ISIL affiliate claims the killing of two policemen in Cairo suburb

Egypt is fighting a wave of militancy against security forces which started in the remote regions of the Sinai, but is increasingly spreading closer to the capital and focusing on targets previously considered safe such tourist resorts on the Red Sea.

Three European tourists were stabbed by two suspected Islamic State militants who attacked a hotel in Hurghada late on Friday.

They came under fire by unidentified armed men, the interior ministry said.

Security sources said the attackers had arrived by sea and also carried a gun and a suicide belt.

Security forces shot and killed one knifeman.

Tourism Minister Hisham Zaazou said the government would announce additional security measures to safeguard tourists after Friday’s attack, which wounded two Austrians and a Swede in the resort of Hurghada.

“But I will say that British holidaymakers are very resilient”.

The attackers were aiming to kidnap tourists, according to local reports.

Renata and Wilhelm Weisslein, both 72, and Sammie Olovsson, 27, were in stable condition Saturday, an Egyptian hospital official told the Associated Press.

Adding that he’d been very ‘lucky that I could avert some fatal stab wound to the chest.

Sean Tipton of Abta, the association of travel agents and tour operators, said Egypt has already suffered a “significant drop-off” in tourism in the wake of terror attacks. Police shot dead one of the knife-wielding attackers and wounded another, saying one of them was also carrying a “sound gun”.

“I got up a few times and when I saw it was clear, I ran out on the street and tried to get hold of an ambulance”.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the Cairo attack in a statement posted on messaging service Telegram.

A member of the hotel’s management staff who witnessed the incident said the attackers sneaked into the Bella Vista from a hotel next door, accessing the facility from the beach.

The assailants used explosives to remotely blow up the pipeline at Al-Midan area, about 15 km from the entrance of Arish city, the source said, expecting the perpetrators belong to the Sinai-based Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM) militant group, which has changed its name to “Sinai State” and declared loyalty to the regional IS militant group.