Egyptian president tells details of dismantling terrorist infrastructure in North Sinai, declares launching exhibition to disclose identities of terrorists

CAIRO – 9 March 2023: President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi attended Thursday the Egyptian Armed Forces' ceremony held on the occasion of “Martyr Day,” and warned of the ultimatum risk of terrorism in his speech, reflecting back on the war of terror the country waged in the aftermath of 2011 Arab Spring.  

 “In 2019, I was deputy chief of the intelligence. At the time, we detected a huge terrorist infrastructure that included both explosives and trained individuals in Sinai. That structure began to form before 2005. Its elimination required both the Army and the Police whereas the former wasn’t allowed beyond a certain point according to the [peace] treaty. That was a big crisis as they could attack Israel. We made the necessary arrangements with the Israelis to deploy the Army in the designated areas. Since then, the size of troops has been growing,” President Sisi said.

“The war on terror since 2011 has not been easy. When I assumed office, there was two scenarios. One was mobilizing all resources towards the war. The other was engaging in war and development in tandem. We pursued the latter...We spent at least LE1 billion per month for 90 months,” the president added.

“We will launch an exhibition of that war [on terrorism] showing the photos and names of those criminals. That war occurred as a consequence of 2011 [revolution]. Don’t allow this to happen again. Don’t use the current economic crisis as a measurement of the [performance] of the state. Remember what we were doing [economically] in 2011. We were at the risk of civil war,” the Egyptian chief of state noted.

President Sisi had addressed earlier in the ceremony the families of martyrs saying that they would witness a North Sinai that would be completely different from the terrorist-infested area that it was in the past few years.

The president then addressed all Egyptians stipulating that they should have the necessary awareness to not repeat the cycle of destruction the country sustained in the past decade

"The price of the eradication of terrorism has been the blood and souls of our children," President Sisi said stressing that also the injured would not be forgotten

A documentary that was streamed during the ceremony highlighted that the Egyptian Armed Forces had demolished tens of thousands of tunnels that were dug in the border areas of North Sinai and that were used for smuggling and terrorist infirtlation.

As it is customary to every ceremony, the president honored the families of martyrs who were serving at the Egyptian Armed Forces and the Police.