Is Egypt Set To Become Syria 2.0?

Brandon Turbeville
Activist Post

As tensions rise between the national government of Egypt and the world of the financier networks and Anglo-American imperialists, violence has once again erupted across the country. On October 6, 2013, clashes between the Muslim Brotherhood/Morsi supporters and Egyptian security forces as well as between Muslim Brotherhood and pro-government/pro-Sisi demonstrators took place which, at the time of the writing of this article, has left at least 51 people dead and 243 injured.

While the violence in Egypt initially appeared to have eased after the initial conflict between the Egyptian government and Muslim Brotherhood supporters in August, Sunday’s clashes have reinvigorated the struggle between Islamists and secular nationalist Egypt. Indeed, the October 6 violence is the worst since the highest point of the August 14 clashes which left hundreds of people dead.

While much of Egypt attempted to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of the 1973 war with Israel, violent demonstrations were organized by the Muslim Brotherhood all across the country in yet another attempt to overthrow the current Egyptian government and replace it with Islamist rule as it had been under Morsi.

As CBS reports,

Several neighborhoods of the capital, Cairo, resembled combat zones after street battles that raged for hours. Morsi supporters fired birdshot and threw firebombs at police who responded with gunshots and tear gas. Streets were left strewn with debris, and the air was thick with tear gas and smoke from burning fires, as the crack of gunfire rang out.

An Associated Press photographer saw nine bodies lying on the floor of a clinic in the Cairo district of Dokki, scene of some of the heaviest clashes. Most of the bodies had gunshot wounds to the head or chest.

Sunday’s death toll of 51 was the highest on a single day since Aug. 14 when security forces raided two sit-in protest camps by Morsi supporters, killing hundreds.

The “counter revolt” against the Egyptian military by the Muslim Brotherhood has been in the works for some time and violence has been building even before the October 6 set off date. Earlier in the week, “unidentified gunmen” killed five Egyptian soldiers after attacking two separate military targets.

Interestingly, the coordination of the Egyptian destabilization was revealed on October 5, 2013 by Israeli news agency DebkaFile, which is widely recognized as having close connections to the Israeli intelligence community in terms of sources. In its report, “Muslim Brotherhood marks Oct.6 war date with anti-military revolt. Gunmen attack Egyptian soldiers,” the agency reveals four “overt tactics” being used by the Muslim Brotherhood regarding the Oct. 6 initiation of revolt, information Debka claims it received from “Middle Eastern intelligence sources.”

The tactics involve the dissemination of information through “backdoor” channels including mosques and religious seminaries to direct millions of Muslim Brotherhood supporters to surprise and overwhelm security forces with a sudden mass presence in the streets. Prior to and during the mass upsurge of Islamists, rural villages and towns, which contain a much lower number of security force personnel, are to be overrun by violent “demonstrators,” thereby overwhelming the scant number of police on the ground and giving the sense that Egypt is losing control of the country. In essence, the strategy is to gain the ground that is readily available to you before attempting to gain harder locations such as Cairo and other large cities. As Debka writes,

Brotherhood strategists are counting on the October 6 rallies starting a blazing uprising of many millions of its adherents across the country. First, these torch carriers will wrest control of outlying locations from the security forces; then, the Brotherhood will move onto the next stage of its counter-coup and fight to displace military and security authority in the big cities.

The Islamists have also been provided with slogans and chants that are intended to suggest that the Egyptian army is “fighting its own people.” The slogans are geared toward negatively contrasting the Egyptian army of 40 years ago with the army of today.

In addition, operations and communications channels of the Muslim Brotherhood have been “decentralized” to rely more so on local and community branches than the national headquarters. This is both an attempt to prevent the Brotherhood from being completely decapitated should the national leadership be removed but also to mimic a grassroots movement such as the Tamarod movement which deposed the incompetent Islamist Morsi. It should also be noted that the decentralization of the Muslim Brotherhood networks comes as a result of the recent ban of the Muslim Brotherhood by Egyptian court order.

Despite the obvious coordination and attempt to overthrow the Egyptian government (which is supported by the overwhelming majority of the Egyptian people) as well as the clearly violent nature of the so-called “demonstrators” filling Egyptian streets, the Western corporate media continues to portray the violence as the fault solely of the Egyptian military. As has been the case in the August series of violent riots by the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, however, the Muslim Brotherhood has been the initiator of violence and every bit as much a purveyor of it as the Egyptian security forces.

For instance, even CBS is forced to admit not only the presence but the use of small arms against the Egyptian army as demonstrators fired birdshot and threw firebombs at police in Cairo.

Even more telling was the fact that on Monday, October 7, Islamists fired rocket-propelled grenades which damaged a satellite dish that routes international calls. In the early morning hours on Monday, Islamists exchanged gunfire with the Egyptian security forces near the Giza pyramids, a battle which lasted nearly half an hour.

Egyptian police have consistently reported that militants have been using weapons in the clashes.

Conveniently timed, terrorist attacks in the Sinai peninsula have been taking place over the past few days just as the violence initiated by the Muslim Brotherhood. On Monday, a car bomb exploded in front of the provincial police headquarters. Gunmen in the Sinai also killed six policemen near Ismailiya.

It should also be noted that, as mentioned earlier, the current Egyptian government enjoys the support of the overwhelming majority of the Egyptian people. This is evidenced by the fact that the Egyptian people in the streets actually came to the aid of the Egyptian police when violence and gunfire broke out.

The Muslim Brotherhood – like the Syrian “rebels” still wreaking havoc upon that nation – are quite the opposite of the “democracy-loving peaceful protesters” the Western corporate media is portraying them to be. The Muslim Brotherhood, also active in Syria alongside other horrific death squads, has been caught in clear video evidence of violence in the form of shooting at security forces, coordinated attacks on Christian churches, and throwing political opponents off of rooftops.

The violent Muslim Brotherhood attempt to overthrow the military government of Egypt and replace it with an Islamist Muslim Brotherhood creation is, in reality, nothing more than an attempt by the West to destabilize Egypt as a result of the new government’s nationalistic tendencies.

Thus, it appears that a refusal to join in a war with Syria and Ethiopia, impose austerity, and capitulate to the IMF has caused the Egyptian government and military to create for itself some very powerful enemies. Only time will tell if the Egyptian military will be able to outlast the Islamist element supported by the West as well as Assad has been able to do in Syria. One can only hope that it can.

Read other articles by Brandon Turbeville here.

Brandon Turbeville is an author out of Florence, South Carolina. He has a Bachelor’s Degree from Francis Marion University and is the author of six books, Codex Alimentarius — The End of Health Freedom, 7 Real Conspiracies, Five Sense Solutions and Dispatches From a Dissident, volume 1 and volume 2, and The Road to Damascus: The Anglo-American Assault on Syria. Turbeville has published over 275 articles dealing on a wide variety of subjects including health, economics, government corruption, and civil liberties. Brandon Turbeville’s podcast Truth on The Tracks can be found every Monday night 9 pm EST at UCYTV. He is available for radio and TV interviews. Please contact activistpost (at) gmail.com.