Egyptian forces shot dead on Monday a Bedouin leader in the Sinai peninsula who was wanted over his suspected involvement in a string of deadly bombings in the area, the interior ministry said.
Egyptian forces had been hunting Salem Khadr al-Shnub for months over his alleged role in the deadly bombings against the Red Sea resorts of Sharm el-Sheikh, Taba and a foreign military base in the Sinai.
”He was killed in clashes with anti-terrorist units on Monday at dawn in a mountainous region of Sinai” known as Jabal Halal, a ministry statement said.
”Police had surrounded the region after receiving information that he was preparing another terrorist operation,” it added.
The Egyptian authorities considered al-Shnub one of the top suspects still at large in their probe into the bombings, which marked a new surge of attacks in Egypt and dealt a blow to the country’s vital tourism industry.
The ministry said al-Shnub acted as a bomb maker and offered his protection to the bombers in Jabal Halal, a largely inaccessible area that has regional trafficking routes and over which al-Shnub reigned like a warlord.
Two of al-Shnub’s relatives, Sallam Sweilam and Sallam Sallam Sweilam, were also killed in the clashes.
In October of last year, near-simultaneous bombings killed at least 34 people, including several Israeli tourists, in Red Sea coast resorts, including Taba on the Israeli border.
On July 23 this year, multiple bombings in the popular resort of Sharm el-Sheikh killed close to 70 people, including many tourists.
An attack on August 15, on a vehicle belonging to the Sinai-based multinational force and observers, left two female Canadian peacekeepers lightly injured.
The death of al-Shnub and his two relatives brings to 11 the number of suspects killed by Egyptian forces and those captured to 37, according to the interior ministry.
The statement did not specify how many suspects are still at large. Many of the top suspects have been killed rather than captured.
The bombings were claimed by a number of organisations, some of them claiming links to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network. — Sapa-AFP