An Egyptian security source on Tuesday said that it had not yet been determined whether a rocket fired at the Israeli resort city of Eilat had been fired from Egyptian territory.
"Security forces are currently combing the area for jihadist groups," the source, who asked to remain anonymous, told Anadolu Agency.
Before dawn on Tuesday, Israel said that its Iron Dome defense system had intercepted and destroyed a rocket fired from Egypt's Sinai Peninsula at the Red Sea town of Eilat.
Later the same day, a shadowy Sinai-based jihadist group claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it had come in retaliation for the killing of four of its members in a Friday air-strike in Sinai, which the group claimed had been carried out by an Israeli pilotless drone.
"The panic that ensued following the rocket's penetration of the Iron Dome system forced [Israeli] officials to issue confused statements regarding the number of rockets that struck [Eilat]," the self-styled 'Majlis Shura al-Mujahedeen fi Aknaf Beit al-Muqdas' ('The Mujahedeen Shura Council in Al-Quds') declared in a statement.
"Some [officials] even went so far as to say three rockets were fired," the group added.
On Friday, four militants were killed in an attack said to have targeted a rocket launcher operated by suspected jihadists in the North Sinai city of Rafah.
Sinai-based jihadist groups say that an Israeli unmanned aerial drone was behind the attack, noting that the militants had been targeted as they prepared to fire rockets towards Israeli territory.
The Egyptian army, for its part, has said that one of its military helicopters – not an Israeli drone – had destroyed the rocket launcher in southern Rafah's Arjaa district after spotting gunmen moving toward it.
An army spokesman has dismissed media reports of security coordination in Sinai between the Egyptian military and its Israeli counterpart as "baseless, insane and illogical."
Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, meanwhile, has asserted that Israel "respects Egypt's full sovereignty," stressing that his country would not allow "rumors and speculation" to harm the 1979 peace treaty between Cairo and Tel Aviv.
Three explosions were heard in different areas
Three explosions were heard in different areas of the North Sinai city of Arish early Tuesday amid conflicting reports as to the causes of the blasts.
Eyewitnesses said the explosions had been caused by rockets fired by unidentified individuals. However, a security official told Anadolu Agency they had been caused by explosive charges set near military and police facilities.
The first blast targeted a military facility in the Ghernata area, while the second went off near Arish's second police station and the third near a private residence next to the city's third police station, according to eyewitnesses.
No casualties were reported.
The areas in which the blasts occurred were quickly cordoned off by security forces, eyewitnesses said.
Bomb experts examined the explosion sites and determined that the blasts had been caused by explosive charges detonated by remote-control, not rockets, the security official, who asked not to be named, said.
Although the blasts left no casualties, the second explosion caused significant damage to buildings in the area, he added.
