News / Egypt

Egyptian man beheaded, teenage son shot dead in Sinai

Tuesday, 01 March 2016 6:19 PM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 01 March 2016 6:17 PM ]

Emergency personnel and security forces stand next to ambulances in the Egyptian town of El-Arish, in the Sinai peninsula, following an attack by militants on November 24, 2015. (AFP photo)

An Egyptian man has been beheaded and his teenage son shot dead in Egypt’s troubled Sinai Peninsula, local officials say.

Local Egyptian security officials and medics said on Tuesday that the man and his 17-year-old son were killed late Monday in the North Sinai provincial town of El-Arish.

"The man's decapitated body and his son's body were brought to hospital on Monday night. His son was shot in the head," a medic said.

No individual or militant group has yet claimed responsibility for the deadly attack, but some local sources said that Daesh terror group was most likely behind the attack.

The latest killings come weeks after a militant group affiliated to Takfiri Daesh terrorists posted pictures online of two men accused of spying for the Egyptian military in the volatile peninsula.

In recent months, militants from the Velayat Sinai Takfiri group, previously known as Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, have beheaded several people and posted gruesome pictures online after accusing them of spying for the army in the troubled region.

This file photo shows Velayat Sinai militants, previously known as Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, in Egypt's troubled Sinai Peninsula. (AFP photo)

In November 2014, the group pledged allegiance to the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group, which is wreaking havoc in Iraq, Syria and much closer in Libya.

The Sinai region is under a state of emergency since October 2014, following a deadly terrorist attack that claimed the lives of 33 soldiers.

Over the past years, militants have been carrying out anti-government activities and deadly attacks, taking advantage of the turmoil caused in Egypt after democratically-elected President Mohamed Morsi was ousted by the military in July 2013.

Hundreds of Egyptian soldiers and policemen have been killed by militants loyal to Daesh mostly in North Sinai over the past years.

An Egyptian policeman inspects a tourist bus, as a soldier from the Egyptian army special forces stands guard, at a checkpoint outside Sharm el-Sheikh airport on November 11, 2015 . (AFP photo)

The Daesh terror group also claimed the October 31 last year downing of a Russian airliner carrying tourists over Sinai that claimed lives of all 224 people on board. The militant group said it had smuggled a bomb onto the passenger plane at an airport in the south of the peninsula.

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