The Muslim Brotherhood proved to all who were paying attention that it saw democracy as a tool to achieve totalitarian control of Egypt. It had no compunction about overriding minority groups once it gained majority control. The Muslim Brotherhood demonstrated that it is ideologically committed to just one, open election.
Once it was handed the reins of government, the rights of opposition and minority parties were to be forever curtailed and reduced, leaving the Muslim Brotherhood in a position of command and control. The Muslim Brotherhood has the same kind of commitment as Hitler and the Nazi's to democracy in Germany in 1933--a useful way to gain power, as a stepping to dictatorial control.
Islam as a religion requires some variant of "command and control" government.
Fundamental limits to government powers such as constitutional constraints, the separation of governing powers, the rule of law, and the legal protection of minorities are foreign to a religious ideology which requires all, everywhere to submit to Allah. It is a political ideology which all Islamic believers instinctively understand.
If the Brotherhood had moved quickly, at the same time as its grasp for authoritarian control, to deal with the economic problems festering within the country, probably it would have got away with it. The energy of mass resistance would have likely ebbed. Oh, yes, and if the Brotherhood had won the tacit support of the military and engaged it as an ally it would have been all over.
Now the army is back in control. The Muslim Brotherhood looks like being outlawed once again. Egypt will likely return to a long-term military dictatorship--complete with its torture chambers and the brutal repression of dissent. Once again, however, this model is congruent with Islam itself. Egypt will enjoy peace--the peace of Islam--if it submits--and it likely will.
Meanwhile, the Christian minority gets persecuted, no matter which dictatorship holds power. This, from Al Jazeera:
The country's Coptic Christian community has paid a particularly high price during recent violence. According to Human Rights Watch, attacks on Christians in Egypt have increased since the ouster of Morsi, which his supporters label a "coup" supported by the Coptic community.
This isn’t the first time Egypt’s Coptic minority has been targeted, said Mina Thabet, a 24-year-old Christian, but the past seven weeks of attacks constitute "a new level of violence against us".
The violence started escalating on July 1, he said, first in Minya and then in Delga, a nearby village. In Luxor, four people, including a friend of Thabet's, were beaten to death.
There are varying numbers on precisely how many churches have been attacked, and the tally kept by Thabet's group, the Maspero Youth Union, is grim.
Since sit-ins held in support of deposed president Mohamed Morsi were violently cleared on Wednesday attacks targeting Christians in eight governorates have left at least six people dead and seven kidnapped.
Additionally, Thabet said 38 churches were "completely destroyed", 23 were left partially damaged; 58 houses, 85 shops, 16 pharmacies, three hotels, 75 cars and busses belonging to Christians were also burned and looted.
"That's only since the removal of the sit-in; all in three days," said Thabet, who said the Coptic community was "not supporting the army," in the June 30 protests. "We were supporting the state of Egypt," he said. "But it seems we are the victims of every regime - we are paying the price of every change."
Thabet blamed “members affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and other groups” for the attacks on Copts. "They all have the same ideas - radical ideas, hate and a tendency to violence," he said.
Issac Ibrahim, a researcher at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, echoed Thabet's view that Morsi supporters from the Brotherhood and other Islamist groups are "promoting sectarian aggression". While post-June-30 attacks on the Christian community were expected, he said, they were "not expected with such ferocity or in the numbers of burned churches". These kinds of systematic attacks on Christian institutions haven’t been seen in Egypt for 330 years, Ibrahim said.
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