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CAIRO (AP) -- With astonishing speed, Egypt has moved from a
nation in crisis to a nation in real danger of slipping into a prolonged
bout of violence or even civil war.
Egypt has
become increasingly polarized since the Islamists rose to power
following the 2011 revolution that ousted autocrat Hosni Mubarak. Fault
lines touching key and potentially explosive issues like identity, the
rights of Christians and other minorities, and democratic values have
never been greater.
The Muslim Brotherhood and
their hard-line allies stand at one end of a bitter standoff with
secularists, liberals, moderate Muslims and Christians.
That
schism grew after President Mohammed Morsi, Egypt's first
democratically elected leader, was ousted in a July 3 military coup. But
it was Wednesday's deadly police raids - with armored bulldozers and
security forces plowing through two protest camps - that will be
remembered as a turning point when what had been primarily a political
standoff erupted into bloodshed.
"The spark of
civil war is out," wrote Islamist columnist and author Fahmy Howeidy in
Thursday's edition of the independent al-Shorouk daily. "The nation is
on the edge of an abyss."
Adding to the mix is
the branding by the state media of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood and
allies as "terrorists" and growing calls for authorities to take a
tougher approach on the Islamists.
In a
glimpse of what may be in store for the most populous Arab state, dozens
of revenge attacks and clashes spilled over into a second day Thursday
in Cairo and other cities - showing the capability of Islamists to
strike and laying bare the depth of their anger over Morsi's ouster and
the crackdown that left hundreds dead.
Angry
young men attacked government and security buildings, setting some
ablaze, cut off roads, damaged or torched dozens of churches and stormed
more than 20 police stations.
In one
particularly gruesome attack, four officers in a police station just
outside Cairo were killed after the building was shelled with
rocket-propelled grenades. The assailants then slit the police chief's
throat, a brutality reminiscent of an Islamist, anti-government
insurgency that raged in Egypt in the 1990s before Mubarak used force to
suppress it, killing and jailing thousands of Islamists.
In
response, the government authorized police Thursday to use deadly force
against anyone attacking security forces or government installations.
While
the international community largely condemned the overwhelming use of
force to clear out the camps on Wednesday, the military-backed
administration's fight against the Brotherhood so far has been supported
by many Egyptians, who are mainly Muslim but object to hard-liners.
"The
army and the police will strike hard and ordinary people will be
supportive," prominent rights lawyer and activist Gamal Eid said.
To
such observers, it is beyond doubt that a majority of Egyptians
supports going after the Brotherhood and its hard-line allies.
Millions
took to the streets for days prior to the July 3 coup to call on Morsi
to step down, angry over what they saw as efforts to monopolize power
for himself and the Brotherhood, failure to implement crucial social and
economic reforms and his public quarrels with the judiciary, the media,
the military and police.
The mass protests
morphed into celebrations on the day of his ouster. And a similar number
responded to a call by military chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi to
take to the streets on July 26 to show support for his moves to tackle
"violence and potential terrorism."
The
military and police also have gone after the Muslim Brotherhood and
like-minded groups on the legal front, arresting dozens including senior
leaders.
State-run TV and newspapers,
meanwhile, are filled with commentators and other content full of
anti-Brotherhood sentiment, often portraying Islamists as enemies of the
people and tapping into nationalistic fervor by alleging that the
Brotherhood is a violent group that is secretly enlisting foreign help
against the rest of Egyptians and that views Egypt as just a part in a
greater Muslim nation that transcends borders.
A
backlash against Mohammed ElBaradei's decision to resign as interim
vice president to protest the violence illustrated how widespread is the
antipathy to the Brotherhood and its allies. The Nobel Peace Prize
laureate and former director of the U.N. nuclear agency said he quit
because he did not want to be held responsible for bloodshed.
"It
has become difficult for me to continue to take responsibility for
decisions I disapprove of, and I fear their consequences," he said in
his letter of resignation. "I regret that those who benefited today are
the proponents of violence, terror and the more extreme groups, and you
will remember my words to you."
His
resignation earned him public rebuke from Tamarod, the youth group that
engineered the mass protests preceding Morsi's ouster. It said he was
dodging his responsibility at a time when his services were needed. Even
the umbrella of opposition groups he led during Morsi's year in power
regretted his decision and bemoaned that he did not bother to consult it
beforehand.
A front-page editorial in the
state-owned al-Akhbar daily on Thursday said ElBaradei's resignation
"amounts to a breach of his position and, consequently, is a case of
treason that should not be allowed to pass without accountability."
In
anticipation of mass protests by Brotherhood supporters on Friday,
Tamarod, or Rebel, has called on Egyptians to form popular committees to
counter any violence by the Islamists during the demonstrations,
proposing a scenario that places rivals face to face on the streets with
a chance of violence breaking out.
Already,
Islamist hard-liners in the strategic Sinai Peninsula are waging a
worsening insurgency against security forces, with near daily attacks.
Sinai has for several years now been roiled in unrest, but the dramatic
increase in the number of attacks on security forces there began as soon
as Morsi was ousted, leading many to deduce that the Brotherhood and
militants in Sinai were somehow bonded.
"Sure
civil war is a possibility," said Michael W. Hanna, an expert on Egypt
from the New York-based Century Foundation. "It will be bad, with
suicide bombings and assassinations but not necessarily another Syria or
Iraq."
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Hendawi is chief of bureau for The Associated Press in Cairo. He has covered the Middle East for the AP since 1995.
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