by Oui
Thu Jun 26th, 2025 at 10:23:18 PM EST
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Egypt North Sinai Attack: "It started with a bomb, and attackers shot people fleeing the mosque" | France 24 - 24 Nov. 2017 |
Tamarod: Political force or revolutionary dream? - Politics | Ahram Online - 30 June 2014 | [cached]
But after achieving its main goal - ousting Morsi - those who were once united are now severely at odds in what seems like a power struggle.
No retribution, only blood
The divisions started early on, when the leaders of the group supported the actions of the interim authorities and the armed forces which wrested power from Morsi.
The group's stance and approval of most of the events that took place after the ouster - including the violent dispersal of pro-Morsi sit-ins in Cairo that killed hundreds - made them lose many supporters.
Bassem Kenawy, a student and a member of liberal Constitution Party, said he was so enthusiastic about the idea behind Tamarod when it first started. He distributed copies of the group's signature forms to his friends and family.
"We thought Tamarod would represent the values of the 25 January revolution in civil governance, bread and freedom," Kenawy said. "But it went another way instead. We didn't find retribution for blood spilled in the 2011 revolt but even more blood."
Kenawy said he wished the group would remain committed to its initial cause of rebelling against repression and not become a political party.
But to analysts, the idea is too dreamy, like romanticising a political equation.
"You cannot just put a movement in the refrigerator and get it out whenever you want opposition," said Gamal Abdel-Gawad, a political analyst at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies. "Tamarod did its job and was consumed as an idea."
Tamarod also faces other accusations of being supported and led by the military intelligence to oust Morsi, claims that the group's spokesman says are flattering but not true.
"If this is our accusation, that we are supported by national institutions, then this is an honour," spokesman Mohamed Nabawy said.
"The first communication between us and the armed forces was on 3 July [Morsi's ouster]."
Trafficking and the Role of the Sinai Bedouin | Harvard Belfer Center - 21 June 2007 |
On the evening of October 7, 2004, three trucks laden with explosives were driven to resorts in the northern Sinai where they were detonated, killing more than 30 people and wounding hundreds more. The targets were Israelis vacationing during their High Holidays at the usually tranquil desert oases of Taba, Ras al-Sultan and Tarabeen. At least three previously unknown terrorist organizations claimed responsibility for the terrorist incident; however, the leading suspect and group named by the Egyptian government was al-Tawhid Wal-Jihad ("Monotheism and Struggle"), comprised of Bedouin tribesmen from the Sinai Peninsula (al-Ahram Weekly, September 14-20, 2006).
The Taba attacks marked the first time that Bedouins from the Sinai were implicated in acts of terrorism on Egyptian soil. This trend continued with the bombings at Sharm el-Sheikh, as well as various shootings of police and other security forces (Daily Star [Egypt], May 10, 2006). Analysts attribute this development to the fact that northern Bedouin tribesmen have not benefited economically as much as their southern brethren by the high level of tourism available in that part of the peninsula. Deep-seeded ideological, political and cultural differences between the Bedouin and the Egyptian government also explain the rise in terrorist activity.
The speaker was probably Kamal Allam, one of the military commanders of Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM) / Wilayat Sinai [Supporters of Jerusalem/Sinai Province] from El-Arish City.
Crossing the Canal: Why Egypt Faces a Creeping Insurgency | West Point CTC - July 2017 |
Egypt-based Islamic State affiliate Wilayat Sinai is one of the most formidable of the Islamic State franchises. Despite the organization's relatively small size--it is estimated to have fewer than 1,000 operatives--Wilayat Sinai has fought the Egyptian army, one of the region's more capable armies, to a standstill. Egypt has deployed in excess of 20,000 mainline troops to the northern half of the Sinai Peninsula in addition to an equal or larger number of police and paramilitary forces.
These forces, especially troops from the relatively well-trained Second and Third Field Armies, benefit from dedicated air support and access to a range of sophisticated weapons systems. Yet despite Egypt having launched what is its largest military operation in the Sinai since the 1973 war with Israel, Wilayat Sinai is, as yet, undefeated. In fact, both the tempo and sophistication of its attacks have increased. It launches attacks on soft and hard targets across northern Sinai almost daily. Wilayat Sinai has also carried out an attack in southern Sinai, and most significantly, it is increasingly able to operate in mainland Egypt.
On April 9, Wilayat Sinai carried out improvised explosive device (IED) attacks on Coptic churches in Tanta and Alexandria. The attacks killed 45 people. On April 18, the group attacked a guard post near St. Catherine's Monastery, which is visited by thousands of tourists and pilgrims annually, in southern Sinai where Wilayat Sinai had previously struggled to expand its reach. Most recently, Wilayat Sinai attacked Coptic Christians who were on their way to visit a monastery located in Minya, 150 miles south of Cairo, killing 28. These three attacks demonstrate the Islamic State's two-pronged strategy in Egypt: inflame Muslim-Christian tensions and damage the country's fragile economy by targeting its already beleaguered tourist industry.
In response to the attacks, the Egyptian government, led by President Abdul Fattah el-Sisi, declared a new and more sweeping state of emergency that further increases the scope of police detentions, suspends many constitutional rights, and further limits the right to assembly. However, the state of emergency will do little, if anything, to hamper Wilayat Sinai's growth in Egypt. In fact, the government's heavy-handed and often punitive tactics in the Sinai particularly are partly responsible for creating an ideal operational environment for groups like Wilayat Sinai.
Sinai: The Buffer Erodes | Chatham House - Sept. 2012 |
For over 30 years, the Sinai peninsula has served as a near-empty territory cushioning the geopolitical
aspirations of Egypt, Israel and the Palestinians. With the changes brought about in Egypt by President Hosni Mubarak's fall from power in 2011, that buffer is in doubt. The state security apparatus that underpinned the Egyptian regime collapsed, creating a vacuum that the territory's sparse Bedouin population quickly filled with coping mechanisms of its own. Captivated by the prospect of acquiring power, local irregulars reacted fiercely to the regime's efforts to regain control over its periphery, culminating in the August 2012 operation that targeted an Egyptian base, killing 16 soldiers, and perforated Israel's border defences at the intersection of its border with Egypt and Gaza. Security officials, police stations, government buildings and Cairo-based institutions have all come under attack. In the eyes of its neighbours, Egypt is losing its grip over Sinai, transforming the peninsula into a theatre for the region's competing new forces.
As Sinai's internal stability erodes, other givens of regional security seem increasingly fragile. Groups antithetical to the old order have found a haven not only in the isolation of Sinai's mountains, but in the thoroughfares of its largest city, El Arish. Cross-border assaults by non-state actors have exacerbated tensions between Egypt and Israel, calling into question the durability of their peace treaty signed in 1979. Having consolidated its grip on Gaza, the Islamist movement Hamas is expanding its reach beyond the confines of the narrow enclave into its Sinai backyard. Israel's closure of Gaza's northern and eastern borders has quickened the process, turning Sinai into Gaza's primary trade and access route. Sinai's indigenous population struggles to maintain its share of scarce resources and of the supply chain, in part by playing the various regional rivals off against one another.
Egypt's efforts to claw back a semblance of the authority it enjoyed under the old order have met with mixed results. The central government's relations with some tribal elders have improved, and the repeated attacks on state assets in Sinai have ebbed. But promises of a new dawn for Bedouin-Nile Valley relations have yet to materialize, and the police have yet to re-establish control. Future cross-border attacks or sabotage of shipping lines in the Straits of Tiran or through the Suez Canal could yet trigger regional escalation. Few can predict with confidence Sinai's long-term stability. Without a new political contract balancing the new power and trade relationships in the peninsula, Sinai's continued fragility could render it a proxy battlefield for surrounding powers.
The old accords underpinning regional security relations have failed to keep pace with the changing times. Devised when Egyptian and Israeli state forces reigned supreme, they are ill-suited to an era when a new quasi-state actor has emerged on Sinai's borders in the shape of the Hamas government of Gaza, and when transnational actors from Islamist movements to cross-border Bedouin clans challenge the central authorities in and around Sinai. The separation of state forces that enhanced regional security following Israel's 1980 Sinai withdrawal has now created a security vacuum that endangers it.
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Shin Bet Trains Islamic State Terrorists as Proxies
Mossad created dummy Swiss "humanitarian" foundation funded by ministry of defense and American Jewish far-right billionaires
Shin Bet's Palestinian Proxies Are Gaza Gangsters | Tikun Olam |
Abu Shabab Militia Terror Trained by Shin Bet
Gaza's residents are accusing the Israeli-backed Abu Shabab gang of looting aid, kidnapping civilians and violently targeting those seeking food.
Also known as the Yasser Abu Shabab Popular Forces, the paramilitary group has been linked to attacks at aid distribution points across Rafah.
Since the US-Israeli Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began operating on May 27, more than 500 Palestinians have been killed at aid collection sites, including 93 shot dead by Israeli forces as they approached UN aid lorries, according to the world body.
Palestinian analyst Mohammad Shehada told The National the gang is doing Israel's "dirty work" in exchange for weapons and protection. "Before, they'd first send drones, then dogs, then soldiers," he said. "Now they send those gangs first."
More Hasbara from Israel
Leader of Israeli-Backed Gaza Aid Looting Network, Yasser Abu Shabab, Disowned by Family
"His blood is forfeit," the statement said. "We will not allow one man to stain the legacy of our family, which has long stood with the Palestinian people and their struggle for freedom."
[Quds News Network]
A limited number of aid trucks arrived safely to UN warehouses after the coordination of Palestinian local groups in northern Gaza [25 June 2025]
Aid Delivered In Northern Gaza Support Local Groups
