Is Egypt's Brotherhood playing the role of enemy instead of Israel?

By Magdy Samaan

 

When the ex Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was toppled, there was a consensus that Mubarak is the last military ruler. Now Egypt is taken to another round of military ruling that use the Muslim Brotherhood as the new enemy of the people to justify the continuation of the failure military ruling of Egypt.

For decades Israel was that enemy, and the Arab Israeli-conflict was used to justify the Egyptian military ruler's dictatorship. But the conflict with Israel has retreated and reviving it is not easy as the fragile Egyptian economy can't afford the bill of a new conflict.

Since overthrown the MB president Mohamed Morsi, the military regime is working on creating a long term conflict with the MB by provoking the Islamists and drag them to violence, and that is helping the regime to impose the police state once again and spread the culture of fear.

There are no proves yet that the MB is involved directly in terrorism attacks, but a group called Ansar Bayt el Maqdis, which is not clear its connections and agenda has claimed responsibility for a series of deadly bomb operations such as the blast of Cairo Directorate of Security, the blast of Dakahlia Directorate of Security, and the killing of General Mohamed Saeed, a senior interior ministry official.

Many observers had had fears that removing the Islamic president could lead to a war such as what happened in Algeria, but the Muslim Brotherhood has announced that they will stick to peaceful protests unlike their previous discourse during Morsi ruling, though they failed to act like a peaceful movement, their protests included march-past and show of power with a hostile and hate speech, that have given the military some justifications to commit many massacres against the semi peaceful protesters since the break up of the presidential guard sit-in where at least 51 protesters were killed, and then Rabaa sit-in massacre were nearly 600 protesters were killed and since then Egypt has witnessed merely bloody mascaras under the banner of a "war against terrorism". And even before any terrorist operation happened the regime and its media Trumpets declared that Egypt fighting terrorism.

In a press conference was held by the Islamic Alliance that the MB working through, it was said that there is a conspiracy against the 25^th of January revolution by the military. I asked, if you are aware of that and you know that the military is using you, why you keep calling for the return of Morsi instead of admitting your mistakes and try to assure the people who are sacred from your agenda so there will not be justifications for military ruling?

But I believe that the Islamists is using democracy as an excuse as the regime using terrorism. The 25th of January revolution demand of democratization was not only a challenge for the military but also for the Islamists.  For Islamists, democracy was a threat to their gains, which they have achieved during the military ruling. For them, there aren't more to achieve, the Egyptian legal system is consistent with the Islamic Sharia and the Egyptian society has been already Islamized.

The MB has a long history of having under table deals with the military regime since July 1952 coup. General Abdul Hamid Khairat, the ex deputy head of the State Security, reviled in an interview the real relation between the regime and the MB. He said that the MB is "part of Mubarak regime, which used to use them" and that "they used to get instructions from the State Security" but while he considered that Mubarak regime has gone there is a consensus among the revolutionary powers that there are no big changes in the regime structure with its security institutions.

The Islamists have allied with the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) after Mubarak stepping down to force a road map against the will of the secular demands of liberal democracy. The SCAF facilitate the success of the MB in the presidency. According to a leaked statement with Morsi in prison, he said that the ex in-term president Husien Tantawi told him that they prefer him in presidency than the MB strong man Khairat Al-Shater.

After helping Morsi to succeed in winning the presidential election, the military deep state used Morsi's poor governing skills and the Islamists hate speech that incite for violence to scare large sects of the people in order to maintain their power. The MB has been helping the military by their stubborn attitude and their failure to compromise with the secular demands, as Al-Nahda party did in Tunis.

While Al-Nahda Islamist party in Tunis has acted responsibly and succeeded to compromise with the seculars and the democracy requirements, the MB seems to play a similar role of the Islamists in Syria who have giving the Assad regime a kiss of life.

If the MB is serious in opposing the return of the military ruling it needs to pause for introspection by admitting its mistakes and confess that its founder, Hassan Al-Banna, goals to apply full Islamic state are out of date and not in line with the modern state values. Otherwise it should release that by going too far in protesting with the goal of returning Morsi back to power will only lead to a new round of military dictatorship using them as the enemy of the people.