The identity of the Dahab bombers remains a mystery, report Niveen Wahish and Sherine Abdel-Razek It was on 24 April, a day before the national holiday marking the handover of Sinai to Egypt that terrorists chose to attack the popular resort town of Dahab. It was on 23 July, the holiday marking the 1952 Revolution, that they launched an attack last year and before that, in 2004, on 7 October, a day after the holiday marking the war of 1973. The timing of the attacks in Taba, Sharm El-Sheikh and now Dahab are unlikely to be a coincidence: they were selected, says former head of state security Fouad Allam, to "deliver a message". The already tense situation in Sinai following the Dahab attacks was further heightened yesterday when two suicide bombers struck near a Multinational Peacekeeping Forces base close to the Gaza border. Allam believes that those responsible for the Dahab bombings belong to the same group that attacked Taba and Sharm El-Sheikh. "The group clearly differs from those that emerged in the eighties," says Allam. While militant groups like Jihad and Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya targeted government symbols in their attempts to overthrow the regime, this new group is targeting civilians. "They are choosing locations and times when it is mostly locals and Egyptian tourists who are around." And given that none of the earlier groups ever staged attacks in Sinai, Allam believes the perpetrators of the recent attacks hail from the peninsula and that the group draws its support mostly from locals. Nabil Abdel-Fattah, a senior political analyst at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, concurs, pointing out that those behind the Dahab bombings obviously know their way around and are able to circumvent the many checkpoints set up across the peninsula in the wake of last July's Sharm El-Sheikh blasts. Amr El-Chobaky, also from Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, believes the bombers operate as mobile cells and seem to lack any clear long-term strategy: "They undertake small missions and their main objective appears to be to embarrass and thus damage the regime." But even if it turns out that locals carried out the bombings there are still those that believe foreign hands, including Al-Qaeda, may be involved. It is too early, says Abdel-Fattah, to tell whether or not they have any direct links to Al-Qaeda but "all Islamic radical movements build on each other's experiences and use techniques developed in Afghanistan, Iraq, Chechnya and the Balkans." While tactics may appear similar, says Allam, this is not the same as establishing any direct link. Al-Qaeda and other known groups, he points out, tend to claim responsibility for operations while the three attacks in Sinai have been followed by silence. In video and audio tapes Bin Laden and Ayman El-Zawahry have not once mentioned the attacks in Egypt and the group behind them does not appear to have the technological or financial resources associated with Al-Qaeda: "They are," says Allam, "using limited amounts of explosives and primitive bombs." While conspiracy theorists were quick to suggest Israel may have had a hand in the incidents, pointing out that each attack has been preceded by warnings to Israelis not to travel to Sinai, Allam sees such possible involvement as restricted to attempts to stir the people of Sinai against the Egyptian government. Yet according to at least one political analyst, who asked that his name be withheld, "Israeli intelligence stands to benefit from having tourists in Egypt." Any official travel warnings, he stresses, are unlikely to be anything more than routine advice to avoid crowded areas. And while the US and Israel may feed on the political instability created by such bombings, says Abdel-Fattah, neither would jeopardise their international image by becoming directly involved. Whoever the perpetrators eventually turn out to be the third attack in Sinai in less than 18 months has exposed major holes in the peninsula's security regime, as well as in the management of the ensuing crises. That the bombers can seemingly avoid checkpoints with ease suggests not only inefficiency on the part of those in charge of security but knowledge on the attackers' part of the deployment of security personnel, says Abdel-Fattah. The heavy-handed treatment meted out to Sinai's Bedouins following the two previous attacks, says El-Chobaky, is almost certain to have antagonised the local population. Nor does the mass detention of suspects, and reported torture of their families, invite confidence in the precision of intelligence gathering in the area. El-Chobaky predicts that the Bedouins will now face a replay of government tactics in dealing with Islamic Jihad in the 1980s -- tactics that, though ultimately successful, failed to head off 10 years of sporadic attacks. There is an urgent need, argues Allam, to upgrade security operations and recruit better educated officers, as well as employ more advanced technology. "This may be costly," he says, "but it is a fraction of what Egypt has lost in tourist revenues over the past 30 years." If there is no agreement over the identity or affiliations of the attackers as yet, commentators concur on one thing: the Dahab bombings will inevitably be used as a green light to extend the state of emergency. The security apparatus "is here to protect the regime, and not the people," says an anonymous analyst, "and the bombings will be used to distract attention from the failure of the government to properly tackle sectarian conflict in Alexandria and recent police attacks against judges". Following the Dahab bombings and the uncovering of Al-Taefa Al-Mansoura, an allegedly Jihadist cell operating on Cairo, Abdel-Fattah fully expects the regime to adopt a much more hard-line policy against opposition groups.
