While official statements issued by the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies in the National Coalition in Defence of Legitimacy insist opposition to the army-backed Egyptian government remains peaceful, a very different picture emerges on the hundreds of social media pages created by mostly young Islamist supporters. There you can find instruction manuals for the making of bombs and Molotov cocktails, details of tactics to be adopted when confronting anti-riot police in militia-like formations, lists of the equipment protesters needed to carry, ways to escape arrest and how to feed live footage of protests to Al-Jazeera Mubasher Egypt in Doha, long considered a mouthpiece for the Brotherhood. One page even announced the results of a competition on who could set the most armoured police vehicles on fire. There have been nearly daily demonstrations and violent clashes between the police and army and supporters of Islamist groups since the removal of Mohamed Morsi as president on 3 July. While Islamists charge Morsi was the victim of a “military coup” army chief Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi, widely tipped as the next president, insists the military was responding to mass calls to oust Morsi. Hundreds have been killed and more than 20,000 arrested according to local human rights groups. Extremist Islamic groups, some like Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis with ties to Al-Qaeda, have launched a growing number of terrorist attacks in recent months against police and army targets in Sinai, Cairo and the Delta. Most recently alarm bells have been ringing in Egypt's security establishment at the growing practice of publishing photos of police officers accused of taking part in “massacres” of Morsi supporters. The response has been a wide-scale crackdown, lasting two weeks now, on the administrators and owners of social media pages, the majority on Facebook, that have displayed the images. While most photos show heavily armed officers in uniform, some picture security personnel in civilian clothes, occasionally with their families. One showed a police officer inside a church. The photographs are accompanied by calls for revenge. A typical example: “Reda Raouf Fahim, one of the criminals who took part in the dispersal of Rabaa. Let's share it as widely as possible. Let people know we will not let them go, that we are going to get them, that their children are no more valuable than ours. Revenge is coming.” The comment was posted beneath the photograph of the Christian police officer carrying his daughter. Such images appear on pages with titles such as: “Lovers of the legitimate president Mohamed Morsi”, “What's less than bullets is peaceful” and “Peaceful in a new taste… We will show you.” The last page recommends forming hundreds of pre-emptive units, each comprising 15 to 20 participants, whose job will be to monitor the police presence in any area where protests take place and launch hit and run attacks with Molotov cocktails against police vehicles. The justification for these attacks is the same used to justify acts of peaceful resistance by Morsi sympathisers. “After the massacres, burning, killing, arrests and destruction carried out, and which is still being carried out daily, we have decided to meet any attack against us from the Interior Ministry and its thugs by using all legitimate means of self-defence,” posted Mohamed Fathi. Another comment on the same page reads: “Being peaceful doesn't mean that when you are shot you say please shoot me again. Being peaceful means that when a policeman or soldier tries to shoot and kill you, you break his arm so he cannot do it again.” Promises of martyrdom abound, and demonstrators are reminded they are not only fighting a political cause, or for the reinstatement of a president they supported, but in defence of Islam. Mohamed Qodousi's post on the “Ghosts against the coup” webpage is typical: “Recall the spirit of Islam that you are defending, be confident that you are on the right path and that God is on our side. It's enough to make us proud that we are the ones God chose to call for justice,” “Ghosts against the coup” is one among the most popular pages on Facebook, boasting branches in a number of Egyptian cities all tasked with coming up with “creative” ideas for “peaceful resistance” that would turn more Egyptians against the “coup” and lead them to back the Brotherhood's call for Morsi's reinstatement. Its tactics include blocking major highways, spilling oil on bridges and jamming mobile phone networks by makings tens of thousands of phone calls at the same time. Alongside the displays of bloodied corpses, dubbed “martyrs” on those social media pages, are images mocking Al-Sisi. He is portrayed as a vampire sucking blood, with blood dripping from his hand and in one image as squirming beneath a pile of discarded shoes. Several pages showcase growing intolerance towards the millions of Egyptians who clearly back Al-Sisi. “Al-Sisi is the president of all donkeys,” reads a comment on one Facebook page under pictures of demonstrations in support of Al-Sisi during the 14 and 15 January referendum on the constitution. “Don't be surprised if you see thousands following Al-Sisi,” it continued. “Millions worship statues all over the world. The question is how do you expect us not to despise you? You are a people who adore injustice and worship the army boot.”
