Egypt’s New Leaders Press Media to Muzzle Dissent
|
Version 0 of 1. CAIRO — As soldiers and policemen opened fire on supporters of President Mohamed Morsi outside an army officers’ club on Friday, killing at least four people, one of Egypt’s state television channels broadcast a religious show that advised viewers to respect the elderly. On a second state channel, a police officer gave an interview, assuring the public that the department was working night and day to “secure the people.” After the military removed Mr. Morsi from power while promising that it was not “excluding” any party from participating in Egypt’s future, the leadership moved forcefully to control the narrative of the takeover by exerting pressure on the news media. The authorities shuttered some television stations, including a local Al Jazeera channel and one run by the Muslim Brotherhood, confiscated their equipment and arrested their journalists. The tone of some state news media also seemed to shift, to reflect the interests of those now in charge. “This is evidence of the return of the military police state in its worst form,” said Mohamed Abdel-Razek, 28, who worked as a newscaster at Misr 25, a Brotherhood station. The crackdown on the channels, carried out with well-orchestrated speed, was another sign of just how far Egypt’s Islamists had fallen. Having recently been among the most prominent voices on television, they struggled for days to be heard. When Egyptian television stopped covering their protests, the president’s supporters provided live streams on the Internet to show Egyptians their numbers. Human rights activists condemned the closings and said they thought that the authorities, now under a spotlight, might cave to pressure. Most of the detained journalists have been released, but even so, the crackdown added a martial note to Egypt’s transition, seeming to undermine the military’s assertion that it intended to stay out of politics. And, as violence erupted throughout the country, the shifting media landscape hardened the feeling that Egypt was inescapably stuck in the past. As in the uprising more than two years ago, when Hosni Mubarak was toppled, bridges became battlegrounds and the country counted new dead. Rumors were treated like fact before evaporating, leaving nothing but doubt. As Mr. Morsi’s supporters dialed up their language against the army and Islamists were accused of deadly attacks, the military seemed able to count on wide latitude from the public to exert its control. In another echo of the last revolt, the military started accusing foreign news media of spreading “misinformation” and, in at least one case, interfered with their work. During a live broadcast, soldiers stopped a CNN correspondent as he reported on clashes in downtown Cairo, and briefly confiscated a camera. After the BBC and other outlets reported that pro-Morsi protesters had been killed by soldiers outside the Republican Guard club, an unnamed military source told the state newspaper, Al Ahram, that “foreign media outlets” were “inciting sedition between the people and its army.” Some private outlets have also thrown their weight behind Egypt’s new leaders. A reporter at one newspaper said that her editor had given his staff explicit instructions not to report on pro-Morsi demonstrations and to make sure that articles indicated that the perpetrators of violence were always Islamists. The reporter requested anonymity, and her claims about the editor’s remarks could not be independently confirmed. A look at Saturday’s articles on the Web site of the newspaper seemed to corroborate her assertions. The arrests and closings affected longtime journalists, producers and technicians, as well as firebrand clerics at some of the channels who were widely seen as engaging in hate speech and promoting violence. The shift of power and changing tone of coverage were apparent on Wednesday, even as Egypt’s defense minister, Gen. Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi, prepared to go on television and announce the end of Mr. Morsi’s presidency. Millions of people had marched for days, demanding that result. State television prepared the public for the earthquake, in soothing segments that made no mention of Mr. Morsi or the Brotherhood, which instead was referred to as “that group.” A host interviewed a retired general, who spoke about the central, critical role of Egypt’s military over decades. Clips of fighter jets screeching through the sky were played, as well as patriotic anthems. During another interview, a legal expert discussed the question at the center of Egypt’s crisis: whether constitutional or popular legitimacy was more important. The expert explained that any ruler had to have the support of the people to succeed, bolstering the case that the military was about to make, that the people had spoken. General Sisi had hardly finished his announcement when, at an office of Al Jazeera’s local affiliate in the Agouza neighborhood, men in civilian clothes carrying guns broke down the door, according to journalists who were there. They asked for identification but provided none of their own. They took mobile phones, computers and iPads — anything the journalists could use to communicate. Then they took the employees, and others there, downstairs, where police wagons and other men with guns were waiting. The other stations were closed down at almost exactly the same moment, in what appeared to be a well-coordinated clampdown. Events stoked the growing sense of victimhood among the president’s supporters at a demonstration in Nasr City, where the sudden loss of privilege was acutely felt. As journalists were warmly welcomed at the sit-in, there was no talk of Mr. Morsi’s own prosecutions of his opponents in the news media, which while less draconian, were just as selective. The protests were covered live by at least three of the shuttered stations, including the local Al Jazeera network, which was seen, like its Arabic-language parent, as sympathetic to Mr. Morsi and the Islamists. After the arrests, Palestinian networks carried the protests, and people shared videos online. Al Jazeera now has a camera back up at the site. Seif el-Bgeegy, a 29-year-old plumber who helps guard the protests and is responsible for cameras at the site, said that the images would be protected by “millions” of the president’s supporters inside. “If they came in, they’d go to war with the masses,” he said. <NYT_AUTHOR_ID> <p>Mayy El Sheikh and Ben Hubbard contributed reporting. |