Egypt arrests 32 women from prominent North Sinai tribe 

Thirty-two women from the Fawakhira tribe in North Sinai have been arrested, according to Al Jazeera Arabic.

Following the announcement of US President Donald Trump’s peace plan last week, the threat level in Sinai has been raised to the highest point. Security forces say they are pre-empting developments in the Gaza Strip.

Under the war on terror, authorities have been carrying out systematic human rights abuses against the local population in Sinai, including extrajudicial killings, land displacement and the demolition of homes.

READ: Egypt bans editors from publish Al-Azhar’s view on US ‘peace plan’

Several observers have said Egypt is preparing the peninsula for Trump’s so-called deal of the century, under which the North African state will receive $9 billion of investment.

In anticipation of resistance, Egypt has cracked down on anyone opposing the peace plan, including the son of the former acting Prime Minister Nabil Shaath and his colleague Mohamed El-Massry.

Egypt’s intelligence agency has tried to control the narrative and warned newspaper editors not to refer to the US peace proposal as the “deal of the century” but as the “peace plan”.

It also instructed editors not to focus on the religious or national elements of the plan and to emphasise the pivotal role of Egypt on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.