Fahmy Howaidy, MB’s war declaration against Egypt

Yesterday, we published an article in which we replied to the idea of Mr. Fahmy Howaidy through which he tried to suggest that decisive confrontation by the state and its security services against the Muslim Brotherhood increases the scale of violence and expands its circle.

We further emphasized that these groups only know the language of force, and that any inaction on the part of the state in confronting them will be wrongly assessed by these groups as weakness and softness that must be dealt with in a manner that suits them, by escalating violent operations.

The article mentioned the experience of the Islamic Group, which began to set conditions upon conditions, carried by those affiliated with them, such as Howaidy and Al-Awa for dialogue with the state.

When the state rejected that dialogue in the nineties of the last century for six years, the Islamic Group was forced to lay down its arms unconditionally, and issued a statement to stop violence unilaterally in July 1997.

“We faced a country with strong army and strong police, but the use of force did not succeed, and the number of detainees and widows increased, so we stop the violence and lay down arms unilaterally,” a statement by the group had said.

And we said earlier that if the state had responded to the conditions of the Islamic group that Howaidy and his comrades held, by the way, at the time, we would have been on the cusp of a new republic like Tehran for at least twenty years.

Today, we tell Howaidy and his companions of a visit made by Al-Banna himself to Abdul Rahman Ammar, undersecretary of the Ministry of Interior at the time, begging him to meet with the then prime minister and minister of the interior, Mahmoud Fahmy Al-Nokrashy, after the situation between the group and the government worsened, as is happening now.

In his report Ammar says that Al-Banna came to the office of the Ministry of Interior, and asked to meet them under the pretext of revealing important matters that he would like to report immediately to the Prime Minister.

When they met him, he told them that he had known that the government had issued a decision to dissolve the Muslim Brotherhood, or was in the process of issuing this decision, and that he wanted to conclude to the Prime Minister’s that he had relied once and for all on abandoning engaging in political affairs, and limiting the group’s activity to religious affairs. 

Al-Banna also said he would seriously like to cooperate closely with the government and support it in all matters, and that he would be responsible for directing his men in all directions to serve the country. He further expressed his regret for the crimes committed by people he believed to have infiltrated the Muslim Brotherhood.

The painful blows turned the head of the Brotherhood’s founder and intoxicated him, until he had to go and offer to cooperate with the minister of interior at the time to hand over Brotherhood young members, after he had said before his famous saying, “They are not brothers and they are not Muslims.”

The undersecretary of the Ministry of Interior at the time had said that Al-Banna concluded his speech by saying that he is ready to return the Muslim Brotherhood to its bases away from politics and parties, and make its goal to only serve the religion and spread its teachings.”

Rather, Al-Banna had wished that he could seclude himself in his home, read and compose, then he started to weep and said that he would return to his headquarters awaiting the instructions of the Prime Minister, praying for him well and success.

This meeting was on December 8, 1948, after which a decision was issued to dissolve the group, as Al-Banna expected, and one of the chapters of its presence on the Egyptian scene ended, until the July Revolution revived it once again.

The language of force is what this group and its allies understand, and it is the only language in which the state will deal, according to a prior popular mandate, which was confirmed by granting 97% confidence to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s program, which includes providing security for the Egyptians and imposing the prestige of the state.