Jihadist Escalation Leaves Civilians More Threatened In Egypt
By Sherif Tarek
4 Feb 2015
Egypt gets hit by a highly deadly militant operation
every several months, the last of which was Thursday's attacks on military and
police facilities with car bombs and mortar rounds in the restive North Sinai.
Other more frequent, yet usually less lethal, terror acts have been taking
place nationwide. But lately jihadists behind smaller operations seem to have
altered their strategy and now increasingly threaten civilians.
During the recent past and this week there has been a
notable rise in the number of explosive devices planted across Egypt, most of
which were home made and had limited impact, if real at all. Many of these
bombs, reported on a daily basis, were apparently aimed at civilians, and not
security personnel who have borne the brunt of bombings that have grown rife
since the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013.
One of these small bombs was found last week inside a
toilet at City Stars, one of Cairo's largest shopping malls. The whole mall
complex was evacuated with explosives experts brought in to defuse it. Similar
bombs were found in non-military buildings and facilities throughout the week.
Explosive devices were detected and defused in a parking space at Cairo
International Airport Tuesday.
"You also have random shootings at civilians and
bombs targeting public services and infrastructure, such as Upper Egypt
railways and electricity pylons, which directly touches the lives of
civilians," pointed out terrorism expert Lieutenant Colonel Khaled Okasha.
A number of security experts and observers believe the
new strategy's purpose is to target civilians to pile up pressure on the state
and its security apparatus, who remain the primary target in view of
intensifying hostility between the two sides amid recurrent confrontations over
the past year and a half.
Jihadists also aim at expanding the range of bombings
as much as possible across the nation, and at a higher rate, to exhaust and
frustrate the police.
Heterogeneous jihadists
But changes to jihadists' bombing strategies might not
have been pre-planned, says Aly Bakr, a senior researcher on Islamist
movements.
"Militants don't comprise one homogenous entity
under a unified or clear leadership. What we have is a cocktail of jihadists,
which means they don't have a single pattern or mindset. This also means you
cannot reach an agreement with them at any point in the future."
The likes of the jihadist Salafists and Al-Gamaa
Al-Islamyia hardcore groups abandoned violence and proclaimed peace in the last
decade of the 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak, after being out-muscled by the
security forces in the 1980s and 1990s. It is believed an underhand deal
between the state and Islamists was struck to end confrontations and militant
operations.
"In general, terrorists have priorities. They
mainly target security forces, but wouldn't mind collateral damage, namely
civilians," Bakr explained.
The latest attacks in restive Al-Arish last week, for
which Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis claimed responsibility and that reportedly killed 44
and injured over 60, saw at least nine civilians amid the toll.
The Egyptian Sinai-based jihadist group, which has
claimed all major bomb attacks in the country and is seeking to seize control
of Sinai, lately pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, the largest militant
movement that has killed numerous civilians in Iraq and Syria in recent months.
Operations executed by other groups in cities outside
the Sinai Peninsula, where the insurgency is the most violent and widespread,
could also threaten civilians but are mainly impulsive and random, which makes
the militancy unsystematic overall, explained Bakr.
"Some of the Muslim Brotherhood has turned
violent, while we have hardliner Salafists too among other groups and cells
that believe in jihad. Some individuals might even be acting of their own
accord without a chain of command, out of revenge against security forces in
some cases."
"One of the main reasons why militancy has become
more common is the jihadist and takfiri rhetoric at the sit-ins of Rabaa and Nahda
in 2013."
The Muslim Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails, along
with other Islamist groups and supporters held mass sit-ins at Rabaa Al-Adawyia
and Nahda squares (in Cairo and Giza) to counterbalance mass protests against
Morsi's rule that swept the country in 2013.
Both sit-ins continued for over a month after Morsi's
ouster in July 2013 before they were forcibly dispersed by security forces.
Hundreds were killed in the dispersals, mostly from among sit-in participants.
Common were enthusiastic roars at the Rabaa and Nahda
sit-ins in support of inflammatory rhetoric that often from respective main
stages incited violence against security forces as well as Copts and churches.
There was also sporadic use of black flags of Al-Qaeda
and photos of Bin Laden at Islamist demonstrations, which indicated a lack of
commitment to peace within at least certain sections of the Muslim
Brotherhood-led sit-ins.
Proclaimed
Militancy, Hostility against Civilians
For months, the Muslim Brotherhood, its
ultra-conservative ally Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya, and the National Alliance in
Support of Legitimacy (NASL) — the Islamist umbrella group supporting Morsi —
have more than once categorically denied using violence, saying they have been,
and always would be, peaceful in their quest to reverse the "coup
d'état."
Yet lately the Islamist rhetoric seems to be leaning
towards endorsing militancy more explicitly and even attacking civilians,
spurring speculation among political analysts that the sustained security
crackdown on Islamists and their continued protests, with no prospect of
reconciliation from either side, would lead many of them to adopt violence.
The Brotherhood issued a statement to condemn the
recent Al-Arish attacks, but in English only. On their Arabic site, two days before
the attacks and right after clashes on the fourth anniversarry of the 2011
uprising, the group posted a statement — later removed — in which they called
on supporters to be prepared for jihad. They quoted Hassan Al-Banna, who
founded the Muslim Brotherhood 1928, in which he stressed the importance of
physical strength when needed.
Also recently on Rabaa TV, an anti-military channel
that broadcasts from outside Egypt and whose logo is the four-fingered Islamist
solidarity salute used by Morsi's supporters, a bearded presenter read out what
he called Communiqué No 7 from the "leadership of the revolution
youth." He said foreigners, including diplomats and investors, must leave
Egypt next month or be hunted down.
That was among other televised warnings and
inflammatory statements broadcast from abroad on the same channel and Sharq TV.
Meanwhile, a Facebook page called "Losers
Conference — Egypt 2015," in reference to the economic summit scheduled
for March that persons behind the page seemingly aim to sabotage by stirring
chaos, claimed responsibility for some terror acts, such as setting on fire a
Cairo KFC restaurant and the City Stars incident. The police reportedly said
Tuesday a ten-man cell responsible for torching KFC was arrested, saying it is
affiliated to the Brotherhood.
Mahmoud Kotri, a former brigadier general and security
expert, has no doubt the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies are behind the
recent spike of bomb attacks across Egypt, as well as the targeting of
civilians.
"It seems that all Brotherhood members and
company got orders to turn to bombers immediately. That explains the rise in
numbers. This is also why many of the bombings are very basic, because not all
these members have the expertise or knowledge to pull off more damaging operations,
so they resort to improvised bombs that pretty much anyone can make."
Since Morsi was ousted, the leadership of the
Brotherhood was arrested as well as numerous members and followers. Many others
were killed in ensuing violence at the hands of security forces.
Many of their properties were also confiscated and the
group was declared a terrorist organisation in the wake of a car bomb attack on
the Daqahliya security directorate in the Delta city of Mansoura in December
2013. It was one of the more major operations of Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, that had
rarely took place outside Sinai.
"There is an expansion of terrorism in quantity,
not quality. I think the Brotherhood's decision to increase bombings and
further terrorise civilians that way came after they grew desperate amid a
sustained crackdown on them," Kotri elaborated.
Citizens
in the Equation
The days that followed the bomb incident at City Stars
saw tighter security measures at the mall. People entering the building through
gates weren't subject to exceptional measures, though security personnel were
more cautious than normally.
Metal detectors followed by manual scans if necessary
were more carefully applied, causing long queues. Similarly, cars heading to
underground parking were carefully inspected with explosives sniffing dogs and
manual inspection of car trunks.
Patrons at the mall were fewer than usual, "But
not by much," said Osama, a waiter at City Stars. "For a few days
after the bomb was found it was really empty, but near the weekend (Friday and
Saturday) it started to get back to normal."
All shops were open at the mall and the ambiance
didn't feel different all-in-all from the normal routine of the massive
shopping mall.
Elsewhere, in Giza's Mohandeseen district, an owner of
a small crepe shop also seemed unfazed by the fact that civilians are becoming
more exposed to terror acts.
"The Imbaba court complex is right behind me and
it was targeted many times," said Mohamed Hassan, 31. "It was bombed
a number of times, but I still go near it when I have to.
"Life won't stop. There is nothing I can do but
to carry on with what I'm doing. If I am to die accidently in a bomb blast I
won't be able to stop that."
Security expert Ehab Youssef explained precautions
must be taken by civilians these days to ensure safety and even to become
proactive in the face of terrorism.
"Shop owners must make sure they don't leave
their doors open; drivers should look around their cars in case a bomb is
hidden around or underneath it," he said. "This is for normal people
who are not targeted."
In general, people must be aware of any unusual
activities and report those they think might be terror related, or criminal, to
the police, Youssef stressed.
"But the police would need to find a scientific
method to register all these reports and analyse them so as to better
understand what's going on. They also need to assure people that their names
won't be used, because that would scare them."
"Also important is that the police keep a good
relationship with the people. Abuses at the hands of law enforcers have
reportedly increased of late, after they seemed to have reduced for a while.
This builds a wall between both sides, and the police definitely needs the help
of citizens."
Greater
Police Role Needed
The state and the interior ministry has done a lot to
put an end to violent jihadism, but obviously still not enough, Okasha says.
"The interior ministry has arrested many cells for bombings and exerted
huge efforts, but the battle is far from over."
Amid the status-quo, the only way to end militancy is
through more comprehensive security operations, opined Kadry Saied, former
major-general and a strategic and military analyst. "And the battle will
last for long, not a matter of months or even a year, it will take longer than
this," he said.
In Sinai, it is the Egyptian army that handles most of
the confrontations in the peninsula, where violence has prompted it to demolish
houses and clear residents in the North Sinai border city of Rafah to set up a
buffer zone aimed at deterring militant infiltration and arms smuggling. Also,
Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi formed a unified military
counter-terrorism command in Sinai two days after the Al-Arish attacks.
However, Korti believes it is the police that should
play a greater role in combating terrorism, while the army would only help when
needed in big operations. "Because the army is only trained to kill
enemies, it can't handle internal security and that's a main reason why Sinai's
situation is terrible and uncontained."
"The work of the secret police is important; to
infiltrate these groups is very essential, for instance. The army can't play
that role. So the police handling the situation there would be ideal, but of
course the police have been anything but at their best."
Korti went on to talk about lack of preemptive
security in Egypt in recent decades, and that this is part of the problem,
"because terror acts are crimes after all. If you have a security system
that works on preventing crimes before they happen, that would reduce
operations, whether in Sinai or elsewhere in Egypt."
"What we mainly have is the investigative police
that take action only after the crime is committed, and not constant presence
of police personnel on the street, whether through patrol cars or checkpoints,
for crime prevention. A new strategy must be drawn up by the police I'd say,
but that would entail reforms to police leadership and policies."
Kotri also stressed the importance of revamping
private security firms, which are tasked with securing non-governmental
buildings across Egypt, since such facilities and civilians are more targeted
these days.
"Employees of these firms have absolutely no
training that qualifies them to deal with terrorists; it is the police that
should handle their training. In order for that to happen, the police must
revamp themselves first."
Source:
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/151/121865/Egypt/Features/Jihadist-escalation-leaves-civilians-more-threaten.aspx
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