Four Egyptian policemen were killed on Wednesday when gunmen fired at a patrol car in the northern Sinai city of al-Arish, state newspaper Al-Ahram reported.

Authorities in Arish, the capital of North Sinai province, were on the hunt for the attackers, the paper said.

Attacks on security forces have been frequent in Egypt since the army, led by general-turned-President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, ousted Muslim Brotherhood President Mohamed Mursi in 2013 after mass protests against his rule.

The violence has been concentrated in the Sinai Peninsula, where Egypt is fighting an insurgency but has also expanded to hit Egypt's Coptic Christians, the country's largest minority.

On Tuesday, a group of gunmen killed two police officers and wounded another in a village north of Cairo, al-Ahram had said.