IS says it attacked Israeli tourist bus in Cairo

The Islamic State group on Friday claimed to have staged an attack on an Israeli tourist bus in Cairo which happened a day earlier. 

IS said a "security detachment" had targeted a "tourist bus carrying Jews" and that there were "killed and wounded in the ranks of the Jews and hotel security forces"

However, officials and witnesses have said that vandals were behind the incident and that no one was injured. 

According to officials and witnesses, who spoke to the media on Thursday, a gang of youths hurled fireworks and fired birdshot at a bus and police guarding the hotel without hurting anyone. 

There was no reference to Jews, but to Palestinian citizens of Israel, who were staying at the Three Pyramids Hotel. Photos of tourists leaving the hotel while waving and smiling for the press were taken shortly after the incident. 

A security official said about 40 tourists were inside waiting to board a bus when the attack occurred.

The interior ministry said unknown assailants had gathered outside the hotel and targeted police guarding it, who fired back.

It added that one of the attackers was arrested.

An AFP photographer said bits of the facade and the bus's windows had been broken.

The IS statement, published online, claimed the attack was in response to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's call "to target the Jews everywhere".

In an audio message released on 26 December, Baghdadi pledged to attack Israel, saying IS has "not forgotten Palestine for a single moment".

Egypt, which has fought several wars with Israel, is one of only two Arab nations, along with Jordan, to have signed a peace treaty with Israel. 

The country has been roiled by mainly militant violence since the army ousted Egypt's first democrtaically elected president Mohamed Morsi, who hails from the country's now banned Muslim Brotherhood organisation, in 2013.

The attacks have largely focused on security forces in reprisal for a fierce crackdown on Morsi supporters.

The Egyptian branch of the Islamic State militant group on Thursday said it had bombed a pipeline that carries gas to Jordan and to a major industrial zone in north Sinai.

Security sources confirmed that attackers set off explosive devices under the pipeline close to Al-Midan village in the north of the peninsula. They said the blasts did not cause any casualties.

North Sinai is a bastion of the "Sinai Province" group, the Egyptian affiliate of IS.

In a message posted on Twitter and signed by "Sinai Province", the militants claimed responsibility for the attack.

"By the name of God, not a drop of gas will reach Jordan until the caliphate gives its permission," the statement said.