Another monthly post as part of the COVID-19 coverage in Egyptian Chronicles.
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| Egypt's Healthcare workers in protective suits "Xinhua" |
This time it is a quick look into COVID-19 numbers in Egypt after 16 months since its arrival to the country in February 2020.
This is the time of our monthly post about the coronavirus pandemic and its numbers in graphs.
The official numbers of coronavirus cases in Egypt continued officially surged and then declined in May 2021 following April 2021.
In the first half of May 2021, we had Ramadan, Orthodox Easter and Eid. It was like a big social gathering despite warnings and official preventative measures that actually were not to be seen on the ground.
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| Eid Prayer on 14 May 2021, foreign students wearing masks before heading to pray Eid prayer at Al Azhar Mosque "AFP" |
May finished as the numbers of cases began to decline in its last week officially.
Disclaimer: According to Minister of Health Hala Zayed in early January, the official numbers of cases represent between 10%-15% of the real number of cases worldwide Egypt included.
Now to the graphs of May numbers.
It is another new month under the coronavirus pandemic.
It is June and we supposedly start to witness the end of the third wave of coronavirus that hit the country in April and May.
The official number of cases began to decline in the last week of May.
At the same time, we began to witness a true increase in the number of people who got vaccinated “I got my first dose in the last week of May” as Egypt began to receive more shipments of coronavirus vaccines.
Still, Egypt got a long road to safety for real.
The majority of the people in Egypt still act as if there is no coronavirus unfortunately despite all the infections and fatalities.
Please stay safe, keep your social distance and get vaccinated as soon as possible.
Here is our monthly live coverage of everything coronavirus below
On Friday, an Israeli Jerusalem district court decided to postpone its final ruling in yet another case involving Palestinian citizens fighting eviction orders from their homes in their occupied city by the Israeli occupation authority.
It is not another new episode in the bitter fight over Sheik Jarrah neighbourhood, but it is rather another episode in the older fight over Silwan district of East Jerusalem.
Yes, the district court decided to postpone its final ruling in the case of Silwan’s Btan Al-Hawa neighbourhood till next December where seven Palestinian Jerusalemite families are appealing against the evict orders issued by the Israeli authorities.
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| Save Silwan from a protest organized by the Palestinians on Friday "AFP" |
We are speaking about at least 700 people on the verge of losing their homes.
The Israeli court decided to adjourn its ruling because there are two appeals filed by other Palestinian families in Silwan against the Israeli evict orders.
Israeli authorities claim that those Palestinian families are living on land owned by Jewish owners, which is untrue historically and legally.
Before we go to the history of Silwan, I must state some fundamental facts.
Legally Silwan district is in East Jerusalem, an officially recognized occupied territory by international law, the UN Nations and its Security Council as well as most of the World Community.
Israel, its orders, its laws and courts have no jurisdiction officially in East Jerusalem. So, all the past, present and future eviction orders are officially null.
It is also worth mentioning that forced displacement can reach the level of a war crime.
Historically, Silwan is from the ancient villages in Jerusalem and actually, it is one of the areas that were originally built by the Jebusite Canaanites. The Jebusites were the true builders historically of Jerusalem if we are going to speak ancient history.
Please watch this short documentary produced by Vice News about the recent events in Palestine that started technically in the small neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah in occupied East Jerusalem and the storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque.
The video is focusing on the case of Sheikh Jarrah and its Palestinian residents who are facing illegal forced evictions.
The documentary includes the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque on video.
I was following Vice News reporter Hind Hassan on that day the Israeli forces stormed the Aqsa Mosque from two weeks ago.
It turned out that she was doing this short documentary on Sheikh Jarrah but things got escalated fast.
Now this short documentary got a special appearance of the Arab World’s favourite Fauci aka Jacob Fauci or Yacoub Fauci
We knew more information about our infamous blatant illegal settler from New York’s Long Island.
Unsurprisingly, he is a Kahanist Trump support and COVID-19 truther. It is like a whole package !!
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| Tahrir square after renovation |
The facades of the neoclassical, modernist and Art deco buildings were recoloured and re-painted with the pastel beige and had this new lighting system at night.
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| The building at the intersection of Tahrir square and Mohamed Mahmoud street |
The new lighting system was made by the Public sector ministry and it cost LE 60 million.
I wonder if all those lights are turned off at a certain time at night or how they manage it. Here is a shaky photo of some of Tahrir square’s buildings.
US Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez aka AOC hit a nerve from a couple of two days ago when she tweeted that “Apartheid states are not democracies” hinting out to Israel without naming it.
Apartheid states aren’t democracies.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) May 15, 2021
The tweet went viral, and the US media did not like that much and the crazy woman screaming online card was pulled for the young Congresswoman from New York, but it did not intimidate her.
So are the extensively researched, painstaking conclusions from the UN, Human Rights Watch, and B’Tselem (among the largest human rights orgs in the world and in Israel) considered “outbursts” too?
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) May 16, 2021
Or is that just a descriptor MSN reserves for the women legislators quoting them? https://t.co/i0c0M3OjGe
And yes, Israel is an apartheid state whether you support it or not, it is an apartheid state.
For decades Israel positioned itself as the oasis of democracy in the Middle East full of Arab dictatorships. What helped this perception to be enforced two facts: The Middle East has been ruled so far by dictatorships and Israel has a democracy that enjoyed and is limited to its Jewish citizens only.
This Israeli democracy is too flawed by another fact that has been hidden too long from the world but Arabs especially Palestinians know very well: It is an apartheid occupation state.
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| Palestinians and Israeli activists protest a plan by the Israeli government to annex parts of the West Bank, at the Almog Junction near Jericho in the West Bank on June 27, 2020 "UPI" |
Before Human Rights Watch publishes its report on Israel as an apartheid state, Palestinians knew that fact too long especially the Palestinians living in the Greenline aka the 1948 borders and there is a lot of damning evidence that supports this.
By facts and by numbers in 2019 according to Palestinian activists, there are 6.6 million Jewish Israelis who are free to live through Israel and most of the West Bank.
On the other hand, there are 1.6 million Palestinians who are officially citizens of Israel “Living in the 1948 borders” and can vote but barred by the Israeli government and its committees from living in 68% of the towns in Israel!!
There are 0.3 million Palestinians living in East Jerusalem which is according to international law and UN security council resolutions an occupied territory since 1967 that Israel must withdraw from immediately.
