Satellite image of the Sinai.

JNS.org – Israel should do all it can to help the new secular government in Egypt beat the Muslim Brotherhood, even if that means amending the Military Annex of the Camp David peace accords to allow more Egyptian military assets into the Sinai Peninsula, the former director of the Israeli Counter-Terrorism Bureau in the Prime Minister’s Office Brig. Gen. (Res.) Nitzan Nuriel told Army Radio on Sunday.

A new Islamist terrorist group in the Sinai calling itself Ansar al-Shariah announced its formation on Friday, Israel Hayom reported. The group, in a statement posted on an online forum for terrorists, said it would gather arms and start training its members.

Israeli Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman MK Avigdor Lieberman (Likud-Beytenu) warned over the weekend that jihadists in the Sinai are taking advantage of the current turmoil in Egypt to stage attacks on Israel. The Sinai-based Sunni terrorist group Jamaat Ansar Bayt Al-Maqdis took responsibility for a rocket attack on Eilat last Thursday.

“What is transpiring in Egypt should in no doubt be worrying us,” he said. “This is our largest neighboring country, the first one we signed a peace agreement with, and clearly instability over there carries implications for the entire region.”