Cairo: A leading anti-Islamist group, which helped bring about the fall of Egyptian president Mohammad Mursi, urged on Wednesday the country’s new rulers to block US-led moves to attack Syria.
Hassan Shahin of the Tamarod (Rebellion) group called for barring warships, suspected of involvement in a military action threatened by the West against, Syria from using the Suez Canal.
“Supporting the Arab Syrian army is a national duty,” Shahin added in a tweet. “The Arab people have to rebel after unmasking the plot of the Free (Syrian) Army and its backers among the Muslim Brotherhood and their allies from the militant groups,” he said.
Few weeks before his ouster by the army on July 3, Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood cut off diplomatic links with Syria and ordered the closure of the Syrian embassy in Cairo. Dozens of Egyptian Islamists have reportedly been killed in fighting against troops of President Bashar Al Assad in Syria in recent months.
“We will support the Arab Syrian army and there is no place for traitors of their countries,” said Shahin.
Tamarod launched a successful petition campaign demanding Mursi to step down. The group mobilised massive street protests, cited by the military to depose Mursi, Egypt’s first democratically elected president.
Egypt’s newly installed Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmi said last month his country has no intention for pursuing “jihad” (holy war) in Syria, signalling a thaw in the relations with Damascus strained under Mursi.
Egypt is home to thousands of Syrian refugees, some of them have experienced public ire in Egypt over perceived backing for Islamists’ anti-military protests, according to local media reports.
Egypt’s Arab League envoy, Randa Labeeb said this week that her country opposes a “military solution” to Syria’s 29-month-old conflict.
