(AFP Photo)
Military intervention is unacceptable, said Muslim Brotherhood spokesperson Gehad El-Haddad on Tuesday, describing the military statement as a “coup.”
El-Haddad told American media outlet CBS that the military’s threat has changed everything, adding that the Brotherhood will take action if the military intervenes.
He went on to explain that his organisation had “already thought through” a similar scenario and that they were now in the course of “shifting [their] tactics.”
Mohamed Soudan, Alexandria spokesman for the Brotherhood’s political wing, the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), meanwhile clarified that both the Brotherhood and the FJP are willing to negotiate with the armed forces about the current situation.
Soudan said that El-Haddad’s statement is not to be taken as a call for military confrontation with the armed forces, adding that the FJP respects the armed forces and is not “equipped or qualified” for such a confrontation.
He qualified however that “it was a mistake when [Egyptian Defense Minister Abdul Fatah] Al-Sisi issued the statement without getting back to the president, who is the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces.”
After President Mohamed Morsi’s speech on Tuesday night, El-Haddad tweeted that Morsi has offered all “democratic mechanisms” possible to extricate Egypt from its current crisis.
He also said that the future of Egypt is outlined by the will of the people, which he emphasized would be represented “only [through the] ballot box.”
In a subsequent tweet he addressed all those concerned for the future of the Brotherhood or Morsi in Egypt, saying: “both [are] expendable [for] the sake of saving Egypt and establishing sustainable democracy.”
