A suicide bomber rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into a police base in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula on Tuesday, killing a civilian and wounding 24 policemen.

A suicide bomber rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into a police base in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula on Tuesday, killing a civilian and wounding 24 policemen, security and health officials said.

The early morning attack took place in the North Sinai provincial capital of El-Arish, the officials said.

"The bomber drove a water tanker filled with explosives into the rear gate of the base," a security official said.

"As the vehicle approached, police fired on it, detonating the explosives inside."

Extremists militants have stepped up attacks in the peninsula since the army's ouster of the Muslim Brotherhood’s president Mohammad Mursi by the in July 2013 then army chief and now president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.