Scene From A Cairo Mosque-Turned-Morgue
Audio for this story from will be available at approximately 7:00 p.m. ET.
A man walks among shrouded bodies at a Cairo
mosque on Thursday. At the El Iman mosque, more than 200 bodies were
being prepared for burial, the victims killed in a crackdown on
protesters by Egypt's military backed government. Some relatives said
the government wanted them to declare suicide or natural causes as the
cause of death to obtain a certificate needed for burial.
A man weeps as he surveys row upon row of corpses. Some are completely burned. "They are all my brothers," he cries.
Nearby, men methodically break apart blocks of ice in two caskets inside this Cairo mosque. They then place them under the bodies to stop them from decomposing.
But still the sickly sweet smell of death hangs in the air.
Volunteers burn incense and spray air freshener to mask it but it only adds to the stifling atmosphere.
Everywhere you look families cry out in sorrow. More than 200 bodies are being prepared for burial here, at the El-Iman mosque.
These corpses were brought to this place after the main camp for Morsi supporters was forcibly evacuated and set on fire by security forces Wednesday night. The blazes lit up the night sky and on Thursday, ashes still smolder.
Families preparing to bury the dead say they've been facing hurdles. They need a government issued certificate with the cause of death. They're claiming that the state is pressuring relatives to say the victims committed suicide or died of natural causes.
A woman rails against Egypt's head of police. "God burn him. God take vengeance on him," she cries.
Nearby a father and son have received the worst news. They sit huddled together in shock dealing with the loss of a son, a brother. His name was Omar.
"He was a hero," says Omar's brother, Mohamed Abdel Moneim. "He was shot saving others who were under fire, helping the wounded."
But if the brutal crackdown was supposed to put an end to the turmoil here, it seems to have had the opposite effect.
At the entrance of the mosque people chant defiantly: "Oh Martyrs sleep, and we will continue the struggle," they say. "Wait for us at heaven's gate."
Hundreds are gathered in support of Morsi and against the military.
Amr Mohammed wanders in to the area. The bespectacled consultant works nearby. He and a protester begin to argue over Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood leader who became Egypt's first democratically elected president, but was ousted by the military last month.
The protester yells, "You want me to forgo the ballot box, and let them throw my vote in the trash?"
Mohammed responds, "The votes that were cast are gone now, we don't want strife.
"This isn't strife," says the protester, "this is an uprising for rights."
A man nearby shushes them. This isn't the time or the place he says. Behind them more bodies are being carried in and out of the mosque.
Mohammed blames the Brotherhood for bringing Egypt to this point. The protesters were warned to disperse and they refused, he says. Later, I ask him why he came to this pro-Morsi protest: "People I believe should talk to each other. Other than this it's a disaster. We are divided, and we will continue to be more and more divided. It cannot continue like this."
It's a lone voice of reason in a country that seems to be hurtling into an abyss.
And the violence is continuing although much less widespread than Wednesday. A mob stormed a government building in Giza and set it on fire. And in Sinai at least seven soldiers were shot dead by unknown assailants. Forty-three members of the security services were killed Wednesday.
The rhetoric from the government has hardened. The Cabinet issued an ominous statement saying it was determined to counter "terrorist acts" and will use force in the face of any attacks on citizens or the state.
Civilians are being referred to military trials. Yet another sign of the army taking control of the state.
At a press briefing at the foreign ministry, officials showed video of dead policeman and Morsi supporters firing weapons during Wednesday's clashes. Deputy Foreign Minister Hatem Seif el Nasr defended the decision to impose a state of emergency: "If you don't impose a state of emergency in a situation like this when are you going to impose it?"
At nightfall, Muslim Brotherhood leaders called for protest marches in Cairo and elsewhere in defiance of the government-ordered curfew.
August 15, 2013
"It's difficult to see a path out of this crisis, at least not without more people dying."
That's how NPR's Cairo bureau chief, Leila Fadel, . After Wednesday's deadly crackdown by Egyptian troops on supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi — a crackdown that according to latest estimates left more than 500 people dead and 3,500 or so wounded — the fear is that there will be much more bloodshed.
As Leila reported, members of the Muslim Brotherhood have vowed to
continue their protests over Morsi's removal from office by the
military and the dismantling of his year-old, democratically elected
government.
Meanwhile, the generals and the interim government they installed have declared a monthlong state of emergency. Those who violate night curfews or try to organize new protests and sit-ins could be dealt with harshly. As Leila says, "the lines have hardened in Egypt."
The likelihood that things will get worse in Egypt before they get better is a recurring theme in Thursday morning's news reports:
— "The violence of the crackdown, which has led to hundreds of casualties, has paved the way for more chaos and instability in Egypt." ()
— "As military makes its move, forget about liberal democracy in Egypt." ()
— Egyptians awoke Thursday "to a frightening and uncertain future." ()
— "Whether the powerful military can keep a lid on the fury felt by millions of supporters of ousted President Mohamed Mursi, whom it deposed on July 3, is unclear." ()
— "Muslim Brotherhood supporters of the deposed president, Mohamed Morsi, urged followers to take to the streets on Thursday. ... The call for renewed demonstrations — threatening further bloody confrontation on the streets — came as an overnight curfew, ignored by some pro-Morsi figures who gathered at a mosque and other places, drew to a close and gave way to a brittle, muted calm in the city." ()
Update at 12:10 p.m. ET. Live Ammunition Will Continue To Be Used.
The potential for more bloodshed is underscored by new reports such as this dispatch from Reuters:
Egypt's Health Ministry now puts the number of dead in the crackdown in excess of 600, with nearly 4,000 wounded. The ministry says 288 of those killed were in the largest protest camp at Cairo's Nasr City district and 90 others were at a smaller encampment near Cairo University.
Hassan Ammar/AP
In the wake of the by Egypt's security forces, many analysts are
no longer talking about a country struggling with democracy. Rather,
they see a revolution gone awry and a military that seems determined to
crush the Muslim Brotherhood.
"I don't think it's right for us to even talk about a democratic transition in Egypt," Shadi Hamid, director of research for the Brookings Doha Center, . "The transition is over. And again, what we might be seeing is something worse than what happened under [former President Hosni] Mubarak."
Those sentiments were echoed by Steven A. Cook, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. In a piece headlined "," Cook argued in Foreign Policy magazine that "the 'revolution' that really never was, is over."
Obama's Criticism
President Obama, in his first public remarks since Wednesday's events in Cairo, "" the crackdown and canceled biannual military exercises with Egypt planned for next month.
The president did not specifically mention the $1.5 billion that the U.S. provides in aid to Egypt each year, saying only that Washington would continue to monitor conditions and may take further steps.
Hamid, the analyst from Brookings Doha, called it a "very weak response."
"The U.S. isn't really willing to put a lot more pressure on the Egyptian military," Hamid told Tell Me More. "And this is after a day where ... it's really the single highest death toll in Egypt's recent history."
Here are some of the other reactions to the events in Egypt:
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon condemned the violence "."
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a supporter of Morsi's, said he was "" by the crackdown and called on the U.N. and Arab League to intervene "to stop this massacre."
Qatar, which supported Morsi's government that was ousted last month, "."
Catherine Ashton, the European Union high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, ", injuries and destruction in Cairo and other places in Egypt."
One country that was not critical was the United Arab Emirates. The UAE opposes the Muslim Brotherhood and pledged $3 billion to Egypt after Morsi's ouster. The UAE "re-affirms its understanding of the sovereign measures taken by the Egyptian government after having exercised maximum self-control."
As violence continues in Egypt, an ongoing debate is ensuing
here on American soil about the role of the United States in this
international crisis. Senior Editor for The Daily Beast's "Open Zion"
joined HuffPost Live's Ahmed Shihab-Eldin to discuss the implications of American foreign aid in Egypt.
Commenting on President Obama's speech today, Gharib told Shihab-Eldin, "I think he didn't really go far enough. It's past time to send a stronger message than just canceling a military exercise."
"The truth is that the U.S. is a massive funder of the Egyptian military. Our aid constitutes roughly a fifth of the Egyptian military's budget, and they've come to understand that that money will flow to them without consequences for any of their actions. They're basically on that front acting with impunity," continued Gharib, echoing his recent article in The Daily Beast, "Time To Cut Off Egypt."
"I believe that not only is there a legal imperative to cut off aid to a military coup government ... but there's a strong moral imperative too," Gharib said.
For more on this discussion, watch the full segment here.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/15/ali-gharib-us-aid-egypt_n_3763174.html
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
The
escalating violence in Egypt means that the battle between the military
and Muslim Brotherhood is now openly for control of the country. One
side or the other is going to win, and there's little hope for
democratic reconciliation in the near term. The U.S. role amid the chaos
should be to keep focused on American strategic interests, which at
this stage means trying to prevent a bloody civil war that compounds
Middle East instability.
The military government behaved in typically
brutal fashion in trying to clear out camps of Brotherhood sympathizers
of deposed President Mohammed Morsi. The raids resulted in the most
serious violence to date, with hundreds of police and civilians killed
or hurt. The government of military chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ignored
U.S. calls for restraint, and the resulting violence has hurt its
standing at home and abroad.
The violence cost the support of the military's alliance with Egypt's secularists who had joined to oppose Mr. Morsi's excesses. Mohammed ElBaradei, who was vice president in the current interim government, resigned on Wednesday in protest. Mr. ElBaradei's political base barely covers an upscale district of Cairo, but his presence was a sign of military intent to lead the transition to a new constitution and legitimate government after the Morsi coup.
Now this is entirely a military show. General Sisi declared a one-month state of emergency on Wednesday, which is the same tool that Hosni Mubarak used to run Egypt unchallenged for 30 years until he was deposed by a popular uprising in 2011.
The violence also plays into the Brotherhood's desire for martrydom, which will feed its brooding political radicalism. That was on display after Mr. Morsi was elected but then tried to impose a form of religious authoritarianism by decree. In his last speech as president, Mr. Morsi incited his supporters to fight to the death, and too many of the Brotherhood take this literally.
While the
media focused on the military's overkill in Cairo, our sources and other
reports say Islamists on Wednesday attacked dozens of Coptic Christian
churches, burning some to the ground. This will cause further emigration
by the Copts, who make up about a tenth of Egypt's 82 million people,
much as Jews were once forced to flee or be killed.
The secretive Brotherhood can now reorganize in opposition to a familiar military foe. The danger is that Islamists across the region will conclude that their only political option is violent struggle, creating more terrorists like al Qaeda's Ayman al-Zawahiri. Although Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood abandoned armed struggle in the 1970s, its younger acolytes may not be so restrained. Islamist radicals are already active in the Sinai peninsula, where Egypt and Israel have cooperated recently to disrupt camps used by terrorists.
President Obama has had little or no influence amid these events, and on Thursday he canceled joint U.S.-Egypt military exercises. He added that his Administration is reviewing America's annual military aid of $1.3 billion. While cutting off aid would offer some moral satisfaction in the short run, it wouldn't make General Sisi any more likely to allow a democratic transition. The reality is that U.S. aid will be impossible to sustain politically if the violence continues.
The U.S. needs a stable Egypt that isn't a breeding ground for al Qaeda, honors its peace treaty with Israel, and has a political process that settles domestic disputes without taking to violence and the streets. The U.S. can nudge the ruling generals in that direction without taking sides with either the military or the Brotherhood.
NATIONAL POST
The World
After Deaths Of Hundreds, More Bloodshed Feared In Egypt
Li Muzi/Xinhua/Landov
Ahmed Hayman/EPA/Landov
Khalil Hamra/AP
Khaled Desouki/AFP/Getty Images
Amr Abdallah Dalsh/Reuters/Landov
Mahmoud Khaled/AFP/Getty Images
Khaled Elfiqi/EPA/Landov
Mahmoud Khaled/AFP/Getty Images
That's how NPR's Cairo bureau chief, Leila Fadel, . After Wednesday's deadly crackdown by Egyptian troops on supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi — a crackdown that according to latest estimates left more than 500 people dead and 3,500 or so wounded — the fear is that there will be much more bloodshed.
Related post at 10:47 a.m. ET:
Meanwhile, the generals and the interim government they installed have declared a monthlong state of emergency. Those who violate night curfews or try to organize new protests and sit-ins could be dealt with harshly. As Leila says, "the lines have hardened in Egypt."
The likelihood that things will get worse in Egypt before they get better is a recurring theme in Thursday morning's news reports:
— "The violence of the crackdown, which has led to hundreds of casualties, has paved the way for more chaos and instability in Egypt." ()
— "As military makes its move, forget about liberal democracy in Egypt." ()
— Egyptians awoke Thursday "to a frightening and uncertain future." ()
— "Whether the powerful military can keep a lid on the fury felt by millions of supporters of ousted President Mohamed Mursi, whom it deposed on July 3, is unclear." ()
— "Muslim Brotherhood supporters of the deposed president, Mohamed Morsi, urged followers to take to the streets on Thursday. ... The call for renewed demonstrations — threatening further bloody confrontation on the streets — came as an overnight curfew, ignored by some pro-Morsi figures who gathered at a mosque and other places, drew to a close and gave way to a brittle, muted calm in the city." ()
Update at 12:10 p.m. ET. Live Ammunition Will Continue To Be Used.
The potential for more bloodshed is underscored by new reports such as this dispatch from Reuters:
Update at 4:00 p.m. ET. Official Death Toll Crosses 600."Egyptian security forces will use live ammunition to counter any attacks against themselves or public buildings, state television said on Thursday, quoting the Interior Ministry. The announcement came hours after protesters torched a government building in a Cairo suburb."
Egypt's Health Ministry now puts the number of dead in the crackdown in excess of 600, with nearly 4,000 wounded. The ministry says 288 of those killed were in the largest protest camp at Cairo's Nasr City district and 90 others were at a smaller encampment near Cairo University.
Egypt's Bloody Crackdown Raises Specter Of Prolonged Battle
An Egyptian army soldier stands Thursday amid
the charred remains of the Rabaah al-Adawiya mosque, in the center of
the largest protest camp of supporters of ousted President Mohammed
Morsi, that was cleared by security forces in Cairo on Wednesday.
"I don't think it's right for us to even talk about a democratic transition in Egypt," Shadi Hamid, director of research for the Brookings Doha Center, . "The transition is over. And again, what we might be seeing is something worse than what happened under [former President Hosni] Mubarak."
Those sentiments were echoed by Steven A. Cook, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. In a piece headlined "," Cook argued in Foreign Policy magazine that "the 'revolution' that really never was, is over."
The Muslim Brotherhood's Morsi by the military last month."Just as Egypt's political system before the January 25 [2011] uprising was rigged in favor of Mubarak and his constituents, the Brothers sought to stack the new order in their favor, and today's winners will build a political system that reflects their interests. ... Although virtually all political actors have leveraged the language of political reform and espoused liberal ideas, they have nevertheless sought to wield power through exclusion. This has created an environment in which the losers do not process their grievances through elections, parliamentary debate, consensus-building, and compromise — but through military intervention and street protests. This plays into the hands of those powerful groups embedded within the state who have worked to restore the old order almost from the time that Hosni Mubarak stepped down into ignominy two and a half years ago."
More On Egypt
The president did not specifically mention the $1.5 billion that the U.S. provides in aid to Egypt each year, saying only that Washington would continue to monitor conditions and may take further steps.
Hamid, the analyst from Brookings Doha, called it a "very weak response."
"The U.S. isn't really willing to put a lot more pressure on the Egyptian military," Hamid told Tell Me More. "And this is after a day where ... it's really the single highest death toll in Egypt's recent history."
Here are some of the other reactions to the events in Egypt:
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon condemned the violence "."
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a supporter of Morsi's, said he was "" by the crackdown and called on the U.N. and Arab League to intervene "to stop this massacre."
Qatar, which supported Morsi's government that was ousted last month, "."
Catherine Ashton, the European Union high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, ", injuries and destruction in Cairo and other places in Egypt."
One country that was not critical was the United Arab Emirates. The UAE opposes the Muslim Brotherhood and pledged $3 billion to Egypt after Morsi's ouster. The UAE "re-affirms its understanding of the sovereign measures taken by the Egyptian government after having exercised maximum self-control."
Ali Gharib: U.S. Has 'Moral Imperative' To Cut Funding To Egyptian Military (VIDEO)
HuffPost Live
|
Posted: 08/15/2013 7:04 pm EDT
Commenting on President Obama's speech today, Gharib told Shihab-Eldin, "I think he didn't really go far enough. It's past time to send a stronger message than just canceling a military exercise."
"The truth is that the U.S. is a massive funder of the Egyptian military. Our aid constitutes roughly a fifth of the Egyptian military's budget, and they've come to understand that that money will flow to them without consequences for any of their actions. They're basically on that front acting with impunity," continued Gharib, echoing his recent article in The Daily Beast, "Time To Cut Off Egypt."
"I believe that not only is there a legal imperative to cut off aid to a military coup government ... but there's a strong moral imperative too," Gharib said.
For more on this discussion, watch the full segment here.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/15/ali-gharib-us-aid-egypt_n_3763174.html
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
America's Interests in Egypt
The U.S. should use its small influence to prevent a civil war.
more in Opinion
»
Related Video
Global View columnist Bret Stephens on
whether the Egyptian military can contain the Muslim Brotherhood after
Wednesday’s massacre. Photo: Associated Press
The violence cost the support of the military's alliance with Egypt's secularists who had joined to oppose Mr. Morsi's excesses. Mohammed ElBaradei, who was vice president in the current interim government, resigned on Wednesday in protest. Mr. ElBaradei's political base barely covers an upscale district of Cairo, but his presence was a sign of military intent to lead the transition to a new constitution and legitimate government after the Morsi coup.
Now this is entirely a military show. General Sisi declared a one-month state of emergency on Wednesday, which is the same tool that Hosni Mubarak used to run Egypt unchallenged for 30 years until he was deposed by a popular uprising in 2011.
The violence also plays into the Brotherhood's desire for martrydom, which will feed its brooding political radicalism. That was on display after Mr. Morsi was elected but then tried to impose a form of religious authoritarianism by decree. In his last speech as president, Mr. Morsi incited his supporters to fight to the death, and too many of the Brotherhood take this literally.
Egypt's Defense Minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi
The secretive Brotherhood can now reorganize in opposition to a familiar military foe. The danger is that Islamists across the region will conclude that their only political option is violent struggle, creating more terrorists like al Qaeda's Ayman al-Zawahiri. Although Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood abandoned armed struggle in the 1970s, its younger acolytes may not be so restrained. Islamist radicals are already active in the Sinai peninsula, where Egypt and Israel have cooperated recently to disrupt camps used by terrorists.
President Obama has had little or no influence amid these events, and on Thursday he canceled joint U.S.-Egypt military exercises. He added that his Administration is reviewing America's annual military aid of $1.3 billion. While cutting off aid would offer some moral satisfaction in the short run, it wouldn't make General Sisi any more likely to allow a democratic transition. The reality is that U.S. aid will be impossible to sustain politically if the violence continues.
The U.S. needs a stable Egypt that isn't a breeding ground for al Qaeda, honors its peace treaty with Israel, and has a political process that settles domestic disputes without taking to violence and the streets. The U.S. can nudge the ruling generals in that direction without taking sides with either the military or the Brotherhood.
The World
Egypt police freed to use deadly force amid fears protest death toll will top 1,000
CAIRO,
Egypt — Egyptian authorities on Thursday authorized police to use
deadly force to protect themselves and key state institutions from
attacks after violent protests erupted across the country.
Presumed supporters of Egypt’s deposed Islamist president torched two local government buildings near the capital in the latest of a series of apparent reprisals to follow a bloody crackdown on their protest camps that led to more than 600 deaths.
U.S. President Barack Obama interrupted his vacation Thursday to condemn the violence. The president cancelled joint military exercises with Egypt next month saying America’s traditional co-operation “cannot continue as usual while civilians are being killed in the streets.”
Also on Thursday, the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of national security, announced new measures after an angry crowd stormed buildings in Giza, the city next to Cairo that is home to the Pyramids. A two-storey, colonial-style villa and a four-storey administrative building were set on fire.
“The ministry has given instruction to all forces to use live ammunition to confront any assaults on institutions or the forces,” the statement read.
Attackers set fire to churches and police stations across the country
on Wednesday after security forces assaulted two Cairo sit-ins where
thousands of supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi were camped
out. Officials said the death toll was 638, mostly Morsi supporters, and
4,200 injured.
Egypt’s military-backed government pledged in a statement to confront “terrorist actions and sabotage” allegedly carried out by members of Mr. Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood.
“The cabinet expressed its determination to confront the terrorist actions and sabotage by elements of the Muslim Brotherhood organization,” it said. “These actions are carried out as part of criminal plan that clearly aims at toppling down the state.”
On Wednesday, the government declared a nationwide state of emergency and a nighttime curfew.
State TV blamed Morsi supporters for the fires in Giza and broadcast
footage showing both structures burning as firemen evacuated employees
from the larger building.
The Brotherhood website Ikhwanweb said thousands marched through Giza but were attacked by pro-military “militias.” It did not say how the government buildings were set on fire.
In the coastal city of Alexandria, witnesses and a security official said, Morsi supporters stabbed a taxi driver to death for hanging a picture of Defence Minister Gen. Abdel-Fatah al-Sisi, the leader of the July 3 coup.
“The driver was caught in middle of a protest by the Muslim Brotherhood chanting against the military. He argued with them to watch out, they pulled him out [of his car] and stabbed him,” said Mohammed el-Mashali, a reporter for the al-Fagr weekly who said he witnessed the killing.
Tamarod, the youth movement that organized mass rallies calling for
Mr. Morsi’s ouster, said citizens should set up neighbourhood watch
groups to protect government and private property.
Meanwhile, successive attacks on Coptic Christian churches continued for a second day, according to Egypt’s official news agency and human rights advocates.
Egypt’s MENA agency said Morsi supporters set fire to the Prince Tadros church in the province of Fayoum, nearly 80 kilometres southwest of Cairo.
Ishaq Ibrahim from The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights said his group has documented as many as 39 incidents of violence against churches, monasteries, Coptic schools and shops in different parts of the country on Wednesday.
Speaking from his week-long vacation in Massachusetts, Mr. Obama directed his national security team to see what additional steps the U.S. might take.
“America cannot determine the future of Egypt,” Mr. Obama said. “That’s a task for the Egyptian people. We don’t take sides with any particular party or political figure.”
The Bright Star military exercise has been a centrepiece of the two countries’ military relations for a decade, but with the army consumed by the chaos in Cairo and other major cities, it was not clear that the cancellation of the joint manoeuvres would be seen as more than a symbolic move.
The U.S. and Egypt have not held the biennial exercises since 2009.
As part of guarantees to Egypt when it made peace with Israel more than 30 years ago, the United States has been sending $1.3-billion in aid annually, most of it to the military. Fearing Washington might lose what leverage it has with the Egyptian army, the Obama administration so far has refused to call the military takeover a coup.
Mr. Obama has been criticized for that policy by both opponents and some supporters in the United States.
“We appreciate the complexity of the situation,” Mr. Obama said. “While Mohammed Morsi was elected president in a democratic election, his government was not inclusive and did not respect the views of all Egyptians.”
The president said Egypt would have “false starts” in its efforts to embrace democracy and recalled America’s own “mighty struggles to perfect our union.”
Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, called for an independent inquiry into the use of “extreme force” by the security forces against the protesters.
The UN Security Council has called for an emergency meeting for Friday.
The Associated Press
Presumed supporters of Egypt’s deposed Islamist president torched two local government buildings near the capital in the latest of a series of apparent reprisals to follow a bloody crackdown on their protest camps that led to more than 600 deaths.
U.S. President Barack Obama interrupted his vacation Thursday to condemn the violence. The president cancelled joint military exercises with Egypt next month saying America’s traditional co-operation “cannot continue as usual while civilians are being killed in the streets.”
Also on Thursday, the Interior Ministry, which is in charge of national security, announced new measures after an angry crowd stormed buildings in Giza, the city next to Cairo that is home to the Pyramids. A two-storey, colonial-style villa and a four-storey administrative building were set on fire.
“The ministry has given instruction to all forces to use live ammunition to confront any assaults on institutions or the forces,” the statement read.
Egypt’s military-backed government pledged in a statement to confront “terrorist actions and sabotage” allegedly carried out by members of Mr. Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood.
“The cabinet expressed its determination to confront the terrorist actions and sabotage by elements of the Muslim Brotherhood organization,” it said. “These actions are carried out as part of criminal plan that clearly aims at toppling down the state.”
On Wednesday, the government declared a nationwide state of emergency and a nighttime curfew.
The Brotherhood website Ikhwanweb said thousands marched through Giza but were attacked by pro-military “militias.” It did not say how the government buildings were set on fire.
In the coastal city of Alexandria, witnesses and a security official said, Morsi supporters stabbed a taxi driver to death for hanging a picture of Defence Minister Gen. Abdel-Fatah al-Sisi, the leader of the July 3 coup.
“The driver was caught in middle of a protest by the Muslim Brotherhood chanting against the military. He argued with them to watch out, they pulled him out [of his car] and stabbed him,” said Mohammed el-Mashali, a reporter for the al-Fagr weekly who said he witnessed the killing.
Meanwhile, successive attacks on Coptic Christian churches continued for a second day, according to Egypt’s official news agency and human rights advocates.
Egypt’s MENA agency said Morsi supporters set fire to the Prince Tadros church in the province of Fayoum, nearly 80 kilometres southwest of Cairo.
Ishaq Ibrahim from The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights said his group has documented as many as 39 incidents of violence against churches, monasteries, Coptic schools and shops in different parts of the country on Wednesday.
Speaking from his week-long vacation in Massachusetts, Mr. Obama directed his national security team to see what additional steps the U.S. might take.
“America cannot determine the future of Egypt,” Mr. Obama said. “That’s a task for the Egyptian people. We don’t take sides with any particular party or political figure.”
The Bright Star military exercise has been a centrepiece of the two countries’ military relations for a decade, but with the army consumed by the chaos in Cairo and other major cities, it was not clear that the cancellation of the joint manoeuvres would be seen as more than a symbolic move.
The U.S. and Egypt have not held the biennial exercises since 2009.
As part of guarantees to Egypt when it made peace with Israel more than 30 years ago, the United States has been sending $1.3-billion in aid annually, most of it to the military. Fearing Washington might lose what leverage it has with the Egyptian army, the Obama administration so far has refused to call the military takeover a coup.
“We appreciate the complexity of the situation,” Mr. Obama said. “While Mohammed Morsi was elected president in a democratic election, his government was not inclusive and did not respect the views of all Egyptians.”
The president said Egypt would have “false starts” in its efforts to embrace democracy and recalled America’s own “mighty struggles to perfect our union.”
Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, called for an independent inquiry into the use of “extreme force” by the security forces against the protesters.
The UN Security Council has called for an emergency meeting for Friday.
The Associated Press
