It begins: Qaradawi to lead Friday prayers in Cairo
He’s the spiritual leader of that mostly secular Egyptian civics group called the Muslim Brotherhood. And he just might become the Ayatollah-esque figure that the Egyptian revolution has lacked so far.
For the first time since he was banned from leading weekly friday prayers in Egypt 30 years ago, prominent Muslim scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi will lead thousands in the weekly prayers from Cairo’s Tahrir Square on Friday.
Sources told Al Arabiya that a military force will accompany the head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars from his home to Tahrir Square, provide security for the prayers and accompany him back to his residence.
Al-Qaradawi last delivered a Friday prayer sermon in Egypt in 1981 after the assassination of former President Anwar el-Sadat.
But really, there’s nothing to fear. The Muslim Brotherhood are basically Egypt’s answer to the Village People. Or YMCA. Whatever.
Yusuf al-Qaradawi was really the third pick.
Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber were already booked.
I got that from highly informed sources.
I think there are an awful lot of people who owe Glenn Beck an apology…
Well, I’ll be there and we’ll see what happens.
I spoke to an Egyptian lawyer last night and he told me that the Muslim Brotherhood, all things being equal, are somewhat marginalized but a great threat because of their organization. He said the only cure is for the Egyptians to get out and organize and vote.
Otherwise he said he’ll grow a beard and put head scarves on his wife and daughter. He actually said that.
The “We are all Khaled Said” Facebook page now has some 80,000 members but somewhat more disturbing are two Facebook pages that say Wael Ghonim (the Google guy and man behind the Said page) is a “traitor” and that “We don’t trust” him; each has some 30,000 people.
There are quite a few people trying to portray Ghonim as a freemason for some reason, posting photos with arrows pointing at his shirts with the English Lion on them which Ghonim wears quite a bit. The problem is that they don’t point arrows to the numbers on the sleeves which reveal them to be Polo shirts.
It’s evident that the opposition to the anti-government protesters are listening and learning and taking this Facebook thing to heart. This uprising is also being hijacked by religious elements who wanted nothing to do with it before Jan.25 and are now trying to be the face of it.
If I had to speculate and predict, I’d say we haven’t seen the last of the street protests and that they will fragment along secular and religious demands but the MB doesn’t have the numbers to put on the street like what happened during the uprising; this could lead them back to terrorism to make their point. I’d say the almost 3 decades old emergency laws are the hot button issue right now and if the army doesn’t do away with them immediately you’ll see problems.
The first cracks on the street may appear today. The army represents old money more than it likes to let on, the Muslim Brotherhood see this as their chance and the anti-government protesters who came at this from a more secular view of freedom and dignity and who were in fact the driving force that caused Mubarak to step down may find themselves marginalized right out of the picture.
Stay tuned cuz this is going to get interesting – too interesting in my opinion. That thing about living in interesting times… yeah.
“But really, there’s nothing to fear. The Muslim Brotherhood are basically Egypt’s answer to the Village People. Or YMCA. Whatever.”
Hysterical!