Senior National Security official claims Muslim Brotherhood is a masonic group

A National Security official who took part in the investigation of former President Mohamed Morsi’s espionage case has claimed that the Muslim Brotherhood is a masonic group that aims to bring a new religion into Egypt, state-owned Al-Ahram reported.

In his testimony on Monday, Adel Azab, head of the National Security’s extremist activity investigations department, supported his allegations by saying that Hassan al-Banna is not the group founder’s real name, and that no one in Banna's family has that surname. He added that Banna's father is a Moroccan Jew who relocated to Egypt.

Morsi, along with 10 other members of the Muslim Brotherhood, is facing charges of leaking sensitive intelligence reports and military information to Qatari authorities.

Azab added that Morsi had pledged to hand over a part of Sinai to Palestine's Hamas, in return for the group attacking the Egyptian military. He also claimed that Morsi had given orders not to search certain cars coming in from Gaza through the Rafah crossing.

In addition, Morsi released and pardoned several terrorist and criminal groups in order to use them as militias to protect the Brotherhood while they were in power, Azab said. He added that the ousted Islamist president granted Hamas members Egyptian citizenship.

To add to Morsi's laundry list of alleged crimes, Azab claimed that the former president removed certain names from no-fly lists and pressured security forces not to disperse the Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins in front of the Constitutional Court and the Egyptian Media Production City. Morsi also purposely broadcasted the secret meeting held on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissiance Dam “to weaken Egypt’s position when it comes to negotiations in this matter,” Azab said.

The National Security official’s testimony also covered the contentious events of the Rabea al-Adaweya sit-in, with Azab claiming that Morsi called on his supporters to hold the sit-in in order to instigate a civil war.