Residents are demanding that the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Ismailia’s Seventh Zone be moved from their neighbourhood after clashes broke out in front of the offices as a result of recent protests against the constitutional declaration.

Residents are demanding that the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Ismailia’s Seventh Zone be moved from their neighbourhood after clashes broke out in front of the offices as a result of recent protests against the constitutional declaration.

“I will not rest until they move from the Seventh Zone,” Ibrahim Ahmad shouted, demanding officials to move the Brotherhood’s HQ from the Seventh Zone in Ismailia, considering it the least possible compensation he ought to get to make up for the damage allegedly done to him by Brothers last Wednesday.

Ahmad, who is studying tourism and hotel industry and works as a bartender in Sharm el-Sheikh, says he is uninterested in politics and is still not concerned about the revolution, even two years after its outbreak. He is one of the ‘couch potatoes’ referred to by politicians.

Last Wednesday at nine in the evening, Ahmad visited his friends at a cafeteria near the Muslim Brotherhood HQ only to find out that his cousin was “drowned in blood” after he was badly hit with a piece of marble, allegedly by Muslim Brothers who were busy answering the protestors’ cries.

According to Ahmad, his cousin went to buy dinner from a nearby restaurant and waited to watch the confrontations between the protestors and the Brothers, but he was hit by the latter.

“Brotherhood militias”

When Ahmad returned from hospital after visiting his cousin, he was also hit by a group of people in front of his house.  “They had sticks and clubs and were crying, “God is the greatest and praise be to him.” Ahmad’s many attempts to convince them that he had nothing to do with the issue and that he was one of the residents fell on deaf ears. They even hit his mother and friends who were trying to take him to hospital and save him from, as he put it, the “Brotherhood militias”.

They went to the Ismailia University Hospital, but strangely enough two doctors, a surgeon and an anaesthetist, refused to admit him, since they were Brothers and knew, he claimed, that he came from near their HQ. Accordingly, he was obliged to go to a private hospital.

Ahmad was nearly disabled after his pelvis was cracked and his shoulder and kneecap were dislocated. He had many bruises all over his body with six stitches in his head and blood retention in many parts of his body.

Ahmad revealed that the Brotherhood tried to gain his favor after they discovered he was actually a Seventh Zone resident and had not taken part in the protests. These attempts came through people from Souk Al-Joma’a in Ismailia, who were “known to be thugs,” he claimed. He stressed that they had threatened him in order to withdraw the accusation he had filed against the Brotherhood.

Ahmad concluded that he would not compromise his right after he was hit, tortured, threatened and humiliated and after his mother and friends were also hit, stressing that the least thing to appease his rage was to move the Brotherhood HQ, which was the wish of some of the area’s residents, especially after three other innocent residents who had nothing to do with the protests were also injured.

Police do not wish to pay the price of political disputes

“He who lives next to the Brotherhood lives is fortunate,” Major General Muhammad Annany, Assistant Director of Security in Ismailia, says with a loud laugh. He himself was injured during the same events but accused no one. He explains that the Brotherhood neighbours should be happy because the police patrols which pass by their HQ ensure stability in the area, a thing envied by many people.

Annany stresses that his ministry always pays the price of political disputes without being involved in any of them, adding that although the police’s duty is to protect the citizens’ homes they also have to take part in protecting public buildings and headquarters, including those of the Brotherhood, the current rulers of Egypt. The police have nothing to do with moving their HQ because they are tenants who must be protected just like any other citizens.

Warning against using violence

Sabri Khalafallah, head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s administrative office in Ismailia, considers the demands to move the HQ rather odd. He stresses that the Brotherhood deeply respect “only the honoured” residents of the Seventh Zone, but whoever attacks the Brotherhood HQ should be punished, as was done to the thugs and intelligence agents who protested in front of their HQ for the first time.

Khalafallah admits that a young resident was unintentionally injured in the events without assaulting him. “Just a building block was thrown at him,” he explains. Khalafallah underlines that he will use his power to find out the organizers of these protests. Although he approves the right to protest peacefully, he says: “People who wish to protest should do that in front of the Freedom and Justice Party’s HQ not in front of a religious group whose sole mission is to preach about God.”

According to Sayed Abu Dhaif, head of the Political Sciences Department at Suez Canal University, protesting in front of the Brotherhood’s HQ was instigated by the division caused by President Morsi’s latest decisions. He underlines that the right to protest was ensured even in front of the HQ of the Muslim Brotherhood to which the president belongs, and that the Brotherhood must reconsider its decisions rather than blame others for protesting in front of their HQ. He however warns against escalating peaceful protests into violence events.