Al-Dustour, "Egypt Will Only Be Saved From Death and Destruction by the Union of the Army and the People"

Below is a translation of the front-page editorial that seems to have led to the confiscation of privately owned newspaper Al-Dustour’s Saturday, August 11 edition.

I did what I could to maintain the original, ah, excited tone.  And as usual, apologies for any mistakes.

Egypt Will Only Be Saved From Death and Destruction by the Union of the Army and the People

In a few days – no more than sixty – the new Brotherhood (Ikhwangi) constitution will be done away with.  This outcome is sealed, of course, by the Brotherhood constitution’s sweeping of the country…  Marking and announcing openly the establishment of the Brotherhood’s Emirate.

After several days and over the coming ten years, Egypt will witness the worst days of its political past and history of struggle and the collapse of its citizens’ patriotic honor…  The collapse of the citizen’s honor in front of his family and his children, and the violation of individual property rights…  Killing and bloodshed… Cutting out the media’s tongue and muzzling it…  The declaration of fascism and the fall of democracy…  Fear and panic for Egyptian families…  And the spread of crime, in all its forms, in the ugliest way imaginable.

After the ratification of the new constitution, legislative authority will be transferred and the Consultative Council (Meglis ash-Shura) will return to the Brotherhood’s control…  And naturally, that legislative power will be lost by the military establishment that now holds it.

At that time, the current senior leadership of the armed forces – who protect the constitutional legitimacy of the civil state, lest its identity be changed to that of a Brotherhood emirate – will be overthrown.  The critical question posed, then…  What comes after the toppling of the present armed forces command…  Will the new leadership of the armed forces come from the Muslim Brotherhood, or no??  If the leadership comes from the Brotherhood, then no individual or group in society will be able to freely express their opinion, protest peacefully or violate the doctrine of the Brotherhood’s Emirate…  If this happens, God forbid, there will be massacres and murder in the streets for all to see until the whole of society submits to the Brotherhood’s rulings and religious doctrine, avoiding a clash with it…  This is the real and honest picture that society will see within days.

Egypt will not be saved from death and destruction except by the union of the army and the people, with the formation of a national salvation front made up of political leadership and the army and the declaration of a civil state under military protection in line with the Turkish system…  If this does not happen in the coming days, Egypt will fall, and, over the few days remaining before the announcement of the new constitution, we will regret it…  The people must go out and protest peacefully, and it is their patriotic duty to do so until the army responds and announces its support for the people.

Readying for the Announcement of Zero Hour

May Egypt Be Under God’s Protection