Dear Egyptian Islamist Forces,
First of all, I would like to thank you. If it wasn’t for the massive organised effort and insane amount of money that you poured into having a strong showing in Giza and Alexandria last Saturday, and the full Panic mode that you put all the secular people of Egypt (who are now the majority after five months only of your rule), we wouldn’t have seen yesterday’s massive, nay, colossal turn out in all of the governorates. Not only did we pack Tahrir, we completely covered the huge area surrounding the Presidential palace (despite security checkpoints placed there by your security forces to divide the crowds and make the numbers look small, and which were naturally removed by the protesters), not to mention the massive turnout in Alexandria, Assiut, Minya, Daqahliya, Suez, Port Said, 6th of October, Mahalla, Hurghada, Sharm El-Sheikh, Damanhour, Damietta, Aswan and others. This is not surprising if compared to the turn-out last Tuesday in Tahrir, but definitely compared to the turn-out last Friday, which marks the first symbolic change of the second wave of this revolution: Tuesday is the New Friday.
It makes sense when you think about it: When we were all on one side, Friday made sense since we were mobilising after Friday prayers, a tactic that you pioneered. The switch to Tuesday showcases the symbolic change in demographics in the revolution, after the independents finally joined our side, who go down to the streets after work instead of getting bussed in after Friday prayers. Friday was the day we demonstrated with you, Tuesday is the day we demonstrate with all of Egypt, because -unlike you- we don’t need the mosques to mobilise our people. Hell, we don’t even need to plan or provide logistical support or pay people to increase the numbers: Our people come down on their own, and they are LEGIONS. If by your count the people you brought to the streets last Saturday were six million, I estimate our people count by your math to be around two billion. Yeah, that sounds about right.
In light of yesterday’s events, we urge you to convince your president to withdraw the constitutional declaration and cancel the referendum. I am sure you will find him very agreeable to this notion after his daring escape from the Presidential Palace yesterday. It must be very hard on him to be the first Egyptian President to escape from the Presidential palace, especially five months after he stood in Tahrir opening his suit to prove the absence of a bulletproof vest as a show of how unafraid he is from the people. But then again, he did escape from protesters at a mosque near his house last week, and before that from prison, so escaping is kind of his thing. I would also scale back the threatening Jihad talk from now on, because, what will you do, exactly? You obviously don’t have the numbers to control the streets of Egypt, so your only option is terrorism, which, meh, we’ve been through before in the 1980s and 1990s and survived it with no problem. And if you go down that route, it won’t be the MOI that will hunt you down, it will be the people this time who will view you as an enemy and act accordingly by bringing you from your houses. You will lose. You will die. We don’t recommend it. Back down.
Also, don’t go on the media and try to manoeuvre your way out of this and try to have the referendum anyway. If all of those people went out against the constitutional declaration yesterday, then there is no consensus on the constitutional draft and it shouldn’t even be put on a referendum. Even if you go through with it, we know that the majority is with us, so you will either lose or you will forge it, and we will go after you and bring you down. What are you counting on? And why do you have people like Beltagy go on TV talking about how the protesters should abide by the rules of democracy? You mean the same rules of democracy your president broke by giving himself unprecedented powers, by sending his supporters to prevent the constitutional court from doing their job as a check on his decisions and by trying to push through a constitution that is rejected by everybody outside his base of support? Why do your sheikhs talk about conspiracies by the church in your media? Yes, naturally we have Christians in our demonstrations, like we have representatives of every other group in Egypt in our demonstration, because they are Egyptians, and as we keep telling you, we are a diverse population. Come to our rallies and you will find it representative of Egypt, while your rallies only have Islamists. And then your president speaks about how you have the majority? What majority? He won the presidential elections by 1% with the help of non-islamists. Get a grip on reality.
Yesterday was called “The Final Warning”, and it was just that: our final warning to you to back down from this insanity. We were at the gates of the presidential palace and we could’ve stormed it, and we chose not to, and instead gratified all over it to let you know that you are not untouchable behind palace walls. Our symbols have given you until Friday to back down on both the referendum and the declaration, a generous offer that you frankly don’t deserve, but we really find it distasteful to get into violent conflict with other Egyptians, and we really don’t want to bring down the first democratically elected president after only five months; But we will if we are forced to. If you don’t back down by Friday, then prepare yourselves for the wrath of an entire population next Tuesday. And Just in case you forgot, here is a friendly reminder: January 25 was also a Tuesday. 😉
I hope you listen.
Best Regards,
Mahmoud Salem
