Hard Reckoning Awaits Cairo for Sweeping Crackdowns

Posted: September 11th, 2017

By Timothy E. Kaldas

Timothy E. Kaldas is professor at Nile University in Cairo, and a non-resident fellow at TIMEP focusing on political analysis. His research interests include transitional politics in Egypt, regime survival strategies, and US-Egyptian relations. Beyond Egypt, his research examines the social and political history of sectarianism in Iraq, US policy towards the Arab-Israeli conflict, and discrimination against Muslim Europeans, particularly in France. His commentary and analysis has been featured on CNN, France 24, BBC World, Radio France International, Al Jazeera English, and Mada Masr. He was a contributing photographer for “The Road to Tahrir,” a photobook documenting the early days of the Egyptian uprising in 2011, and he contributed a chapter to Looming Shadows: Migration and Integration at a Time of Upheaval on the politics and history surrounding discrimination against French Muslim citizens. Mr. Kaldas holds an MA in Arab Studies from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

At least 18 Egyptian policemen were killed Monday in an ISIS attack on a security convoy in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. Over the last few years, ISIS’ Sinai affiliate has conducted frequent attacks against Egyptian military and security forces deployed in the Sinai and has also struck in Cairo, carrying out seven attacks in the Egyptian capital in 2016 and four the previous year. The group has also targeted Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority, killing 47 in twin church bombings in the cities of Tanta and Alexandria on Palm Sunday in April. In this most recent incident, militants detonated a roadside bomb near the town of el-Arish in Northern Sinai and proceeded to open fire on the policemen.

Egypt’s President Abdel Fatah el Sisi has repeatedly pledged to combat terrorism in the Sinai and across the country, as well as to protect Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority, which represents roughly 10 percent of the population. He was elected president on a strong counterterrorism campaign.

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