The Egyptian army killed on Sunday five members of the al-Qaida-linked terror group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, and arrested 15 others in the Sinai Peninsula, military sources told Xinhua.

The five were killed during clashes with army commando forces in the North Sinai city of Sheikh Zuweid, the sources said.

According to the sources, three of the 15 arrested terrorists are prominent leaders of the group who are involved in deadly attacks that targeted the military in Sinai's Rafah City and left dozens soldiers killed and injured.

The army also seized machine guns, telecommunication tools and hand grenades used by the militants.

The Egyptian army intensified anti-terror military operations and raised alert level in Sinai in the wake of a car-bomb attack that killed around 30 Egyptian soldiers in late October.

Egypt has been facing a rising wave of terrorism since the ouster of former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi by the military in July last year following mass protests against his one-year rule.

The following crackdown on Morsi's supporters has left about 1,000 killed and thousands more injured and arrested. Anti-government attacks have since extended from the restive Sinai to Cairo and other provinces across the country.

The Sinai-based Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, which was founded in 2011 and claimed responsibility for dozens of deadly attacks against Egypt's military and police personnel, was designated by an Egyptian court verdict as a terror group in April.

The United States also blacklisted Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis as a terror group earlier this year.