CAIRO -- Egyptian soldiers and police clashed with
Islamists protesting the military's ouster of the president in bloodshed
that left at least 51 protesters and three members of the
security
forces dead, officials and witnesses said, and plunged the divided
country deeper into crisis with calls by the Muslim Brotherhood's
political party for all-out rebellion against the army.
The
carnage outside the Republican Guard building in Cairo - where toppled
President Mohammed Morsi was first held last week - marked the single
biggest death toll since massive protests forced Morsi's government from
power and brought in an interim civilian administration.
Even
before all the bodies were counted, there were conflicting accounts on
how the violence began. The pro-Morsi protesters said the troops
attacked their encampment without provocation just after they had
performed dawn prayers. The military said it came under a heavy assault
first by gunmen who killed an army officer and two policemen, though its
account of the
events left many questions unanswered.
Witnesses
from outside the protest camp said troops appeared to be moving to
clear the days-old sit-in and were firing tear gas when gunfire erupted.
One said she believed the fire came from the protesters' side, though
others could not tell.
Whatever the spark,
clashes went on for three hours, with protesters hurling stones and
molotov cocktails from rooftops and gunshots ringing out. Nearby clinics
run by Brotherhood supporters were swamped by wounded protesters, some
with gaping, bleeding wounds. More than 400 were wounded in the mayhem,
officials said.
The violence is almost certain
to draw sharper battle lines between Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood, who
say the military has carried out a coup against democracy, and their
opponents, who claim Morsi squandered his 2012 election victory and was
wrecking democracy by bolstering his and the Brotherhood's grip on the
state.
In a move that is likely to further
inflame the situation, the Freedom and Justice party, the Muslim
Brotherhood's political arm, called on Egyptians to rise up against the
army. Morsi has been a longtime leader of the Brotherhood.
The
party also called on the international community to stop what it called
the massacres in Egypt and accused the military of pushing Egypt toward
civil war, warning the country was in danger of becoming a "new Syria."
"The
only thing the military understands is force and they are trying to
force people into submission," said Marwan Mosaad, speaking at a field
hospital run by Morsi's supporters. "It is a struggle of wills and no
one can predict anything."
The bloodshed opened cracks in the grouping of movements that backed the military's removal of Morsi.
Egypt's
top Muslim cleric warned of "civil war" and said he was going into
seclusion until the violence ends - a rare and dramatic show of protest
directed at both sides. He demanded a process immediately be set up for
reconciliation, including the release of Brotherhood detainees.
Sheik Ahmed el-Tayeb, head of Al-Azhar Mosque, said he had "no choice" but to seclude himself at
home "until everyone shoulders his responsibility to stop the bloodshed instead of dragging the country into civil war."
The
ultraconservative Al-Nour Party, the sole Islamist party that had
joined talks on a new government and a post-Morsi political process,
announced it was suspending its support for the transition plan in
response to the "massacre."
The party was
struggling whether to fully bolt from the new leadership in the face of a
possible revolt by its own members angry over what they see as a a
massacre against fellow Islamists. One lawmaker from the party said it's
unclear how long party leaders can keep their control, with some
members breaking ranks to join the Brotherhood. The lawmaker spoke on
condition of anonymity to discuss the group's internal situation.
In
a statement, Al-Nour and the Dawa Salafiya, its parent group of
hard-line clerics, issued a statement saying the military's response in
the violence was "exaggerated." It denounced what it called incitement
against fellow Islamists and appeared to be trying to find a compromise
stance short of outright breaking ranks with the post-Morsi leadership.
Speaking to Al-Jazeera TV, the party's chief Younes Makhyoun raised the possibility of calling a referendum on Morsi.
Pro-reform
leader Mohamed ElBaradei, a top secular and liberal figure who backed
the military's removal of Morsi, condemned the violence and called for
an investigation, writing on Twitter that "peaceful transition (is) the
only way."
The escalating chaos will also
further complicate Egypt's relations with Washington and other Western
allies, which had supported Morsi as the country's first freely elected
leader and now are reassessing policies toward the military-backed group
that forced him out. Still, the White House said Monday that cutting
off the more than $1 billion in annual aid to Egypt was not in the
U.S.'s best interests, though it was reviewing whether the military's
moves constitute a coup - which would force such a measure under U.S.
law.
The morning's violence left at least 51
protesters dead and 435 wounded, most from live ammunition and birdshot,
emergency services chief Mohammed Sultan, according to the state news
agency. Two policemen and one soldier were also killed, according to the
military.
The Morsi supporters had been
camped out for days at the site in tents around a mosque near the
Republican Guard complex, where Morsi was initially held but was later
moved to an undisclosed Defense Ministry facility.
Spokesmen
for the military and police gave a nationally televised press
conference to give their version of the morning's bloodshed.
Army
Col. Ahmed Mohammed Ali said police and troops guarding the Republican
Guard complex came under "heavy gunfire" at around 4 a.m. and attackers
on rooftops opened fire with guns and molotov cocktails. Along with the
soldier and two policemen, 42 in the security forces were wounded, eight
critically, he said.
He underlined that the
troops had the right to defend the installation and that the protest
"was no longer peaceful." He pointed out that suspected Islamists have
carried out coordinated armed attacks on several military facilities in
recent days in the Sinai Peninsula.
One
witness, university student Mirna el-Helbawi, watched from her apartment
overlooking the scene, prompted when she heard protesters banging on
metal barricades, a common battle cry. El-Helbawi, 21, said she saw
troops and police approaching the protesters, who were lined up on the
street behind a make-shift wall. The troops fired tear gas, the
protesters responded with rocks, she told The Associated Press.
Soon
after she heard the first gunshots and saw the troops initially retreat
backward - which she said led her to believe the shots came from the
protester side. She saw Morsi supporters firing from rooftops, while the
troops also opened fire.
Supporters of Morsi,
however, said the security forces fired on hundreds of protesters,
including women and children, at the sit-in encampment as they performed
early morning prayers.
"They opened fire with
live ammunition and lobbed tear gas," said Al-Shaimaa Younes, who was
at the sit-in. "There was panic and people started running. I saw people
fall."
A Muslim Brotherhood spokesman, Mourad
Ali, denied any Morsi supporters fired first and said the military had
warned protesters it will break up the sit-in.
Abu
Ubaida Mahmoud, a religion student from Al-Azhar University, said he
had been praying when the sit-in's security teams began banging on metal
barricades in warning. He then saw troops coming out of the Guard
complex.
"The number of troops that came from
inside was stunning," said Mahmoud, who was wounded in the hand. The
troops opened fire and "I saw injuries in the chest, the neck, the head
and the arm," he said.
A guard at a nearby
bank said security forces first moved in on the encampment firing tear
gas, then he heard gunfire, though who couldn't tell who was firing. He
said that over recent days the Morsi protesters had imposed their
control on the surrounding district and were clearly armed.
At
field hospitals set up by Morsi supporters, at least six dead bodies
were shown laid out on the ground, some with severe wounds, in video
aired by Al-Jazeera TV. The bodies had been draped with an Egyptian flag
and pictures of Morsi. Pools of blood covered the floor and doctors
struggled to deal with gaping wounds among some of the hundreds injured.
Egyptian
state TV showed images provided by the military of the scene of the
sit-in amid the melee. Dozens of protesters were shown pelting troops
with rocks and setting tires on fire. Soldiers in riot gear and carrying
shields formed lines a few meters (yards) away.
A
fire raged from an apartment in a building overlooking the clashes.
Images showed men throwing spears from atop nearby building rooftops.
Other protesters were lobbing fire bombs at the troops. It was not clear
at what stage in the melee the footage was filmed. Security officers
were showing cameras bullet casings, and troops were carrying injured
colleagues.
By the afternoon, the sit-in site
was cleared along with blockades that had been set up on roads. The site
of the early morning clashes, a strip of road about a kilometer long
(about half a mile), was covered with rocks, shattered glass, shoes,
clothes, prayer rugs and personal photographs. A big Morsi banner
remained hoisted in front of the Republican Guards' building. On the
ground below it, graffiti read: "Where are our votes?"
Interim
President Adly Mansour ordered a judicial inquiry into the killings.
Significantly, the statement from his office echoed the military's
version of events, noting that the killings followed an attempt to storm
the Republican Guard's headquarters.
Prosecutors
in Cairo also ordered the closure of the Brotherhood party's
headquarters amid investigations into a cache of weapons found there,
according to the official Middle East News Agency.
Morsi
supporters have been holding rallies and a sit-in outside the
Republican Guard building and elsewhere around Cairo since the military
deposed Morsi on Wednesday. The military chief replaced Morsi with an
interim president until presidential elections are held. The transition
plan is backed by liberal and secular opponents of Morsi, and had been
also supported by the Al-Nour Party and Muslim and Christian religious
leaders.
----
