Assailants used automatic weapons to kill Egyptian Brigadier General Adel Rajaaie before fleeing the scene in a car, Rajaaie's widow Samia Zain El Abedeen said Saturday.

"Minutes after he left the house I heard gunfire, I went out to find him covered in blood ... he took a lot of bullets," she told the Reuters news agency.

"He died instantly."

Rajaaie was a senior commander in Egypt, which has been ruled by a military regime since the fall of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi in 2013. He is the highest-ranking officer to be killed since the takeover.

Fighting in Sinai

Rajaaie's sister-in-law, Huda Zein El Abedeen, said the 52-year-old general was killed on Saturday morning while leaving his home outside Cairo to go to work.

"I can't tell you if it was six or 12 bullets. It was before he could get into his car," El Abedeen told AFP.

The Egyptian army also confirmed Rajaaie's death. A relatively unknown group calling itself Louwaa el Thawra, or the Revolution Brigade, has claimed responsibility for the assassination. The claim could not be immediately verified.

Rajaaie commanded an armored division deployed in northern Sinai, where hundreds of soldiers and policemen have been killed battling jihadists loyal to the so-called "Islamic State."

dj/cmk (AFP, Reuters)