The protests in front of the Israeli embassy in Giza continue as of time of writing, with thousands calling for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador and severing all ties with the Zionist apartheid regime. Protesters are also waving Palestinian flags, calling for war on Israel.
Are we having a short term memory loss? On 2 June, the former head of the newly founded Homeland Security (former SS), announced there was no Al-Qaeda presence in Sinai nor in Egypt. Today, SCAF is deploying thousands of troops in Sinai to fight “Al-Qaeda inspired militants.” So was General Hamed Abdallah lying in June or is SCAF making up another bogus terror enemy?
Congratulations… The Egypt-Israel gas pipelines were attacked in Arish for the fourth time on the row in 6 months. If the regime won’t halt the gas supplies to the apartheid state of Israel, then the people will.
The military junta and Essam Sharaf‘s cabinet are continuing forward with Mubarak’s foreign policy, despite all sorts of “change” rhetoric. The Egyptian people have made it clear in Tahrir and elsewhere (and all throughout our protests and campaigns these past years) that gas supplies to the apartheid state of Israel must stop completely. The gas trade deal with Israel has not only been the target of the wrath of Egyptians, but has become also a subject almost featuring daily now in the local press, with more details coming out about the extent of corruption and bribery in that deal which involved a wide array of regime officials from the Mukhabarrat to the Oil Ministry and Mubarak’s own family and circle of friends.
Still, the best thing the govt can come out with is “renegotiating the prices.” Well, if the government isn’t going to stop the gas supplies, then the people will do it. For the third time in 6 months, the pipelines have come under attack by the Sinai Bedouins, which caused temporary disruptions to the supplies heading to Israel and Jordan. The regime propagandists have been trying to depict the operation as the work of Hamas or “professional terrorists” in similar manner to what they used to do under Mubarak. So much for change. Hamas is hardly implicated in any operations outside Palestine (I know when an American sneezes, the US media is usually quick to assume it’s a Hamas-Hizbollah-Al-Qaeda operation, but I’m afraid it’s not true). And knowing what sort of compromising leaders Hamas has, they’ll be seeking warm relations with the SCAF. And we forget that the Sinai Bedouins despite the defamation campaigns against them are just as anti-Zionist as many of their fellow Egyptians are. The Bedouins have repeatedly called on the authorities, before and after the revolution, to open the Rafah crossing and stop the gas supplies. There were even news circulating during the uprising, which I did not report coz I couldn’t confirm, that the Bedouins were threatening to target US warships passing through the Suez Canal if Obama didn’t drop his support for Mubarak.
The attacks on the pipelines will continue, till the govt yields to the people’s demand of severing all sorts of economic and diplomatic ties with the Zionist state.
The relations vis a vis the Arab Gulf dictatorships are even more worrying. The money flooding in to Sharaf’s cabinet from those corrupt monarchs aim at nothing but “keep[ing] Egypt in their orbit.” And as I’m reading today’s newspapers, I’m sickened to find Sharaf “praising the wisdom of the Bahraini king” on his visit to Manama, and asserting that the Bahraini “national security” is organically linked to Egypt’s. In other words, our revolutionary prime minister stands hand in hand with the Bahraini tyrant, whose hands are soaked with his people’s blood–his people who’ve been defamed by the media (and Sheikh Qaradawi) as some sectarian Shiites whose loyalty went to Iran.
A revolutionary Egypt must have a revolutionary foreign policy, that seeks actively to export Tahrir and support the fight for freedom in the region and the world. We will not be able to build a democratic Egypt, while we are still surrounded by an ocean of Arab dictatorships, an apartheid regime and US military bases. What is regional is local and what’s local is regional.
What a night! Above, Gamal and Alaa Mubarak taken to prison, while protesters gathered outside call for their execution, chanting: “Thieves!” and accusing Hosni Mubarak of being an American agent. The demonstrators also demanded Alaa and Gamal to be transferred to Tora Prison in a police, not private, car.
Via Sibilant Egypt…
This video was taken on the morning January 29 in the town of Sheikh Zowayed in North Sinai, the day after the Interior Ministry’s final showdown with protesters. It is in front of the police station there. According to sources in that area, police officers on January 28 were sniping passersby from the station all morning. The protests that day were happening to the right and left of the police station, in the main road that runs throughout the town. People who were passing through for any reason were shot at. At least six people were allegedly killed in this manner according to the source from Sheikh Zowayed who handed me this footage. By sunset the orders had apparently been given for police forces to withdraw, which they did in Sheikh Zowayed by night time. Residents were not sure they had left and checked the following morning, which is when they found the two bodies in the video. First there is a man inside his truck who has been shot in the chest. A little later there is the contorted body of a young man lying near the pavement.
Statement by representatives of the majority of the tribes of North and South Sinai, regarding the Egyptian Revolution. They support the revolution and pledge to protect the eastern borders of Egypt, calling for prosecuting the police officials involved in murdering protesting, the immediate lifting of the emergency law and asserting their ownership of the Sinai lands. The Bedouin representatives consisted of around 350 mainly young Bedouin men from different tribes and met at Wadi Watir near the city of Nuweiba in South Sinai. They will be electing next week the delegation which will represent them in any negotiations with the government.
Clashes broke out today in Sinai, as citizens stormed Arish’s 2nd Police Station, liberating the detainees…
Sinai Bedouins continued their protests on Wednesday, trying to storm Sheikh Zewayed’s Police Station, denouncing torture, and calling for the release of detainees and impeaching the notorious General Habib el-Adly, the ministry of interior.
Hossam el-Hamalawy is an Egyptian journalist from Cairo
hossam [at] arabawy [dot] org
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