An injured Egyptian soldier has been kidnapped from an ambulance and later killed by ISIL-affiliated militants operating in the restive Sinai Peninsula, security officials say.

On Friday, militants from Velayat Sinai (Sinai Province), previously known as Ansar Bait al-Maqdis, attacked the ambulance carrying the wounded soldier south of the town of Sheikh Zuweid in Sinai and abducted him, officials said.

Searching the area, Egyptian security forces later found the dead body of the soldier, who had been wounded in an earlier clash with the militants.

The Velayat Sinai, who pledged allegiance to the Takfiri ISIL terrorist group last November, claimed responsibility for the killing of the soldier.

Our soldiers “stopped an ambulance in an ambush and killed" the wounded Egyptian soldier, the terror group said on a Twitter account.

Since the ouster of Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically elected president, in July 2013, gunmen have launched numerous terrorist attacks in the Sinai Peninsula, which has long been considered a safe haven for militants.

A state of emergency has been declared in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula since a militant attack on an Egyptian army checkpoint killed more than 30 soldiers in October 2014.