The Muslim Brotherhood at a crossroads

After days of violence, Egypt's leaders are toughening their rhetoric against the Muslim Brotherhood.

Hazem el-Beblawi, Egypt's interim prime minister, has proposed the legal dissolution of the brotherhood. 

" We're not into the effort of dissolving anyone - or preventing anyone from being active in the public domain, but we're trying to make sure that everyone is legalised according to what the Egyptian law says ..." Mostafa Hegazy a spokesperson for Egypt's interim president said. 

If the Brotherhood is dissolved,  it will be forced to go back underground, and many fear that it may even embark on a path of armed resistance.

Former political prisoner Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice party, became the first democratically elected president in Egypt's history when he was inaugurated in 2012.

For Morsi's supporters and even the Muslim Brotherhood, known as the Ikhwan, this had seemed impossible just a few years ago.

The movement was founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna.

He aimed to spread Islamic principles and morals, but his ultimate goal was to establish a political system inspired by sharia.

In 1952, the Muslim Brotherhood supported the military coup led by Gamal Abdel Nasser but its relations with the government soon deteriorated and thousands of Muslim Brotherhood leaders and supporters were sent to jail.

The group was forced to go underground, persecuted and tortured, and some of the Ikhwan leaders endorsed the use of violence against the government.

However, in the 1980s the Ikhwan started to emerge from the shadows and took part in elections.

And in 2005, they won roughly 20 percent of the seats in the parliament, a political gain which alarmed the then Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, and prompted him to launch a clampdown on the group.

But Mubarak was toppled in a popular revolt in 2011, ushering in a new era for the Muslim Brotherhood.

They then formed a new party, the Freedom and Justice, which together with Egypt's ultraconservative Salafi party, Al Nour, won nearly 70 percent of the seats in the People's Assembly.

But not long after that, the group was accused of undermining democracy, and even their closest allies the Salafis abandoned them.

On July 3, 2013, the army deposed President Morsi following days of massive anti-Ikhwan protests. However, the Muslim Brotherhood remained defiant and staged mass rallies calling for Morsi to be reinstated.

Its supporters took to the streets in Cairo's Nahda square and also outside Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque, where thousands gathered for days denouncing the military coup. 

Egypt's clerics and religious leaders sided with the Ikhwan while the liberals and the seculars supported the military takeover - this created a divide on the streets, increasing fears of more violence. And when the security forces dispersed the Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins, hundreds were killed and thousands more arrested.

Despite international condemnations, the Egyptian government said it is determined to eradicate what it describes as terrorism. But for the Muslim Brotherhood it is yet another ordeal.

So, will the Muslim Brotherhood be forced to go back underground? And what does the future hold for Egypt's democracy? Is this the starting point of an armed resistance?

To discuss this, Inside Story with presenter Shihab Rattansi, is joined by guests: Mona al-Qazzaz, a Muslim Brotherhood spokesperson; Wael Nawara, an Egyptian writer and activist, and co-founder of the opposition Al Dostour Party; and Robert Fisk, Middle East correspondent for the British newspaper The Independent.