6 civilians killed in three attacks in North Sinai - sources

Saturday 04-07-2015 08:03 PM
6 civilians killed in three attacks in North Sinai - sources

The rubble left after the Arish explosion in Northern Sinai, on November 12, 2014. Aswat Masriya - Muhamed Sabry

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NORTH SINAI, Jul 4 (Aswat Masriya) - Two civilians were killed and a third was injured in a blast in North Sinai's Sheikh Zuweid on Saturday, police sources said, raising the civilian death toll on Saturday to six.

Employees at the Electricity Company were fixing a power station when an explosive device went off killing two of them, sources said. The injured civilian was taken to the al-Arish General Hospital for treatment, medical sources said.

A child was killed and four were injured, including three children when an improvised explosive device detonated near a checkpoint located in Rafah earlier on Saturday, security sources said. 

Three more civilians were also killed and two were seriously injured when a rocket hit a house near North Sinai's Sheikh Zuweid city earlier on the same day. 

The attacks come at a turbulent time for the peninsula which has witnessed an escalation of militancy last week. 

On Wednesday, the Sinai-based Ansar Bayt Al-Maqdis militant group conducted a string of attacks on a number of security checkpoints and a police station in the town of Sheikh Zuweid, in a failed attempt to take over the town. 

The attacks claimed the lives of 17 army personnel and injured 13, according to military figures. The military said it killed no less than 100 suspected militants on that day. 

The army announced on Saturday that over the past three days it killed 205 militants in North Sinai. 

On Friday, Ansar claimed responsibility for for three rockets it said it fired into Israel, earlier that day. 

The group changed its name to Sinai Province last November after pledging allegiance to Islamic State fighters in Iraq and Syria. 

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