Cairo: Egypt’s leading religious authority warned of “civil war” on Friday and called for calm after a member of the ruling Muslim Brotherhood was killed ahead of mass rallies aimed at forcing the president to quit.
“Vigilance is required to ensure we do not slide into civil war,” the Al Azhar institute said. In a statement broadly supportive of Islamist head of state Mohammad Mursi, it blamed “criminal gangs” who besieged mosques for street violence which the Brotherhood said has killed five supporters in a week.
Thousands of backers of Egypt’s Islamist president rallied Friday in Cairo in a show of support ahead of planned opposition protests this weekend demanding his removal, as passengers swamped the capital’s international airport to leave, fearing widespread violence.
For the past several days, Morsi’s opponents and members of his Muslim Brotherhood have been battling it out in the streets of several cities in the Nile Delta in violence that has left at least five dead. The latest died Friday from injuries suffered in fighting the day before, security officials said.
The Brotherhood says the five killed in the Delta clashes were its members. Some people “think they can topple a democratically elected President by killing his support groups,” Gehad Al Haddad, a Brotherhood spokesman, wrote on his Twitter account. There was no immediate sign of trouble as Islamists gathered round a Cairo mosque after weekly prayers to show support for Mursi. His opponents hope millions will turn out on Sunday to demand new elections, a year to the day since he was sworn in as Egypt’s first freely elected leader.
“I came to support the legitimate order,” said Ahmad Al Maghrabi, 37, a shopkeeper from the Nile Delta city of Mansoura whose hand bore grazes from street fighting there this week. “I am with the elected president. He needs to see out his term.” There was a mostly festive atmosphere in the hot sunshine, with vendors selling mango and cakes and banners flying.
Cairo International Airport was flooded with departures, in an exodus airport officials called unprecedented. They said all flights departing Friday to Europe, the United States and the Gulf were fully booked with no vacant seats.
Many of those leaving were families of Egyptian officials and businessmen and those of foreign and Arab League diplomats - as well as many Egyptian Christians, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they are not authorised to talk to the press.
Some opposition gatherings were also under way. A handful of protesters watched security men ringing the presidential palace, the focus for Sunday’s Cairo rally. Mursi has moved elsewhere.
The army, which heeded mass protests in early 2011 to push aside Husni Mubarak, has warned it will intervene again if there is violence and to defend the “will of the people”. Both sides believe that means the military may support their positions.
In Alexandria, the second city, several thousand protesters marched along the seafront. Some fear the Brotherhood is intent on usurping the revolution to entrench its power and Islamic law. Others were complaining mainly about economic stagnation.
“I’ve nothing to do with politics, but with the state we’re in now, even a stone would cry out,” said 42-year-old accountant Mohammad Abdul Latif. “There are no services, we can’t find diesel or gasoline. We elected Mursi, but this is enough. “Let him make way for someone else who can fix it.”
Al Azhar, an ancient academy which traditionally maintains a distance from the political establishment, urged the opposition to accept Mursi’s offer of dialogue and abandon demonstrations.
Senior Al Azhar scholar Hassan Al Shafei was quoted by state media saying they should accept it “for the national good, instead of the insistence on confrontation”.
Opposition leaders dismissed Mursi’s proposal on Wednesday to include the fragmented opposition in panels to review the constitution and promote reconcilation, saying such offers led nowhere because the Brotherhood refuses to dilute its power.
Mursi and the Brotherhood accuse loyalists of the old regime of being behind violence and of thwarting their efforts to reform an economy hobbled by corruption.
In his speech, Mursi denounced his critics but admitted some mistakes and offered talks to ease polarisation in politics that he said threatened Egypt’s new democratic system. But opposition leaders said their protests on Sunday would go ahead.
“Dr Mohamed Mursi’s speech of yesterday only made us more determined in our call for an early presidential vote in order to achieve the goals of the revolution,” the liberal opposition coalition said after its leaders met to consider a response.
“We are confident the Egyptian masses will go out in their millions in Egypt’s squares and streets on June 30 to confirm their will to get the January 25 revolution back on track.”
It is hard to gauge how many may turn out but much of the population, even those sympathetic to Islamic ideas, are deeply frustrated by economic slump and many blame the government.
Previous protest movements since the fall of Mubarak have failed to gather momentum, however, among a population anxious for stability and fearful of further economic hardship.
