Egypt: Unidentified shell kills eight in their Rafah home

A shell from an unidentified source has landed on a house in Egypt's north Sinai city of Rafah, killing eight people, including one child, witnesses have said.

MENA

1 min read

The New Arab

21 January, 2017

Plumes of smoke were seen after the loud blast destroyed most of the house [Anadolu]

Eight people including a child were killed early on Saturday after a shell landed on a house in southern Rafah, in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, witnesses and medical sources said.

Plumes of smoke were seen following the loud blast that destroyed most of the house, according to witnesses.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack and the source of the shell was unidentified, medical sources told local media.

Egypt has been battling a growing Islamist insurgency since the military overthrew Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

Most of the attacks, which have killed hundreds of police and army officers and soldiers, have taken place in the north of the Sinai Peninsula, which borders Israel and the Palestinian Gaza Strip, though attacks have reached Cairo.

Last week, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for a car bomb assault on a police checkpoint in the Sinai that killed eight people.

The group also said it conducted a suicide bombing that killed 28 Christian Copts at a church service in Cairo on 11 December.

Last year, IS claimed it planted a bomb on a Russian airliner travelling from the Sinai, which went down over the peninsular killing all 224 people on board.