Egypt Army Seizes Weapons While Chasing Terrorists

Military armored vehicle securing worshippers outside a mosque in Bir Al-Abed, northern Sinai, Egypt, December 1, 2017. Reuters
Military armored vehicle securing worshippers outside a mosque in Bir Al-Abed, northern Sinai, Egypt, December 1, 2017. Reuters
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Egypt Army Seizes Weapons While Chasing Terrorists

Military armored vehicle securing worshippers outside a mosque in Bir Al-Abed, northern Sinai, Egypt, December 1, 2017. Reuters
Military armored vehicle securing worshippers outside a mosque in Bir Al-Abed, northern Sinai, Egypt, December 1, 2017. Reuters

Egyptian army's border guards seized a number of weapons within the framework of its war on terrorist organizations.

Border guards seized two automatic rifles, 29 shotguns, 5,000 bullets, and 24 explosive devices, as well as 29 metal detectors, 2,200 kilograms of a rock from which gold ore is extracted and 73 vehicles used for smuggling during the period from January 16 until February 12.

The guards also managed to arrest 2,770 people while attempting to illegally cross the western and southern borders, according to armed forces spokesman Tamer al-Rifai, adding that the army detected and destroyed four tunnel openings on the border strip in North Sinai.

On Saturday, the army announced that seven terrorists and 14 others were injured in North Sinai in fire exchange after they attacked a force concentration. According to the army, 15 Egyptian soldiers were killed and injured during the attack, which ISIS claimed the responsibility for.

Since the army's overthrow of president Mohamed Morsi in 2013, a number of soldiers have been killed in attacks by extremist groups.

The General Secretariat of the Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC) condemned the terrorist attack on a security checkpoint in North Sinai.

OIC Sec-Gen, Yousef bin Ahmed al-Othaimeen, expressed his sincere condolences to the families of the victims and to the Egyptian Government. He stressed the OIC solidarity and stand with Egypt in the face of terrorism aimed at destabilizing its security and stability and support for all the measures Cairo would take to protect security and stability, and the safety of its citizens against the schemes of the terrorist organizations and groups.

Othaimeen reiterated the Organization’s principled position condemning terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.

Also, Arab Parliament Speaker Mishaal bin Fahm al-Salami condemned a deadly terrorist attack that targeted the security checkpoint in Arish.

In a statement on Sunday, Salami strongly condemned the attack in North Sinai and asserted the support of the Arab Parliament to Egypt in its war against terror.

Salami lauded the Egyptian Armed Forces and their efforts to maintain stability in the country.



An Israeli Strike that Killed 3 Lebanese Journalists Was Most Likely Deliberate

A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
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An Israeli Strike that Killed 3 Lebanese Journalists Was Most Likely Deliberate

A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)

An Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists and wounded others in Lebanon last month was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime, an international human rights group said Monday.
The Oct. 25 airstrike killed three journalists as they slept at a guesthouse in southeast Lebanon in one of the deadliest attacks on the media since the Israel-Hezbollah war began 13 months ago.
Eleven other journalists have been killed and eight wounded since then, Lebanon's Health Minister Firass Abiad said.
More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon, and women and children accounted for more than 900 of the dead, according to the Health Ministry. More than 1 million people have been displaced since Israeli ground troops invaded while Hezbollah has been firing thousands of rockets, drones and missiles into Israel - and drawing fierce Israeli retaliatory strikes.
Human Rights Watch determined that Israeli forces carried out the Oct. 25 attack using an air-dropped bomb equipped with a US produced Joint Direct Attack Munition, or JDAM, guidance kit.
The group said the US government should suspend weapons transfers to Israel because of the military´s repeated "unlawful attacks on civilians, for which US officials may be complicit in war crimes."
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the report.
The Biden administration said in May that Israel’s use of US-provided weapons in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza likely violated international humanitarian law but that wartime conditions prevented US officials from determining that for certain in specific airstrikes.
The journalists killed in the airstrike in the southeastern town of Hasbaya were camera operator Ghassan Najjar and broadcast technician Mohammed Rida of the Beirut-based pan-Arab Al-Mayadeen TV, and camera operator Wissam Qassim, who worked for Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV.
Human Rights Watch said a munition struck the single-story building and detonated upon hitting the floor.
"Israel’s use of US arms to unlawfully attack and kill journalists away from any military target is a terrible mark on the United States as well as Israel," said Richard Weir, the senior crisis, conflict and arms researcher at Human Rights Watch.
Weir added that "the Israeli military’s previous deadly attacks on journalists without any consequences give little hope for accountability in this or future violations against the media."
Human Rights Watch said that it found remnants at the site and reviewed photographs of pieces collected by the resort owner and determined that they were consistent with a JDAM guidance kit assembled and sold by the US company Boeing.

The JDAM is affixed to air-dropped bombs and allows them to be guided to a target by using satellite coordinates, making the weapon accurate to within several meters, the group said.
In November 2023, two journalists for Al-Mayadeen TV were killed in a drone strike at their reporting spot. A month earlier, Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and seriously wounded other journalists from France´s international news agency Agence France-Presse and Qatar´s Al-Jazeera TV on a hilltop not far from the Israeli border.