Kahf
MASSA - CAIRO (AP) Egypt's military moved swiftly Thursday against senior
figures of the Muslim Brotherhood, targeting the backbone of support for ousted
President Mohammed Morsi. In the most dramatic step, authorities arrested the
group's revered leader from a seaside villa and flew him by helicopter to
detention in the capital.
With a top judge newly sworn in as interim president
to replace Morsi, the crackdown poses an immediate test to the new army-backed
leadership's promises to guide Egypt to democracy: The question of how to
include the 83-year-old fundamentalist group.
That question has long been at the heart of democracy
efforts in Egypt. Hosni Mubarak and previous authoritarian regimes banned the
group, raising cries even from pro-reform Brotherhood critics that it must be
allowed to participate if Egypt was to be free. After Mubarak's fall, the newly
legalized group vaulted to power in elections, with its veteran member Morsi
becoming the country's first freely elected president.
Now the group is reeling under a huge backlash from a
public that says the Brotherhood and its Islamist allies abused their electoral
mandate. The military forced Morsi out Wednesday after millions of Egyptians
nationwide turned out in four days of protests demanding he be removed.
Adly Mansour, the head of the Supreme Constititonal
Court, with which Morsi had repeated confrontations, was sworn in as interim
president. In his inaugural speech, broadcast nationwide, he said the
anti-Morsi protests that began June 30 had "corrected the path of the
glorious revolution of Jan. 25," referring to the 2011 uprising that
toppled Mubarak.
To cheers from his audience, he also praised the army,
police, media and judiciary for standing against the Brotherhood. Islamists saw
those institutions as full of Mubarak loyalists trying to thwart their rule.
Furious over what it calls a military coup against
democracy, the Brotherhood said it would not work with the new leadership. It
and harder-line Islamist allies called for a wave of protests Friday, dubbing
it the "Friday of Rage," vowing to escalate if the military does not
back down.
There are widespread fears of Islamist violence in
retaliation for Morsi's ouster, and already some former militant extremists
have vowed to fight. Suspected militants opened fire at four sites in northern
Sinai, targeting two military checkpoints, a police station and el-Arish
airport, where military aircraft are stationed, security officials said. The
military and security responded to the attacks, and one soldier was killed and
three were injured, according to security officials who spoke on condition of
anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Multiple officials of the Brotherhood firmly urged
their followers to keep their protests peaceful. Thousands of Morsi supporters
remained massed in front of a Cairo mosque where they have camped for days,
with line of military armored vehicles across the road keeping watch.
"We declare our complete rejection of the
military coup staged against the elected president and the will of the
nation," the Brotherhood said in a statement, read by senior cleric
Abdel-Rahman el-Barr to the crowd outside the Rabia al-Adawiya Mosque in Cairo.
"We refuse to participate in any activities with
the usurping authorities," the statement said, urging Morsi supporters to
remain peaceful. The Rabia al-Adawiya protesters planned to march Friday to the
Ministry of Defense.
The Brotherhood denounced the crackdown, including the
shutdown Wednesday night of its television channel, Misr25, its newspaper and
three pro-Morsi Islamist TV stations. The military, it said, is returning Egypt
to the practices of "the dark, repressive, dictatorial and corrupt
ages."
A military statement late Thursday appeared to signal
a wider wave of arrests was not in the offing. A spokesman, Col. Ahmed Mohammed
Ali, said in a Facebook posting that that the army and security forces will not
take "any exceptional or arbitrary measures" against any political
group.
The military has a "strong will to ensure
national reconciliation, constructive justice and tolerance," he wrote. He
spoke against "gloating" and vengeance, saying only peaceful protests
will be tolerated and urging Egyptians not to attack Brotherhood offices to
avert an "endless cycle of revenge."
The army's removal of Morsi sparked massive celebrations
Wednesday night among the crowds of protesters around the country, with
fireworks, dancing and blaring car horns lasting close to dawn. The
constitution, which Islamists drafted and Morsi praised as the greatest in the
world, has been suspended. Also, Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud, the Mubarak-era top
prosecutor whom Morsi removed to much controversy, was reinstated to his post
and immediately announced investigations against Brotherhood officials.
Many of the Brotherhood's opponents want them
prosecuted for what they say were crimes committed during Morsi's rule, just as
Mubarak was prosecuted for protester deaths during the 2011 uprising. In the
past year, dozens were killed in clashes with Brotherhood supporters and with
security forces.
But the swift moves raise perceptions of a revenge
campaign against the Brotherhood. The National Salvation Front, the top
opposition political group during Morsi's presidency and a key member of the
coalition that worked with the military in his removal, criticized the moves,
saying, "We totally reject excluding any party, particularly political
Islamic groups."
The Front has proposed one of its top leaders,
Mohammed ElBaradei, to become prime minister of the interim Cabinet, a post
that will hold strong powers since Mansour's presidency post is considered
symbolic. ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace laureate who once headed the U.N. nuclear
watchdog agency, is considered Egypt's top reform advocate.
"Reconciliation is the name of the game,
including the Muslim Brotherhood. We need to be inclusive," Munir Fakhry
Abdel-Nour, a leading member of the group, told The Associated Press. "The
detentions are a mistake."
He said the arrests appeared to be prompted by
security officials' fears over possible calls for violence by Brotherhood
leaders. There may be complaints against certain individuals in the Brotherhood
"but they don't justify the detention," he said, predicting they will
be released in the coming days.
Abdel-Nour said the Front intends to ensure the
military has no role in politics. He added that the Front is hoping for the
backing of ultraconservative Salafis for ElBaradei's bid for prime minister.
Some Salafi factions have sided with the new leadership. He noted that the
constitution was not outright canceled, in a gesture to Salafis.
Morsi has been under detention in an unknown location
since Wednesday night, and at least a dozen of his top aides and advisers have
been under what is described as "house arrest," though their
locations are also unknown.
Besides the Brotherhood's top leader, General Guide
Mohammed Badie, security officials have also arrested his predecessor, Mahdi
Akef, and one of his two deputies, Rashad Bayoumi, as well as Saad el-Katatni,
head of the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, and ultraconservative
Salafi figure Hazem Abu Ismail, who has a considerable street following.
Authorities have also issued a wanted list for more
than 200 Brotherhood members and leaders of other Islamist groups. Among them
is Khairat el-Shater, another deputy of the general guide who is widely
considered the most powerful figure in the Brotherhood.
The arrest of Badie was a dramatic step, since even
Mubarak and his predecessors had been reluctant to move against the group's top
leader. The ranks of Brotherhood members across the country swear a strict oath
of unquestioning allegiance to the general guide, vowing to "hear and
obey." It has been decades since any Brotherhood general guide was put in
a prison.
Badie and el-Shater were widely believed by the
opposition to be the real power in Egypt during Morsi's tenure. Badie was
arrested late Wednesday from a villa where he had been staying in the
Mediterranean coastal city of Marsa Matrouh and flown by helicopter to Cairo,
security officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were
not authorized to talk the press.
Mahmoud, the top prosecutor, said he was opening
investigations into the killings of protesters during Morsi's rule. He ordered
el-Katatni and Bayoumi questioned on allegations of instigating violence and
killings, and put travel bans on 36 others, a sign they too could face
prosecution. He also took steps toward releasing a prominent activist detained
for insulting Morsi.
Mansour, the 67-year-old interim president, is a Mubarak
appointee like nearly every judge. He had been the deputy head of the court for
more than 20 years. He was elevated to the chief justice position only three
days ago, when his predecessor reached mandatory retirement age.
Mansour was among the judges who ruled against a
political isolation law in 2012 that would have barred many Mubarak-era
officials from politics. As a result, Mubarak's last prime minister, Ahmed
Shafiq, was able to run against Morsi.
In his speech, Mansour said the massive street demonstrations
"brought together everyone without discrimination or division," and
were an "expression of the nation's conscience and an embodiment of its
hopes and ambitions."
But he made no sign of outreach to the Brotherhood in
his address. He suggested Morsi's election had been tainted, saying, "I
look forward to parliamentary and presidential elections held with the genuine
and authentic will of the people."
The revolution, he said,
must continue so "we stop producing tyrants."
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