In a statement released to its Facebook and Twitter pages, the jihadist group Ajnad Misr (Soldiers of Egypt) took responsibility for today’s bombing in the western Cairo suburb of 6 October City. The attack killed one police officer, Brigadier General Ahmed Zaki, and wounded at least two others.
Ajnad Misr said that its fighters had monitored and recorded Zaki’s movements prior to the attack. Along with its statement, the jihadist group released three images of Zaki approaching and getting in his car. According to the statement, which was translated by the SITE Intelligence Group, Ajnad Misr fighters managed to plant a “sticky explosive device on the car of the criminal.”
“It was detonated after we had chosen the appropriate time and place, such that no damage would befall those passersby on the street,” the group said.
Zaki, according to Ajnad Misr, had “followed all possible methods of camouflage and escape,” prior to today’s bombing. Today, he had entered a car that “did not bear any sign of being part of the criminal apparatus.”
According to Ajnad Misr, Zaki had been involved in the targeting of Egyptian youth with live ammunition as well as “arresting and torturing many of them.”
Ajnad Misr
Ajnad Misr, which formally announced itself on Jan. 23, 2014, has said it is engaged in a campaign to target “criminal” elements of Egypt’s current regime. The group has taken credit for at least 15 attacks since November, according to a tally maintained by The Long War Journal. These attacks have killed four and wounded at least 39.
Several of those attacks were claimed in a statement released on April 2, in which the jihadist group took credit for bombings at Cairo University as well as attacks on March 4, March 11, and March 29 in the Cairo area. On April 17, the jihadist group issued a video detailing 8 of its attacks.
Ajnad Misr, which has been described as “our brothers” by the Sinai-based jihadist group Ansar Jerusalem (Ansar Bayt al Maqdis), has said that it is prepared to receive “information about the movements of the officers and personnel of the criminal services, and their addresses.”
Ajnad Misr has also claimed to have aborted or altered certain of its operations out of concern for civilians in the area.
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Point of (not entirely pedantic) clarification: “Ajnad Misr” does not mean, in Arabic, “Soldiers of Egypt” but, rather, “Auxiliaries, Helpers, Reinforcements.”