ISIS’s Egypt branch says it was behind a car-bomb explosion targeting the Italian Consulate in Cairo early this morning, according to Reuters. The Egyptian Health Ministry reports that at least one person was killed and ten injured in the attack, the first time the country’s current insurgency has targeted a foreign mission. The bomb severely damaged several floors of the building, which the Italian government says was closed at the time (no embassy staff members were injured). Egypt’s military-led government is currently grappling with a multifaceted, two-year-old insurgency that in recent weeks has stunned the nation with the assassination of the country’s top prosecutor, a suicide attack on an important tourism location in Luxor, and a dramatic assault on military forces in the volatile Sinai Peninsula. Though it is not yet known exactly why the Italian Consulate was bombed, the attack nonetheless continues a dangerous escalation of violence against Western targets in the country.
