Insurgents Seize Egyptian Town

Two days after Egypt's attorney general was killed in a precisely executed car bombing, Islamists affiliated with the Islamic State carried out a series of attacks that left more than 100 soldiers and police officers dead.

The New York Times reports that calculated assault on the town of Sheik Zuwaid left police trapped in their stations and ambulances immobile as roads were booby trapped and militants rode about on motorcycles. The situation was so dire that the Egyptian military felt it had no choice but to use war planes on its own territory.

While the attack on Sheik Zuwaid and the attorney general were orchestrated by the Egyptian branch of ISIS, the Egyptian government is also battling a variety of other armed groups. Violence has been a regular feature in the country since the Muslim Brotherhood, which rejects violence, was thrown from power after winning an election.

The Sinai Peninsula, where Sheik Zuwaid is located, is a desert area adjacent to the West Bank and Israel. It has been the focus of the insurgency since the military took power and established a dictatorship that shoots protesters in the street and regularly tortures its opponents, Islamist or secular.

While violence in the region is not a new phenomenon, it has not occurred on such a coordinated or large scale before.

The violence has picked up in intensity particularly since the government gave Mohammed Morsi, the deposed Muslim Brotherhood president, a death sentence. Just hours after the sentence was handed down, three judges were killed in the Sinai.

The fight for Sheik Zuwaid is still ongoing, and would represent a major territorial gain for the Islamists, who already control several small pockets of the peninsula.