Mubarak-regimet ønsker ingen konkurranse om makten. Tidligere leder av IAEA, Mohammed ElBaradei, er en populær mann og kan være aktuell som presidentkandidat. Nå spres bilder av datteren i badedrakt, og på steder som serverer alkohol på Facebook. Det antydes at hun ikke kan være en god muslim siden hun er gift med en europeer.
Motivet er åpenbart å fortelle de konservative og religiøse at ElBaradei er for vestlig og liberal. Men det sier en del om hvordan religion og moral er blitt et kort i politikken. Mubarak spiller nesten med samme kort som Det muslimske Brorskap.
Hosni Mubarak og regimet har lagt opp til at sønnen Gamal skal overta. Det henger nå svære plakater av ham over hele Kairo.
Many in the conservative Muslim country may look askance at the pictures. Islam forbids alcohol and advises women to dress ‘modestly’.
The Facebook group also published a snapshot of what it said was Laila’s profile in which she presented herself as agnostic, a claim that is likely to be seen by some as further evidence of western decadence in the ElBaradei family.
Her marriage to a European investment banker also raised eyebrows among conservatives in Egypt.
Laila is married to financier Neil Pizey, and the couple live in London. Comments on the Facebook group expressed concern as to whether Mr Pizey was a Muslim.
«The pictures of Laila will have an effect, as personal matters do in politics, anywhere,» said Dia Rashwan, a political analyst with the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.
«And they were posted in Ramadan, which is a month of piety.»
ElBaradei accuses Egyptian government of smear campaign over Facebook photos of daughter
Mohammed ElBaradei, the former UN nuclear chief and leading Egyptian dissident, has accused the government of President Hosni Mubarak of publishing private photographs of his daughter in an attempted smear.