Islamist activists and reporters clashed outside MB headquarters last Saturday The Muslim Brotherhood has hit out at calls for Friday protests outside its east Cairo headquarters in el-Mukattam, following violent clashes with opposition earlier this week. Muslim Brotherhood Secretary-General Mahmoud Hussein has claimed during a chaotic press conference in Cairo that his Islamist group has witnessed unprecedented attacks in recent months, bearing “a great deal of beatings, torture and raids” without “resorting to violence or verbal abuse.”
“While they were committing vandalism and torching police stations and hotels, we were carrying out development work in the provinces,” Hussein claimed, referring to the Muslim Brotherhood’s “Let’s Build Egypt Together” campaign, launched at the height of January’s civil disobedience.
Primarily, \"the protection of private and public property is the responsibility of the police,\" Hussein told a press conference on Thursday.
\"But the owner of every house has the right to defend it using all means. If the police don\'t carry out their responsibility, we will protect our property with all we possess,\" the Brotherhood leader warned.
Activists, including often violent Black Bloc protesters, have called for a demonstration outside the Brotherhood\'s Cairo headquarters on Friday, almost a week after they clashed with the Islamists and police guarding the building.
The Brotherhood has seen about 30 of its offices across the country attacked in widespread protests against President Mohammed Morsi, the Islamists\' successful candidate in last June\'s election.
Hussein cut short the chaotic press conference after angry journalists kept drowning him out. Some reporters said they and colleagues had been assaulted by Islamists during the clashes last Saturday.
Journalists had demanded an apology, meanwhile providing the names of young Brotherhood activists allegedly responsible for attacks on their colleagues.
The confrontation marked a new low in relations between the increasingly secretive Islamic group and a hostile domestic media, which has complained of censorship under Egypt\'s new Islamist leaders.