CAIRO, July 14 (Reuters) - Gunmen ambushed an Egyptian security checkpoint on Friday, opening fire on a car and killing five policemen in an area just south of the capital, the state-run MENA news agency and the Interior Ministry said. Three gunmen on a motorbike attacked police in al-Badrasheen area of Giza province, 30 km (20 miles) south of Cairo, killing two officers and three conscripts, the agency said citing a security source. CBC Extra, a privately owned Egyptian TV network, said surveillance cameras in a gas station near the site of the attack showed the attackers disguised in police uniforms and that they stopped the police vehicle before opening fire. No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but Egyptian security forces have been battling the local affiliate of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) in the northern Sinai area and attacks have spread to other parts of Egypt. The violence has been concentrated in the northern Sinai Peninsula, but there have also been several attacks on the mainland, including in the capital. Last Friday, IS claimed responsibility for a stunning attack on a remote Egyptian army outpost in the Sinai Peninsula with a suicide car bomb and heavy machine gun fire Friday, killing at least 23 soldiers. The Interior Ministry said that the militants sprayed the policemen's vehicle with bullets from machine guns as the security force was on the move to patrol the surroundings. While Hasm distances itself from attacking Egypt's Christians, the IS affiliate has concentrated its campaign on Coptic Christians, calling them the group's "favorite prey" and over the past months, suicide bombers struck three churches and a bus carrying Coptic Christians killing more than 100 people.
Gunmen shoot dead five police officers near Giza.