|
|
|
Demonstrators protest at the Ghazala Gardens Hotel in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt on July 24, 2005. (AP Photo/Kevin Frayer)
|
INDEPTH: EGYPTIAN ATTACKS
Targeting civilians
CBC News Online | July 25, 2005
Since the early 1990s, there has been a string of attacks on civilians by suspected Islamic militants in Egypt. The country's authorities have accused several groups of trying to destabilize the tourist industry, which is worth about $6 billion US a year to Egypt's economy.
Authorities have also said most of the attacks are likely the work of people who want to overthrow the country’s secular government and replace it with an Islamic fundamentalist regime.
Two groups authorities have named – the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya – have been blamed for many of the attacks on civilians as well as the killings of several of the region's key figures.
Members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad were blamed for the assassination of President Anwar Sadat on Oct. 6, 1981, a month after he cracked down on Muslim and Coptic organizations, throwing 1,600 people in jail. The organization was also angry that he had negotiated a peace treaty with Israel. Sadat was shot by soldiers who were members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad during a military parade.
Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya claims the blind cleric Omar Abdel-Rahman as its spiritual leader. He’s serving a life sentence in the United States in connection with the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York. Two members of the group were convicted of the 1992 killing of Farag Foda, an Egyptian who was harshly critical of Islamic fundamentalism. The group is also believed to have been responsible for an attempt to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak while he was visiting Ethiopia in 1995.
The following is a timeline of attacks on civilians that began in 1992, when Egyptian authorities say fundamentalists started targeting the tourist industry:
Oct. 21, 1992:
A British woman is killed and two British men are wounded when their tourist bus is ambushed.
Feb. 26, 1993:
A Turk, a Swede and an Egyptian die when a bomb rips through a Cairo coffee shop. Twenty others are wounded.
June 8, 1993:
A bomb goes off near a tour bus on Pyramids Road in Cairo. Two Egyptians die and 22 people of various nationalities are wounded.
March 4, 1994:
A German tourist is killed when gunmen open fire at a Nile tour boat in southern
Egypt.
Aug. 26, 1994:
A Spanish boy dies when a tourist bus comes under fire in southern Egypt.
Sept. 27, 1994:
Two Egyptians and two German tourists are killed in an attack on the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.
Oct. 23, 1994:
A British tourist is killed and three others are wounded when their minibus is attacked.
April 18, 1996:
Eighteen Greek tourists are shot and killed in an attack near the Pyramids. The gunmen said they thought they were killing Israelis.
Sept. 18, 1997:
Nine German tourists and their driver are killed in a shooting and firebomb attack outside the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.
Nov. 17, 1997:
Attackers kill 58 tourists and four Egyptians at an ancient temple near the southern town of Luxor. Six gunmen and three police officers also die. The Luxor massacre is the worst in Egypt in decades. The militants responsible for the massacre were leading members of Egypt's largest Islamist group, Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya. It’s believed the attack was meant to destabilize Egypt’s tourist industry and its secular government.
Oct. 7, 2004:
Bombs go off outside the Taba Hilton hotel on Egypt's border with Israel, killing 34 people. The area is a popular destination for Israeli tourists. A month earlier, Israel’s counter-terrorism agency warned that visiting the Sinai could be dangerous because of intelligence that pointed to the likelihood of an attack by militants on civilians.
April 7, 2005:
An attack in a Cairo bazaar kills an American and two French citizens as well as the suspected suicide bomber.
April 30, 2005:
A suicide bomber sets off a nail bomb, wounding seven, including two Israelis, an Italian and a Swede, near the Egyptian museum in central Cairo. An hour later, the man’s sister and fiancée open fire on a tourist bus in another part of Cairo. One commits suicide after killing the other. No tourists are injured in the attack.
July 23, 2005:
A series of car bombs explode in the popular tourist destination of Sharm el-Sheikh. At least 88 people are killed and more than 200 are wounded, including many foreigners. Most of the dead are Egyptians. It’s believed a suicide bomber rammed a car laden with explosives into the Ghazala Gardens Hotel after running over two police officers. A second car explodes at city's old market. It’s believed the car was to have been detonated outside a second hotel.
Egyptian police are said to be looking for several Pakistani men in connection with the attack. An Egyptian group – the Mujahedeen – claims responsibility for the attack. Police were trying to determined whether there was a link between this attack and the bombing of Taba Hilton in October 2004.
July 24, 2005:
A man carrying an explosive is badly injured after it goes off while he is carrying it. Police investigate whether he was planning to detonate the device near the Pyramids.
^TOP
|
|
 |
 MENU |
|
|
| MORE: |
|
|
|
|
