MORE than four decades ago, Egypt was hit by the emergence of some fanatic groups that used violence against a society they considered similar to the Jahili (infidel, literally ignorant) society Prophet Mohamed (PBUH) fought in Mecca more than 14 centuries ago. Al-Takfir wal-Hijra group was one of the many movements that emerged in the 1970s, intending to impose their radical image of Islam on Egyptian society. They considered the Egyptian society as a group of infidels that should be abandoned and fought by the "believers" (members of this group) as Prophet Mohammed once did when he migrated with his Muslim followers from Mecca to Yathreb (now Al-Medina Al-Munawara) in Saudi Arabia. The security agency came down strongly on against such groups, especially when they started assassinating some Muslim scholars and governmental officials. The assassination of President Sadat in 1981 was perpetrated by members of the Islamist group that was enraged by the peace treaty Sadat signed with Israel in 1979. Naturally, the first decade of Mubarak rule experienced a strong crackdown on members of these fanatic groups, which started widening their operations to destroy the state authorities by targeting tourists and vital sites in the country to weaken and embarrass the government. Sweeping arrests of members of the Islamists groups and society's wide resistance against these movements and their ideas forced some to reconsider their stands and enter into reconciliation with the authorities in return for being released from prison. These deals included the promise to renounce the use of weapons against the state. Although the Islamists failed to form political parties, the then regime accepted their participation in the political process, which enabled some members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) to win seats in parliament in 2005. However, they were still subjected to security harassment from time to time to contain their work in society. Meanwhile, the January 25 Revolution enabled those Islamists to form political parties and strongly participate in the parliamentary elections, in which they gained a majority for the first time in Egyptian parliamentary life. This encouraged the Freedom and Justice Party, the political wing formed by the MB, to present a candidate in the presidential election race after previous promises not to participate in this process. Even before naming the first elected president to be an MB member, the different Islamist parties started showing a high profile in society and openly opposed the civil, liberal and leftist parties, accusing them of infidelity after uniting with them during the 18 days of the uprising to unseat Mubarak. Despite their shocking opinions over different aspects of life and the various State institutions, including the judiciary and Al-Azhar, the Egyptians still accepted the Islamists' presence in the political scene so long as they did not resume their old violent approach against society. However, hearing some leading MBs and Salafists threaten to set the country afire if the Islamists candidate, Mohamed Morsi did not win the presidential election race, raised public concern about Egyptian civil society's future and the entire democratic process with the Islamists reaching rule in Egypt. Herein, the opposition powers started consider uniting under a single front to confront the apparent attempt of the Islamists to dominate political life and the different state institutions, curbing the possible rotation of power via the democratic approach the Egyptians chose to follow after their 2011 revolution. Although the Egyptian revolution was peaceful, successive youth-led revolutionary events have always ended with some violent incidents, either from the security forces or some Islamists, MB members or supporters that refuse any kind of peaceful protest against the MB regime! One still could not consider it a setback in the Islamists' approach of seeking politics rather than the use of arms against society, as was the case some decades ago. However, seeing these Islamists' party showing strong opposition to launching a military operation against the terrorist group that kidnapped some six central security conscripts and an army soldier on Thursday May 16, prompts us to reconsider the actual intentions and policies of all these Islamists parties on the scene. Even if not taking up arms while dealing with society, political parties should not support some Salafi Jihadists that insist on using force against the security agency as well as the different state institutions with the aim of destabilising Egypt or forming an Islamic emirate on the Sinai Peninsula. On the emergence of the crisis, senior members of the Salafist parties and other Islamist groups hastened, with the apparent blessing of the Presidency, to contact members of the Jihadists in Sinai with the aim of mediation to release the soldiers. They established their viewpoint on the pretext that such an operation would cause the deaths of civilians. Some critics even excoriated the peace accords with Israel whose conditions included limiting the strength of the army in Sinai destabilising security. The need to amend the peace accords with Israel is recognised to ensure tighter control of the security and armed forces on the peninsula and the eastern border of Egypt. However, this should not be an excuse to avoid confronting those lawless Jihadists, who refuse to relinquish their weapons against the state even with an Islamist president-reaching rule of the country. So what would be the case if the Egyptians choose a civil president in the coming presidential elections or brought a parliament with civil majority? Despite the fears of having the army involved in a long-term and operation that exhausts its power, there is still a need for it to eradicate terrorism from Sinai that has been described as a new spot for al-Qaeda allies. This could be used as a future excuse to target Egypt with a foreign offensive to abort the terrorists' activities as happened in countries such as Yemen and Mali. The people of Sinai suffered under Israeli occupation and in having their land become the theatre of many military operations until fully liberated in 1981. However, they still been deprived from their citizenship right of benefiting from the wealth of their land and enjoying good utilities and services in their long-neglected peninsula. The people have even been treated by the security agency with great suspicion and many families have been subjected to mass arrest following terrorist operations in the Sinai. For the sake of Sinai and all Egypt, the security agency and the Armed Forces should move now to liberate Sinai from terrorist activity and impose the rule of law, so as to launch a giant development project for the depressed Sinai in the interests of all Egyptians.
