Egyptian Attorney-General Abdel Meguid Mahmoud held a meeting on Tuesday at which investigators into the New Year's Eve church bombing in Alexandria informed him that the bomber had been killed in the explosion and his body torn apart by the force of the blast. They also reportedly told Mahmoud that the bomb used in the attack had not been thrown to the floor, but rather had detonated in the bomber's hand or was placed on top of a car parked nearby, since no blast marks were found on the floor of the church. They also pointed to holes in the walls of the church and a nearby mosque, asserting that the perpetrator of the attack had carried the bomb in a handbag, parts of which could be found at the crime scene. The bomb reportedly contained half a kilogram of TNT along with another half kilogram of shrapnel, the latter of which was found at the crime scene and in victim's bodies. According to forensic investigators, the bomb also contained electric circuits intended to augment the explosion and cause shrapnel to fly at a horizontal--rather than vertical--trajectory. A security source said the method employed by the bomber was the same as that used in the bombing of a church in Cairo's Nozha district last year that wounded three people. Police are currently investigating all hotel guests in Alexandria during the month of December, as well as those who rented apartments in the area during the same period. Translated from the Arabic Edition.
