Egypt ISIS affiliate claims attack near pyramids

Ahram Online , Friday 8 Jan 2016

The group says its attack on a tourist bus near the hotel came in response to its leader's call to 'target Jews everywhere'

Hotel
Egyptian security forces (L) stand at the entrance of the Three Pyramids hotel in Cairo's Al-Haram district on January 7, 2016 (AFP)

The Egyptian ISIS affiliate Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis said on Friday its members had carried out Thursday's attack on a tourist bus outside a hotel near the Giza Pyramids which authorities say did not result in casualties.

Egypt's interior ministry said the attack, which involved a group of people hurling fireworks, was aimed at security forces guarding the Three Pyramids hotel.

Ansar Beit-Maqdis said in a statement on Twitter that light arms were used in the attack on a tourist bus which came in response to a call by ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi to target Jews "everywhere."

The group claimed the attack resulted in deaths and injuries among "Jews and forces protecting the hotel," though authorities say the incident left no casualties, but caused damage to the hotel's facade and the tourist bus in front of the building.

The Israeli government said the tourists were Arab Israelis.

The authenticity of the militants' claim could not be independently verified.

Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis is spearheading an Islamist insurgency based in North Sinai, which spiked following the 2013 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.

The group claimed responsibility for the deadliest attacks since, saying it planted a bomb on a Russian passenger jet that crashed in Sinai in October 2015, killing all 224 people on board.

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