Gunmen on Tuesday shot an army conscript at a checkpoint near the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip, army sources told Aswat Masriya.

Egypt has been hit by an upsurge in militant attacks by Sinai-based fighters since the army ousted elected Islamist president Mohamed Morsi last summer following mass protests against him.

Militant violence has mainly targeted police and troops but has also led to civilian casualties. Several radical groups have claimed responsibility for many of the attacks, which they say are carried out in retaliation for the killing and arrest of Islamists in a state crackdown following the ouster of Morsi.

Also on Tuesday, Egyptian security forces destroyed a training camp belonging to Islamist insurgents in the restive Sinai Peninsula, the sources added.

The camp in the North Sinai town of Sheikh Zuweid was destroyed during raids at dawn on Islamist hideouts in the region.

It was the first time troops have discovered an equipped training position, the sources said. Two militant suspects were arrested in the raids.

On Monday, army troops laid waste to five cross-border smuggling tunnels with the Gaza Strip, bringing the total number of tunnels destroyed by the army to 1,706 since it intensified its campaign early in 2013, an army spokesperson said in a statement.

Border guards in the country's west have seized 465 shotguns from a weapons depot in the mountainous region, the statement added.