Egyptian security forces fired on a mosque with large explosions rocking the structure where antigovernment protesters were holed up Saturday, capping a 24 hour standoff between the two sides, with clashes leaving at least 137 dead across the country.
“No one inside has any guns, so why are they shooting them?” said Ahmed Atef, 32 years old, an onlooker.
Antigovernment protesters erected barricades inside the al Fatah Mosque in Cairo’s Ramses Square after deadly clashes Friday had turned the mosque into a makeshift morgue and medical center that afternoon and a refuge for some 400 protesters later that evening.
But the narrative over what happened at the mosque Saturday reflects the further polarization between the Muslim Brotherhood and the government’s version of events. The Brotherhood says it is fighting to preserve democracy while the government claims it is crushing terrorism.
On Saturday morning, security forces in armored personnel carriers surrounded the al Fatah Mosque, with tanks and snipers on the roofs of nearby buildings. They appeared to fire the opening shots at about 1:30 p.m., although state TV reported that there were gunmen in the minaret that fired first. Reporters inside the mosque, however, said they didn’t see any arms there, where supporters of the Brotherhood-led Anti-Coup Alliance were holed up.
As antigovernment protesters fled the mosque they were violently beaten by civilian groups, known as popular committees. The police had earlier struggled to keep civilians from storming the mosque, creating a cordon used both to protect antigovernment protesters inside while readying to clear the mosque themselves.
But the inability of national security forces to control the civilian mobs showed how quickly Egypt’s army and police had lost grip of an already volatile situation.
And the government seemed to be inflaming the situation by encouraging civilians to stand up to the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters, labeling them “terrorists.”
“We need more support from the Egyptian people to avoid any mistakes while we secure [government] facilities and churches,” the spokesman for the prime minister said in televised remarks Saturday afternoon, adding that security forces had been acting with “self restraint.”
Further dashing hopes for a political solution to the crisis, the government announced it may disband the Muslim Brotherhood and even outlaw the movement, the spokesman added.
The Brotherhood was reticent, calling on supporters to continue protesting every day for the next week in what they called a “Week of Departure,” an extension of their Friday protests.
Friday’s violence killed at least 137 people across the country, 95 of those killed in Cairo. Some 1,330 people were injured in those clashed and 1,004 were arrested—more than half in Cairo—according to the government.
But with the government’s encouragement of the popular committees on Saturday, it seemed that Egypt was headed for further divide and violence on the streets between ordinary civilians.
The popular committees first came out in full force Friday night, during the clashes in Ramses Square between antigovernment protesters and security forces.
Egyptian civilians created new security checkpoints on major roads, patrolling their neighborhoods against what they said was the threat of Brotherhood protesters.
“We’re looking for terrorists,” said one of these civilians, as he popped open car trunks in downtown Cairo as Egypt’s military curfew approached.
At up to a half-dozen points in the city before dusk, members of several of these bands could be seen breaking up sidewalks and piling up the debris to create checkpoints to stop strangers from entering their neighborhoods.
That capped what Muslim Brotherhood protesters called a Day of Rage—called to mourn the dead after Egyptian security forces cracked down Wednesday on supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi, leaving more than 600 people dead.
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