A total of 112 fighters from the so-called Ansar Beit al-Maqdis (partisans of al-Quds) group have been killed and injured and 69 others arrested in a week.

A total of 112 fighters from the so-called Ansar Beit al-Maqdis (partisans of al-Quds) group have been killed and injured and 69 others arrested in a week, the Egyptian army said Thursday.

In a Facebook statement, army spokesman said that 49 tunnel openings had been destroyed and 104 rifles and 12,500 bullets had been seized in the Sinai Peninsula, northeastern Egypt, in the past week.

The Egyptian army accuses the Ansar Beit al-Maqdis of being allied to the Muslim Brotherhood, which was branded a terrorist group by the government in December.

The Egyptian army has launched an all-out crackdown on militant groups in Sinai for several months now.

Egypt has been rocked by a series of attacks in recent months, many of which were claimed by the Ansar Beit al-Maqdis group.

The Egyptian security forces also thwarted an attempt to blow up a gas pipeline in the Sinai Peninsula.

In a Friday statement, the North Sinai Security Directorate said that three projectiles have been found.

A security source said that the projectiles were likely planned to be used in blowing up the pipeline near the pipeline in the North Sinai city of Arish.

Gas pipelines were attacked several times since the January 25 revolution that ousted long-serving president Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

In west Cairo, two Egyptian policemen were also killed on Thursday, a security source said.

The two policemen were shot in the head and the chest in Sakkara, a tourist area in western Cairo, as they manned a police checkpoint, the source told Anadolu Agency.

The attackers had fled the scene unscathed.

Security forces cordoned off the area in an attempt to arrest the attackers.
Earlier on Wednesday, four policemen were gunned down in two separate attacks in Cairo and the canal city of Ismailia.

Thursday's fatalities take to eight the number of policemen killed in the past three days.