Creeping insecurity in the Sinai Peninsula punctuated by spectacular attacks had generated months of tension between the Egyptian army and the Muslim Brotherhood-linked government of then-president President Mohammed Morsi, according to a new report by the Associated Press. Citing numerous interviews describing the thinking of the military in genereral, and the country’s military chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in particular, the overarching impression is one of increased nervousness over cozy relations between the Brotherhood and various strands of Islamists and Salafists:

The reason, the officials said, was because of profound policy differences with Morsi. El-Sissi saw him as dangerously mismanaging a wave of protests early in the year that saw dozens killed by security forces. More significantly, however, the military also worried that Morsi was giving a free hand to Islamic militants in the Sinai Peninsula, ordering el-Sissi to stop crackdowns on jihadis who had killed Egyptian soldiers and were escalating a campaign of violence…

And at root, the military establishment has historically had little tolerance for the Muslim Brotherhood, Morsi’s Islamist group. The military leadership has long held the conviction that the group puts its regional Islamist ambitions above Egypt’s security interests. Its alliances with Gaza’s Hamas rulers and other Islamist groups alarmed the military, which believed Gaza militants were involved in Sinai violence. The officials said the military leadership also believed the Brotherhood was trying to co-opt commanders to turn against el-Sissi.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s ties to Hamas, which the military blames for violence in Egypt stretching back to the 2011 overthrow of then-president Hosni Mubarak, came in for particular attention.

Tensions between the Palestinian faction and the army are ongoing. One top army commander this week claimed that Hamas is continuing to supply heavy weapons to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt for use against Egyptian soldiers and civilians. Major General Osama Askar gestured toward the recent interception of 19 Grad rockets, of the same brand used by Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades in Gaza, which were en route to Cairo. He did  not mince words:

“The confiscated rockets were enough to destroy an entire neighborhood, indicating they were on their way to be used in terror activities against the Egyptian people,” Askar told the Egyptian news site Aswat Masriya. He added that smuggled army uniforms captured by his troops last Sunday “were enough for an entire army.”

The interception comes amid a months-long campaign by the army to demolish the underground smuggling tunnels between the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and the Egyptian-controlled Sinai.

[Photo: Matanya / Wiki Commons]