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Dozens of ISIL terrorists coming from Libya launched a cross-border assault on Tunisian town of Ben Guerdane Monday dawn attacking the Tunisian army and police forces and leaving at least 53 people dead.

The militants launched their cross-border attack at dawn, and residents told AFP that it was still raging after daybreak.

“I saw a lot of militants at dawn. They were running with their Kalashnikovs," Hussein, a local resident, told Reuters by telephone. "They said they were [the Islamic State group] and they came to target the army and the police."

It started with coordinated attacks on a military base and nearby police posts, the Defense and Interior Ministries said in a joint statement.

A National Guard army barracks, a government building and local hospitals in the vicinity of the Ras Ajdir border crossing and the nearby town of Ben Guerdane were targeted.

Hospital official Abdelkrim Chafroud told Agence France-Presse a 12-year-old patient was among those killed in the clashes.

The clashes reached civilian areas and the final death toll was set at 53, where 35 terrorists, 7 civilians, and 11 members of Tunisia’s security forces were reported dead according to Tunisian Interior and Defense ministries.

“This is an unprecedented attack, planned and organized, and whose goal was probably to take control of this area and to announce a new emirate,” said President Beji Caid Essebsi.

The town of Ben Gardane is 18 miles away from the Libyan border, and is close to a popular, and usually crowded, beach resort called Djerba.

Tunisian security forces blocked entry to Djerba and continued searching the area for more militants, according to the local state agency TAP.

A night curfew in the town will be set as of Monday evening due to the unstable and unsafe conditions, until further notice. Officials also called upon the residents to stay indoors as the gunfire continued.

"We have decided to impose a curfew in Ben Gardane on both vehicles and pedestrians ... starting from today [Monday] between 7pm [18:00 GMT] and 5am [04:00 GMT]," an interior ministry statement said.

This clash is the second clash in the district in a week. Last week, a number of heavily armed men crossed the Tunisian borders coming from Libya. Tunisian security forces killed five of them after a long gunfight.

Reinforcements and helicopters were sent to the area around Ben Guerdane by the Tunisian military.

Tunisian defense minister Farhat Horchani had said last week that German and American security experts were expected in Tunis on Monday to help Tunisia devise a new electronic video-surveillance system of its border with Libya.

Reports explained that Tunisian troops on the border have been alert and aware for any possible assault, after slipped reports since a US air strike on an ISIS group training camp in Libya on February 18 killed dozens of Tunisian militants.

Accordingly, a security and military campaign began last week in Ben Gardane, after Tunisian security officials said that "terrorist groups" had sneaked into the country. Officials said the campaign followed attacks in Libya against ISIL terrorists.

ISIL terrorists launched several attacks inside Tunisia last year.There has been growing concern in Tunisia that the war in Libya would spillover its borders, since the presence of ISIL there has been increasingly expanding.