Egypt’s Al-Sisi dragged the country into civil war

Egypt’s Head of the Armed forces’ call for people to authorize him for brutal crackdown of so called “violence and terrorism” resulted in massacre of hundreds pro- Morsi, anti-coup demonstrators in Cairo and elsewhere in the country. The provocative talk by General Al-Sisi, the de facto ruler of the country since the ouster of de jure President Mohammad Morsi, is tantamount to pushing Egypt – the Arab world’s most populous country – into a civil war.

By reference to violence and terrorism, Al-Sisi actually meant the members of the Muslim Brotherhood and other Mohammed Morsi supporters who have been staging countrywide democratic demonstrations against the coup. Anatolia News Agency reported the death toll in security forces’ brutal crackdown at Rabaa Al- Adawiya square well over 200, more than 500 thousand injured.

On Saturday, condemning the massacre in Egypt; Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan said “People were calling on their rulers to desist from the coup and give them back their president. But instead of listening to their people, the coup-stagers in Egypt have responded by sending their gangs with guns and bullets,”

This sinister modus operandi of polarizing society and demonizing political opponents was taken to new heights this week when Junta applied it’s well-thought-out plan to disperse the opposing demonstrators using pretext of fighting to eliminate terrorism and violence.

The atrocious old guards of Egypt are back with the reinstatement of Mubarak era cliques. Two years after Egypt bravely stood against tyranny; its military apparatus has cleverly reintroduced the former regime's men under the cover of so called second revolution.

The US and EU principal backers of the Egyptian Coup d’état that ousted President Morsi are merely condemning the violence, not the atrocities committed by Egyptian security forces. They are ingeniously choosing the words that do not directly implicate the Egyptian security forces of massacring the peaceful protesters, demanding for their legitimate democratic rights.  

Cornered and under enormous attack, the Muslim Brotherhood has proven more resilient than anticipated by its enemies. One needs to understand that the Egypt military coup was devised with one goal in mind and one goal only, the death of the Muslim Brotherhood in the birthplace of political Islam. 

The relentless countrywide protests and demonstrations that hundreds of thousands of people have been holding to express their opposition to the ouster of the first democratically elected President of the country made Junta exasperated.

History bears testimony to the fact that no country has ever won its civil liberties through the intervention of its military. One has only to look at Turkey and its hard-fought battle for freedom and democracy to realize that a military-installed government will only lead to a democratic void.

On Saturday Egypt's Junta installed Interior Minister; Mohammad Ibrahim speaking at press conference in Cairo vowed to restore Mubarak-era torture cells. In Ibrahim’s own words “The monitoring departments would be reactivated despite their dismantling having been a main demand of the January revolution. He also said the pro-Morsi protestors would be dispersed, and Muslim Brotherhood leaders arrested. He described the closure of these departments after the January 2011 revolution– which toppled long-serving president Hosni Mubarak – as a "mistake.""This mistake is being rectified,”

The basic distribution of power within Egyptian society has not changed and will not change any time soon. The Military and the Muslim brotherhood led Islamists are the two main powerful blocks in the country.  The Western-oriented liberals do not have any real power and stand, as we are seeing now; they are only the fringe block striding on the Military’s shoulders.

Writing for the Hindu on July 27, 2013 eminent foreign policy expert Chinmaya R Gharekhan “The genie of people empowerment has come out of the bottle in the largest Arab country and it will definitely not acquiesce n a prolonged power grab by the army. Millions will again take to the streets if they feel their hard won power is slipping away from their hands. The ‘moderate’ Islamist regimes in Tunisia and Libya would no doubt draw their own lessons from the Egyptian upheaval”.

The ouster of Mubarak on 11 February 2011 was a stage managed arrangement on the behest of Egyptian deep state that too; temporarily quell the profound public resentment against the decades of autocracy. After the fall of Mubarak, the same deep state never allowed harbingering a new democratic beginning for Egypt.

Ironically, millions of Egyptians who voted for Morsi's presidential bid in June 2012 feel that their long-fought-for democratic rights have been trampled on by the same military machine that they rose up against in January 2011 as part of the Arab awakening. 

In less than three years time Egypt has seen two paradoxical scenarios, first when hundreds of people killed demanding the ouster of decades old dictator Hosni Mubarak and in second scenario where equal number of people killed, demanding the reinstatement of democratically elected President Mohammad Morsi. In both the scenarios the slayers are the same, Egyptian security forces.

It remains to be seen that whether Junta regime will be successful in its intrigue, like its predecessors who consecutively outlawed the Muslim Brotherhood or Brotherhood will bounce back against all odds.

http://www.radianceweekly.com/370/11042/egypt039s-al-sisi-dragged-the-country-into-civil-war/2013-08-04/covery-story/story-detail/egypts-al-sisi-dragged-the-country-into-civil-war.html