CAIRO
By Mohamed Abu Eta
Two Egyptian military helicopter gunships have bombed targets in the south of the border town of Rafah, northern Sinai Peninsula, eyewitnesses said.
The witnesses said that a batch of armored vehicles had then combed the area in Abu Helw area. Yet, they failed to identify the targeted sites.
No official statement has yet been issued by the Egyptian army about the operation.
The Egyptian army has launched a massive offensive against militant groups thought to be based in the Sinai Peninsula, which shares a border with both Israel and the Gaza Strip.
The military has also been destroying underground tunnels along borders with the Gaza Strip, which has been reeling under a 7-year-Israeli blockade, for what it called "security reasons".
The peninsula has been the center of rising tension since the January 25 revolution, which ended the autocracy of former President Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
Militant groups have heightened their attacks on security and army targets in northern Sinai since the July 3 ouster of Egypt's first democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi by the military.
Dozens of people, most of them police officers and army personnel, were killed in the violence. An attack on a military intelligence headquarters in Rafah last Wednesday led to the death of six army personnel.
Besides, six people were killed when Egyptian army bombed houses in the Sheikh Zuweid town of North Sinai on Friday as part of an ongoing military offensive in northern Sinai Peninsula, eyewitnesses had said.
"The army bombed houses believed to belong to militants on Friday, and adjacent houses were hit in the process, leaving six people dead, including two women," the eyewitnesses told the Anadolu Agency.
A reliable security source said the bombing targeted suspected hideouts of militants who took refuge in houses and farms in the town.
The source confirmed the six fatalities, saying their houses were hit by mistake.
"An army force stepped in to try to save their lives, but their injuries were life-threatening, and they died immediately," added the source.
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