Some in Egypt Turn Their Anger on Islamists,

and the Syrian Embassy Is Attacked

CAIRO — The resentments of many young political activists toward the Muslim Brotherhood spilled into a public spat on Friday as some demonstrators who came out to mark the first anniversary of the country’s revolution turned on the group.

The protesters, who accuse the popular Islamists of being too accommodating of the military leaders who replaced the ousted president, Hosni Mubarak, surrounded a stage set up by the Brotherhood, jeering and in some cases hurling plastic bottles.

Although the exchange lasted only about a half-hour and was hardly representative of national opinion, some Brotherhood members appeared shocked by the vehemence of the verbal assaults. At one point, protesters who have grumbled privately for weeks that the Brotherhood had made its peace with the military rulers chanted, “You sold out the revolution.”

Adding to the tumult, opponents of another autocratic leader, President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, stormed into that country’s embassy a few blocks from the demonstration and caused some damage. Many Egyptian pro-democracy advocates and Syrians in Cairo believe that Mr. Assad should be overthrown as part of the Arab Spring revolts.

It was the second time in five months that Egyptian security forces failed to prevent an attack on an embassy; the previous attack was at the Israeli Embassy.

The hostility toward the Brotherhood appeared to reflect the Islamist group’s transition from outlawed opposition to part of the political establishment, as well as the frustration of pro-democracy advocates who accuse the military of thwarting revolutionary change.

The dispute broke out around sunset Friday as thousands of people in several anniversary marches converged on the capital’s Tahrir Square, where the Muslim Brotherhood had erected a giant stage.

The marchers were determined to use the anniversary to call for the military council leading the country to exit power immediately. But the members of the Brotherhood, which dominates the newly elected Parliament, came to the square in an attempt to keep the anniversary demonstration upbeat. The Brotherhood has endorsed the generals’ timetable for a handover of power by the end of June.

When the marchers reached the square, some vented at the Brotherhood, both for its approval of the military’s timetable and for the acoustic domination of its stage.

A crowd surrounded the stage, shouting insults and waving their shoes in the air, a grave affront in the Arab world.

The speakers on the stage, including several sheiks from the prestigious Al Azhar College of Islamic Studies, looked stunned. “Please, don’t do this,” one speaker pleaded. “We are all one hand!”

The Brotherhood speakers attempted to join with the crowd by leading chants of “the people want the fall of the regime” and “down with military rule.”

But the protesters appeared unconvinced. The speakers retreated under a hail of insults and an occasional plastic soda bottle.

“Young people made the revolution, but then the army brought us Tantawi,” said Abdelrahman Ahmed, 37, a telecom engineer, referring to Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the top officer of the military council. “And now the Brotherhood mocks us.”

As the sun set, both Brotherhood members and some in the crowd knelt for evening prayers. But soon the crowd jumped to its feet and began chanting, “Get off! Get off!” to Brotherhood officials on the stage.

Another sound system inside a tent city in the square boomed: “No Brotherhood, no officers! Down, down with military rule!”

The Brotherhood members appeared to make a decision at that point to try to ride out the protest, sitting on the stage with their microphones and lights turned off. Eventually, the protesters melted away, replaced by Brotherhood supporters.

A man on the stage then led a new chant: “We want to go back to how it was, one hand in the square!”

The attack on the embassy also started around sunset when about 15 people broke through the front doors, pushing past armed Egyptian guards who did nothing, according to Syrian diplomats. The embassy was empty at the time.

The group tore through the building for about 15 minutes, smashing pictures of Mr. Assad, who has orchestrated a bloody crackdown on protests against his rule. The attackers damaged office equipment and tore open files in the ambassador’s office. Then, after about 15 minutes, they left without any resistance.

Youssef Ahmed, the Syrian ambassador, said he saw no connection between the attack and the invasion of Israel’s embassy after a demonstration last September.

“The Israeli Embassy was attacked by the revolutionaries of Egypt because Israel is the first enemy of the Arab nation,” he said. He placed blame for the attack on his own embassy on “barbarians moved by money” that he asserted had been provided by unnamed Persian Gulf countries bent on Mr. Assad’s ouster.

But like the Israelis, he criticized the Egyptian authorities for failing to fulfill their treaty obligations to safeguard the embassies of other nations. “We warned them so many times to protect our embassy,” he said.

One Syrian diplomat said that Egyptians had told Syrian authorities that their embassy needed no additional guards because it was in a secure zone near the American and Canadian Embassies.

Security cameras recorded the event Friday, but the identity of the attackers, whether they were Syrians or Egyptians or both, was unclear.

Dina Salah Amer contributed reporting. source:

Post-Mubarak Egypt is facing profound challenges with its unfinished revolution and looming economic crisis. The last thing it needs is to pick a fight with the United States. Yet the military rulers have done just that, demonstrating contempt for civil society and an old ally.

On Dec. 29, security forces raided as many as seven nongovernmental groups in Cairo, including three American-financed democracy-building groups — the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute and Freedom House. Employees were hauled in for questioning in a bogus criminal investigation.

On Thursday, the Egyptian government confirmed that it had barred at least six Americans — including I.R.I.’s Egypt director, Sam LaHood, the son of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood — from leaving the country.

The generals make the specious charge that recent unrest was caused by “foreign hands.” Outside forces didn’t drive Egyptians to courageously rise up against Hosni Mubarak. And outside forces aren’t driving them to keep pressing the military to keep its promises and move fully to civilian rule. If Egyptians want outside help to make that transition, they should be allowed to accept it.

I.R.I.’s president, Lorne Craner, said that in his organization’s 30-year history, it has never been treated like this by any country, including Russia, China and Venezuela.

Egypt’s military receives $1.3 billion in annual aid from Washington. It is beyond us why the generals would keep pressing this destructive dispute, even after hearing remonstrations from President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. They must let Mr. LaHood and the others go immediately.