Six members of Tunisia’s security forces were killed Sunday in a “terrorist attack” near the border with Algeria, the interior ministry said, the country’s deadliest such incident in over two years.

A national guard border patrol in the Ain Sultan area of the Jenduba border province “was hit in a landmine ambush that killed six agents” at 11:45 a.m. (1045 GMT), the ministry said in a statement.

Ministry spokesman Gen. Sufyan al-Zaq said the blast was a “terrorist attack” and that assailants had “opened fire on security forces” after the mine exploded.

“Combing operations” were underway, said Zaq, who had earlier told AFP that eight guards were killed in the attack.

No group has claimed the attack, which took place in a mountainous border area where the al-Qaida-linked Okba Ibn Nafaa Battalion and the Tunisian branch of the Islamic State group, Jund al-Khilafa (Soldiers of the Caliphate), are active.

Sunday’s assault marks the first major attack in Tunisia since a March 2016 attack on security installations in the town of Ben Guerdane on the Libyan border.

That attack killed 13 security forces and seven civilians.

The latest incident comes as Tunisia is targeting its best tourist season since visitor numbers plummeted in the wake of a string of deadly jihadist attacks in 2015.

Tunisia’s tourism industry was devastated by those attacks, which included one at the National Bardo museum in Tunis and another targeting a beach resort in Sousse that together killed 59 foreign tourists and a Tunisian guard.

In May, Tourism Minister Selma Elloumi Rekik said the industry had made a “real recovery.

“People are coming back to Tunisia because there is security … we are at the same level (of security) as any European city,” she said.

Since the 2011 uprising that toppled dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, jihadist attacks in Tunisia have killed dozens of members of the security forces and foreign tourists.

Since Ben Ali’s fall, “at least 127 militants and 118 soldiers, national guardsmen, and police officers have been killed in the northwest”, according to figures compiled by analyst Matt Herbert and published in June by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“This new attack shows that there are still pockets where security problems have not been solved,” he told AFP on Sunday, while stressing “the vast majority of Tunisia remains safe.

The country has been under a state of emergency since November 2015, when an IS-claimed suicide bombing in Tunis killed 12 presidential guards.

The General Command of the Egyptian Armed Forces on Tuesday issued communiqué no. 25 on recent developments in the military’s Operation Sinai 2018, like reported by ahram.org.eg.

The armed forces launched Operation Sinai 2018 in February to target terrorist and criminal elements and organizations in north and central Sinai, parts of the Nile Delta and the Western Desert.

Operation Sinai 2018 involves the army, navy, border patrol, air force and police.

The 25th communiqué stated that the following results were achieved over the past days:

Egypt’s air force destroyed five vehicles and an administrative supply depot belonging to terrorist elements.

Three “takfiris”, who possessed an automatic rifle and munitions, were killed and 59 suspects were arrested in north and central Sinai.

The operations also resulted in the destruction of 12 vehicle used by terrorists in attacking security posts.

A fuel depot and a workshop used to armour vehicles used by terrorist elements were also destroyed during combing and raid missions.

The operations also destroyed 285 hideouts and a storage depo in central and north Sinai, where munitions, TNT, wireless communication devices and takfiri books were found.

Army engineers discovered and detonated ten IEDs which were planted to target troops in operation zones.

The communique added that the forces had also discovered and destroyed a number of tunnels in the city of Rafah in North Sinai.

The naval forces continue to secure the country’s seas, and to block supply lines to terrorist elements and secure strategic marine posts, the communiqué added.

A conscripted soldier was injured during fighting against terrorist elements, and two civilians were killed after an explosive device placed to target raiding units in their routes detonated.

As well, border patrol forces on the western strategic front discovered a large number of birdshot rifles, three sniper rifles, an automatic rifle, and hundreds of bullets.

On the same front, the border patrol forces also discovered and confiscated 1,928 kilograms of cannabis, 3 million drug pills, 66 gold items, and eight 4×4 vehicles used in smuggling operations.

The communique explained that these operations come as part “of the sacrifices rendered by the men of the armed forces and the police in chasing and routing the terrorist elements, and to buttress the capacity to secure land and sea borders in all strategic directions.”

The central bureau for judiciary investigations (BCJI), under the general directorate for territory surveillance, arrested four individuals linked to the Islamic State terrorist organization (ISIS) and operating in the cities of Casablanca, Tangier, Nador and Tiznit, says the Interior ministry.

In addition to their total adherence to ISIS’s destructive agenda and propaganda actions in favor of this terrorist organization, the investigations carried out by the security services revealed that the arrested members were acquiring skills in the manufacture of explosives to commit terrorist operations in the Kingdom, the ministry points out in a statement.

The Israeli military sent additional tanks and artillery cannons to the Syrian border on Sunday in light of a renewed offensive by dictator Bashar Assad and the Russian military against the remaining rebel holdouts in the country’s southwest, the army said according to toi.com.

The reinforcements were sent to the Israel Defense Forces’ 210th Bashan Division, which guards the Golan Heights, the army said.

“This was [done] as part of IDF preparations and preparedness in light of developments in the Syrian Golan Heights near the border,” the IDF said in a statement.

The military vowed a “determined response” to any strike — deliberate or accidental — that hits Israeli territory from Syria.

“The IDF sees great importance in maintaining the armistice agreement between Israel and Syria from 1974,” the army said.

“The IDF will continue to uphold its principle of non-involvement in what is happening in Syria, alongside a policy of delivering a determined response to violations of the sovereignty of the State of Israel and threats to its citizens,” the IDF said.

Since the renewed campaign by Assad’s forces, with aerial support from Russia and ground assistance from Iran-backed militias, began earlier this month against rebel-held towns in the Daraa province, which abuts Israel and Jordan, some 160,000 Syrian nationals have fled their homes and traveled to the borders of the two countries, seeking refuge.

Both Israel and Jordan have stated that they will not accept refugees, but have provided humanitarian aid to the displaced people.

Last week, the IDF announced it had delivered several tons of humanitarian aid — food, clothes, medicine — to southern Syria in light of the deteriorating situation in the hastily erected displaced person camps near the border.

Israel on Friday night also brought in six injured Syrians, four of them children orphaned in the Syrian-Russian attacks, for medical treatment in Israeli hospitals.

“Israel has been giving humanitarian aid for years and will continue now in light of the need for it,” the army said.

On Sunday morning, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated that Israel would provide assistance, but not allow refugees into Israel.

“We will continue to defend our borders. We will extend humanitarian assistance to the extent of our abilities. We will not allow entry into our territory and we will demand that the 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement with the Syrian army be strictly upheld,” Netanyahu said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting.

The prime minister added that he, the defense minister and the IDF chief of staff were all in constant contact with the United States and Russia — the two main powerbrokers in Syria — about the fighting in the country’s southwest.

Since June 19, backed by Russia, the Damascus regime has carried out a deadly bombing campaign in southern Syria as it pushes to retake the strategic area bordering Jordan and the Israeli Golan Heights.

As of Saturday, government forces controlled more than half of Daraa, up from just 30 percent at the start of the operation, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said.

Eight towns in the province returned to regime control under Russia-brokered deals, the Observatory said.

That came “after talks in each town between Russian generals as well as local notables and remaining rebels,” Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.

The so-called “reconciliation” deals for the towns’ surrender are the latest in a string of such agreements across the country that have seen the government retake opposition-held areas, often after devastating air and ground offensives.

Retaking the whole of Daraa province would be a symbolic victory for the regime, as it is seen as the cradle of the anti-Assad uprising seven years ago that spiraled into civil war.

Regime forces continued to bombard other parts of Daraa province on Saturday, with airstrikes killing at least 15 civilians, according to the Observatory.

Unidentified airstrikes killed 10 civilians including five children in the rebel-held town of Al-Sahwa, the Britain-based monitor said.

The recent escalation comes despite Daraa and opposition-held parts of neighboring Quneitra province being included in a so-called “de-escalation zone” agreed on by Russia, the United States and Jordan last year.

Syria’s main opposition group, the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC), implored the international community to speak out against the violence.

“We call on the international community to condemn the brutal breaching of the de-escalation zone… and take all possible measures to halt this assault on our people,” SNC spokesman Yahya al-Aridi said in a statement.

In total, 115 civilians have been killed in regime bombardment on the province since June 19. In that same period, 96 pro-regime fighters and at least 59 rebels have lost their lives.

The spike in violence in Daraa over the past two weeks has forced around 160,000 people to flee their homes, according to initial United Nations estimates.

These include around 20,000 to areas near the Naseeb border crossing with Jordan, a country that already hosts more than 650,000 registered Syrian refugees and says the actual figure is closer to 1.3 million. Thousands more have fled to the border with Israel on the Golan Heights.

Amman has said it cannot open its frontier to any more Syrians fleeing the seven-year conflict, but on Saturday announced it had sent aid across the border to the displaced.

More than 350,000 people have been killed in Syria since the war started in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.

Egypt’s Interior Ministry says its forces have killed six militants in a raid on their hideout in Beheira province, north of Cairo, like reported by dailymail.co.uk.

The ministry said in a statement Thursday the militants belonged to Hasm, a group it considers to be a splinter of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. It said two others were arrested.

On Wednesday, a security official said four militants were killed in a shootout in southern Assiut province. The ministry confirmed those fatalities in Thursday’s statement.

The ministry said the militants killed in both raids were behind an explosion that targeted the convoy of Alexandria’s former security chief in March. The official survived but two policemen were killed.

Hasm routinely targets security personnel. Militant attacks have surged in Egypt since the 2013 military ouster of an elected Islamist president.

Incriminating images show the terrorist group is “spearheading” the campaign of incendiary and explosive balloons and is launching them from its positions in Gaza • Arson attacks persist Sunday with some 30 fires in various locations in Israel’s south.

The IDF on Sunday revealed the operational methods behind Hamas’ cross-border arson campaign and issued incriminating photos proving that the terrorist group launches incendiary devices and explosive balloons from its positions in Gaza.

The IDF said in a statement that the flaming kites and exploding balloons that have been terrorizing Israeli communities surrounding the Gaza border in recent weeks are prepared in bulk by Hamas operatives on the orders of their commanders.

“This arson terrorism is an intentional and well-timed act of terror perpetrated by the terrorist organization Hamas,” the IDF statement said. “Hamas is spearheading the explosive and incendiary kite phenomenon, and it is [Hamas] that is responsible for launching them [into Israel] and therefore Hamas bears the responsibility for this terrorism.”

“After it initially began as a grassroots terror phenomenon, in recent weeks we have seen Hamas lead the efforts as an organized campaign,” the army said.

The IDF also released names and photographs of some of the members of the arson terror cells.

Meanwhile, the arson attacks persisted on Sunday with some 30 fires in numerous locations in southern Israel, near the Gaza border. Two explosive balloons were found in the Merhavim Regional Council.

In response to the arson attacks, the IDF targeted a vehicle used by an arson cell operating in southern Gaza, and a truck used by another Hamas cell to make incendiary and explosive balloons. According to reports from Gaza, three Palestinians were wounded in the IDF strikes.

Palestinian media outlets in Gaza also said a Hamas position in the coastal enclave was destroyed in a separate IDF attack.

Also Sunday, a Palestinian demonstrator, who was wounded by IDF fire during a Gaza border protest on Friday, succumbed to his wounds, Palestinian sources said.

‘A solution has to be found’

State Comptroller Yosef Shapira visited Gaza-adjacent communities on Sunday along with MK Haim Jelin from Yesh Atid.

“We came here to show support for the residents and lend them strength,” Shapira said, amid the devastating arson wave. “This isn’t a war in military terms but it is a daily battle nonetheless. The children breathe in the smoke from these fires, and the damage gets worse with each passing day. A solution to put an end to this matter has to be found.”

Agriculture Minister Uri Ariel also toured the Gaza area and listened to farmers talk about the challenges they face.

“I came here to be with the incredible farmers; this is Zionism in 2018 at its best. We will check with [Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon] how to help the farmers here. The [Agriculture Ministry] is helping and will help to keep [the farmers] strong,” Ariel said.

Discussing ways to combat the kite terror, Ariel said those who launch flaming kites should be targeted by the military.

“Whoever wages terror against Israel should be shot; terror is terror is terror,” he said. “Those who harm Israel and its citizens shouldn’t come away clean. You don’t need to kill, hitting them is enough. After the first 10 [who are hit], there probably won’t be an 11th.”

Algerian Foreign Minister Abdelkader Messahel reiterated Algeria’s willingness to share its experience in the fight against extremism and terrorism, like reported by xinhuanet.com.

Messahel made the remarks at the opening of the third regional conversations for the prevention of violent extremism in the capital Algiers.

He noted that the event aims to exchange good practices and share experience in which Algeria is committed at different levels.

Messahel said the ultimate goal of such initiatives is to mobilize the collective effort of different countries and strengthen their capacities to fight this borderless threat.

He said the spread of radicalization and violent extremism in some parts of Africa is facilitated by the combination of social networks and the financial vulnerability of young people.

Some 60 participants from the Sahel-Saharan region are taking part in these conversations. The previous two conversations took place in Senegal’s Dakar in 2016 and in Chad’s N’Djamena in 2017.

Israel is prepared for a major ground operation in the Gaza Strip, security officials said Wednesday, if Hamas continues to escalate tensions along the border, like reported by inn.com.

Overnight, terrorists operating out of the Strip fired 45 rockets and mortars at Israeli towns in the western Negev.

At least three of the rockets exploded in Israeli towns in the Eshkol Regional Council near the border.

While there were no reports of injuries, several buildings sustained damage in the attacks.

One of the rockets landed next to an Israeli kindergarten.

The attacks escalated an already tense situation along the Israel-Gaza border.

From March 30th through early June, thousands of rioters gathered almost daily opposite the Israeli security fence, clashing with Israeli soldiers and attempting to breach the border.

In recent weeks, the rioters have shifted from direct clashes with IDF personnel to arson attacks using “terror kites” and incendiary balloons armed with improvised explosive devices and firebombs.

Terrorists in the Gaza Strip have launched thousands of the balloons and kites into Israeli territory, causing millions of dollars in property damage.

Overnight, Israel Air Force fighter jets struck Hamas targets across the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the recent attacks and wave of arsons.

Senior IDF officials say Israel is prepared for further escalations, including a possible ground operation inside of Gaza, if Hamas continues the attacks.

“The army is ready for a wide-reaching operation inside of Gaza if Hamas continues to create new rules [in the conflict],” IDF sources said, according to a report by Channel 2 on Wednesday.

The statement comes shortly after senior security officials, including IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot, held a briefing on the security situation along the Gaza border, following last night’s rocket attacks and Israel’s airstrikes.

The briefing emphasized Israel’s military readiness for a major operation should Hamas not clamp down on the attacks.

“If Hamas thinks that Israel will hesitate to enter [the Strip] for a conflict, it is mistaken,” an official said during the briefing.”

Libya’s Es Sider oil port was shut due to armed clashes nearby and at least one storage tank in the neighbouring Ras Lanuf terminal was set alight, an engineer in the area said according to reuters.com.

Loadings were suspended at Ras Lanuf, according to a local shipping agent.

The clashes between forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) and rival armed groups were taking place south of Ras Lanuf, where the LNA was targeting its rivals with air strikes, local sources said.

The LNA took control of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf along with other oil ports in Libya’s oil crescent in 2016, allowing them to reopen after a long blockade.

Storage tanks at both terminals were badly damaged in previous fighting and have yet to be repaired, though there has been regular loadings from Es Sider.

A military source said the three-pronged attack was launched by the Benghazi Defence Brigades (BDB), a group that has previously tried to take the oil crescent and advance on Benghazi, which has been fully controlled by Haftar since late last year.

The clashes were not affecting any oilfields, the source said.

A local resident said he had heard the sound of heavy clashes and air strikes at dawn and had seen a large fire at the Ras Lanuf tank farm.

Libya’s oil production recovered last year to just over 1 million barrels per day (bpd) and has been mostly stable, though it remains vulnerable to shutdowns and blockades at oil facilities.

National output is still well under the more than 1.6 million bpd Libya was producing before a 2011 uprising led to political fragmentation and armed conflict.

Libya’s eastern-based army confirmed that its air force carried out three airstrikes on terrorist targets near the city of Sirte, some 450 km east of the capital Tripoli, like reported by xinhuanet.com.

After monitoring al-Qaida terrorists who fled from Benghazi, Libyan air force fighter jets carried out an airstrike in the morning and two others in the afternoon on terror positions 60 km south of Sirte, the military spokesman Ahmad Mismari said in a statement.

“The airstrikes were precise and our fighter jets returned to their bases safely,” Mismari added.

Islamic State terrorists are active in the desert of Sirte as well as southern Libya, which is dominated by the rugged desert and valleys.

The Benghazi Defense Brigades, a coalition of extremist groups that fights the army in the eastern city Benghazi, has launched several attacks in eastern cities in Libya.

In the most recent attack on the southern airbase of Brak in June 2017, 141 army soldiers were killed.

The eastern-based army, led by Gen. Khalifa Haftar, last year expelled the armed group from Jufra town, some 240 km south of Sirte, forcing them to flee into the nearby valleys and desert areas.