Egypt Junta Orders Police to Crush Cairo Sit-In Protests

Insists Protests Are Both Terrorists and a Traffic Disruption

We’ve already seen two major massacres by security forces against anti-coup protests in Cairo this month, and it seems like the junta is setting the stage for more today, ordering the police to use “all necessary measures” to stop the demonstrations.

Sit-in protests appear to be the biggest problem by the estimation of junta officials, who termed them a threat to national security on both “terrorism” and traffic disruption grounds.

The police don’t exactly have a great record in this regard, having only last weekend attacked a sit-in in Cairo’s northeast, killing 120 of the protesters and wounding several thousand others.

Protest leaders say they don’t accept the order to stop the protests, saying they are an attempt to “terrorize” peaceful protesters. Many of the Muslim Brotherhood protest leaders are already in hiding, with the junta ordering them arrested for “incitement” for criticizing the coup.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.