CAIRO, 12 April 2005 — Egyptian authorities identified the bomber who carried out last week’s deadly attack in a busy Cairo bazaar and said the bomb exploded prematurely suggesting that it may not have been a deliberate suicide operation. The bomber, 24-year old Hassan Raafat Ahmed Bishindi, lived in the north Cairo suburb of Shubra El-Kheima and was a first year engineering student at Zagazig University in the east of the Nile Delta.
“After his father died in August last year, he started to be excessively committed to certain religiously extremist ideas and tried to force his family not to watch television and also showed signs of emotion and tension about the course of events internationally and regionally — a source of dispute between him and his mother,” said a statement released by the Ministry of Interior yesterday. “Few months before the blast he also showed great interest in the ideologies of militant Islamists.” The ministry said that while the perpetrator, who was carrying a leather bag containing about 6.5 pounds of explosives and a large quantity of nails, was preparing the bomb his hand accidentally touched it and triggered the blast prematurely.
Bishindi’s maternal uncle who works for the Ministry of Education said: “The DNA of my sister matched with that of the bomber’s and police have detained her and her two sons for questioning,” he told Arab News.
Security sources said Bishindi’s brother, Hassan, was also involved in the attack. “His brother has provided valuable information. He has admitted that he helped his brother in preparing the bomb with another two people,” said the sources. “The other two are also engineering students from the same university,” they added.
Meanwhile, the three suspects were referred yesterday to the Supreme Emergency State Police for further investigation.
