A senior member of the Salafi-oriented Raya Party said party founder Hazem Salah Abu Ismail will lobby supporters to protest if President Mohamed Morsy is removed from his post by the military.
“Another power takeover by the military will happen over our dead bodies,” Safwat Barakat, one of the party's chief founders, told Al-Masry Al-Youm.
Barakat vowed to settle old accounts with "the media, which stands in the way of the Islamic platform."
He noted that Abu Ismail's fan group, Hazemoon, had not yet participated in any protests supporting or opposing the president.
“We will offer our lives for the sake of the Islamic platform.” Barakat added that Abu Ismail’s actions would “surprise” everybody if a military coup were to take place. He also accused executive and military bodies of carrying out “foreign plots.”
Egypt’s army has given political actors 48 hours, or until Wednesday evening, to resolve a political stalemate after mass protests that started Sunday called for early presidential elections as Morsy completes one year in office. The army said it would impose its own roadmap for Egypt’s future if popular demands were not met.
Morsy’s Islamist supporters have also been protesting in defense of his legitimacy as elected president.
Abu Ismail, a popular Salafi preacher who was disqualified from the 2012 presidential race, has been a staunch critic of the military. He has recently stirred controversy for remarks attacking Defense Minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
