Ahmed Gomaa/AP
Egyptian military police soldiers run towards a checkpoint attacked by gunmen outside of Cairo, Egypt, on Saturday.
Gunmen stormed an Egyptian army checkpoint outside Cairo early Saturday morning and killed six soldiers, including some still in their beds, officials said, in what amounted to an escalation by militants on military targets near the capital.
Just days earlier, masked men opened fire on a busload of military police inside city limits, another rare attack on soldiers this far from the restive Sinai Peninsula, where the army is fighting a counter-insurgency campaign.
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Provincial security chief Maj. Gen. Mahmoud Yousri told state news agency MENA that the gunmen also planted explosive devices after Saturday’s attack in Shubra al-Kheima, but bomb disposal experts managed to diffuse two and detonate another in a controlled explosion.
Eman Helal/AP
Egyptian military police soldiers stand guard at a checkpoint attacked by gunmen in Shubra al-Kheima, a suburb north of Cairo, Egypt, on Saturday.
The military blamed the Muslim Brotherhood for the attack, calling the group “terrorists” and saying they had planted the additional bombs to target rescue workers rushing to the scene.
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Armed Forces Spokesman Col. Ahmed Mohammed Ali said the soldiers, of a military police unit, were attacked just after morning prayers. The Health Ministry confirmed the death toll.
“These cowardly operations will only increase our determination to continue the war against terrorism,” Ali said in comments on his official Facebook page.
AHMED GAMEL/AFP/Getty Images
Emergency personnel are seen are at the site where gunmen killed six soldiers at a checkpoint outside of Cairo on Saturday in an attack the military blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood.
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Amr Darrag, former head of the Foreign Relations Committee for the Brotherhood’s political party, condemned the attack on his Twitter account and denied responsibility.
“How can the (Brotherhood) be accused (a) few minutes after the attack with no evidence or investigation?” he wrote.
Egyptian authorities say the Brotherhood has orchestrated a series of bomb attacks on police and other targets following the overthrow of President Mohammed Morsi, who hails from the Islamist group. This week, prosecutors referred about a dozen Brotherhood members to trial for allegedly forming an armed unit that has carried out attacks in the Nile Delta.
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