Former PM Hisham Kandil Latest Muslim Brotherhood Member Captured

Authorities in Egypt have arrested the ousted President Morsi’s Prime Minister, Hisham Kandil. Kandil was caught in the southeast mountain area with smugglers while he  was trying to cross the border to Sudan. His arrest came as no surprise since the Egyptian authorities have been hunting down all prominent members of the Muslim Brotherhood and Morsi’s cabinet.

I have been asked time and time again about what is going on in Egypt since I spent six month there this year. Unfortunately my explanation sounds more like fiction, but it seems very obvious to me.

The Muslim brotherhood, who lived in the shadows for years, came out of hiding after the initial revolution that removed Mubarak in 2011. It was a great opportunity for them to replace  Mubarak and capitalize on the revolution. The reason why the Egyptian Military and secret services have been very successful in capturing Brotherhood members is because the Brotherhood felt very comfortable after Mubarak’s fall.

After all, the Brotherhood went through a parliamentary election and won 60% of the seats in 2011, and followed that by nominating an unknown person, Morsi, for the presidency. Getting Morsi a majority of the popular vote must have been a very comforting ego boost to the Brotherhood.

With all the winning in 2011 and 2012, the Brotherhood must have felt as if they were free at last, after 60 years of hiding. The Muslim Brotherhood had attracted more people by proving themselves legitimate after winning a majority and installing Morsi as the president.

In 2013 the Muslim Brotherhood were unstoppable. They became the mainstream, and gained street credibility. However they underestimated the Military, who were watching and quietly doing what they do best; creating a list of all the Muslim Brotherhood members. So when the military answered the people’s call for removing Morsi on July third, they were also ready to dismantle the Brotherhood soon after.

So If you want to know what is going on in Egypt, keep an eye on the military, because they are the ones with the guns, and they have the most to gain or lose if the economy goes bust.

When you hear that the authorities arrested another Brotherhood member, it shouldn’t be a surprise. It is a round-up that the military is doing to secure the country, but mostly to secure their interests and stay relevant.

Civil War Propaganda in the Making

I woke up today to terrible news. Forty people were killed by the military in front of the Republican Guard headquarters. 

However other news by the BBC included different details. They say the military attacked the unarmed protesters in the mosque at 4 AM today while they were praying. That seems odd to me, because by 3 AM the prayer is over and people are no longer in the mosque.

On the other hand, Al Jazeera had footage of people showing the camera empty bullet shells. Others showed unfired unused bullets. This is supposed to be evidence that unarmed people at prayer were attacked. But the bullets are easy to debunk; the empty shells fall off next to the shooter. If you are  in a protest where the police or the army is shooting at you, any empty bullet shells were probably fired by people standing next to you, not people firing at you. And they don’t fire unused bullets either; those have to come from somewhere else.

Another eyewitness who was awakened by the gunfire said that the whole thing took place in front of the Republican Guard headquarters on the street. the Muslim Brotherhood were trying to infiltrate the Republican Guard headquarters, and the military had to use force to get them out of there. So reports that it happened inside a mosque are very unlikely.

One of the famous people in the Muslim Brotherhood, a middle-aged woman named Oun Lymen, showed up on BBC Arabic to tell her side of the story. According to her she was raped for three hours by the military.

The news was bad to begin with. And it is being badly reported.

Retaliation by the Muslim Brotherhood Turns Bloody

While the whole world is worried about whether what is going on in Egypt is a coup or not coup, the Muslim brotherhood is vowing to bring Morsi back to power over the dead bodies of the Egyptian people.

July 5 was a bloody day in many cities in Egypt, but in Cairo it was just crazy. The Muslim Brotherhood and other Morsi supporters went to have their Friday prayer in the Nasser city mosque. After the long prayer, they marched to the Republican Guard headquarters, where they believed the military were holding Morsi, to free Morsi and install him in power again.

When they got there, the military was on high alert and ready to protect the building. The Morsi supporters turned to attack mode. That's when the military started shooting over their heads to scare them, and disperse the crowd. However the angry mob didn’t seem to be fazed by the military action, and they didn’t leave. So the military shot tear gas to scare them away.

The Islamists keep spreading rumors that the military killed three islamists during these clashes. With the chaos of conflicting reports, these rumors have even made it to the headlines on the BBC. But we have not seen the dead people up to now.

However this wasn’t the only rally in Cairo. Anti Morsi demonstrators also gathered in Tahrir square to show support for the military, and to show that they are content with the decision to get rid of Morsi. This gathering in Tahrir was attacked by a Muslim Brotherhood rally, resulting in more than 30 confirmed dead and over a thousand injured so far.

What I don’t get are all the rumors from all the external mainstream media about how the Egyptian army is creating a danger zone. The international press seem to be trying to make it sound like the military is the attacker, even though the Muslim Brotherhood is obviously the aggressor here.

The Muslim Brotherhood is a sore loser.They point to the election as proof of their legitimacy, but they overlook the fact that the legitimacy of any elected representative of the people comes from the people. When the people elect a person, that doesn't mean it is a lifetime vote. In a true democracy, it doesn't even mean that the person can stay in that position till the end of the term, if public opinion turns a different way.

Egypt may not have a formal recall process for elected officials yet, but thanks to the intervention of the military, the people can still make their voices heard when those who are in power are not meeting the needs of the country.

The people elected Morsi, yes, after waiting through a year of no political progress and in a total leadership vacuum. But the people who elected him can say we don’t want you anymore. Just because the cook delivered a bad meal, that doesn't mean we have to eat it too.

The Egyptian military understood that, and stood by the Egyptian people against an elected president who failed to gain the support of the people.

Cleansing the Judiciary System, Ikhwan Style

The islamist party, Ikhwan, has been calling for a week of protest since april 19, to cleanse the judiciary system.

You might ask, "Why? Why are the ruling majority protesting to cleanse the judiciary system?"

This is a hard question to answer. It depends on who you ask. Egyptian society is polarized, with political parties, rumours, and discontent with Morsi’s ruling party--and with Morsi himself.

The majority of Egyptians are not even aware of any judiciary system problems. They only notice a problems when they have to go to court for one reason or another. Then they might see evidence of the corrupt system we have in Egypt.

So is there a simple answer to the question why Ikhwan is protesting against the judiciary system? The popular opinion is that Ikhwan wants to replace all the current judges with Ikhwan judges, to put control over all aspects of the regime into their hands.

You might point out that all newly elected presidents try to bring in people from their own party, who share the same views, to make the job of the president easier. That seems like a fair assumption. But what you might not know is that many of the judges have received complaints and cases against Morsi, along with requests to to bring him to justice on many accounts of espionage.

Here's a little background: Morsi was a political prisoner during the popular Egyptian uprising that started on January 25, 2011, and he is very proud of that record. Not only was he in prison on charges of espionage, Morsi was freed on January 28, 2011 by unknown people. That is not the weird part; many prisoners were freed during the revolution to create chaos and unrest, and to intimidate people from leaving their homes.

But Morsi didn’t terrorize anyone when he was freed. The first thing Morsi did, when he was standing right outside of the prison gate, was to call Al Jazeera channel's live broadcast to let them know on air that he was free, and that he was stuck in the middle of the highway between Cairo and Alexandria.

Morsi also mentioned the names of all the people who were freed with him that day, according to Al Jazeera's English translation of the broadcast:

“Mohamed Morsi and Essam el-Erian and Saad Katatni and Mohy Hamed and Mahmoud Abu Zeid Mustafa Ghoneimy and Saad Al Husseiny these 7 members of the Guidance Bureau, and with us Mr. Enzily official Giza in the Muslim Brotherhood, and Ahmed Abdel Rahman official Fayoum in the Muslim Brotherhood, and Majid Zomor, a northern Cairo, Hassan Abu Shaish official Brotherhood in Kafr El-Sheikh, on Ezz, one of Assiut, one of the officials of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

Well the story gets even more bizarre. Starting on January 27, 2011 the whole country had no connectivity. There were no landlines, no cell phone lines, and not even internet for two days.

So with this information, we have more question than answers:

• Why did Morsi call Al Jazeera first thing when he got out of prison?
• Where did Morsi get a working cell phone to call Al Jazeera?
• How did Morsi make an international phone call to Qatar if there were no phone lines or internet?
• How did Morsi know the Al Jazeera phone number to call?

So the case against Morsi is waiting for investigation, and so far it has been delayed. That may be because it is easy to question an individual, but questioning a president is a different story.

In the meantime, the protests by Ikhwan against the judiciary system were the start of the violent clashes in Egypt since April 19. And according to reports on April 20 in Al Ahram Online, over a hundred people were injured in clashes nationwide. Seventeen of the injured were policemen, some of whom were treated for birdshot wounds. Almost forty people have been arrested in connection with Friday’s clashes, accused of everything from damaging property to “terrorizing citizens.”

The people of Egypt need to pay attention to what's happening, before Ikhwan replaces everyone in the entire regime with representatives from one organization.