My MB (Muslim Brotherhood) supporter friends were asking why we tend to believe the pro-army stories reported by the media instead of giving credence to the stories propagated by the MB?
My friends were talking about stories concerning the clashes between the MB protestors and the army on Monday 8 July in front of the Republican Guards headquarters in the east of Cairo, where they thought the ousted MB president Mursi was being held. In that event, 51 Egyptians were shot to death. The MB posted photos and videos to prove it was army that opened fire on them as they performed dawn prayers
Here is my answer to that question:
The public believes the pro-army stories and videos in the media because these stories and videos carry credibility. We don’t believe that our army started the violence of 8 May because of the following reasons:
1. No person in their right mind would believe that the Egyptian army under the current conditions of strong international focus on Egypt, especially where the army is being ‘accused’ of having conducted a coup, would have been so stupid as to attack peaceful civilians. It defies reason that the army would have committed an act that would condemn it before the people of Egypt and the international community.
2. If the army wished to attack civilians, gas bombs would have served the purpose very well at the Rabaa Adawiya square where the MB Mursi supporters had been camping for over 10 days, turning the lives of the neighbourhood residents into a real nightmare. A few gas bombs should have done the job, while shooting would have only resulted in more instability and would have compounded the situation.
3. The MB have a notorious history of justifying crimes and lies because their ideology condones all and every means—or sins even—if they serve the purpose and help achieve their goals. They lied about not running for the presidency, they lied about Abu-Ismail’s American citizenship, they lied about al-Nahda project, they lied about respecting the constitution and law, they lied about accommodating opposition; and this is just part of the long list of their lies during their first year in office. Mursi himself lied through his teeth, and his lies were especially idiotic, as when he claimed the daily nationwide power outages were owing to a “guy bribed by EGP20 to cut the power switch”. He didn’t realise that this convicted him in the first place: if so, why didn’t his employees ever catch that guy? When he was running for the presidency last year he claimed that if one day 10,000 Egyptians protested against him in Tahrir Square, he would step down right away, yet his supporters are today resorting to violence to bring him back in the name of Islam and legitimacy.
4. In order to convince the world that the army committed crimes against them last Monday, the MB posted photos on the social media that turned out to be photos of victims of the civil war in Syria. They said children had been killed, but it turned out there was not a single child among the victims. They claimed the army shot the protestors as they bowed down for dawn prayers, but the shooting actually took place a full hour after dawn prayers. Had they been shot as they prayed, the worshippers should have been shot in the back, which wasn’t the case; the victims were shot in the head and chest and were wearing shoes, which they are required to take off when they pray.
5. MB supporters are notorious for their double standards. Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, who in 2011 urged Mubarak to step down to save Egyptian blood is today supporting Mursi and justfiying bloodshed. Safwat Hegazy threatened that anybody who dared do anything against Mursi would come under MB revenge which includes violence and murder. Muhammad Beltagui threatened that terrorist operations against Egyptian soldiers in Sinai will only stop if Mursi is reinstated.
6. While they encourage poor MB supporters to risk their lives to and fight for Islam and legitimacy, the top leaders of the MB do not do such thing. The Supreme Guide Muhammad Badie disguised himself as a fully-veiled woman to go and give a speech to the protestors at Rabaa, then left the square in the same disguise. I, and many others, see this as pure cowardice.
7. Even those who were MB members in the past and today claim to embrace a more tolerant, liberal version of Islam, such as Abdel-Moniem Abul-Futouh, are now asking the interim President Adly Mansour to step down because of the ‘massacre’ of 8 July. Where was that hypocrite and the likes of him when Egyptian soldiers were being killed in Sinai during the year Mursi was in power? Why didn’t he ask him to step down then?
8. On top of all that, MB leaders call on foreign countries to interfere in Egypt to reinstate Mursi. What kind of patriotism is that?
9. The educated people I know, who support the MB, keep on sharing tweets and facebook posts that totally lack credibility, urging innocent people to take to streets to fight for the so called legitimacy. They claim there is an ongoing war against Islam although Islam has nothing to do with what these terrorists are doing. The MB in Alexandria hurled four teenagers to their death by throwing them to the street from over the rooftop of a building. They killed in cold blood anti-Mursi protestors who were heading to Tahrir Square from the Cairo district of Manial. And they showed no sign of respect or regret for having killed innocent people.
I hope the above, my dear friends, helps you see things as they really are. I hope they alarm you before it’s too late. Everybody in this country is required to take an informed stance to preserve Egypt before it’s too late.
Ms Mansour, a Watani reader, is a communication engineer
WATANI International
12 July 2013