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WORLD NEWS Friday 28 September 2018

Egypt arming Sinai tribesmen in fight against Islamic State

By BRIAN ROHAN Rashid, also of the Tayaha
Associated Press tribe. He said the army of-
CAIRO (AP) — In a remote fered his unit assault rifles,
outpost in Egypt's Sinai Pen- light machine guns, body
insula, Ibrahim Abu-Sefira armor and helmets. "They
watches a mountainous treat us like soldiers and
skyline of jagged rock, ears give us everything we
tuned to the twilight si- need," he said, adding that
lence, listening for any signs his men have uncovered
a fragile peace may be dis- explosives, fuel supplies,
turbed. cars and other equipment
An elder from the Bedouin in homes and caves.
Tayaha tribe, he has seen Allison McManus, a re-
armies, both Egyptian and search director at the U.S.-
Israeli, pass through this based Tahrir Institute for
vast desert. Now the area Middle East Policy, said the
is the center of a yearslong, military benefits from the
bloody conflict between Bedouins' knowledge of
the Egyptian military and a the terrain and local intel-
local affiliate of the Islamic This photo posted on a file sharing website Jan. 11, 2017, by the Islamic State Group in Sinai, a ligence.
militant organization, shows a deadly attack by militants on an Egyptian police checkpoint, in
State group. el-Arish, north Sinai, Egypt. But cooperation "should be
In a switch from the past, Associated Press part of a long-term strategy
the military has begun that includes plans for dis-
arming Bedouin tribesmen the long history of tensions on the movement of peo- caches, as well as man- armament, demobilization,
like Abu-Sefira and hav- with the tribesmen. The shift ple and goods. ning checkpoints to control and reintegration to avoid
ing them patrol in opera- appears to be an attempt The war has largely taken roads, tribesmen have told protracted armed conflict
tions against the IS militants to bring the Sinai popula- place hidden from the the AP. once the insurgency is de-
deep in the peninsula's tion more onto the govern- public eye, with journalists, Usually if fighting erupts, the feated," she said.
interior, where their local ment's side in the fight. non-residents and outside Bedouin move back while Tribesmen were already
knowledge gives them an Egypt has struggled to de- observers barred from the security forces engage, but providing scouts and in-
advantage, Abu-Sefira feat the insurgency, led by area. The conflict has also "some of us even stay and telligence to the military
and other Bedouin say. the IS affiliate known as the been kept at a distance fight up front," says Abu- under a broader organiza-
"We have to do it, it's our Sinai Province of the Islamic from tourist resorts at the Sefira, who patrols several tion, the Sinai Tribes Union.
duty to make the people State. For years, the epi- southern end of the penin- times a week with the army. There have also been local
feel safe from the terrorists center of the conflict has sula. The tribesmen estimate arrangements with armed
who were killing us," Abu- been in a triangle of towns In February, the military that around 100 Bedouin Bedouin in key combat
Sefira told The Associated and cities in the northeast launched a massive op- have been killed, whether zones near the Gaza bor-
Press by telephone from a corner of Sinai on the Medi- eration in Sinai that also in gunbattles or by road- der.
checkpoint he was man- terranean coast. The insur- extended to encompass side bombs. They said they The Abdelsalam group rep-
ning along with a dozen gency gained momentum parts of the Nile Delta and operate under Egypt's Third resents a more direct co-
other men from the area, after general-turned-Pres- deserts along the country's Army and are regularly at- operation, arming the Bed-
near the Halal mountains ident Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi western border with Libya. tached to its units, with 4x4s ouin — who do not serve in
where the IS affiliate has led the army's overthrow Since then, the pace of IS and armored vehicles. the military — in a militia-like
been known to stockpile in 2013 of the elected but attacks in Sinai's main the- The Bedouin role points to arrangement over a larger
weapons and equipment. divisive Islamist president, ater has slowed to a trickle. how the fight has expand- area. The development re-
The military has not pub- Mohammed Morsi. In the operation, the army ed beyond the coastal calls the Sahwa movement
licly acknowledged arming Thousands of security forc- has employed a force towns deep into the desert in Iraq, where U.S. forces
and using the Bedouin as a es and civilians have been known as the Abdelsalam landscape of the penin- armed Sunni tribesmen to
fighting force, saying only killed, and thousands more group, with several thou- sula. The tribesmen spoke fight al-Qaida after the
that they cooperate and arrested in what critics de- sand Bedouin, deployed in of operating in areas as far outbreak of Iraq's sectarian
provide intelligence. In the scribe as a heavy-handed central parts of Sinai. Their as 90 miles (150 kilometers) fighting in 2006, although
past, security forces have security crackdown. Homes main role is to accompany south of the coast. in the Egyptian case the
been wary of giving weap- have been destroyed, and troops on patrols and raids "Central Sinai is now mostly weapons are likely lighter
ons to the Bedouin, given heavy restrictions imposed searching for weapons cleared," said Saleh Ibn- and fewer.q