Protesters Once Again Clash With Police In Tahrir Square

The protesters have returned to Tahrir Square, and so has the violence.

Nine months after their protests brought down the 30 year old regime of Hosni Mubarak, Egyptians are once again in the streets of Cairo protesting their government:

CAIRO — A police action to roust a few hundred protesters out of Tahrir Square on Saturday instead drew thousands of people from across Egyptian society into the streets, where the violence continued on Sunday. The confrontations were the most violent manifestation so far of growing anger at the military-led interim government.

In a battle reminiscent of the clashes that led to the ouster of former President Hosni Mubarak nine months ago, a mass of protesters converged on Tahrir Square, fled before an onslaught of riot police officers firing tear gas and rubber bullets, and then surged back to retake and hold the square through the early hours of Sunday.

State media reported Saturday night that more than 700 people had been injured, including 40 riot police, and at least one civilian died of a gunshot wound. Protesters operated a makeshift field hospital in small mosque near the square, where doctors said Sunday morning that they had treated at least 400 people for serious injuries and hundreds more who suffered from tear gas. The smell of gas was still heavy around the square.

The clashes continued Sunday through midday as a crowd of perhaps a few hundred who stayed in the square through the night swelled back to thousands. Though demonstrators occupied the square unmolested, a battalion of young men that filled a city block was charging against a wall of police, who fired tear gas to defend the headquarters of the interior ministry. Witnesses said the battle had pushed back and forth through the night.

“I saw the revolution being slain so I had to come,” said Ahmed Hamza, 41, a lawyer, watching the fray. Like many in the square, he vowed to stay until the ruling military council committed to a swift exit from power but also said he feared the generals welcomed the chaos as pretext to cancel elections. “Today there will be violence,” he predicted, awaiting new moves to clear the square.

At least three prominent political candidates suspended their parliamentary campaigns to focus on the crisis.

In a television interview late Saturday night, General Mohsen Fungary, a spokesman for the ruling military council, promised a formal response the next day. He blamed demonstrators for igniting the violence, suggested protestors were “enemies” of Egypt, and he hinted that unnamed satellite news channels—presumably Al Jazeera—had played a role. “The youth are blinded to the reality of the situation,” he said.

Coming a day after a huge Islamist demonstration and just more than a week before the first post-Mubarak parliamentary elections, the outpouring of anger was the strongest rebuke yet with the military’s attempts to grant itself permanent governmental powers. And it was a reuniting of Islamist and liberal protest movements that had drifted apart since the early days of the uprising.

This time, instead of chanting for the fall of Mr. Mubarak, the demonstrators were chanting for the fall of the ruling military council that initially presented itself as the revolution’s savior.

“The generals said to us, ‘We are your partners,’ and we believed them,” said Tarek Saaed, 55, a construction safety supervisor who used a cane to walk among the boisterous crowds in the square. “Then the next day we find out they are partners with Mubarak,” he added, calling the day a turning point for Egypt.

This is hardly surprising, really. Throughout history, military coups, and that is exactly what the downfall of Hosni Mubarak was in the end, have typically not led to a free society. In the end, the military, is primarily concerned with stability and maintaining its position in society. In the case of the Egyptian military, we’re talking about an institution that has led a privileged existence since the days of Nassar and Sadat. It’s not surprising that they’d be reluctant to cede control over to civilian authorities that aren’t necessarily trustworthy, especially since some of those civilian groups have talked about thinks like abandoning the peace treaty with Israel, which is apparently widely supported among the Egyptian military if only because they know that military conflict with Israel would be a disaster for them in the end.

As I noted back in February, though, the protests that created the conditions that allowed the military to push Mubarak aside and take control (hence why it was, in fact, a coup) had created expectations among the people that the military might find hard to control:

[T]he extent to which the public has become engaged over the past three weeks seems to make it unlikely that they’d be able to turn Egypt into a military state. However, stranger things have happened and the Egyptian military now seems to have tied itself inexorably to the “stability” of the state. The next move is in their court.

As these protests indicate, there’s at least some segment of the Egyptian public who now believes that the military will not live up to the promises they made in February. So, they’ve returned in February. The difference this time seems to be that the same military that restrained Mubarak from a bloody crackdown nine months ago doesn’t necessarily feel compelled to restrain itself this time around. If the protests continue, those could end up getting quite bloody indeed.

Photo via New York Times

FILED UNDER: Middle East, World Politics, , , , , , , , ,
Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. Liberty60 says:

    But they were blocking the sidewalks!

  2. de stijl says:

    @Liberty60:

    And they set up tents. Tents!

  3. Liberty60 says:

    Thats how it starts- first they block the sidewalks, then set up tents, next thing you know they will be playing hackeysack and wanting a government that represents the people.

    I say ya got to nip it in the bud!

  4. Lit3Bolt says:

    Where’s the dismissive sneering about drum circles, Doug? You disappoint me.

  5. Unlike the former residents of Zucotti Park, people in Egypt are actually trying to do something constructive

  6. waltm says:

    Aljareeza is reporting three dead so far, security forces retreating from the square, reinforcements moving in, dense fog of tear gas and multiple gun shots. The bleeding has begun.

  7. Rick Almeida says:

    @Doug Mataconis:

    Have you seen a detailed list of their specific policy proposals?

  8. de stijl says:

    @Rick Almeida:

    Blocked sidewalks, tents, no specific demands, plus I’m sure one of them pissed in a corner. Let’s bring in the tanks and squash ’em like bugs!

  9. michael reynolds says:

    @Doug Mataconis:

    You choose to make generous assumptions about the people in Egypt and to assume the worst about your fellow Americans.

    Your choice, but not based on anything. Just assumption.

  10. I’m judging them by the past two months, and by the not insignificant fact that we don’t live in a military dictatorship

  11. jan says:

    There are anecdotal incidents, like this one, in so many Occupy cities all over the country.

    Those who unconditionally support OWS, though, seem to ignore the obnoxious behavior, loss of revenue for merchants around their encampments, instead dwelling on pitching ‘tents,’ and the like, granting them carte blanche ignore-all-the-rules privileges.

    If the teas had created half the problems, ignoring other people’s rights to make a living, had all the sanitation/public health issues, police intervention (taking them away from other areas needed in given cities), there would be outrage from the liberals. Talk about double standard!

  12. michael reynolds says:

    @Doug Mataconis:

    I’m judging them by the past two months, and by the not insignificant fact that we don’t live in a military dictatorship.

    We are not a police state. We are however a corrupt and undemocratic oligarchy.

    And the Egyptian military sees the parallels:

    The Egyptian military, battling renewed demonstrations in Tahrir Square, have defended their used of force against protesters by comparing themselves to police in the US who are dealing with the Occupy protests.

    According to various sources, officials on Egyptian TV have asked why they are being criticised when similar tactics are allegedly being used against peaceful protesters in America.

    The comments come in the wake of controversial tactics used by police in a number of US cities. Just in the past week, 84-year-old Dorli Rainey was allegedly pepper-sprayed by police at Occupy Seattle and protesters at UC Davis were pepper-sprayed after police claimed they felt threatened by a bunch of people sitting on the ground.

  13. Lit3Bolt says:

    Stop trying to demolish Doug’s intellectual laziness, Michael. Not that it takes much effort to demolish, “Protests in America I disagree with = bad and pointless,” and “Protests anywhere else in the world = interesting and constructive.” Reform in America is just not practical, and nothing is going to change, so there’s no need to talk about it because it will never happen.