The function of dialogue, between two sides or more, is to discuss issues on which they disagree and perhaps reach an understanding and an agreement over them. Yet for one side to make a decision on issues of disagreement and then to invite others to engage in dialogue, means at best placing them before a de facto situation, and at worst ridiculing them. And that is what President Mohamed Morsi has done with the forces opposed to his constitutional declaration, and to his bringing out the draft constitution from the already disagreed-upon Constituent Assembly and then calling for a referendum. With opposition forces active in the country having rejected the dialogue called for by Morsi yesterday, the formula that has been adopted is that of dialogue with those present, from among the forces allied to the Muslim Brotherhood or from marginal forces that seek to play some role in its shadow. It is no coincidence for this scenario, which issued from the Presidency, to have been prepared in the Brotherhood's kitchen, according to information that was leaked from the neighborhood of the Presidential Palace, after the Muslim Brotherhood felt that previous meetings at the Presidency had reached formulas that could have met some of the opposition's fundamental demands and provided a honorable way out of the predicament of the constitutional declaration. Such behavior involves a series of messages directed at the opposition's secular forces, without any consideration for what it could lead to in terms of escalation in the street and of increasing the intensity of the violence we have been witnessing after the constitutional declaration. Foremost among those messages is that the Brotherhood has obtained the presidential victory achieved by Morsi under the known circumstances, especially in terms of having attracted a large number of votes that were cast against his rival Ahmed Shafik much more than in support of Morsi himself. It is thus now giving itself the right to exercise power, through the President who remains a member and follows the orders of its Supreme Guide – making the management of power correspond to the Brotherhood's view of it, and making it monopolize the decision-making of state institutions and subject them to its goals. In connection with this view of power, the opposition becomes in the eyes of the Brotherhood a symbol of the baltagia (hired thugs), remnants (of the former regime), apostates and foreign agents – in clear and profound contempt for the popular movement of opposition that has filled public squares in every Egyptian city, and in disdain for its current demands, past movement and role in bringing an end to the former regime. The Brotherhood is thus dealing with this popular eruption as being the work of enemies, and one which those in power should, on the one hand, not be lenient with, and on the other reject the proposals and demands of. It is thereby purposely dividing the Egyptian people into the chosen, from among its members and supporters, and the wicked, which include the remainder of the people – with the discrimination and arrogance such a view entails. Indeed, what is the fact that the Brotherhood has driven its supporters to confront opposition protests but the expression of this division sought by the group, as well as of the fact that it will not hesitate to drive towards civil violence and to defeat the opposition in the street after having obtained power? In other words, the Muslim Brotherhood seeks to subdue the popular opposition, even if by force, after having considered itself to have become the ruler. And in the style of the famed “national fronts" of tyrannical regimes, the Brotherhood seeks to replace the representatives of the popular opposition, which it has placed among the ranks of enemies and of the wicked, with marginal movements and figures, and to portray such movements and figures joining with the Muslim Brotherhood government as popular consensus over this government. The Brotherhood would thereby preserve the core of its vision of Morsi's rule, as being an expression of its own rule. It would therefore move forward with its plans regardless of developments on the ground and of attempts to reach a solution, as it expresses in its statements and in those of its senior officials, who consider themselves to effectively speak for the current Egyptian government. It would have been possible for things to settle down quickly for the Brotherhood, and without it having to pay a high price, under circumstances different from the ones that currently prevail in Egypt. And it is perhaps here that resides its gravest mistake. Indeed, the Muslim Brotherhood, in the view that it holds of itself, as holding the truth alone unlike all others and as being absolutely right, and with the condescending view towards others that this entails, has not paid heed to the fact that those who oppose it today are the same ones who brought to an end the former regime, with all of its power and might, and who faced its violence and the bullets of its soldiers without backing down – which increases manifold their strength and their resolve to confront the Brotherhood's plans.
