Egypt: Four Beheaded Corpses Found In Sinai Peninsula

Four beheaded corpses were found by residents of
a town in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula on Wednesday,
security sources said, blaming Islamist militants
waging an insurgency against Cairo.
The security sources in Sinai and Cairo, said
residents of Sheikh Zuwaid found the bodies two
days after the men were abducted by gunmen while
travelling in a car in the town, a few kilometres
from the Gaza Strip.
Though the men were civilians, they may have been
targeted for their perceived allegiance to the police
and army, the sources said, speaking on condition
of anonymity. They gave no other indication of the
identity of the men.
The militants have stepped up attacks on policemen
and soldiers since then-army chief Abdel Fattah al-
Sisi toppled President Mohamed Mursi of the
Muslim Brotherhood in July 2013.
The government does not distinguish between the
Sinai militants and the Brotherhood, which it has
designated a terrorist group although the movement
says it is peaceful and denies any links to the wave
of militant attacks.
Sisi, now elected president, said last month that
Islamist militants were ravaging the Middle East and
pose a threat to security globally.
The Sinai militants are not believed to be officially
linked to Islamic State insurgents who have swept
through parts of Iraq and Syria and have released a
video purporting to show the beheading of a U.S.
journalist.
The attacks by the Egyptian militants initially
targeted security forces in Sinai - a remote but
strategic part of Egypt located between Israel, the
Gaza Strip and the Suez Canal - but they have
since extended their reach to the mainland with
bombings of security installations.
The government says nearly 500 people, mostly
from the army and police, have been killed in
clashes and in attacks by Islamist insurgents
angered at Mursi's removal. Rights groups have put
the number far higher, saying that many hundreds
of Brotherhood supporters, meanwhile, have been
killed at the hands of security forces.
A security crackdown since Mursi was ousted has
also seen many thousands of Islamists arrested.
More than 1,000 have been sentenced to death.
Secular liberals accusing the government of rights
abuses have also been jailed.
Seventeen pro-Brotherhood protesters were
sentenced to life in prison by an Egyptian court on
Wednesday on charges including murder and
possession of arms during clashes that erupted at a
protest in August 2013.
Rights groups say trials of Islamists have generally
violated the most basic rights of citizens to fair
hearings due to a lack of evidence against the
defendants, among other problems.