Protests In Egypt Continue, 22 Reported Killed
People in Tahrir Square
Egypt entered on Monday a third day of protest as the military rulers tried to contain an explosion of protest in Tahrir Square and across the country demanding their ouster a week ahead of the general elections. On Sunday, when the military attempted to clear the Tahrir Square, the fight took a bloody course. 22 people were reported killed by the Health Ministry since the protests began.
The fight went on throughout the night with gunfire being heard in the streets choked with tear gas. Eyewitnesses report that three bodies were wrapped in blankets and that they were of protesters hit by ammunition.
On Monday, the center of the capital was covered in stones and debris resulted from the fighting. Security forces continued to fire on a street leading from Tahrir Square to the Interior Ministry with tear gas but the street remained in the hands of the clogged demonstrators. Thousands were in the square and the surrounding streets by midday.
A general from the ruling military council visited Tahrir Square on Monday and spoke in a brief press conference that the council respected their right to peacefully protest, and added that the military did not initiate any violent act and that they merely defended themselves.
Asked about the people injured by the security forces, the general said that those injured were “thugs,” not protesters. He urged the protesters to consider the implications of their protest for the economy, the costs of closing the square to the traffic and the reaction of the markets to this new revolt.
The general, whose name was not revealed, said that there was an invisible hand in the Tahrir Square pushing the people to protest. On Sunday, when hundreds of security forces stormed the square along with riot police, twice as many people came to protest. Some people even said that this was a moment when they reclaimed their revolution.
The use of ammunition on people caused even more moderate voices, like Mohamed ElBaradei, who’s been keeping a low profile for the past months, to condemn the military. Same condemnations came from the Muslim Brotherhood.
The entire scandal revolves around the military announced decision to continue to have a grasp on the newly elected parliament even after the elections. Both liberals and Islamists agreed that the military must protect the people not rule them, and that power must be returned to the people as soon as the elections have established a winner.
Earlier in the year, the military announced that the presidential elections will be held sometime in 2013, and that until then the power will remain with their supreme ruling council.
The political forces, using this protest to campaign for the upcoming election, said that there were three possibilities: the return of power immediately to civilian authorities; the return of power to the lower house of the parliament in April next year; the return of power to the people after the presidential elections.
The entire protest started on Friday as a peaceful march of tens of thousands of Islamists, but erupted on Saturday in a wave of anger when the military wanted to dismantle the tent city set in the Tahrir Square.
There were people who called what was going on “the real showdown,” saying that getting rid of Mubarak was just a warming up, and that the real revolution is to come. There were television commentators saying that the military permitted this situation to develop so that they may have a reason to postpone the elections.
The Muslim Brotherhood warned that they would not accept any delay or cancellation of the elections. They also said that they held responsible the military for the surge of violence in the center of the capital.
