Are Sinai-based terrorists shifting to Cairo?

A correspondent in Egypt

Oct 5, 2020

A member of the Egyptian security forces stands guard next to a damaged bus following a roadside bomb blast that wounded 20 Egyptian policemen on the outskirts of the northern Sinai Peninsula's provincial capital of El-Arish on July 9, 2015. The military is fighting an Islamist insurgency in the northern Sinai Peninsula, which grew since the 2013 ouster of President Mohammed Morsi by then army chief and now President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. — STR/AFP via Getty Images

CAIRO — Egyptian authorities continue to crack down on terrorist elements in the Sinai Peninsula, but more recently these operations seem to have moved out of Sinai and closer to the capital city of Cairo.

On Sept. 28, Egypt’s security forces killed two suspected militants in Qalyubia governorate, in the Greater Cairo area. The Egyptian Ministry of Interior said in a statement that a shootout erupted when police raided a hideout in al-Qalg used by suspects planning terrorist attacks. The statement said Hossam Abd Rabbo, 47, and Ahmed al-Sayyid al-Biyoumi Ibrahim, 37, were killed and found in possession of a machine gun, a pistol and various types of ammunition of different calibers.