“Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah and your enemies…” (Qur’an 8:60)
“Egyptians return to Sinai homes to find Islamic State booby traps,” Middle East Eye, October 24, 2020:
Residents of Egypt’s restive North Sinai are torn between the anguish of displacement and the threat of death posed by explosives left by Islamic State group (IS) militants who previously occupied their villages.
In July, residents of Qatiya, Iqtiya, Al-Ganayen and Merih in Beir el-Abd fled from their homes when militants affiliated with IS occupied the area in the aftermath of a foiled attack on an Egyptian army camp nearby.
Though the militants have since been forced from their villages, residents are terrified of landmines and booby traps left behind, not to mention the threat that IS may return and bring with them renewed air strikes by the Egyptian military.
According to local sources, many are especially concerned about potential long-term displacement, similar to that suffered by the residents of the Sinai cities of Rafah and Sheikh Zuweid in 2014.
“IS militants are still roaming around the area. We are worried they will enter our village again,” one resident from the village of Iqtiya told Middle East Eye, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“We don’t feel safe anymore. We are facing either displacement, death by landmines, or IS occupation.”
Bir al-Abd, situated about 80km west of North Sinai’s capital, al-Arish, had been the site of several attacks claimed by IS, including the deadliest attack in modern Egyptian history in which more than 300 worshippers were gunned down in a mosque in 2017.
According to several official and local reports, since August, the army gradually has wrested the villages from IS control, but it delayed allowing those displaced to return.
The delay triggered rare protests demanding a safe return to their villages.
A few days later, the army allowed hundreds to return to Al-Ganayen, Iqtiya, Qatiya and Merih. But they were shocked to see the scale of damage to their homes as a result of the military’s air strikes and clashes with the militants.
The jubilation of returning home was spoiled even further: since 10 October, fifteen civilians, including eleven women and three children, have been killed by explosives left in family homes.
According to a local source, the explosions were caused by booby traps left by militants before their withdrawal from the villages earlier this month….
The combination of the army’s clashes with IS and other military operations have turned most areas of North Sinai into ghost towns, according to satellite images published last year by MEE, comparing the area before and after operations….
Walter Sieruk says
The murderous ISIS jihad violence is based on the “holy book” of Islam the Koran, or as some call this religious book the Quran : “Is the Quran the Word of God or is it a fabrication of a man. Thus, is the Quran the truth or a fiction and a hoax ?” The jihadists, as those of ISIS, use many verses from the Quran as the main source of justification for their violence, mayhem and murders. As found in For example, 2:191. 4:89. 5:33. 9:5,111,123. 47:4.
The answer to this question is clearly given on pages 145 through 157 in THE ISLAMIC INVASION by Robert Morey in which he wrote a section on the Quran with its self-contradictions. Just two of the many he cited are the following “The Quran differs on whether a day is a thousand years or fifty thousand years in God’s sight’ and “Who was first to believe? Abraham or Moses [Sura 6:14 versus 7:143]? The above is inconsistent and illogical. Further, Morey wrote about “The fact that Judaism and Christianity broke up into different sects was used in the Quran to prove that they are not of God [Suras 30:20-32. 42:13, 14]. Yet Islam has broken up into many warring sects and therefore cannot be true if the Quran is right.” Moreover, Morey in his book shows many more contradictions and absurdities in the Quran, there are and how Muhammad incorporated extra Biblical and Jewish folklore along with pre-Islamic Arabian myth and parts of Zoroastrian and Hindu stories into the Quran.
Furthermore, the Muslims claim that “the Quran is the direct, literal word of God unmodified in any way by the Prophet who uttered them at the bidding of God.” Furthermore,,in the book UNVEILING ISLAM by Ergun Mehmet and Eethi Caner has shown that the Quran was modified in the following account on pages 45. “Muhammad felt the need to improve on the words of Allah, since he changed Allah’s wisdom for his own on several occasions. A hadith tells of the nonchalant emendations of Muhammad:’ On a number of occasions he [a scribe] had, with the Prophet’s consent changed the closing words of verses. For example, when the prophet had said ‘God is mighty and wise ‘ Adbollah b. Abi Sarh suggested writing down ‘Knowing and wise’ and the Prophet answered that there was no objection. Having observed a succession of changes of this type, Adbollah renounced Islam on the grounds that revelations, if from God could not be changed at the prompting of a scribe such as himself. After his apostasy he went to Mecca and joined the Qorayshites.’ Other writers reveal that later Muhammad and his people did go war with the Qorayshites and he personally killed Abdollah. Obviously Abdollah knew too much and Muhammad wanted Abdollah’s knowledge to die with him.”
In conclusion, the Quran is not only a fiction, it’s also a hoax therefore the cause of the jihadists of ISIS is a false cause. A terribly false cause
vcragain says
In response I would say that ANY book written down by a human is the work of a human brain, regardless of how fervent he/she is in declaring they are words that a God told him/her to write…..therefore believing any of them is totally silly. this is all the product of our deep yearning to know ‘what all this is’ because we have brains that want rational explanations. And of course there IS an explanation – ie there is ‘a truth’, but we are not equipped to understand what we see or think we know…..we have limited brains….we need to realize that having this deep need to ‘know’ is what drives humans to invent a story that we can fixate on, whatever that is, hence so many varieties of said fixations – none of which are any more reliably ‘true’ than any other ! We should drop all this “killing for God” which just drives us into ever worsening situations !
Walter Sieruk says
One of the explanations as to how such totally unconscionable, ruthless, vicious actions and murderous are committed by the Muslim terrorists who make up the brutal and deadly jihad entity ISIS is answer in the following .
The jihadists of ISIS are engaging in the Islamic doctrine of “Muruna” which is the dogma of Islam that teaches committing evil for the greater good is a noble part of the jihad for Islam. This is, in essence, the same type of “philosophy” that the communists had gone by in the twentieth century. That it’s a “good thing “ to commit many evils to obtain a “worker’s paradise.” Likewise, during World War II even the Nazis had this line of thinking.” To express, as in to illustrate this idea, even more, is by using a twenty-first century movie. Near the end of this movie, just before the final defeat of the super-arch –villain General Zod , that super villain said “No matter how brutal and deadly I was I did it for the greater good.” That is the common mindset of many villains including those of ISIS.
DavidR says
People convinced of their superiority, when surrounded by like minded people, often succumb to their natural tendency towards sadism. Sometimes the difference is breathtaking. How could an ethnicity that produced and encouraged the genius of Bach, Kant, Planck, and endlessly more, how could they follow Hitler? He made them feel special in an almost euphoric way. From there it wasn’t hard to start their descent into his black hole. This should ring a bell with some Muslims.
mortimer says
President Sisi has one of the hardest jobs in the world … getting the Muslim Brotherhood out of Egypt where it began and has deep roots.
gravenimage says
Egypt: Islamic State driven out of Sinai villages, but murders 15 civilians with booby traps left in their homes
……………………
And in most cases these victims are themselves Muslim–but they are not Islamic *enough*…
God, I hate Islam.
Rob says
Not long after Israel withdrew from Sinai and the Egyptians returned, the locals were pining for Israel to come back.