Egypt’s military campaign against insurgents in northern Sinai is harming thousands of civilians and risks turning more people against the government, according to Human Rights Watch.

The government has evicted 3,200 families over the past two years and razed hundreds of hectares of farmland and thousands of homes in its bid to destroy smugglers’ tunnels connecting the Gaza Strip with Egypt’s northern Sinai peninsula, the rights group said in a report published on Tuesday.

“Destroying homes, neighbourhoods and livelihoods is a textbook example of how to lose a counterinsurgency campaign,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, the organisation’s director in the Middle East and north Africa.

C. Hulsman: One also hears this critique in Egypt but critique is easier then helping Egypt to find alternative ways to counter terrorism.