CAIRO, Feb 2: After eight days of protests that killed nearly 60 people, a video of one demonstrator stripped naked, dragged across the ground and beaten with truncheons by helmeted riot police has fired Egyptians to a new level of outrage.

Hamada Saber, 48, lay in a police hospital on Saturday, the morning after he was shown on television naked, covered in soot and thrashed by half a dozen policemen who had pulled him to an armoured vehicle near the presidential palace.

President Mohamed Morsi’s office promised an investigation into the incident, which followed the deadliest wave of bloodshed of his seven-month rule. His opponents say it proves he has chosen to order a brutal crackdown like that carried out by Hosni Mubarak against the uprising that toppled him in 2011.

“Morsi has been stripped bare and has lost his legitimacy. Done,” tweeted Ahmed Maher, founder of the April 6 youth movement that helped launch the anti-Mubarak protests.

Another protester was shot dead on Friday and more than 100 were injured, many seriously, in battles between police and demonstrators who attacked the palace with petrol bombs.

That unrest followed eight days of violence that saw dozens of protesters shot dead in the Suez Canal city of Port Said and Mr Morsi respond by declaring a curfew and state of emergency there and in two other cities.

But none of the bloodshed has quite resonated like the images of officers abusing a man at their feet — clearly helpless, prone and no possible threat.

“Stripping naked and dragging an Egyptian is a crime that shows the excessive violence of the security forces and the continuation of its repressive practices – a crime for which the president and his interior minister are responsible,” liberal politician Amr Hamzawy said on Twitter.

The anger was compounded with disbelief on Saturday when the prosecutor’s office released a statement saying Mr Saber had exonerated the police and denied they had assaulted him. His clothes had inadvertently come off while police were shielding  him from protesters, it quoted him as saying.

“This shows that state institutions are collapsing, as is the rule of law. We are living in chaos,” said lawyer Achraf Shazly, 35. “Next thing you know, the martyr killed yesterday will rise from the dead and say he wasn’t shot.”

The liberal, leftist and secularist opposition accuses Mr Morsi of betraying the revolution that toppled Mr Mubarak by concentrating too much power in his own hands and those of his Muslim Brotherhood, a formerly underground Islamist movement.

Meanwhile, Egypt’s main opposition group backed calls to oust President Morsi and demanded he go on trial after deadly clashes left the Islamist leader scrambling to contain fallout from footage of police brutality.

The opposition National Salvation Front (NSF) demanded Mr Morsi be prosecuted for “killings and torture” as it urged Egyptians to stage peaceful protests.

“The Salvation Front completely sides with the people and its active forces’ calls to topple the authoritarian regime and the Muslim Brotherhood’s control,” it said in a statement. It said Mr Morsi should be put on trial after an “impartial investigation” and ruled out dialogue with the presidency until “the bloodletting stops and those responsible for it are held accountable.” —Reuters/AFP