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May 20, 2013
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 Dispatches From Cairo: Revolution One Year LaterPosted on Jan 31, 2012
(Page 3) The Tahrir Friday noon prayer from Al Azhar mosque, observed by thousands in the square, urged the people on. “Our right is to dictate the decisions of the revolution,” the imam Muzhar Shahine proclaimed from the “revolutionaries” stage, not the MB stage, as the crowd cried “Allahu akhbar” (“God is great.)” He continued with the people’s list of demands. State media must be purged, there must be a constitution that is “shared by all political parties and that gives rights for all of Egypt’s children,” and Christians must be given the same rights as Muslims. He cried out to responding chants, “A year later, has state security really been dissolved? Has our land been freed?” Afterward, as the Muslim Brotherhood started to once again take over the center stages and the sound space of the square, blasting religious doctrine, there was a surprise to many, mostly to the MB. The people began to shout down the fundamentalists. “Hey Brotherhood, hey Brotherhood! No Shariah in the square! Get out!” And “Go out and read the Quran to the SCAF!” “This is the revolution’s square! You are not the revolution!” “We want freedom! You want power!” “The Brotherhood deals with [Field Marshal] Tantawi!” People yelled at the stage, which was protected by handholding MB security people. Some in the crowd held up their shoes, a heavy insult. The speaker begged, “Brothers, don’t do this! We are the people! One hand! … We want civilian government.” Then religious music was turned up in order to calm the chanting. The crowd chanted louder, some scuffling broke out. Meanwhile, in nearby areas thousands occupied the sites of violent martyrdom like Mohamed Mahmoud Street; some demonstrated at Maspero, the site of the horrible and shamelessly denied massacre of Copts and the home of Egyptian National Television, source of propaganda and media manipulation. There were projections of the film “Liars” on the side of a building. Protesters chanted—and an announcement came through that the film would be shown on national TV! And guests from the revolution were to be invited on shows! The shift has begun. Advertisement I still do not have running water most days in my apartment. Air, water and land pollution plagues the city, and the people are as yet unaware of the advantages and mechanisms of waste management and industrial rigor. Egyptians are in ignorance of what goes on behind the opaque curtain of government, and of the extent of the material wealth of this nation and how it is used and what the government does exactly. There are still vestiges of primitive behavior and custom marbled through this huge population, which also contains enough brilliant, talented, forward-thinking and pure-hearted men and women to lead a global phenomenon mobilizing millions of diametrically opposed social strata in an explosion of creative potential and hope that inspires and worries the world as it stumbles in its newness. The taxi driver whose brother owns the shoe store downstairs from my apartment was not voting Sunday and gave me a ride to the hospital. After the long weekend of revolution participation here, I had to pay 13 Egyptian pounds—the equivalent of three U.S. dollars—to have an X-ray of my stress-fractured ankle. The hospital was part of a labyrinthine and crowded complex, and I had to ask directions repeatedly. But eventually a cast and a containment brace were put on my ankle, all for the cost of the equivalent of an additional 45 U.S. dollars. I tsk-tsked and said to the young doctor, “That is expensive! Much more than last year.” He replied apologetically, “Yes, I know, I am sorry, but now we are using some American products.” I did not mention that these American products would cost at least 300 times more in the U.S. than they cost here, or that in America I would have to pay $600 to health insurance extortion every single month for life in order to afford medical treatment. As I limped back to the taxi, accompanied by the typical sympathy, offers of help and well-wishing of strangers, I reflected on the strange chasm of values, self-interest, the evils of capitalism, human decency, pragmatism, social unity, and the vacuum of understanding into which can rush ... anything.
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By gerard, February 1, 2012 at 4:55 pm Link to this comment
Robespierre: Once more with feeling: Please look around on the net and find out some of the really beneficial things Occupiers are accomplishing. You won’t find them in the general press, but they are there. Images of the violence (mostly police) in Oakland get all the attention, at the expense of quite moving social justice issues that are being faced locally and of course non-violently, but largely without support from government agencies.The picture is very complex, and people of your intelligencee need particularly to get a more nuanced view of what is going on, its potential and the dangers that it may be brought down.
Report thisBy gerard, February 1, 2012 at 10:54 am Link to this comment
Robespierre: Thanks for your comments and venting. We all do it, and no wonder! NOBODY knows what to do—least of all the 1%. Millions of the 99% are struggling toward something new and different—something strange and scarey and unpredictable—something far outside their previous education and indoctrination. It’s vague. It’s being defined minute by minute, made of intimations, partial successes, partial failures, misunderstandings, hopes, fears. Only the geneneral principles seem to offer a way out of mass murder, and there’s no Gandhi or Mandela or Havel Merton or Berrigan or King in the immediate vicinity.
Report thisSorry to be so explicitly vague, but—it’s a stage everybody has to go through. Better to point in the direction of life than to advocate for death. (Think Bill McKibben. Think Chris Hedges. Think Bill Moyers. Think of millions of people who believe in “peaceful tomorrows”.
OWS is not doing so bad, considering. Even the police are wondering about what’s happening. The rules don’t seem quite right, somehow, and more people are vaguely aware of problems and possibilities. That’s pretty good, considering the ponderous distracting media influences, exposiong everything except what reallly needs attention.
Old processes are inadequate to the need. New processes are not going to be born complete and explicit, unfortunately.
By truedigger3, February 1, 2012 at 10:37 am Link to this comment
The writer of this article ignores Egypt’s biggest problem which is its extremely high birth rate. There is no way under any economic or political system that the Egyptian economy can provide a decent life for so many people and counting. So the discontent and anger will continue, no matter who is governing and under what system.
Report thisThe writer says Egypt is a wealthy country which is false. Egypt is a very poor country.
Birth control is badly needed in Egypt.
The military council, regardless of its current incompetence and spinelessness, is the glue that is holding the country together. If the military is removed from power, the Muslim Brotherhood will take complete control and the country will descend into complete anarchy and chaos with very dire calamatous consequences for Egypt.
By kradek, January 31, 2012 at 11:20 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
The political movements that called for the protests
or participated in them–various youth coalitions, the
April 6 Youth Movement, Kefaya, supporters of the
liberal politician Mohamed ElBaradei, and petty-
bourgeois “left” groups such as the Revolutionary
Socialists (RS)–initially supported the junta. They
claimed that it was the “protector of the nation” (in
the words of ElBaradei), or that it could be
pressured for more social and democratic reforms (the
position of the RS).
After one year of bitter revolutionary struggles
between the junta and the working class, these lies
are exposed; the political establishment is now
desperately trying to cover up its initial support
for the junta and prevent the outbreak of renewed
revolutionary struggles.
One the one hand, millions of protesters, driven by
Report thisworsening social conditions and demands for social
equality and genuine democracy, are renewing their
calls for the downfall of the regime and demanding a
“true second revolution.” On the other hand, the
existing political parties are working to prepare the
next trap for revolutionary workers and youth. The
latest is a call for a handover of power to a
civilian regime based on the parliamentary election
recently held under martial law.
http://wsws.org/articles/2012/jan2012/egyp-j26.shtml
By Robespierre115, January 31, 2012 at 8:36 pm Link to this comment
@gerard, for months now you’ve only been offering a vague, general set of comments. Nobody is advocating violence, but sorry, whenever you take on a dominant system or government there will be confrontation whether politically or on the streets, that’s just life and history my friend. We are not at the level of Syria or Egypt in terms of the kind of government we are facing, so we don’t need armed guerrillas roaming around Los Angeles or New York, in those countries they HAVE NO CHOICE, even Gandhi extensively wrote about the inevitability of violent confrontation when the situation reaches a breaking point. Here we can still overturn the system through democratic, electoral methods if the people organize new movements and organs of power as seen in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina etc.
If all you offer is some vague set of slogans where you sit around plazas or try to take over abandoned buildings, people will support you morally and find it cute that you’re “taking on the man,” but the average worker, the average joe who gets up early every morning to slave to feed himself and the family wants concrete, clear alternatives to then take the plunge. This is why you were whining a few months ago over NY residents not “housing” or “sheltering” the OWS protesters. In the eyes of the proletariat, I’m sorry if that term offends the postmodernists who use bullshit slogans to hide their centrist weaknesses, Occupy is admirable and the right start, but for now it’s just VENTING. Nobody gives a fuck unless Rosa Luxemburg and the Spartacists finally appear with some serious plans. You cited Oakland, Oakland is a perfect example of why SERIOUS THINKING and ORGANIZING is needed, because the state will not tolerate rebellion, which is why it’s laughable to see Occupy leaders boasting about “having good relations with local authorities,” please grow the fuck up and wake up. What will it take? War with Iran for people to finally start TAKING SIDES and demanding actual, serious, momentous changes?
As for your final comment on “business as usual,” yes, you are absolutely correct, the oligarchy continues to bask in its decadence because it knows you don’t have any idea of how to overthrow them, you just dance around with bullshit hippie peace signs babbling about being apolitical, aidealistic and aanything.
Report thisBy gerard, January 31, 2012 at 5:41 pm Link to this comment
Robespierre: Everyone in OWS is not “sitting around” in occupied plazas, and it is unfair to say so. Somewhere on an firedoglake list yesterday I found about 200 communities undergoing various kinds of change due to the actions of local “occupiers.”
Report thisThe national press is of course deliberatellly over-
looking them, but they are there nonetheless. They are not bloody. Some are more confrontational than others. The Oakland event shown here in video was among the most violent and oppressive. In many places, law enforcement is restrained and not oppressive, hence no press interest.
Viewing complications in Egypt and viciousness in Syria, it is doubtful that wisdom is on the side of violence.
Of interest to me is what you mean by “running things in a business-like way.” Repression as usual? Failure to face problems? Farcical elections? Persistent economic deterioration? Encouragement of unendurable class differences? Pretenses of business as usual? Drinking cocktails on balconies?
By Robespierre115, January 31, 2012 at 3:14 pm Link to this comment
The big problem for young people in Egypt (and around the world) is the postmodern attitudes that keep them from forming any serious, revolutionary alternatives to challenge the old guard. It’s as if everyone’s too afraid of being wrong or confrontational. Instead of learning from history or the current changes happening in Latin America, young people’s idea of learning about revolution is watching “V For Vendetta.” In the US a lot of kids involved in OWS ramble on about “anarchy” without ever having read serious Anarchist philosophy. It’s ridiculous and those in power know this, which is why they keep running things in a business as usual way while everyone sits around in “occupied” plazas.
Report thisBy Morpheus, January 31, 2012 at 1:03 pm Link to this comment
We need a real revolution. The false promise of a democratic republic doesn’t work.
“WAKE UP AMERICA!” - SAVE YOURSELF. Stop waiting for democrats and republicans to save you.
Read “Common Sense 3.1” at ( http://www.revolution2.osixs.org )
Report thisBy gerard, January 31, 2012 at 11:17 am Link to this comment
Again, a most valuable piece of work. Truthdig, please notify us if and when these essays are assembled and published as a unit. In my estimation the work is invaluable—accurate, intimate and emotionally and intellectually stirring. Contains the very essence of soulful truth.
Report thisBy balkas, January 31, 2012 at 9:30 am Link to this comment
with islamic cult and/or islamic leadership against timocratic
Report thisgovernance/interdependent daily living; without tanks, secret police, and politics,
it was easy of me to expect that the protest [unless it involved all the 99%] in egypt
bahrain, morocco would fail.
in libya the protest against its govt was accompanied with militarism which was
also helped by most arab and european lands.
the armed rebellion did bring down libyan govt. it is now replaced by a mullahic
govt; similar to that of many other muslim lands.
and they make very good allies of the world’s onepercent.
syrian and libyan govts have not supported or allied selves with world
supremacists; thus end of libyan govt and soon also syrian govt. so, it is indeed
regime change: from a disobedient to a obedient govt. thanks
By Rehmat, January 31, 2012 at 9:15 am Link to this comment
Recently, Obama have sent several of his Zionists staffers to court Muslim Brotherhood. They have met MB leaders and told them the US $1.3 billion annual aid depends on maintaining Egypt-Israel peace treaty when MB comes in power in future. The latest one is deputy secretary of state, William Burns, a Zionist Jew. Burns’ meeting with Mohammed Morsi, head of MB’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) in Cairo was applauded by State Department’s Jewish spokeswoman Victoria Nuland. She claimed Burns reinforced Washington’s desire that Egypt’s parties will “support human rights, women rights and religious tolerance“. None of which exists in the US if one listens to the speeches of all GOP presidential hopefulls and Obama’s cheerleaders.
Interestingly, in the meatime, the US installed military junta has called off the annual Abu Hassira annual mulid (birthday) festival. The festival draws thousands of Jew pilgrims from Israel and around the world every year to the tomb of Jewish holy man Abu Hassira.
On Wednesday, Cairo informed Tel Aviv that it would not ‘appropriate’ for pilgrims to make the annual visit to Demitiouh village in the northern province of Beheira. The week-long festival is held on January 15 each year.
The Abu Hassira festival, which was made possible after Egypt signed the 1979 Camp David Accord with the Zionist entity, has repeatedly drawn angry reactions from residents of the village.
The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Centre on Wednesday slammed the decision, which it said was influenced by Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, which has just claimed the lead in the landmark post-Mubarak parliamentary elections.
Abu Hassirs (1807-1880) was born as Yaccov Aharon in Morocco. According to Jewish legend – Yaccov on a trip from his homeland to Jerusalem, crossed the Mediterranean riding on a hassira (mat) until he reached Alexandria. He settled in Dimitouh village some 150 kilimeter north of Cairo.
Abu Hassira, a cobbler, is believed to have been a miracle-worker aka Messiah. Jerry Rabow in his book ’50 Jewish Messiahs’ (published in 2002) has documented the stories of 50 Jewish religious leaders who claimed to be the “Promised Jewish Messiah” since the crufication of Jesus of Nazreth. Most prominents among them was the 17th century Jewish Messiah, Shabbatai Tzvi, whose followers, the ‘Crypto-Jews’ are still found among Turkish secular elites faking as ‘Christians’ or ‘Muslims’.
“Here lies a good man who came from Morocco and went back to the dust” is engraved in Hebrew on his gravestone. Pieces of paper listing the wishes of the previous year’s pilgrims can be found near the memorial. Photo on top right.
Emad El-Gilda, the ruling National Democratic Party’s MP for Beheira, recently asked Prime Minister Atef Ebeid at a People’s Assembly session to order the immediate halt of “Israeli celebrations on Egyptian soil, especially since they include rituals that violate Egyptian customs and traditions.” El-Gilda cautioned that this year’s celebrations “are bound to have negative psychological consequences for Egyptians, who view them as a political demonstration.”
“The mulid of Abu Hassira turns the quiet, placid life of Demitiouh into hell because of the tight security measures taken to protect participants,” Mukhtar El-Sweifi wrote in a letter to Al-Ahram. “It is an opportunity for Israelis to mock and ridicule Egyptians in their own homeland every year.”
http://rehmat1.wordpress.com/2012/01/12/israel-jews-are-not-welcome-in-egypt/
Report thisBy OzarkMichael, January 31, 2012 at 7:00 am Link to this comment
—-Lauren Unger-Geoffroy
Strange to see a positive statement about nationalism on Truthdig.
This article takes the long view, summarizing the disconnect between the Left and the common people, tracing some historical causes. This article also shows(indirectly and unintentionally) that there are differences between the cultures that arise from different religions. This article also shows that Revolution does not necessarily lead to Freedom. Its going to be a long road for Egypt.
Overall it was very well written. I am glad Truthdig publishes these dispatches.
Report this