According to news reports, the son of well-known resistance leader Sheikh Hassan Khalf was killed Friday in Sheikh Zowaid area near Rafah, Sinai, by a stray bullet during a campaign waged by Egypt's army against militants in the Sinai since the ouster of Morsi on 3 July.

Egyptian armed forces presented formal condolences on Sunday to Sheikh Khalf for the death of his son, Hussein.

“The armed forces present sorrowful condolences to Sheikh Hassan Khalf, Sheikh of the 'Mujahedeen' in Sinai for the martyrdom of his son two days ago. We express our deepest condolences as commanders, officers and soldiers to his family, praying for God to grant them patience,” read a statement published by official army spokesman Col. Ahmed Mohamed Ali.

Sheikh Khalf has often been called “the Sheikh of the Mujahedeen,” in reference to his leading role in local resistance movements that cooperated with military intelligence from 1967 to 1973.

During the resistance years he was arrested by the Israeli army and sentenced to 149 years in jail for military operations in Sinai, including an attack on the Israeli rulers' HQ and Israeli army’s camps in northern Sinai.

Some of the operations he participated in are the Arish airport bombing, the bombing of the headquarters of the Israeli military ruler and an attack on the Israeli camps.

Egypt's military says it has killed dozens of Islamist militants, and captured tens others during its assaults on weapons depots and Islamic militant hideouts in the region.