Alexandria clashes kill 2, injure 4, while dozens arrested nationwide

Clashes between residents of Alexandria’s Al-Amreya district and protesters allegedly affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood left two people dead and four injured on Friday, reported the state-owned Middle East News Agency (MENA).

Victim Mohamed Abdallah, 18, was fatally shot in the chest, and Hossam Magdy Gaber, 21, died after being shot in the stomach, according to Alexandria Security Directorate chief Nasser al-Abd.

Since former President Mohamed Morsi’s military-backed ouster last July, Fridays have become a routine day of protest for those opposed to the regime change and the state's violent crackdown on Islamist groups. The protests have often devolved into deadly clashes with security forces, and increasingly with area residents backing the interim government, in a nation growing ever more polarized ahead of another round of presidential elections.

The Ministry of Interior said in an official statement that 27 people were arrested in the Alexandria clashes on charges of possessing two homemade bombs, Molotov cocktails and knives.

Seven were arrested in Cairo, including four men and one woman who were apprehended on the Ring Road and charged with possessing “tools to manufacture homemade bombs.”

Earlier on Friday, an explosion targeting a traffic checkpoint in Heliopolis left one soldier dead and three others injured.

Six others were arrested in Giza and two more in Fayoum, who were also charged with possessing homemade bombs and Molotov cocktails. Three others were arrested in Qalyubiya while allegedly “attempting to prepare for violent attacks during today’s protests with two guns and one pellet gun,” said the MOI.

Also on Friday, the prosecution referred 102 purported Brotherhood supporters to the Minya Criminal Court for their alleged involvement in violent acts following the August dispersal of two protest camps in Rabea al-Adaweya and Nahda Square, which left over 1,000 dead.

The defendants are accused of thuggery, theft, attacking public and private properties as well as governmental institutions, burning churches and illegal possession of arms.

The Minya Criminal Court has faced international condemnation for its recent landmark rulings. In March, the judge sentenced 539 defendants to death by hanging for their alleged role in an attack on a police station. Last week, the grand mufti only approved 37 of the death sentences, and the court commuted the remaining sentences to life in prison.

On April 28, the same judge handed down another mass death sentence to 683 more men, including the Brotherhood’s Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie, on charges of killing a policeman.