National Army has been fighting Islamist militant groups and other fighters in Benghazi and Derna for more than two years.

Messmari told reporters in Benghazi late on Sunday that Haftar’s forces were coordinating with Egypt’s military and the weekend raids targeted ammunition stores and operations camps.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said on Friday the air raids targeted militants responsible for plotting the attack, and that Egypt would not hesitate to carry out additional strikes inside and outside the country.

(Additional reporting by Asma Alsharif and Ahmed Aboulenein in Cairo; Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Louise Ireland and Giles Elgood)

Masked gunmen kill 26 in attack on Christians in Egypt

Aftermath of attack on buses and truck carrying Coptic Christians in Minya Province, Egypt, May 26, 2017. EGYPT TV via REUTERS

By Omar Fahmy

CAIRO (Reuters) – Gunmen attacked a group of Coptic Christians traveling to a monastery in southern Egypt on Friday, killing 26 people and wounding 25 others, the Health Ministry said.

Eyewitnesses said masked men opened fire after stopping the Christians, who were traveling in a bus and other vehicles.

Local television channels showed a bus apparently raked by gunfire and blackened by smoke.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which came on the eve of the holy month of Ramadan. It followed a series of church bombings claimed by Islamic State.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi called a meeting of security officials, the state news agency said, and the cabinet said the attackers would not succeeded in dividing the nation.

Muslim leaders condemned the killings. The grand imam of al-Azhar, Egypt’s 1,000-year-old center of Islamic learning, said the attack was intended to destabilize the country.

“I call on Egyptians to unite in the face of this brutal terrorism,” Ahmed al-Tayeb said from Germany, where he was on a visit. The Grand Mufti of Egypt, Shawki Allam, condemned the perpetrators as traitors

The attack took place on a road leading to the monastery of Saint Samuel the Confessor in Minya province, which is home to a sizeable Christian minority. An Interior Ministry spokesman said the unidentified gunmen had arrived in three four-wheel-drive vehicles.

Security forces launched a hunt for the attackers, setting up dozens of checkpoints and patrols on the desert road.

ISLAMIC STATE

Coptic Christians, whose church dates back nearly 2,000 years, make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s population of 92 million.

They say they have long suffered from persecution, but in recent months the frequency of deadly attacks against them has increased. About 70 have been killed since December in bombings claimed by IS at churches in the cities of Cairo, Alexandria and Tanta.

An Islamic State campaign of murders in North Sinai prompted hundreds of Christians to flee in February and March.

Copts fear they will face the same fate as brethren in Iraq and Syria, where Christian communities have been decimated by wars and Islamic State persecution.

Egypt’s Copts are vocal supporters of Sisi, who has vowed to crush Islamist extremism and protect Christians. He declared a three-month state of emergency in the aftermath of the latest church bombings in April.

But many Christians feel the state either does not take their plight seriously enough or cannot protect them against determined fanatics.

The government is fighting insurgents affiliated to Islamic State who have killed hundreds of police and soldiers in the Sinai peninsula, while also carrying out attacks elsewhere in the country.

(Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein, Omar Fahmy and Mohamed Abdellah; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)