Cairo: Egyptian President Abdul Fattah Al Sissi was quick to launch air strikes on militants in Libya in response to a deadly attack on Coptic Christians in Egypt — but the attacks do not seem to be targeting those responsible.
The response was popular with many Egyptians. The country’s state-owned and private news media celebrated it as swift justice, but the president has been vague about exactly who he is attacking.
The strikes have been directed at Islamist groups other than Daesh, which claimed responsibility for Friday’s massacre of dozens in the southern province of Minya, and seem to be intended to shore up Sissi’s allies in eastern Libya.
“The attacks in Minya were claimed by Daesh, and there are Daesh elements active in Libya, but the reports coming indicate Cairo is targeting other groups,” said H.A. Hellyer, senior non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council.
Egyptian and Libyan officials said strikes had been launched on camps and ammunition stores belonging to the Darna Mujahideen Shura Council (DMSC).
Areas targeted include the western entrance to Darna, Dahr Al Hamar in the south, and Al Fatayeh, a hilly area about 20 kilometres from the city.
Yet the DMSC has never been involved in attacks outside Libya and in fact mostly limits its activities to Darna, rarely fighting in larger conflicts within Libya, according to Mohammad Al Jarh, an Atlantic Council political analyst in Libya.
The group has denied taking part in attacks inside Egypt.
In fact, many suggest the air strikes had been planned in advance to shore up support for Sissi’s main Libyan ally, Khalifa Haftar and his self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA), and that the Minya massacre was used as a pretext to launch them.
Forces loyal to Haftar, a military strongman like Sisi, have long been fighting the DMSC, cutting off supply routes to the city and hitting it with occasional air strikes. Despite the LNA’s siege, the military situation in Darna has been in stalemate for months.
Egypt has also carried out strikes in Jufra, where the LNA has been fighting Islamists who fled Benghazi as well as forces linked to the UN-backed government in Tripoli.
The LNA lost dozens of men there in a surprise attack on an airbase earlier in May, but has since consolidated control.
The Minya attack was a catalyst for those inside the Egyptian government and military who are in favour of military intervention in Libya, said Mukhtar Awad, who researches extremism at George Washington University.
“This is Egypt taking action not because of the Minya attack but ... to drive out as many extremists as possible from the east,” he said.
Egypt says it does not target specific groups but that it goes after all militants who could be a threat to its security.
A military spokesman told state media on Monday that all the groups targeted have the same ideology as those who carried out the Minya massacre, which is reason enough to bomb them.
“Names are not important for us, they are all terrorists.
Those who carried out the Minya operation do not necessarily have to be in these camps but their followers are,” an Egyptian intelligence source told Reuters.
Al Jarh also said it was likely the air strikes has been planned in advance and that the Minya attack was an opportunity to carry them out, as part of a larger policy towards supporting Haftar, with Egypt bombing groups that constitute the strongest opposition to him.
Egypt sees any militant activity in eastern Libya, which is near its border, as a threat to its national security.
One of the reasons Sissi has supported Haftar since 2014 is to ensure that all Islamists are driven out of eastern Libya.
Sissi is getting more involved now because of improved relations with Washington, Al Jarah said. He believes US President Donald Trump has given him the green light to fight Islamists in Libya and elsewhere.
When Sissi announced the first round of air strikes on television on Friday, he implored Trump to support him.
Trump, who has made a point of improving relations with Cairo, said his country stood with Sissi and the Egyptian people.
