Who Are the 'Real' Muslim Brotherhood?

[Teddy Bear]

Here's some facts about this organisation that the BBC are doing their best to present as 'moderate', 'conservative', and 'non-violent'. Measure the bias on any article by the BBC concerning this group for yourselves.

Here's first what the BBC want you to understand about them:
Muslim Brotherhood

• Egypt's oldest and largest Islamist organisation
  
• Founded by Hassan al-Banna in 1928
  
• Has influenced Islamist movements worldwide
  
• Mixes political activism with charity work
  
• Banned from open political activity
  
• Rejects use of violence and supports democratic principles
  
• Wants to create a state governed by Islamic law
  
• Slogan: "Islam is the Solution"
  

Now in the real world. Links to the source of these quotes can be accessed directly from the website below

Muslim Brotherhood Fact Sheet

The Muslim Brotherhood logo fits its motto:

"Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope. Allahu akbar!” [1]

· The Brotherhood’s goal is to turn the world into an Islamist empire. The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928, is a revolutionary fundamentalist movement to restore the caliphate and strict shariah (Islamist) law in Muslim lands and, ultimately, the world. Today, it has chapters in 80 countries.

“It is in the nature of Islam to dominate, not to be dominated, to impose its law on all nations and to extend its power to the entire planet.” —Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna[2]

· The Brotherhood wants America to fall. It tells followers to be “patient” because America “is heading towards its demise.” The U.S. is an infidel that “does not champion moral and human values and cannot lead humanity.” —Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Badi, Sept. 2010[3]

· The Brotherhood claims western democracy is “corrupt,” “unrealistic.” and “false.”
—Former Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Mahdi Akef [4]

· The Brotherhood calls for jihad against “the Muslim’s real enemies, not only Israel but also the United States. Waging jihad against both of these infidels is a commandment of Allah that cannot be disregarded.” —Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Badi, Sept. 2010[5]

· The Brotherhood assassinated Anwar Sadat in 1981 for making peace with the hated “Zionist entity.”[6]It also assassinated Egypt’s prime minister in 1948 and attempted to assassinate President Nasser in 1954.[7]

· Hamas is a “wing of the Muslim Brotherhood,” according to the Hamas Charter, Chapter 2. The Charter calls for the murder of Jews, the “obliteration” of Israel and its replacement with an Islamist theocracy.

· The Brotherhood supports Hezbollah’s war against the Jews. Brotherhood leader Mahdi Akef declared he was “prepared to send 10,000 jihad fighters immediately to fight at the side of Hezbollah” during Hezbollah’s war against Israel in 2006.[8]

· The Brotherhood glorifies Osama bin Laden. Osama is “in all certainty, a mujahid (heroic fighter), and I have no doubt in his sincerity in resisting the occupation, close to Allah on high.” —Former Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Mahdi Akef, Nov. 2007[9]

· The Brotherhood “sanctioned martyrdom operations in Palestine.…They do not have bombs, so they turn themselves into bombs. This is a necessity.” — Muslim Brotherhood Spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Dec. 17, 2010[10]

· The Brotherhood advocates violent jihad: The “change that the [Muslim] nation seeks can only be attained through jihad and sacrifice and by raising a jihadi generation that pursues death just as the enemies pursue life,” said Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Badi in a September 2010 sermon.[11] Major terrorists came out of the Muslim Brotherhood, including bin Laden’s deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (mastermind of the 9/11 attacks).[12]

· The Brotherhood advocates a deceptive strategy in democracies: appear moderate and use existing institutions to gain power. “The civilizational-jihadist process…is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house…so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious overall other religions,” reads a US Muslim Brotherhood 1991 document.[13] It believes it can conquer Europe peacefully: “After having been expelled twice, Islam will be victorious and reconquer Europe....I am certain that this time, victory will be won not by the sword but by preaching and [Islamic] ideology.” — Muslim Brotherhood Spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi, “Fatwa,” 2003[14]

· The Brotherhood uses democracy, but once in power it will replace democracy with fundamentalist shariah law because it is the “true democracy.” “The final, absolute message from heaven contains all the values which the secular world claims to have invented....Islam and its values antedated the West by founding true democracy.”
—Former Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Mahdi Akef, Nov. 2007[15]

· The Brotherhood’s view of women’s rights is to subjugate and segregate women: The ideal society would include “a campaign against ostentation in dress and loose behaviour…segregation of male and female students; private meetings between men and women, unless within the permitted degrees of relationship, to be counted as a crime for which both will be censured…prohibition of dancing and other such pastimes." —Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna, “Five Tracts”[16]

· The Brotherhood supports Female Genital Mutilation: “[the Americans] wage war on Muslim leaders, the traditions of its faith and its ideas. They even wage war against female circumcision, a practice current in 36 countries, which has been prevalent since the time of the Pharaohs.” —Former Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Mahdi Akef, 2007[17]

· The Brotherhood will not treat non-Muslim minorities, such as Coptic Christians, as equals. “Allah's word will reign supreme and the infidels' word will be inferior.” —Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Badi, Sept. 2010[18]

· The Brotherhood refuses to commit to continuing the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.[19]Muslim Brotherhood leaders have said that “as far as the movement is concerned, Israel is a Zionist entity occupying holy Arab and Islamic lands...and we will get rid of it no matter how long it takes.” —Former Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Muhammed Mahdi Akef, 2005 and 2007[20]

· The Brotherhood has anti-Semitic roots. It supported the Nazis, organized mass demonstrations against the Jews with slogans promoting ethnic cleansing like “Down with the Jews!” and “Jews get out of Egypt and Palestine!” in 1936; carried out a violent pogrom against Egypt’s Jews in November 1945; and made sure that Nazi collaborator and Palestinian Mufti al-Husseini was granted asylum in Egypt in 1946.[21]

· The Brotherhood remains virulently anti-Semitic. “Today the Jews are not the Israelites praised by Allah, but the descendants of the Israelites who defied His word. Allah was angry with them and turned them into monkeys and pigs….There is no doubt that the battle in which the Muslims overcome the Jews [will come]....In that battle the Muslims will fight the Jews and kill them." —Muslim Brotherhood Spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi[22]

[Teddy Bear]

Here's a great article on what the BBC dangerously want you to believe the Muslim Brotherhood are about.

The BBC and the Muslim Brotherhood

In The Weekly Standard, Just Journalism Executive Director Michael Weiss writes about the distinctions in coverage of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood across BBC platforms.

Michael Weiss

March 11, 2011 12:44 PM

After Hosni Mubarak’s fall in Egypt, there was a whorl of ambiguous media commentary that either tried to present the Muslim Brotherhood as a conciliatory Islamist movement posing no threat to Egypt, its neighbours (read: Israel) or the West, or tried to challenge the Brotherhood about its core tenets and ultimate goals. Nowhere has this confused and contradictory approach been better exhibited than at the British Broadcasting Corporation.

An opening salvo in the image war was fired early on in the Egyptian revolution. On January 31, BBC Middle East editor Jeremy Bowen wrote in an online news article: “Unlike the jihadis, [the Brotherhood] does not believe it is at war with the West. It is conservative, moderate and non-violent. But it is highly critical of Western policy in the Middle East.” Bowen only affirmed what by then had become his news division’s flattering line. On January 28, the BBC posted to its website an info-box summary of the Brotherhood’s orientation, which it unquestioningly described as “reject[ing] the use of violence and support[ing] democratic principles.”

Yet this characterization was somewhat complicated, if not belied completely, by a 2006 Egyptian parliamentary debate where Brotherhood deputies called for the murder of Bahai’s, whom they labelled “apostates.” So much for the supposed democratic principles some proclaimed the Brotherhood to posses. As to its disavowal of violence, the Brotherhood’s own English-language website from 2007 clearly states its allegiance to “solving the Palestinian cause” through the “paralleled lines of unity and jihad,” certainly consistent with the strategy of Hamas, which identifies itself in its founding charter as the Palestinian offshoot of the Egyptian Brotherhood.

An even more laborious attempt to sanitize the Islamist movement came from Middle East editor of the BBC News website Tarik Kafala, who published on February 20, “Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood promotes moderate path.” The article highlighted all the social work that the Brotherhood performed in recent years, particularly its building of “non-political” and not-for-profit medical centers throughout Egypt. Although Kafala later cited the Brotherhood’s “conservative Islamist agenda” and “historical links to radical and sometimes violent groups,” that agenda and those links are happily elided from his piece, as were the scare quotes around the word “moderate” in the headline – typically, the BBC’s house style for casting doubt on the asserted identity of a controversial political group.

The Brotherhood’s vaunted moderation is undermined by what its top-ranking figures have been saying for years and, indeed, what they’re saying now that they’ve gained an international audience. The former general guide of the Brotherhood, Mahdi Akef, called on all Muslims everywhere to support jihad in Iraq, Palestine, and Afghanistan in an open letter he wrote titled, “Jihad and Martyrdom are the Way to Glory and Victory.” When asked by an interviewer whether he saw Osama bin Laden as a terrorist or an Islamic freedom-fighter, Akef, in marked contrast to widespread claims that the Brotherhood is inveterately hostile to al Qaeda, replied: “Certainly, a mujahid [freedom fighter], and I have no doubt in his sincerity in resisting the occupation, drawing closer to God Almighty.”

Another senior member of the Brotherhood, Kamal el-Helbawi just attended the 24th International Islamic Unity Conference in Tehran. According to various state controlled news outlets, el-Helbawi spoke of Iran “as a model of resistance against the West’s domination and… a model for the Muslim world and Ummah.” He praised the theocracy for promoting “unity among Shia and Sunni, human rights and respect for humanity.” Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, el-Helbawi said, “speaks bravely against the corrupt regimes.”

Interestingly, el-Helbawi appeared on the BBC television program HARDtalk on February 6, during which he was equally candid. Faced with the kind of rigorous questioning absent from the BBC’s news coverage of Brotherhood, el-Helbawi was shown to advocate Sharia law for all Muslims, abjured the “terrorist” label for Hamas, and twice refused to answer whether under Muslim Brotherhood rule Muslims would be free to consume alcohol.

BBC radio, too, has better scrutinized the Brotherhood by asking probing questions of its representatives. On the BBC World Service program, “World Have Your Say,” aired on February 14, moderator Mark Sandell put questions phoned-in by global listeners directly to Dr. Ahmed Fahmi, the U.K. spokesman for the Brotherhood, and Mohammed Morsi, a member of its executive council. One question came from an American attorney whose client was an Egyptian Christian that had been forced by the Brotherhood to sign a declaration stating that he had converted to Islam, after which their coercers persecuted both him and his family. Morsi termed this incident an “accident” three times on the air. Fahmi, for his part, disavowed that the Brotherhood was a political organization at all by way of parrying a question about whether he recognized Israel’s right to exist. In fact, Sandell collectively asked Fahmi and Morsi this question a total of seven times during the broadcast, never receiving an answer. And when Sandell confronted them with the Brotherhood’s draft manifesto from 2007, which prohibits women and Coptics from holding the Egyptian presidency, Morsi acknowledged this as “our platform,” nevertheless affirming the Brotherhood’s pledge to gender equality.

A March 3 broadcast of BBC Newsnight also carried a segment on the Muslim Brotherhood, and while its overall tendency was to suggest that the group was not nearly so powerful or extremist as Western commentators have said it is, narrator Tim Whewell interviewed some provocative figures. One included Doha, a young female law student member of the Brotherhood, who strongly advocated the implementation of sharia in Egypt:

Egypt follows French law, and we do not want that, because when someone steals for example, he spends a month in jail and then he’s released to do the same again. But under Sharia law he gets his hand cut off and that’s better.

As to whether or not Egypt ought to maintain its peace treaty with Israel, Doha was similarly adamant:

The first thing to do is to sever all ties with Israel because it is the cause of our ruin. And Mubarak was their agent… In my opinion America is exactly the same as Israel, as long as it harbors bad intentions towards us. We don’t want aid from anyone, we just want other nations not to interfere with us, and we can manage.

Whewell also inquired of Egyptian lawyer Sobhi Saleh, who represented the Muslim Brotherhood on the committee to change the Egyptian constitution, about his view that women and Christians ought not serve as president of Egypt:

They should not occupy the highest post of the presidency. It’s the same policy as in Greece, Spain and in England. We are the majority. We represent 95 percent of the population.

When countered by Whewell that no such laws exist in any of those European countries and that women constitute half the Egyptian population, Saleh replied that the Egyptian president would be tasked with leading the people in prayer. “Islam gives women all the rights except the right to do that, which is one single post among 82 million. How can a woman lead the people in prayer?”

Revealingly, the BBC has been more or less silent in recent days on Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhood’s chief cleric who returned to Egypt after Mubarak’s departure and gave a Friday sermon in Cairo the other week to a crowd of hundreds of thousands. The BBC’s live blog on February 18 cited Qaradawi a few times, mostly in relation to what other commentators were saying about him. Ironically, one reference was a recycled tweet by Shadi Hamid of the Brooking Institution’s Doha Centre, which read, “Can’t wait for western coverage of qaradawi’s return: ‘Khomeini redux,’” surely not characteristic of the BBC’s coverage. On the whole, there was just one BBC news story published about the rally and it fleetingly described Qaradawi as “influential,” quoting his desire to see the Egyptian army “liberate us from the government that Mubarak formed.” No mention here of his hosanna to “liberate Palestine” or that his “influential” status has been somewhat complicated by his well-documented remarks about the Holocaust (God’s divine justice against the Jews), homosexuals (worthy of being killed) or suicide bombings in Israel (he’s for them). This elision was especially odd considering that Qaradawi was banned from England for inciting violence after he told Newsnight in 2004 that “an Israeli woman is not like women in our societies, because she is a soldier. I consider this type of martyrdom operation as an evidence of God’s justice.”

Given that the BBC has exposed the Brotherhood’s extremism in its broadcast programming, it’s remarkable that the BBC online editors remain wedded to a policy of presenting the organization in its own preferred terms.

[Teddy Bear]

The Muslim Brotherhood have now set up a party in Egypt to contest half the seats in that parliament. The potential ramifications and consequences of this can seriously affect the fragile peace of the area, with knock on effects to the other nearby regimes, desperate to rally their citizens presently revolting against them, to instead launch a war against Israel. Already Egypt has stated that it will permanently open the Rafeh border between Gaza and Egypt, which will make it even easier for Hamas to bring in their armaments, and the Muslim Brotherhood has already announced their intention to war against Israel.

However, The BBC reports this news in the most sickening neutral and appeasing way possible, as much a PR job as any advertising bureau could do.

Here's what they have to say on the subject.

Egypt: Muslim Brotherhood sets up new party

Mohammed al-Mursi insisted the new party would not be theocratic

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has set up a new party to contest up to half the seats in a parliamentary election scheduled for September.

The head of the Freedom and Justice Party says it will be a civil, not a theocratic, group.

The election follows the removal of President Hosni Mubarak in February after a popular revolt.

The Muslim Brotherhood ran candidates as independents in previous elections, to circumvent a ban on the group.

It has sought to allay fears of an Islamist parliamentary majority, and said it would be willing to co-operate with secular parties.

Mohammed al-Mursi, the head of the new Freedom and Justice Party, told reporters in Cairo: "It is not an Islamist party in the old understanding, it is not theocratic."

Egypt's constitution bans parties based on religion, class or regionalism.

Here's a more intelligent report using a variety of sources, actually designed to inform - not brainwash, on the subject by Pamela Geller at Atlas Shrugs.

EGYPTIAN MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD LEADER: "PREPARE FOR WAR WITH ISRAEL"

The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt calls for war with the tiny Jewish state. What better way to unify the ummah than with tried-and-true, religiously mandated Islamic anti-semitism?

For all of those quisling clowns desperately trying to scrub the Muslim Brotherhood, here is a good hard slap in the face. Further, it's interesting how the Muslim Brotherhood blames Israel for Mubarak's regime. Not the $300 billion the US has pumped into Egypt. The peace accord (no matter how cold) was a good thing. Now we hear that Obama's would-be peace partners, Muslim Brotherhood's Hamas, are going to destroy the accord. But they want peace with the Jews; get it? Me neither.

Obama has been secretly supporting this revolution for three years. Why? He ignored the people of Iran marching against the annihilationist mullahcracy of Iran. He gave his tacit support to mass slaughter where millions took to the streets.

Anyone who sees this as a good thing secretly dreams of the annihilation of Israel. Big media is not giving you the story. Instead they have the Muslim Brotherhood's US group on, CAIR, calling in from Egypt (and mis-identifying Ahmed Rehab of CAIR as a "democracy activist"). And that was FOX. It's that bad.

Obama's hard left operatives, like frequent White House visitor CODE PINK, are in Egypt now. Coincidence? Methinks not. I don't believe Obama "lost Egypt"; I believe he kicked it to the curb.
Muslim Brotherhood Wants War With Israel

Mohamed Ghanem, one of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, calls Egypt to stop pumping gas to Israel and prepare the Egyptian army for a war with it’s eastern neighbor.

Speaking with Iranian television station Al-Alam, Mohamed Ghanem blamed Israel for supporting Hosni Mubarak’s regime. Ghanem also said that the Egyptian police and army won’t be able to stop the Muslim Brotherhood movement.

There are doubts about the loyalty of the Egyptian army to president Mubarak. If the brotherhood takes control over Egypt, it will be very messy from the whole region.

Iran is the mullah behind the curtain: (from IBT)

Iran's Press TV claimed on Monday Israel is giving weapons to Egypt to prop up the Hosni Mubarak regime which is engulfed in crisis and appearing to inch towards doom as violent popular protests gained momentum.

The Press TV said reports "followed phone conversations between the US, Egyptian and Israeli defense ministers."

"Israel has provided the Egyptian government with weapons amid the country's popular uprising demanding the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, reports say," the Press TV report said on Monday. However, the Press TV report doesn't give further details, nor say clearly how it got the news of Israeli arms supply to Egypt. It however refers to an earlier Washington Post report which quoted an Israeli cabinet minister as saying that Mubarak will eventually tide over the present crisis.

The violent demonstrations, which entered the seventh day on Monday, have forced the Mubarak regime to deploy the military to quell the uprising. The CNN reported on Sunday that Egyptian defense minister Mohamad Tantawi asked the public to obey the curfew. The demonstrators are bracing for a military crackdown of protestors in major Egyptian cities under the curfew.

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood Backs ElBaradei Role - Margaret Coker and Summer Said
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has agreed to back the secular, liberal opposition leader Mohammed ElBaradei, 68, as lead spokesman for the country's opposition groups in reform negotiations, suggesting the movement may be positioning itself as a significant political actor in future Egyptian politics. (Wall Street Journal)
 See also ElBaradei Doesn't Like America - Michael Ledeen
Mohammed ElBaradei is one of the last men I would choose for leading Egypt to a "peaceful transition" to greater democracy. He doesn't like America and he's in cahoots with Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood. (Pajamas Media)

Israel Shaken as Turbulence Rocks an Ally - Ethan Bronner
Israel's military planning relies on peace with Egypt; nearly half the natural gas it uses is imported from Egypt; and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has met with President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt more than with any other foreign leader, except President Obama. "For the United States, Egypt is the keystone of its Middle East policy," a senior Israeli official said. "For Israel, it's the whole arch."
 Israelis worry that a successful overthrow in Egypt could spread to Jordan. And if the Muslim Brotherhood were to gain power in Egypt, that would probably mean not only a stronger Islamist force in Gaza but also in the West Bank, as well as in Jordan, meaning Israel would feel surrounded in a way it has not in decades.
 If Egypt also turned unfriendly, that would quite likely stop in its tracks any further Israeli talk of peace negotiations with the Palestinians, officials and analysts said. There has long been concern that popular sentiment in Egypt is anti-Israel. Eli Shaked, a former Israeli ambassador to Cairo, wrote in Yediot Ahronot, "The only people in Egypt who are committed to peace are the people in Mubarak's inner circle, and if the next president is not one of them, we are going to be in trouble."
 Giora Eiland, a former national security adviser and a senior fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, said even if Egypt did not cancel its peace treaty with Israel tomorrow or in five years, a government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood would mean "you can't exclude the possibility of a war with Egypt." (New York Times)
 See also Israel: Ties with Egypt Must Be Preserved - Matti Friedman 
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that his government is "anxiously monitoring" the political unrest in Egypt. "Israel and Egypt have been at peace for more than three decades and our objective is to ensure that these ties be preserved," he said. If Egypt resumes its conflict with Israel, Israelis fear, it will put a powerful Western-armed military on the side of Israel's enemies.
 "Israel has an interest in Egypt being democratic, but through a process that promises sustainability," said Dan Shueftan, director of the National Security Studies Center at Haifa University. "If you have a process that starts with a desire for democracy but then sees radicals take over, then the result at the end of the process is worse than what you had at the beginning." (AP-Washington Post)

[Teddy Bear]

Oh Dear, it appears the 'moderate' Muslim Brotherhood haven't been following the reports that the BBC have been making about them.

Egypt uprising: Islamists lead Tahrir Square rally

The protest is one of the largest since the toppling of President Hosni Mubarak

Tens of thousands of people have packed Cairo's Tahrir Square, after the first call by Islamist leaders for nationwide demonstrations since President Hosni Mubarak was overthrown in February.

Many protesters - dominated by Muslim Brotherhood supporters - are calling for an Islamic state and Sharia law.

Correspondents say the rallies will be a worrying development for secularists.

The Brotherhood is the most organised political force in Egypt, although it was not prominent in the revolution.

Tensions have been running high between Egypt's Islamist and secular groups, who are at odds over the transition to democracy in the Arab world's most populated country.

Casualties
Later there were a number of casualties when violence broke out in a separate incident in Sinai.

"We have two bodies of civilians in the morgue now and 12 police conscripts being treated for injuries in hospital," Hisham Shiha, Egypt's deputy health minister, told state television.

Around 100 armed men drove around the city of El-Arish, shouting Islamic slogans, and firing into the air, before attacking a police station.

Terrified residents fled into their homes. One of those killed was a 13-year-old boy, according to reports in the local media.

Turning point?
Among the earlier protests in Tahrir Square, liberal groups called for guarantees of a constitution that will protect religious freedom and personal rights, whereas Islamists demanded speedy elections and a recognition of Islam - in one form or another - in the new Egyptian state.

Now the Islamists want their voice to be heard and are showing their muscle for the first time since Mr Mubarak stepped down on 11 February, says the BBC's Jon Leyne in Cairo.

Although the Muslim Brotherhood can turn out huge crowds by rallying its supporters at mosques, it does not necessarily represent the majority of Egyptians and is predicted to win around 20% of the vote in an election, our correspondent says.

There was little sign of any secular groups at Friday's rally, he says, adding that it will be interesting to see how they re-group after today's events.

Since early July, the mainly secular protesters had camped out in Tahrir Square - the epicentre of protests that toppled Mr Mubarak - to denounce the ruling military council over the slow pace of reform.

Islamist groups had for the most part stayed away from the sit-in. Last week, they held their own demonstration and accused the Tahrir protesters of going against the country's "Islamic identity", the AFP news agency reports.

But with Islamists and the more conservative Salafist groups now filling Tahrir Square, it could mark a turning point in Egypt's post-revolution period, our correspondent says.

Later on Friday, witnesses in el-Arish reported men in trucks and on motorbikes firing their assault rifles into the air and forcing frightened residents into their homes.

The men are reported to have been confronted by policemen and soldiers.

"We have two bodies of civilians in the morgue now and 12 police conscripts being treated for injuries in hospital," Hisham Shiha, Egypt's deputy health minister, told state television.