CAIRO: Egypt’s army threatened yesterday to shoot those who use violence in a stark warning before what both sides expect will be a bloody street showdown between Islamists and opponents of deposed president Mohammed Mursi.
An army official said the military had set Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood an ultimatum, giving it until tomorrow to sign up to a plan for political reconciliation which it has so far spurned.
The army has summoned Egyptians into the streets today in an intended turning point in its confrontation with followers of Mursi, the elected leader the generals removed on July 3.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which has maintained a street vigil for a month with thousands of supporters demanding Mursi’s reinstatement, has called its own crowds out for counter-demonstrations across Egypt in a “day to remove the coup”.
Both sides have dramatically escalated rhetoric before today’s demonstrations. The Brotherhood accused the army of pushing the nation towards civil war and committing a crime worse than destroying Islam’s holiest site.
In a Facebook post, the army said it will not “turn its guns against its people, but it will turn them against black violence and terrorism which has no religion or nation”.
A military official said the army had given the Brotherhood 48 hours from yesterday afternoon to join the political process. He did not say what would happen if it refuses.
Army chief General Abdel Fattah Al Sisi has called on Egyptians to take to the streets and give him a “mandate” to act against the violence that has convulsed Egypt since he shunted its first freely elected president from power. The Brotherhood, which has won repeated elections since the fall of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011, accuses the authorities of stirring up the violence to justify their crackdown.
The main anti-Mursi youth protest group, which has backed the army, said it would go to the streets to “cleanse Egypt”.
The West is increasingly alarmed at the course taken by Egypt, a strategic hinge between the Middle East and North Africa, since protests in 2011 brought down Mubarak and ended decades of autocratic rule in the most populous Arab state.
Signalling its displeasure, Washington has delayed delivery of four F-16 fighter jets to Cairo. Yesterday, the White House urged the army to exercise “maximum restraint and caution”.
The United States has yet to decide whether to call the military’s takeover a “coup”, language that would require it to halt $1.5bn it sends in annual aid, mostly for the army.
For weeks, the authorities have rounded up some Brotherhood officials but tolerated the movement’s presence on the streets, with thousands of people attending its pro-Mursi vigil and tens of thousands appearing at its demonstrations.
That patience seems to have run out. Prime Minister Hazem El Beblawi, head of the interim cabinet installed by the army, said there was growing violence by increasingly well-armed protesters, citing a bomb attack on a police station.
“The presence of weapons, intimidation, fear — this causes concern, especially when there are calls for many to come out tomorrow from different sides,” he told a news conference.
After a month nearly 200 people have died in political violence, many fear the protests will lead to more bloodshed.
Past incidents of violence have tended to run through the night and into the following day. Another security official forecast clashes beginning tonight and stretching into tomorrow, the period covered by the army’s ultimatum. He also indicated that the two-day period was expected to be decisive. REUTERS
