Egypt Says Palestinian Plotted Sinai Blasts

A Palestinian refugee plotted the bombings targeting Israeli tourists in the Sinai Peninsula this month and accidentally killed himself while carrying out one of the attacks, Egyptian authorities said Monday.

Discounting the idea of Al Qaeda involvement, Egypt’s Interior Ministry said that Ayad Said Saleh was motivated by growing violence in the Gaza Strip, which his family fled in 1967, and that he carried out the attack with local residents’ help.

One car bomb devastated the Hilton hotel in Taba, yards from the Israeli border. Two others rocked tourist camps at Ras Shaitan, a coastal village 35 miles south. A total of 34 people were killed: Israelis, Egyptians, Italians and Russians.

The ministry said the attacks were masterminded by Saleh, a minibus driver born in the northern Sinai town of El Arish. Saleh, who was in his early 20s, was killed in the Taba Hilton bombing along with a fellow plotter, Egyptian Suleiman Ahmed Saleh Flayfil, 39.

The statement said that both men, identified through DNA testing, had been trying to leave the scene but that the timed explosives went off prematurely.

Two other suspects were said to be at large: Mohamed Ahmed Saleh Flayfil, Suleiman Flayfil’s brother; and Hammad Gaman Gomah Tarabeen. They were accused of carrying out the campground attacks.

Police also arrested five Egyptians accused of playing lower-level roles, including obtaining explosives and cars used in the attacks. The statement did not say when they were arrested or provide details of their capture.

The five are residents of the Sinai Peninsula, a territory Israel captured from Egypt in the 1967 Middle East War and returned in 1982 under terms of the first Israeli-Arab peace treaty.

The Interior Ministry said the three cars used in the bombings were stolen and the explosives salvaged from war armaments in the Sinai. The car bombs, according to the statement, were built using spare parts from washing machines and other equipment.

Egypt’s announcement contradicts statements by Israeli officials, who theorize the attacks were part of Al Qaeda’s campaign against the U.S. and Israel.

Israeli investigators, who were allowed access to the three crime scenes, have not commented officially on their own investigation. However, Col. Zohar Alafi, deputy director of the Israeli military’s intelligence research division, told the Israeli parliament that “this is an octopus with Al Qaeda at its heart.”