ISIS terror group kills prosecutor in bomb attack as Islamists release chilling video
Following their shocking attack in Tunisia, ISIS have released a new video showing militants carrying out a deadly assassination of several high profile court judges in Egypt.The brutal video comes just hours after a car bomb killed one of Egypt’s top prosecutors, Hisham Barakat.
It is thought that ISIS’s Egyptian franchise, ISIS in the Sinai province, may have been responsible for the deadly blast.
Mr Barakat had been one of the key prosecutors for referring hundreds of alleged Islamists to trial following the trial of former Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi two years ago.
Initial reports from state media claimed that Hisham Barakat had only sustained ‘light’ injuries and that was being treated in hospital.
State media claimed that Mr Barakat had suffered injuries caused by flying glass after a bomb was detonated near his convoy in Heliopolis, Cairo.
It was announced this afternoon that Mr Barakat has since died from his wounds, leading to questions over whether the prosecutor’s death will lead to a decline in the number of people being put on trial for being alleged radical Islamists.
Pictures have since emerged of the devastating bomb blast, in which a car, packed with explosives was detonated near Mr Barakat’s convoy of heavy vehicles.
Several of the Egyptian prosecutor’s guards were badly injured in the blast as well as at least one civilian, who was near when the attack happened.
An early medical report from Health ministry spokesman Hossam Abdel Ghaffar had said that Mr Barakat had escaped with a dislocated shoulder, a deep cut and a suspected broken nose.
The death of Hishaam Barakat marks the highest senior state official to be killed since President Abdel Fateh al-Sisit took power. It will be a blow for the President’s campaign to round up members of the banned organisation the Muslim Brotherhood.
The Egyptian franchise of ISIS have developed a reputation for calculated assassinations of authority figures, targeting army and security personnel as well as members of Egypt’s judiciary.
In the video, the militants approach in an unidentified vehicle. The driver speeds up near a silver car, driving in the opposite lane on the motorway.
Two militants suddenly pull out machine guns and begin to spray the silver car with bullets, shattering the glass in the windows in the hail of rounds.
The militants appear to have good knowledge of their targets, shooting the three trapped judges repeatedly from their seats in their speeding vehicle.
Gruesome close up images of their victims bodies are shown, lying in the blood stained and bullet marked car.
Speeding off along the road, the ISIS gunmen escape and are believed to remain at large.
The assassination of the judges reportedly happened in al-Arish last month, just hours after deposed Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi was sentenced to death.
The video footage has only just been released, possibly delayed as part of ISIS’s propaganda strategy to publish its harrowing videos until it can gain maximum publicity.
The brief grainy footage appears to have been filmed on a mobile phone by one of the passengers in the militant’s car.
The fresh bomb attack comes shortly after ISIS in Sinai called for more attacks in Egypt.
The renewed eruption of violence comes after six ISIS linked militants were hanged recently and the government continues to crackdown on anyone linked to the banned Muslim Brotherhood.
The new release comes only days after the Tunisian beach massacre, in which an ISIS linked gunman murdered as many as 38 holidaymakers in a shocking gun attack.
Fears remain that ISIS’s strategy to develop strong terror franchises may be taking off in the North African region, with ISIS backed militants continuing to be a threat in Libya and the worrying security problems in Tunisia.
Source: Daily Mail
