Egyptian state TV broadcast a statement by “security apparatuses”, declaring that police had foiled a Muslim Brotherhood plot against the regime aiming “to hijack the Egyptian state”.
The propaganda video featured different scenes of violence and bombings in Egyptian streets, along with sound effects and military soundtracks.
It also showed a number of defendants allegedly confessing the details of the “plot”. All of the featured defendants can be heard using the same terminology whilst speaking. Further, they identify other defendants and alleged collaborators, giving them the title “Al-Ikhwani”, inferring that they belong to the Muslim Brotherhood.
The language of the alleged collaborators resembles that used by the Interior Ministry’s media centre, which releases daily statements on “the latest achievements of the security forces in fighting crime”.
One of the defendants said a Brotherhood member confessed to storing weapons and ammunition in a private flat. Another said that a Muslim Brotherhood member asked him to form a group to “work on hacking and espionage”.
After various confessions, a narrator can be heard concluding that “this is a general plot by the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood in order to hijack the Egyptian state and destroy its institutions”. The statement added that the plotters aimed to create parallel institutions, to eliminate the “civilian identity of the state”.
It argued that the now-banned group, headed by leader and former deputy supreme guide Khairat El-Shater, aimed to dig up intelligence about state institutions and share it with the group’s leaders and other foreign organisations.
Currently, many members of the group, including its former president Mohamed Morsi are being tried in Egyptian courts on charges of espionage.
The video also broadcasted screenshots of alleged confiscated reports of the “objectives of the plot”. It added that the plot began in 2012, when Morsi took office.
Since Morsi’s ouster in July 2013, Muslim Brotherhood members and affiliates have been on the receiving end of a severe crackdown by the Egyptian state.
Security forces release almost weekly statements that they arrested tens of Morsi supporters on terrorism-related charges.
A Muslim Brotherhood spokesperson said that “the coup security forces think that only the Brotherhood is resisting their regime, which is not true. Other people, un-politicised and who might as well have been anti-Morsi, are now opposing the regime of Al-Sisi”.
The spokesperson denied all the charges in the latest statement, saying it is for “popular usage to convince the masses that they are in danger, and is used as a political manoeuvre, especially after the failed visit of Al-Sisi to Germany”.
