Bye-bye, Brotherhood

Egyptian security may not yet have evacuated the square where Morsi supporters continue to demonstrate, but heightened tension between the government and the Muslim Brotherhood continues to lead the news in Arab dailies on Thursday.

“The Egyptian government escalates its confrontation with the government,” reads the headline of London-based daily Al-Hayat, reporting that Egypt’s prosecutor general has charged Muslim Brotherhood General Guide Mohammed Badie and his deputy Khairat Shater in a criminal court for “killing protesters.”

Meanwhile, the government has defined the pro-Morsi encampment in Rabiah Al-Adawiya square “a threat to national security” and has ordered the security agencies to disperse it.

London-based daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi quotes “observers” as saying that the decision to indict Badie and Shater has “shut the door” on the possibility of compromises with the Muslim Brotherhood, since its leadership has now become “either wanted or under the authority of the criminal court.”

Despite all evidence to the contrary, Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy tells Saudi-owned daily A-Sharq Al-Awsat that the Muslim Brotherhood can be part of Egypt’s new political map, but cannot be “an alternative to the state” as it was when in power.

Fahmy said that allowing foreign delegations to visit deposed president Mohammed Morsi in his secret location proves that Egypt has “nothing to hide,” adding that an Egyptian human rights group was the first to be allowed to see Morsi.

In its top story, anti-Brotherhood Egyptian daily Al-Masry Al-Youm reports that the government will evacuate Rabiah Al-Adawiyah within four days.

The daily reports heated exchanges in a government meeting Wednesday concerning the “terrorist threat” emanating from the pro-Morsi encampment, with some ministers claiming that the military was forsaken by the political leaders to deal with the Islamists with no political or legal backing.

Large pickup trucks were viewed approaching Rabiah Al-Adawia carrying metal bars and large quantities of cement and sand to fortify the opposition barricades, which witnesses said will resemble the Bar Lev line that Israel established along the Suez Canal in the late sixties to block the advance of the Egyptian army, the daily reports.

Qatari news channel Al-Jazeera, sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood, continues to highlight the pro-Morsi demonstrations in its coverage of Egypt. In a TV report, the channel interviews one supporter who says that they will “either die in their spot or be collectively arrested,” adding that they “will face their weapons with bare chests.”

A separate Al-Jazeera article accuses Egyptian mainstream media and artists of inciting violence against Islamist protesters. The media, claims Al-Jazeera, argues that the demonstrators are violent “terrorists,” and oppose life and the environment. Egyptian society is growing dangerously militaristic, with many calling on the army to strike “the others.”

The Muslim Brotherhood, claims columnist Amr Shobaki in Al-Masry Al-Youm, simply despises the state and its institutions.

“Throughout its history, the Brotherhood has maintained its own separate entity, and perhaps its ‘parallel state.’ It has upheld its own historic memory, which contradicted the Egyptian historic memory,” writes Shobaki.