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Senior Brotherhood official claims armed forces are against coup

February 8, 2014 at 2:48 am

A senior official of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt has claimed that the armed forces are actually against the military coup which deposed President Mohamed Morsi on Wednesday. Speaking at a rally in Rabaa Al-Adaweya Square on Friday Dr Abdul Rahman Al-Barr stressed that the protests in the streets will continue until Morsi’s reinstatement. He pointed out that the Commander in Chief and Minister of Defence, Abdul Fatah Al-Sisi, and his cohorts had deceived everyone, including President Morsi, by claiming regularly that the era of military coups had ended, the last occasion being just hours before they overthrew the elected head of state.


Al-Barr insisted that the will of the people will prevail, no matter how powerful the military is. “The soldiers must realise that the people on the streets are their brothers, their fathers, their families,” he said. “I am sure that many of them do not agree to the coup against democratic legitimacy.”

Fellow speaker Dr Nasr Abdel-Salam of the Building and Development Party said that the people will not leave the squares and streets until the “brutal” military coup is overturned. “The people on the streets,” he told the massive crowd, “will not rest, God-willing, until the Islamic project is fulfilled and democratic legitimacy is restored with the return of President Morsi.”

He warned Mohamed ElBaradei, Hamdeen Sabahi and their co-conspirators that Islam will never die in Egypt, citing historical references to prove his point, such as the invasions of the Crusaders and Tartars.

The spirit and determination of the demonstrators was captured by Emad Al-Jazzar who said that the people will not be intimidated by the campaign of arrests and media censorship carried out by the army since the coup. The distribution of the Freedom and Justice newspaper in the square was welcomed with cheers from the protesters.

Around 10,000 people left the square and headed for the Republican Guard headquarters in support of the demonstration there. They were joined by marchers from other mosques in the city. In a humanitarian gesture, the Republican Guards distributed water to the supporters of the deposed president standing in front of the building. They also dismissed the police officers after they provoked the protesters.

Surprisingly, one of the Republican Guard officers held up one of the protest banners: “Our only enemy is Israel… Allah is great… Praise be to Allah… This army is our army… Al-Sisi betrayed our president… our president is Morsi.” That could be an example of the feeling noted by Dr Al-Barr in his speech.