Yes I am opening the file of Lara Logan again because it should not be closed till the rights of this lady return back , even if she was only beaten not sexually harassed or assaulted.Lara Logan was our guest and doing her job and among the true Egyptian values is “we put the guest in our eyes” as we say it in Egypt.
Some incidents should not be wrapped by a press release from CBS or statement from the White house especially that Egypt has suffered in recent years from the sexual harassment epidemic , the file should not closed.
I received many comments on Lara Logan’s post and these comments made me more persistent to discuss the matter and not let it go. Unfortunately many comments were not angry for Lara as much as they were racist and hateful , I did not delete them to show the amount of racism there. I receive comments incriminate the whole race of Muslims and Arabs , I receive comments from the kind “We were happy for you but not any more” , “Arabs have a long way for democracy and civilization” I know that these people do not really care about Lara Logan as a woman or a human being as much they found a golden opportunity to attack Arabs and Muslims and restore the old perceptions about them. It is enough to read this headline in one of the websites “Happy Egyptians rape Lara Logan !!” and to know that Glenn Beck is using the incident of Lara to justify his sick and miserable theories about the Egyptian revolution using the green board just like Qaddafi in 1970s to understand what is going on.
Ironically these people , these websites and also Glenn Beck are only angry because she is working for an American network and also white but on the other they are so silent on the rape crimes committed by U.S soldiers against Iraqi women. If you are human rights champion , women’s rights advocate then you must mention both incidents as matter of principle. Also the right wing blames Lara for being too sexy for her job !! “and you thought it was only the East !!” Well I am sorry but Glenn Beck and O’Reilly are too damn cowards to go in to hot zones.
Any woman in Egypt or in the world actually can be here place and it has nothing to do with being foreign or being white or being Muslim , it could happen to an American lady in the States itself , it could happen to me in Egypt.
I really want the Egyptian authorities to open an investigation about this matter not because Lara was foreigner or because the White house demanded so or because the reputation of Egypt but because what happened was wrong and against the law. The words “Sex assault” are huge despite the fact that according to Wall Street Journal on February 15,2011 there was no rape unlike what the right wing websites claim. I think a proper investigation will end this debate for good.
Of course we need more details in an investigation like this , the general details are not enough. The general details about Lara Logan’s attack was in NY Post based on Sunday Times’ recount. According to Sunday Times Lara Logan was attacked , stripped from her cloth and beaten by flags plastic poles all over her body by a mob of 200 men. She was saved a group of strong Egyptian ladies followed by a group of soldiers. I hope these women come and speak to the media because they are heroes especially those who gave her cloth , calmed her down and escorted her to the Four Seasons. I do not think Lara was too strong to go to the Four Seasons Nile Plaza in that shape alone according to what I understand from Sunday Times’ story posted on February 21st. The authorities should to speak to those ladies and also that group of army soldiers. The authorities should also speak to those who claimed to witnessed the attack.
Speaking about the witnesses , I do not understand why those few witnesses are being bullied online simply because their testimony contradicts the CBS News statement . For example the very interesting post by Mexican freelance journalist Témoris Grecko which includes his testimony and the others’ testimonies from Tahrir square especially those who claimed to witness the attack. According to Gecko she was roughed up only and according to another American tourist who made it very clear that he did not know what happened to Lara before seeing her, Lara’s clothes were not torn up and she was not actually accompanied by ladies but rather young men who formed some sort of human chain around her till they reached to the army post. Grecko also included two other testimonies that supported him.He deleted a third testimony as the witness was being attacked online. Now Grecko is being labeled as yellow journalist !!
For the record I found a similar testimony in the comments of Youm 7 , yes I know Youm 7 and its comments but I found it very interesting because it is also close to what Grecko wrote in his website , that angry mob gathered around her yelling agent and Israeli then one soldier and couple of men protected her till she was reached to the army post.
In any proper investigation or any case in front of any court all stories , all testimonies and all eye witnesses must be included .These witnesses and their testimonies will be recorded in any investigation carried on by the Egyptian government because the law says so. I know that I will be attacked thought !!
If there will be an investigation in Egypt , I think Lara must be cooperative with the authorities to help them with more details. Already the fact that she left the country immediately without being treated in a hospital for fear , anger and distrust is not good. I understand she was scared especially that she was detained earlier, no wonder she left immediately.
Needless to say whether it was a rough up or or sexual assault or a mix “ I think that this is actually what happened is a mix ” , knowing that the state security was “and is still” messing up in the country , I will not be surprised to know that this was a deliberate attack may be not on Lara but on any foreign journalist. I said before and I will say it again.
In almost all the incidents that were recorded from attack on journalists whether foreign or local was that rumor that this reporter were Israeli or that reporter were an agent for foreign powers spreading like the fire. In the past few days with the exposure of the State security files and also methods “their last attempt to turn us against the army” , we have become more and more certain from this. The blame is also on the Egyptian national TV to of inciting hate in the Egyptian society with its systemic claim against foreign reporters or foreigners in general before anyone. The fact that the Egyptian national TV has not apologized or admitted yet this makes me angry.
We do not deny that we got a major problem called sexual harassment, Egyptian people were the first to document and expose to the world the sexual harassment problem in Egypt with videos and photos , we are not hiding it. If you are follower to the blog from old time , you will know that we have been vocal about it and honestly I began to believe neglecting this problem from the security part was another tactic to make us afraid and also to divert our attention.
Now Al Masry Al Youm English surprised me by this report “ Planned Tahrir demo for sexually assaulted US reporter sparks controversy” , already the words “Widespread opposition” are inaccurate considering the fact most of the people did not know that there was a planned protest for her nor there were Facebook pages dedicated to her from Egypt. I agree with the women’s rights activists , if we are going to have a protest then it will be for women in general , it is enough what happened last Tuesday. “Actually that FB page mentioned in report is making her the hero of the revolution !! The fact that it has got links from right wing websites made uncomfortable “
I will try to raise the matter in the Egyptian media not because if the White House demanded this or because the right wing that should go to hell considers us savages whom Mubarak knew how to deal with but because this is the true Egyptian values that want to restore back after 30 years of Mubarak’s rule.
Update : Check out this very important op-ed from Agnes Rajacic in Al Ahram online.
Some incidents should not be wrapped by a press release from CBS or statement from the White house especially that Egypt has suffered in recent years from the sexual harassment epidemic , the file should not closed.
I received many comments on Lara Logan’s post and these comments made me more persistent to discuss the matter and not let it go. Unfortunately many comments were not angry for Lara as much as they were racist and hateful , I did not delete them to show the amount of racism there. I receive comments incriminate the whole race of Muslims and Arabs , I receive comments from the kind “We were happy for you but not any more” , “Arabs have a long way for democracy and civilization” I know that these people do not really care about Lara Logan as a woman or a human being as much they found a golden opportunity to attack Arabs and Muslims and restore the old perceptions about them. It is enough to read this headline in one of the websites “Happy Egyptians rape Lara Logan !!” and to know that Glenn Beck is using the incident of Lara to justify his sick and miserable theories about the Egyptian revolution using the green board just like Qaddafi in 1970s to understand what is going on.
Ironically these people , these websites and also Glenn Beck are only angry because she is working for an American network and also white but on the other they are so silent on the rape crimes committed by U.S soldiers against Iraqi women. If you are human rights champion , women’s rights advocate then you must mention both incidents as matter of principle. Also the right wing blames Lara for being too sexy for her job !! “and you thought it was only the East !!” Well I am sorry but Glenn Beck and O’Reilly are too damn cowards to go in to hot zones.
Any woman in Egypt or in the world actually can be here place and it has nothing to do with being foreign or being white or being Muslim , it could happen to an American lady in the States itself , it could happen to me in Egypt.
I really want the Egyptian authorities to open an investigation about this matter not because Lara was foreigner or because the White house demanded so or because the reputation of Egypt but because what happened was wrong and against the law. The words “Sex assault” are huge despite the fact that according to Wall Street Journal on February 15,2011 there was no rape unlike what the right wing websites claim. I think a proper investigation will end this debate for good.
Of course we need more details in an investigation like this , the general details are not enough. The general details about Lara Logan’s attack was in NY Post based on Sunday Times’ recount. According to Sunday Times Lara Logan was attacked , stripped from her cloth and beaten by flags plastic poles all over her body by a mob of 200 men. She was saved a group of strong Egyptian ladies followed by a group of soldiers. I hope these women come and speak to the media because they are heroes especially those who gave her cloth , calmed her down and escorted her to the Four Seasons. I do not think Lara was too strong to go to the Four Seasons Nile Plaza in that shape alone according to what I understand from Sunday Times’ story posted on February 21st. The authorities should to speak to those ladies and also that group of army soldiers. The authorities should also speak to those who claimed to witnessed the attack.
Speaking about the witnesses , I do not understand why those few witnesses are being bullied online simply because their testimony contradicts the CBS News statement . For example the very interesting post by Mexican freelance journalist Témoris Grecko which includes his testimony and the others’ testimonies from Tahrir square especially those who claimed to witness the attack. According to Gecko she was roughed up only and according to another American tourist who made it very clear that he did not know what happened to Lara before seeing her, Lara’s clothes were not torn up and she was not actually accompanied by ladies but rather young men who formed some sort of human chain around her till they reached to the army post. Grecko also included two other testimonies that supported him.He deleted a third testimony as the witness was being attacked online. Now Grecko is being labeled as yellow journalist !!
For the record I found a similar testimony in the comments of Youm 7 , yes I know Youm 7 and its comments but I found it very interesting because it is also close to what Grecko wrote in his website , that angry mob gathered around her yelling agent and Israeli then one soldier and couple of men protected her till she was reached to the army post.
In any proper investigation or any case in front of any court all stories , all testimonies and all eye witnesses must be included .These witnesses and their testimonies will be recorded in any investigation carried on by the Egyptian government because the law says so. I know that I will be attacked thought !!
If there will be an investigation in Egypt , I think Lara must be cooperative with the authorities to help them with more details. Already the fact that she left the country immediately without being treated in a hospital for fear , anger and distrust is not good. I understand she was scared especially that she was detained earlier, no wonder she left immediately.
Needless to say whether it was a rough up or or sexual assault or a mix “ I think that this is actually what happened is a mix ” , knowing that the state security was “and is still” messing up in the country , I will not be surprised to know that this was a deliberate attack may be not on Lara but on any foreign journalist. I said before and I will say it again.
In almost all the incidents that were recorded from attack on journalists whether foreign or local was that rumor that this reporter were Israeli or that reporter were an agent for foreign powers spreading like the fire. In the past few days with the exposure of the State security files and also methods “their last attempt to turn us against the army” , we have become more and more certain from this. The blame is also on the Egyptian national TV to of inciting hate in the Egyptian society with its systemic claim against foreign reporters or foreigners in general before anyone. The fact that the Egyptian national TV has not apologized or admitted yet this makes me angry.
We do not deny that we got a major problem called sexual harassment, Egyptian people were the first to document and expose to the world the sexual harassment problem in Egypt with videos and photos , we are not hiding it. If you are follower to the blog from old time , you will know that we have been vocal about it and honestly I began to believe neglecting this problem from the security part was another tactic to make us afraid and also to divert our attention.
Now Al Masry Al Youm English surprised me by this report “ Planned Tahrir demo for sexually assaulted US reporter sparks controversy” , already the words “Widespread opposition” are inaccurate considering the fact most of the people did not know that there was a planned protest for her nor there were Facebook pages dedicated to her from Egypt. I agree with the women’s rights activists , if we are going to have a protest then it will be for women in general , it is enough what happened last Tuesday. “Actually that FB page mentioned in report is making her the hero of the revolution !! The fact that it has got links from right wing websites made uncomfortable “
I will try to raise the matter in the Egyptian media not because if the White House demanded this or because the right wing that should go to hell considers us savages whom Mubarak knew how to deal with but because this is the true Egyptian values that want to restore back after 30 years of Mubarak’s rule.
Update : Check out this very important op-ed from Agnes Rajacic in Al Ahram online.
Thanks for your post.
ReplyDeleteIt is imperative at this stage in Egypt to issue clear laws and punishment against sexual harassment. If you remember, we were all very skeptical about the seatbelt law years back, however but reinforcing proper punishment, people learn to change gradually.
We have all been its victim one way or another, and the only way to put an end to it is by empowering women.
Women need to feel that the law is on their side, that they can speak up without being ignored or blamed for it (this is what usually happens in Egypt).
Education will also need to play a leading role in eliminating this horrible habit and create a social shift.
Nathalie
I was very sad and shocked for what happened to Lara, but I became angry on how the US media covered the story.
ReplyDeleteSimply they sent the following message:
This is business as usual for muslims.
This is business as usual for arabs.
This is business as usual for Egyptians.
And by the way they said that literally on Fox news.
So please if you are covering this story, you should have your say on the tide of hatred/racism they used to cover this story.
First time commenter:
ReplyDeleteYour article here seems fair enough but it also seems very obvious to me that you think it beneficial to minimize what happened to Ms. Logan. I'd like to argue that it does not benefit the revolution for you to hide what happened to Ms. Logan or for you to pretend what happened to her was not as brutal as initially reported, particularly if the offenders were the pro-regime protestors that also assaulted many Egyptians and numerous foreign journalists of every race and nationality.
If the attackers were pro-regime, it only proves more valid your effort to cast out the corrupt and oppressive regime responsible for such atrocities. If the attackers were anti-regime protestors, it's better for your cause if the attack were carried out by wild street punks motivated by lust and rowdiness than a concerted and violent beating fueled by angry and vengeful anti-American sentiment.
Either way, it's better to stick to the truth and the truth in this case is that Ms. Logan was hospitalized for five days and has yet to make an appearance in public or to release an official statement in her own words due to the tremendous trauma and shame which she feels has been visited upon her. Unnamed sources have claimed she was not raped. Unnamed medical sources provided supposed details of her injuries. The only official statement is that by CBS, for which she (legally) had to have given her permission.
You have severely downplayed this attack:
ReplyDeleteFor example, you call the "sticks" she was beaten with "plastic" (implying they were flimsy) when, in reality, looking at great body of video of the protests online, most of the flags being waved throughout these protests were held up by sturdy and wooden poles about a meter in length. Some of the pro-Mubarek gangs attacking on camels and horses can be clearly seen wielding these wooden sticks along with whips and swords. I've seen footage of police in black uniforms beating protestors with these same sticks, presumably taken from protestors. If Ms. Logan was hit violently (even a few times) with these sticks, that alone is an outrage because she is a petite woman with little defense against such an attack. It would have only taken a few strikes to the head with such a weapon to render her irreparably brain damaged or dead. Strikes to the body could have resulted in broken bones or internal injuries.
The Daily Mail (Sunday Times; London) reported that her injuries were described by a medical source as being consistent with being whipped with these sticks. This could imply that she was "flogged" or "caned" which would do a considerable amount of damage to her body. I've seen photos and video of this type of punishment being carried out by Islamic clerics and judges. The result can be catastrophic, leaving shredded flesh behind and creating very permanent scarring. If that's what happened, it would might been far less cruel to gang rape her. I know I'd choose rape over a brutal 20 minute thrashing and permanent disfigurement to my back, posterior, thighs, etc. Also, it's unclear whether or not she suffered lacerations to her face or head. The beating alone has the general public horrified as we wait to find out how far she's come along in her recovery.
Also, the vicious groping and pinching mentioned in the Daily Mail is not something trivial. To leave marks mistaken for bite marks, these pinches had to be severe and the marks were said to exist on "sensitive" areas of her body. You have no idea how much damage was caused. For you to claim this type of sexual assault as trivial in comparison to rape is absurd. What difference does it make what sort of object or digit or member someone violates you with when you are the one being violated? It only makes a difference to the man. For the woman, it's just as shocking and painful whether it is a penis or a finger or a weapon.
ReplyDeleteAlso, it has been reported that she was punched. She could have broken ribs, missing teeth, a broken jaw, etc. No one knows yet.
The first-hand account given by Temoris (as pointed out in many comments to his blog post) really only amounts to ten or fifteen seconds of seeing a hostile crowd drag and push a white woman past him on the street. His friend Ferky only follows for a minute or so before being brushed aside. The rest is hearsay. The rest is mostly second-hand accounts from people posting on his Facebook wall, people he has never met, and there are long gaps between the testimonies. Anything could have happened between what he saw and what they saw later after an undetermined span of time.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that it took a band of women accompanies by 20 armed Egyptian soldiers to set her free... is the most scary thing of all. This crowd, even half an hour after the attack started, was still impossible for less than 20 armed men and a band of determined women to repulse. Make no mistake, what was done to her was vicious and brutal and amounted to much more than being bumped in the chest by a few teenagers.
On the news, we saw other protestors stripped by mobs during the demonstrations. During his violent beating, Anderson Cooper saw men attempting to strip his female producer of her clothes. Everything said in the Daily Mail rings true.
This was a violent and egregious attack. Ms. Logan deserves every bit of your compassion and sympathy. She deserves an apology. She deserves justice. It doesn't matter who else deserves what or which cause was just or what motivated the attack. Her attackers are criminals and they should be punished. For this investigation to be closed is ludicrous. [end]
Rape and 'lesser' sexual abuse is recognised as a crime of violence, i.e. triggered by hatred not by sexual desire.
ReplyDeleteWhether hatred is collective or individual, it's invariably the product of fear.
Israelis fear Arabs and Arabs fear Israelis; thus the mutual unthinking hatred which was apparently the mistaken motive in Lara's case (regardless of the extent of abuse).
People who define themselves primarily by their nation, their religion or their politics are, by definition, the pawns of their leaders. Leaders derive their power from the fear and hatred of their followers. Is it a coincidence that the amazing Egyptian revolution has been leaderless.
I have admired and applauded the Egyptian revolution, not because it's Egyptian but because of the high quality of the individuals involved - particularly the women.
There is only one defence against rape (sexual, mental and social) and that is respect - self-respect and respect for one's opponents, whether they are of the same or different gender, religion, race or nation.
I want to thank you for this post and for the information you put forward. Just to say that I agree with you but unfortunately I cannot see the egyptian authorities carrying out an investigation right now.
ReplyDeleteA few hours ago I read a testimony about torture carrying out in the middle of the streets of Cairo by the military forces with completely impunity: http://eskup.elpais.com/nuriateson
Dont people believe in 'innocent until proven guilty'! This story have been blown into big proportion though there are no evidence, statements yet coming from Lara only some rumours what is happening on that night!! I wish she would come out and tell the truth to the world what is truly happening to her since this story is already big and innocent people, religion, women and country are being attacked for no reason!! if indeed there is a crime committed on her then the Egyptian police should find and punish those culprits but before that we need to know what really happened and we need to have those witnesses come forward and tell their story of that night.
ReplyDeletethe West media especially the American medias are quick to judge especially when it is Middle East/Arabs or most and foremost 'Islam' 'Muslims'!
Just read about an 11 years old girl got gang raped in Texas by 18 young boys and the community are more concerned about the young boys lives rather than focusing on the raped young girl's victim!
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/09/us/09assault.html?_r=1&src=ISMR_HP_LO_MST_FB
Why the media didnt make this a big story or headlines on their show or newspapers again and again especially like Glen Beck or Faux news!!!
This to show that crime happens every where in the world and we need to know the truth before condemning and attacking others!
This story is 'blown out of proportion' simply because the victim is a celebrity. That the incident was in Egypt is secondary.
ReplyDeleteThe 11 year-old girl is unknown. In South Africa where I come from there is a rape every 11 minutes (that's only the recorded ones).
When it happens to a celebrity it gets emphasised and discussed. It's the offence which is the problem. Why it happens is what is important, not where.
1. What happened to Lara Logan should not be an indictement on the entire country of Egypt.
ReplyDelete2. What happened to Lara Logan, no matter how anyone wants to spin it, was horrific
3. Almost all reports include that the attack was, in part, Anti Semetic.
4. With regard to Temoris Grecko, personally I think he has other axes to grind. He claims to be a Photo Journalist. Journalist is the operative word here. Most Journalists (Lara Logan included)go out and find facts. Which is probably what she was trying to do when she got attacked. Temoris, relies on something he saw for only a few seconds coupled with what others told him (this is called hearsay) to make a conclusion that the attack was not what was reported. Did he do any actual reporting or actual fact finding to base his conclusions on. The answer is a resounding No.
5. I agree that the facts, however awful they may be, should be made available.
6. Those responsible for the attack and those who may have stood by and let it happened should be held accountable and punished.
7. As of yesterday, a total of 288 people (liked) the Facebook Page Lara Logan an Apology From Egypt... Humm, There are slightly more people in Egypt that 288. I get the feeling that most Egyptians want this to go away quietly.
In conclusion: The attack was indeed horrific and based on hate and Anti Semitism. Trying to spin it away only makes things worse, and lastly it should not be held against an entire group of people.
I get the sense that there is disappointment on your part that the Lara Logan story tarnished the image of the Egyptian Revolution. The way to counteract that is not to diminish what happened to her which is clearly what you are doing here. What is even more surprising is that you would write this the day after the events in Tahrir on International Women's Day.
ReplyDeletethe only thing that matters in Lara's case is that she was not sexually assaulted, although she pretended to have been. She made up the whole story because she is that kind of reporter who is only after bad news. Being beaten up was not enough. She invented the sexual assault to make money out of this incident. She was nit happy that there was no sexual harassment in Midan Tahrir. She lied about it to make herself interesting. I find that disgusting.
ReplyDeleteBullshit. This is a woman who has interviewed presidents and celebrities, served as an embedded correspondent alongside Navy SEALS, and won numerous awards over the span of a decade. She did not need this to happen to remain one of the most important and well respected journalists in the world. To claim she made this up is the height of absurdity. You are an idiot.
ReplyDeleteCan't find my comment, so reposting just in case.
ReplyDeleteThere is a blackout about this story in Egypt's Arabic language press. Most Egyptians have no idea about what happened to Lara Logan. If the owner of this blog has contacts in the media and wants to do the right thing, pursue it with the Arabic language press. Only Youm7 and BBC Arabia covered the story in Arabic.
بصراحة بقا حدوتة لارا لوجان دى مش بالعها خالص فى الوقت الذى كان العالم كله بما فيه الرئيس الأمريكي يتحدث عن تحضر المصريين وكيف أن المصريين أصبحوا مصدر إلهام للشعوب الأخرى فى تحضرهم وسلميتهم ظهرت لنا لارا لوجان تتحدث عن تحرش الجموع بها فالتوقيت نفسه مشكوك فيه وأرجو التحرى عنها وستكتشفين أن بسلامتها صهيونية صرف لا هم لها سوى كراهية العرب وشكرا
ReplyDeleteIt's been a month since the attack and her first public appearance was just yesterday afternoon in Washington D.C. where she was a keynote speaker for a program at a university.
ReplyDeleteYes I am opening the file of Lara Logan again because it should not be closed till the rights of this lady return back , even if she was only beaten not sexually harassed or assaulted.
ReplyDeleteYou just took away her rights by trivializing and even denying what happened to her, Zeinobia. She spent 6 days in the hospital. CBS says she suffered a "brutal and sustained sexual assault" at the hands of a mob of more then 200 people. Some of her injuries have been documented, and they include evidence she was severely whipped with flagpoles and had such bad bruising on some sensitive parts of her body that they appear to be bite marks.
The claim she was rescued by a group of Egyptian women appears to be a fabrication, as none of these women have been located to testify as to what they saw. The claim also doesn't explain how it is that they stood around for god knows how long before deciding to try to do anything. There's also the fact that another westerner has said on her facebook "justice for Lara Logan" page that it was a dutch sound engineer who saw some of what was going on who eventually was able to persuade some Army soldiers nearby to do something about it. Additionally, it's not compliant with other claims that it was female Egyptian protesters who'd started all the trouble with the western journalists that night in the first place by accusing them publicly and loudly of being "zionists". And lastly, it's at odds with what female members of the Egyptian Youth Movement have said online about this case, where many of them were ridiculing Lara Logan and saying she wasn't worthy of their attention.
There also seems to be a problem with the claim that she was only in the hands of the mob for "30 minutes". There have been leaks she was missing for more than 3 hours. Maybe someday Lara Logan and others who were with her will come forward and tell what really happened, but in the meantime we'll have to go with CBS's version which has obviously been sanitized in order to minimize hostility against the Egyptian protesters ie her "rescue" by Egyptian women. The very LEAST you could do is not sanitize that ALREADY sanitized version of the story even further, Zeinobia!
And for those of you quoting that cretin Temoris, you should know that even by his own admission he doesn't know what really happened and didn't see anything with his own eyes other than her being dragged off by a group of Egyptian men. He goes on to weave a tale that's based on what others that he can't vouch for told him, and adds in his personal assumptions for good measure. He's obviously up to no good and a decent human being wouldn't have tried to trash the reputation of a crime victim as he has done.
Unfortunately many comments were not angry for Lara as much as they were racist and hateful , I did not delete them to show the amount of racism there.
Well, for me personally, Zeinobia the attack was horrifying but what REALLY pissed me off was when I read the comments from Egyptians on the "Apology to Lara Logan" facebook page, and later read some news articles about what Egyptians were saying and doing at the attempted demonstration calling for justice in her case. Egyptian culture disgusts me, and if you want to call that racism then have fun with that. I couldn't care less. You and your fellow revolutionaries were supposed to be the folks illuminating the Egyptian masses - that was the story Lara Logan was telling - but despite all your education and all your exposure to other cultures, you are no better than they are. In fact you are worse because you broadcast your barbarism for the whole world to see, and most of us would rather that dirty little secret be kept to yourselves.
PS:
ReplyDeleteI will try to raise the matter in the Egyptian media...
Zeinobia, you are in Egypt right? There are people who were in that square that night who know what happened. There are people who were in that square who SAW what happened. There were even westerners, mostly journalists, who know what happened but aren't saying anything out of respect for Lara Logan's privacy. But I suspect you, Zeinobia, either already know the truth or could easily find out the truth. I think based on the fact that you're using the CBS statement as a starting point and then washing it clean of the worst of the few details they provided is pretty good evidence you aren't interested in discussing what really happened. You're interested in doing damage control. So what value is there in you claiming you will try to get the Egyptian media to pay attention to this? You'd only want them to cover it in such a way that it absolves your movement of any responsibility.
...not because if the White House demanded this...
That's very true. Both President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have personally issued demands to the state of Egypt that the perpetrators be brought to justice. As far as I can tell, the state of Egypt has not even opened an investigation.
So much for good relations between the "new" Egypt and the United States.
...or because the right wing that should go to hell considers us savages...
If you think this incident is only getting under the skin of "right wingers" you're very wrong about that. I've been around a long time now, Zeinobia, and I've seen international incidents that change American public opinion forever. This is one of those. Mark my words. Americans are going to remember this as long as they live. And they will associate it with your revolution. People who are inclined to be nice about it (I'm not, I've seen too much hate and barbarism coming from Egyptians on the blogs for that, including from you) may not bring it up, but it's going to be there. Influencing their opinions.
Google translate of the anoymous arabic comment:
ReplyDeleteFrankly tactful Story Lara Logan, this is not Baalaa sincere at the time the whole world including the U.S. President is talking about attending the Egyptians and how the Egyptians have become a source of inspiration for the other people in the urbanized and Slmithm appeared to us to Lara Logan talks about harassment crowd by timing himself doubtful I investigation Cetkchwin integrity and that Zionism, which they will exchange not only hatred of Arabs and thank you
So basically he/she says Lara Logan is making it all up just to discredit the Egyptian revolutionaries, and it's a zionist plot.
This is the kind of comment coming from your crowd of supposedly educated revolutionaries who were supposedly protesting first and foremost for "human rights" and "dignity" that disgusts me, Zeinobia. Where are Lara Logan's human rights? Where is the respect for HER dignity? Where are those things in this Arabic comment that is coming from somebody who is obviously one of YOUR online revolutionaries, Zeinobia? What should the reaction be of any civilized person who sees your revolutionaries responding to what happened to lara Logan with this kind of bullshit denial combined with making accusations against the victim?
"Mark my words. Americans are going to remember this as long as they live. And they will associate it with your revolution"
ReplyDelete*Yawn* please save us your orientalist ramblings and pseudo-premonitions craig. It's obvious you've only been programmed (maybe by weird obsessions, propaganda, or a combination of both) to spew your racism under the guise of concern for Lara Logan (a case which still has no evidence). Yes you're "disgusted" with us, our culture, etc, and your sweeping generalizations and condescending tone is atypical of a eurocentrism that is prevalent in the minds of many ignorant western people.
The reason of this Lara Logan-baiting is the obvious hate you have for Arab/Muslim civilization, which seems like it needs to be reinvented in new ways every once in a while to satisfy yourself. This is one of those new ways. And I guess it's especially important now as we've shown the capability of our masses to mobilize and organize in the pursuit of freedom and representation.
I know that just burns you orientalists to know that the "savage man" can gain his rights without bowing to eurocentric dictates. And the way you like to capitalize on this Lara Logan story obsessively on almost every blog post (like a 6-year old crying to get something in Toys-R-Us) is disturbing, but not as much as it is pathetically typical of a supremacist mindset. However, the reality remains that the ramblings of racist demagogues with keyboards won't change the bright future in store for the Arab world now :)
انت لحقت ترجمت الكومنت بتاعى ؟ عموما ده مجرد رأى ولو هو ديسجاستنج يو أز يو سى فمتزعلش لأن الرأى والرأى الأخر مقبولين عند الأخت زنوبيا بدون تجريح لأحد وشكرا للجوجل ترانسليشن وللست زنوبيا
ReplyDeleteأخوكم سوبر ماريو
I'd like to encourage your people do do some research on who Lara Logan is, what kind of person she is, and what she's accomplished in her life before calling her names and dismissing the account CBS gave of her attack with her permission.
ReplyDeleteYou can start here:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/12/02/60II/main531421.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lara_Logan
* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSD7xoMIoNA
* http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21502.html
* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XK5WIjWXTbU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTEcsJHv_sU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CT-Hq117w8s
http://www.cpj.org/2011/02/cpj-alarmed-by-attack-on-lara-logan-of-cbs-news.php
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6902206n
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=326881096346875705#
http://telling-secrets.blogspot.com/2011/02/lara-logans-rape.html
http://sonofboldventure.blogspot.com/2011/02/lara-logans-math.html
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23924199-lara-is-never-scared-of-being-a-lightning-rod-for-controversy.do
This was not a fledgling reporter but a very respected seasoned professional (18 years as a correspondent) known for her courage and integrity. To claim she made this story up to get attention would be absurd. To claim she was trying to taint your revolution (a cause for which she was a fierce advocate) makes no sense. Please stop attacking her reputation in an attempt to preserve your own. She was on your side, one of you, and now you are turning your back on her. Instead, you should be offering her compassion and thanks for her courage.
Also, ask some Egyptian women what they went through that week and you'll see many suffered similarly to Lara Logan, lending much credibility to her story.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/694/how-egyptian-women-took-back-the-street-between-two
Anonymous @9:33 AM, you're wasting your efforts here. These are Egypt's online revolutionaries and they don't care what happened to Lara Logan. They make the claims they do because they don't want what their people did to her to tarnish their movement. Their "human rights" and "dignity" movement. Just write it off as a learning experience. Whatever justice Lara Logan receives will be indirect, karmic style. These "revolutionaries" are going to get what they deserve, sooner or later.
ReplyDeleteThere's nothing to see here. Move along.
Anonymous 05:34:00 AM, you have a problem with me using google translate so that I could understand an Arabic comment that accused Lara Logan of fabricating her own gangrape and brutal beating because she was a "zionist"?
ReplyDeleteWhy? It's not the first time animals on this blog have blamed all their own problems on zionists. I think everyone needs to know that Egypt's revolutionaries believe that Lara Logan made it all up because she's a zionist agent. Especially since Egyptian revolutionaries were screaming "zionist agent!" and "jew!" at her while they beat and gangraped her. Makes perfect sense is your sick Egyptian way that you would use the "zionist" accusation to try to prevent any possibility of anyone ever finding out what really happened, let alone getting justice for it.
Who behaves that way? What civilized human being behaves that way?
Anonymous 3/12/2011 03:34:00 AM, I read your comment three times and didn't find anything in it except vicious personal attacks against me, and they weren't even vaguely related to the topic. Is that your idea of a proper response to the many allegations I made in my 3 quite long (for this blog) comments?
ReplyDeleteWho behaves that way? What kind of person?
Sane anonymous: Also, ask some Egyptian women what they went through that week and you'll see many suffered similarly to Lara Logan, lending much credibility to her story.
ReplyDeleteThe accounts of Catie Kouric, Christiane Amanpour, and several other well known western journalists who report they were attacked not by regime thugs but by anti-US and anit-west Egyptian protesters does, as well. As does the fact that CBS sat on the story for 4 days after the incident happened (which is a pretty big deal considering those were the first 4 days after Mubarak stepped down) and the fact that CBS didn't release the story AT ALL until journalists from other western media organizations let it be known they knew about the incident and had some details about it.
In any case, I honestly don't believe that anyone is sincerely claiming they think this is a fake story. It's a knew-jerk and very ugly defensive reaction. No more and no less.
True.
ReplyDelete"People came from all around, surrounding us, punching us, kicking us, trying to rip the clothes off my female producer . It was weird. And we were lucky, frankly." ~ Anderson Cooper (foreign correspondent, CNN)
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/entertainment/post/2011/02/anderson-cooper-talks-to-letterman-about-being-pummeled-/1
Until Ms. Logan or anybody else provides actual evidence, issues a formal charge or even a coherent description of what happened, the fact is we don't know anything. Wild claims and accusations are no substitute for fact or eyewitness testimony, especially from sources that were not there and have no more information than anybody else, ESPECIALLY when they have a history of racist hatred against Arabs and Muslims.
ReplyDeleteProgrammer Craig said:
"I've seen international incidents that change American public opinion forever. This is one of those. Mark my words. Americans are going to remember this as long as they live."
Too bad none of those "international incidents that change American public opinion forever" don't include the vicious and sadistic rape of Iraqi women and children by US invaders. It's been years since Seymour Hersh revealed that he'd seen Pentagon videos of these crimes taken in America's hellish secret prisons in Iraq and demanded that they be released by the US government and the perpetrators prosecuted. Hersh said:
"The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."
http://boingboing.net/2004/07/15/hersh-children-raped.html
Yet Bush and Obama have both refused to do so, claiming that to declassify the evidence of these crimes would endanger the lives of US troops, as though the lives of US rapists and murderers are more precious than the lives of their innocent victims.
Too bad those "international incidents that change American public opinion forever" don't include the photos and films and UN reports about the Israelis' use of phosphorous bombs against Palestinian women and children, burning babies alive, or Israeli soldiers deliberately crushing infants under their tanks or shooting children in the head, while Israeli families brought binoculars and snacks to watch and celebrate the bloodbath.
American public opinion didn't give a shit about the murder of 1.5 million Iraqis, including 500,000 children, from US-imposed sanctions during the 1990s, or about the slaughter of civilians in Afghanistan from American unmanned planes.
It was the "distinguished" American General Tommy Franks who famously said, "We don't do body counts," as he directed the bloody invasion of Iraq, without American public opinion being "changed forever".
We know all about "American public opinion" and you only show how utterly divorced from reality and blinded by racism you are, if you wave it around as some kind of moral standard.
Maybe this is all too long and complicated for you, so I'll summarize it:
F*ck American public opinion.
And f*ck you.
Alice,
ReplyDeleteI'm the other anonymous guy. I want to respond before Craig does and say that I agree with many of your points. This should not be an issue of religion or conflicting ideologies. It was a vicious crime that left an innocent woman beaten and violated but happy to be alive. I'm fairly certain she will file no charges, considering assault, rape or murder mere occupational hazards foreign correspondents risk on a regular basis. It's just the fact that she's a celebrated reporter (and a household name) that has so angered so many people. We all feel like we know her, like she's one of our own so, of course, we're upset about her being attacked. Also, the fact that she's a young mother and a petite woman engage our protective instincts in spite of her dangerous job.
Whether or not justice or retribution are ever sought, I'd just like people to acknowledge that she was honorably doing her job and deserves, if not the respect, surely, the benefit of the doubt from all people.
Ms. Logan hasn't made much of a fuss about the attack herself. I'm pretty sure she's only concerned with getting back to her job and resuming her normal activities. I'm sure she'd have preferred not being identified. The rumor is that CBS only issued the statement because the AP said they were going forward with the story.
Rape and sexual assault are viewed as heinous crimes by the best representatives of every culture and America is surely guilty of many things. This isn't about race or religion. Yes, some Islamic people do still carry out seemingly brutal punishments on their own people but, usually, that has more to do with corrupt totalitarian regimes than the will of the people. There is violence in all cultures. In Serbia, for example, in start contrast to Sudan, it was the Christian soldiers raping the Islamic women in mass.
ReplyDeleteThose who claim gang rape doesn't happen in America need look no further back than the gang rape of an 11 year old girl in Texas this past week. Last October, a young girl was raped in public after a school dance in California as a crowd watched and even cheered on her rapists. Women have been mauled by crowds in Central Park (New York) and Mardi Gras (Louisiana). There is a date rape epidemic and there are many stories about gang rapes involving fraternities and athletes in universities around the country. Sexual assault in Egypt is said to be endemic because 83% of women have been sexually assaulted. In America, it's 80% so... yea.
You mentioned Iraq. What about Jamie Leigh Jones who was drugged and raped by fellow employees (KBR contractors), leaving her brutalized and humiliated. What about the law suit by numerous female soldiers, claiming rape and sexual assault, and contractors that was filed the same week as the attack on Lara Logan? Did our soldiers rape civilians in Iraq? Yes. They did. Rape is a reality in war, a horrible reality.
The mistreatment of women in every culture is a horrible thing we should all stand against. The mistreatment of children. The mistreatment of men. All people deserve freedom, and there can be no freedom when people live in a climate of fear and injustice. Any truly good person wants peace to reign in the future government of Egypt. We all want Egypt to become a great place to live for all people of all faiths, creeds, religions and ideologies. Anyone hoping for a better world is pulling for Egypt. I'm sure, if asked, Lara Logan would not be angry or vengeful against Egypt but with the revolution great success in its endeavors to extend human and civil rights to al people. She'd say her attackers do not represent Egypt as a whole or the whole of Islam.
But, yet, a crime was committed. Actually, 140 journalists were assaulted by pro-regime protestors during this revolution. Some journalists were stabbed, shot and killed. Many crimes were committed. Those victims should be honored, not marginalized or discredited. Lara Logan, counted among their number, should be treated with respect, not blamed for what happened to her or accused of falsifying her report.
ReplyDeleteYou are right to go after Craig for lashing out against Islam. But, how can you blame him for being upset that this blog was treating Ms. Logan like someone worthy of being mocked or dismissed? It would be like an American saying Khaled Said brought his attack on himself, deserved it or that he's really alive somewhere and made the whole thing up.
Evidence exists that Lara Logan was attacked. She was not alone. Her camera crew witnessed the abduction and some of the attack. The beginning may even be on film; the famous picture of her just prior to the attack is obviously a screen capture from video footage. Egyptian soldiers participated in her rescue. She saw doctors in Egypt and here in America where she was hospitalized for five days. This evidence isn't available to the general public but it exists. Her attack was definitely real and definitely vicious and, according to her testimony, sexual in nature. That enough makes it a horrible crime. Pointing to other horrible crimes doesn't make it any less significant.
I'm sure Lara would not want to be singled out. Her colleagues were brutalized, some of them on film. Anderson Cooper, Christiane Amanpour, Katie" Couric, um, here... a list of journalists attacked during the uprising.
http://abcworldnews.tumblr.com/post/3089328425/weve-compiled-a-list-of-all-the-journalists-who
I don't think she wants special treatment. But, listen, she deserves to be counted as brave and honorable alongside the rest. That's all I'm saying and I know you agree. I know your reply wasn't directed at me.
The message should be to end this type of treatment and end hate. Things like the burning of the Christians church in Cairo this week or the assaults on women who gathered for International Women's Day... that has to stop. Make reforms, Egypt. Move forward. 9
Craig,
ReplyDeleteActually, Anderson Cooper and Christiane Amanpour claimed that their attackers were pro-regime, as did nearly every foreign journalist that faced an attack. You can see them doing so in these videos. These were not Islam-based attacks so much as regime-based attacks. Regardless of how you choose to feel about Islam, the bad guys here were people resisting the revolution in favor of a corrupt regime. This same thing has happened all around the world and throughout history.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IxA_EEGw4w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtIZlie9Yxc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DAXiMHiu1M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX8Qf3ijLLA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsugzECG86U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8MVlQv8ljU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FYlssXPmb8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IetRZTxiJ7c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m21vfxjipKM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOKCLwC23AQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nPvBZyJ2RA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wux7KMRNJ4s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItPSPx9gutQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpkqhDHlweU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvqwRYvPKXI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3e_VcPkPxE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YVJBiLDONM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VW0YEbbSnX8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NgwBqofMV8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJQA-DVjrKQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljC03EFtei8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CGOaknmcVs
http://www.3news.co.nz/Kiwi-journalist-attacked-in-Cairo/tabid/311/articleID/197197/Default.aspx
Alice: Until Ms. Logan or anybody else provides actual evidence, issues a formal charge or even a coherent description of what happened, the fact is we don't know anything.
ReplyDeleteWe do know something. We know that CBS issued a statement that she was subject to a brutal sexual assault and beating for a prolonged period of time, and we know she was seriously injured and spent almost a week hospitalized recovering from it. The fact that you claim YOU don't know anything says more about you than about the case. The case that has still not even been opened in Egypt. Speaking of which, we know something else which is that the President of the United States and the American Secretary of State have both personally demanded that the perpetrators of this crime, which you claim didn't happen, be brought to justice.
Wild claims and accusations are no substitute for fact or eyewitness testimony, especially from sources that were not there and have no more information than anybody else, ESPECIALLY when they have a history of racist hatred against Arabs and Muslims.
Are you even serious? Lara Logan would have had to go and be examined by an Egyptian doctor, would have had to be interrogated (again) by Egyptian police, would have had to appear in Egyptian courts and other things just to ATTEMPT to file a case. If the case was filed, she would have had to remain in Egypt for the duration of the trial (months or years?)and she would have had to testify against suspects - if any were ever even found - and after all that she would have had to pray to God that she wasn't accused of adultery and punished for that under Egyptian law.
That's just crazy and stupid to think she would have even considered putting herself through all or even ANY of that, after she was brutalized in public in the middle of a massive crowd that was cheering her victimizers on.
And as for all your ranting about the US, there is no of anything like this ever happening to foreigners in America. Americans don't stand around and cheer while women get raped in public places. And American police don't stand by and do nothing when crimes have occurred. Your attempts to claim this kind of thing happens everywhere and it is therefore no big deal are disgusting, Alice. They do not happen "everywhere". Am I correct in assuming you are a well-educated liberal Egyptian revolutionary, and a female to boot?
I wish every American leftist would come here and read your comments.
Previous anonymous,
ReplyDeleteYou are right to go after Craig for lashing out against Islam.
I haven't said anything about Islam. I blamed Egyptian culture. So whoever was calling me an Islamaphobe (I must have missed that but I don't read the comments of obvious idiots very carefully) was not right. They were wrong.
Actually, Anderson Cooper and Christiane Amanpour claimed that their attackers were pro-regime, as did nearly every foreign journalist that faced an attack.
Actually, many of those who were attacked by mobs of protesters on the street (rather than having been detained) rectified their version of events after Lara Logan was attacked. You may have been reading the previous "politically correct" versions where they called their attackers "pro-Mubarak protesters". That was the thing to do when they were pitching the Egyptian protesters as peaceful and pro-West. But I guess after what happened to Lara Logan they felt guilty because all (other than Anderson Cooper, I believe) have changed their accounts about the real nature of the crowds that came after them.
And look at the Egyptians commenting here. Do you think somebody like Alice, or even Zeinobia, would have a problem with attacking western journalists?
@programmer craig keep that to blogs not frequented by Arabic speakers, we understand the pro-mubarak slogans and read the banners. Arwa Damon, Cooper and Amanpour were attacked by pro-mubarak mobs in the videos shown on CNN. I also watched Egyptian state TV inciting against foreign journalists as Iranian, Hizbullah, Qatari and Mossad agents out to destroy the country.
ReplyDeletePrevious anon, there is no video of the attack on Christiane Amanpour so I'm not sure what you're talking about there. When it comes to others, I will take their word over who it was they were mixing in with when they were attacked over yours, despite the fact you read Arabic and I don't. They know who they were interviewing when the trouble started and they know who was around them. I find it a bit puzzling you think they could have been attacked by "pro-Mubarak" thugs in Tahrir Square on days where there was supposedly notrhing but anti-Mubarak people there, though. How do you explain that away with "banners"? What would have happened to pro-Mubarak demonstrators in Tahrir Square on those days when the "antis" were running security checks to supposedly keep them OUT of Tahrir Square? Makes no sense that they could have not only snuck in, but also openly waved their pro-Mubarak banners around.
ReplyDeleteAlso, you act like there were none amongst the revolutionaries who might have hated western journalists. What's the attitude of the Muslim Brotherhood towards the west, and towards western journalists? And weren't there a lot of MB in Tahrir Square? Oh, but they were on their "good behavior", right? And who is it who made sure they stayed on their "good behavior"? Egyptian liberals? Yeah. Right. And on the day Mubarak stepped down, and putting on a good show for the international community was no longer important, who was babysitting the Muslim Brotherhood to make sure they didn't misbehave then?
And another thing: I don't even need to bring the MB into this to find people who'd be fine with attacking western journalists. As I said before: there are Egyptians on this blog who fit into that category.
PS: I also watched Egyptian state TV inciting against foreign journalists as Iranian, Hizbullah, Qatari and Mossad agents out to destroy the country.
ReplyDeleteI've seen people on this blog making worse accusations against anyone who doesn't see things their way, and they didn't need Egyptian state TV to tell them to do that. Alice just accused one of the most well-respected think tanks in the world of being a zionist front run by mossad agents, for instance. Without any evidence whatsoever. *shrug*
And then there's the fact that many commenters on this blog have ALSO accused Lara Logan of being a zionist, and have claimed she's lying about what happened to her.
Seems to me that Egyptians just love to place blame on everyone except themselves and their own click. If you want to play along with that it's up to you, but I'll choose to call "bullshit" when my bullshit detectors go off. Especially when their lies result in innocent human beings being hurt.
Craig,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on some things, for sure, but it's not true that any of the journalists have "changed their stories" since their attacks. I provided links to videos of both the Anderson Cooper attack and the Christiane Amanpour attack (there is definitely footage) that includes them adamantly insisting that they were attacked by pro-Mubarak protestors. Cooper was attacked outside the square while he was walking through a mob of pro-Mubarek protestors. Christiane is seen having an extended conversation with them and then seen again in her car after the windshield has been smashed with a rock. I also provided video of reporters from CNN, Fox, BBC, etc. being attacked by pro-Mubarak protestors. Maybe someone, at some point, was attacked by anti-Mubarak protestors. I don't know. The only thing I've found along those lines is this black female UK reporter who was sexually harassed by young punks that could have been anti-Mubarak or just some punk kids taking advantage of the crowd to cop some feels:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1358759/Like-Lara-Logan-I-mob-sex-attack-victim-Tahrir-Square.html
Well, we seem to be reading different accounts of some of those attacks. I'm not going to have a google-search war with you over it. Particularly when YouTube is deleting so many "controversial" videos for "terms of service" violations. But this "mubarak thugs" meme is getting pretty old. I'm pretty sure Mubarak thugs didn't make all these Egyptian revolutionary friends of Zeinobia come on here and post these hateful and vicious comments about Lara Logan, right?
ReplyDeleteHappy to hear we have at least a few areas of agreement, anyway :)
we were at the square facing death and inhuman reaction of our police for our freedom not for abusing Lara Logan or anyone else.
ReplyDeleteyou dare to call us animals because of our opinion that prove you are narrow-minded and prove the fact that you bastard son of bitch.
Hi Zeinobia,
ReplyDeletePlease translate the 'Youm 7' witness testimony, rather than just reiterating it. When I put it in Google Translate, I am getting some weird results.
we were at the square facing death and inhuman reaction of our police for our freedom not for abusing Lara Logan or anyone else.
ReplyDeleteBut that's the thing. Lara Logan was also facing death and she was treated in the most inhuman and degrading way possible. And she was there to represent your revolution to the world. And you don't care. You claim you were anti-mubarak because of his inhuman treatment of Egyptians, but that's a lie because if you were a humanitarian you would care about the inhuman treatment of ANY human being. And most especially so when that inhuman treatment is perpetrated by people you support.
I've seen this same kind of disgusting behavior and the dishonest claims being made on the internet by your so-called revolutionaries that I'm now convinced you're worse than Mubarak was, not better. If you don't like that guess what? Too fucking bad. If there were any legit liberal pro-democracy Egyptian revolutionaries (I only know of one I would describe that way and it damn sure isn't Zeinobia) then they made a deal with the devil when they got into bed with animals like you just to topple Mubarak. And we all know what happens to people who make deals with the devil, don't we? :)
Craig,
ReplyDeleteDude, chill out. There is no way the anti-regime protesters did this and you know it. Every source out there says every single one of the 140 journalists attacked were attacked by pro-regime thugs. Not one, not a single one, says they were attacked by anti-regime protesters. You didn't read that anywhere. You're making it up.
It's, like, if someone came to America during the Civil War and got attacked by Confederate Troops and you blamed it on Union troops. That's what you're doing here. You've got no ground to stand on here. I understand why you're upset, we all are, but making shit up doesn't help anything. None of the 140 journalists attacked during the revolution, none, were attacked by anti-Mubarak people.
These are the people you are accusing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SF-ie3bo5R4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZARkUgmpMWk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYczQoDHI8o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5dqe8BPQV0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtIZlie9Yxc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXCsv552wCE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsugzECG86U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqfySjCc_Jw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoqwlmGww9Y
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThvBJMzmSZI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yfNRhpTMBU
Contrast that with the supporters of the regime who ran through town on horses and camels waving swords around and you get what I'm saying. As much as you want to pin this on Islam or Egypt as a whole... that makes absolutely no sense at all. Stop saying it.
Either she was attacked by pro-regime thugs or she was attacked by some punks taking advantage of the crowd to cause some trouble. She wasn't attacked by hardcore peace activists. Give me a break. Seriously.
Zeinobia,
ReplyDeleteI am sorry that you are being pestered by embarrasing bullies who seem to want to find faults and stir up antipathy in the very place where they could be building trust and showing respect.
Your blog is really interesting and the comments you have made seem perfectly reasonable to me.
I think all women of all cultural backgrounds need to be free of men with the arrogance of this Programmer Craig character.
Is he real?
I met good people in Egypt and I am very happy to see you get out of the dictatorship. I really hope it all works out well and that improvements keep coming.
A revolution is a messy and bloody thing, just like any birth. But, the people of Egypt are good people and, after fighting so bravely, standing firm and making this great thing happen, they definitely deserve the bright future they stood up and demanded for their country. The foreign media contributed and they do deserves some thanks for raising awareness and awakening international political pressure but the good people of Egypt did this for themselves and they did it honorably. They deserve it. It's an amazing thing that has inspired oppressed people in nations around the world to stand up for themselves.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtLJpzUp2Z8
I'm just asking that Lara Logan is not accused of anything sordid. She has no agenda here. She has only sought to explain what happened to her that night while she was performing the duties of her job as a journalist. She was attacked. Offer her your compassion and friendship, not your suspicions. Thanks.
no one of the U.S. presidential candidates promised to be fair regarding the middle east crisis, but ALL of them promise to serve Israel, as if the Israelis are infallible angels!!!
ReplyDeleteand they warn us from the conspiracy theories!!
The American Public opinion itself has got brainfucked and America itself needs a revolution for themselves before working to to represent our revolution to the world.
@ Mariana Graham
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for your reasonable comment and your nice words
Other journalists were attacked that night in similar fashion to Ms. Logan:
ReplyDelete"A friend of mine was on Tahrir Square on the same day, with a foreign reporter," says Sarah Naguib, a 25-year-old Egyptian activist, blogger and a freelance journalist. "She told me they were surrounded by at least 100 men who started endlessly groping them". The men became violent as the girls tried to fight back. They managed to get video footage but the foreign journalist is still considering whether she wants her attack made public.
According to Colvin, "the tanks were usually checking IDs, but the night Mubarak stepped down, the army opened the flood gates, everyone was allowed into the square. The gangs who came into Tahrir Square that evening were a new crowd from God knows where, and didn't have any experience with Tahrir Square."
Who are these men? "They were completely random people, not thugs but not protesters either," explains Naguib. She had been on the square continuously for two weeks and noticed a change in dynamic on the days that the announcements were made by Mubarak and then Omar Suleiman. "The square started to have a touristic feel about it."
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23924199-lara-is-never-scared-of-being-a-lightning-rod-for-controversy.do
* This journalist also got sexually harassed:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1358759/Like-Lara-Logan-I-mob-sex-attack-victim-Tahrir-Square.html
In reference to the post about other sexual assaults in Tahrir Square that night (3/17/11 2:35 AM)
ReplyDeletePossibly you already know this story, but this also happened at The International Women's Day in Egypt on March 8th. A large mob of men bum rushed the rally and sexually assaulted the women - aggressively groped and beat some of them. Same description - grabbed them everywhere endlessly. They only stopped because soldiers came and started firing their guns in the air. Hopefully there is footage also so that the criminals can be identified. Here is the article about International Women's Day:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/womens-rights-marchers-in-cairo-report-sexual-assaults-by-angry-mob/2011/03/08/ABrDkQP_story.html
This also happened in the U.S. in New York City's Central Park about 10 years ago and there was video footage of the attacks (they filmed themselves attacking the women - smart). Most of the men caught on camera were arrested and convicted.
Actually, possibly people on here are not aware of this, but The Washington Post stated on 2/15/11 that sources at CBS compared Lara Logan's attack to the New York City Central Park attacks in 2000 (the mob attacks I just referenced). So what you described is definitely similar to what happened to Lara Logan according to The Washington Post. And The Washington Post is a real U.S. newspaper (the paper kind), not some tabloid or internet blog. They actually fact check and contact their sources. The Washington Post Article from 2/15/11:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/cbs-news-lara-logan-beaten-and-sexually-assaulted-in-egypt-by-tahrir-square-mob/2011/02/15/ABr0koQ_story.html
A Hungarian journalist just wrote an article discussing her attack in Tahrir the same night, exact same type attack. However, she had people all around her come to her rescue and actually attack the mob of men, which I think makes a huge difference when it comes to opening up to the public about something like this. When you are sexually assaulted with no actual justice, so to speak, it is really difficult to talk about.
By the way, this blog is ridiculous to even suggest that Lara Logan was not sexually assaulted. Come on! It is common knowledge that these aggressive groping attacks are used by cowardly scum Egyptian men to humiliate and intimidate women. And if anyone was a member of that mob, attacking a tiny woman, it was cowardly scum. And this has been going on for a long time, in all sorts of contexts (sport games, religious celebrations, just walking down the street, etc…), it is not revolution related. Denying that Egypt has serious problems with sexual harassment and sexual assault would be equivalent to me arguing that the United States does not have serious problems with acquaintance rape.
@programmer craig
ReplyDeleteCan I offer you some advice here: Put that rock you have in your hand back into your bucket with the other rocks you have been throwing and keep very very still and very quiet..if you cant see them now there are large cracks forming in that very very very big glass house you have decided to live in.
When you speak about another persons culture in such disparaging terms you will get a reflexive.
You should never speak as if you speak for an entire country as 'us' or 'we' because you can only speak for yourself.
Shit happens all the time all over the world everyday - if women are assaulted in the city or town you are living in do you go online and start insulting the entire culture of the US for it.
There is a disturbing grossly unequal power ratio in Eygpt between men and women which Eygptians themselves will take time to address, time Craig, as in all the established democratic countries are still to this day trying to equalise. Men assault women and men all the time its sad and its oppressive and a worldwide problem.
It is inappropriate of you to speak for Lara the American journalist if she has chosen not to address it publicly herself why do you deem it necessary to speak on her behalf. Lara has obviously decided it would probably be pointless and its pure speculation on your part to declare that she sustained a 3 hr attack because if you were reasonable about it anyone who was physically attacked by a group of men with sticks for that long would be dead.
Very odd that you ignore that pack rape pack assaults happen in all countries - all countries. It happens here in my country Australia and it happens in yours the US.
Eygpt is not your country to critique like that, its no ones right to critique a whole population because of a portion of society is hell bent on keeping part of their population under their control. Women are brave Lara was brave along with a lot of other female Eygptian protestors and foreign journalists throughout what we all witnessed. Don't sully what has been an amazing event in history to fit in with your myopic view of the world.
What you should really be focusing on is your own country - as Alice (above) articulated very well. There is a miasma in the mentality you support and its inappropriate and disproportionate ie lay off mate!
who are we to say that Ms. Logan didn't actually ENJOY the attention and fondling? she was, after all, a journalistic thrill seeker addicted to drama and strife, and she live this way even in her personal life.
ReplyDeletethere is absolutely no way to effectively bring any of her attackers/suitors to justice without relying on hearsay evidence and eventually prosecuting INNOCENT people.
we have ALL suffered greatly from this tawdry hanky-panky, and now its time to heal and move on without hate and forgive.
I am appalled at the Muslim response to such a horrific act. Anyone with any bit of common sense would know that this is being hushed up in the US media. The US media airs all of our dirty laundry. This is not being aired with the exception that is happened. If there was no rape you would have heard reports from Lara Logan that she was not raped long before now. And she would not have been in the hospital so long. As a western women and knowing that this has happened to Lara Logan as the high rate of sexual harassment I would never...never...never travel to Egypt now. And unless the Egyptian government very publically puts these rapist in jail. You will see a hugh reduction in tourism to Egypt...pyramids or not.. going to see the great pyramids of Egypt is not worth taking the chance on getting gang raped in Egypt. And the Egyptian government standing by and doing nothing about. All you Muslims get on here now and say how wrong I am for feeling like this...how islamophobic I am...keep making your stupid excuses that this did not happen...keep blaming everyone else...but guess what!!!!...until there is justice and western women see that something is being done to protect them from this kind of barbaric...animalist...disgusting...low life...behavior....our western money will go to tourism in other countries....go ahead keep it up keep blaming others. Keep right on not taking responsibility. Keep right on claiming islamophobic and doing nothing about it...YOU ONLY HURT YOUR SELVES...AND THE REASON THE MUSLIM RELIGION WILL DIE IN THE END...BECAUSE YOU CAN NOT TAKE RESPONSIBILITY...BY YOUR SILENCE YOU CONDONE THIS YOU ARE JUST AS GUILTY AND THEREFORE OUR MONEY AND OUR BUSINESS GOES TO SAFER...YES SAFER...LET ME REPEAT SAFER...COUNTRIES TO VISIT AND DO BUSINESS IN.
ReplyDeleteA picture of Ms. Logan speaking at the IMI Conference at American University in D.C. on March 10th, almost exactly one month after the attack:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.american.edu/americantoday/campus-news/20110316lara-logan-ahmed.cfm#
She looks relatively fine and in good spirits. Yes! :)
This is a great update! It looks like she is recovering nicely and beginning to make public appearances again.
ReplyDeletethe following link is from the international amnesty regarding March 9 events
ReplyDelete"Egyptian women protesters forced to take ‘virginity tests’"
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/egyptian-women-protesters-forced-take-%E2%80%98virginity-tests%E2%80%99-2011-03-23
Now who are you truing to kid with this pirated "American Intercultural Nonsense?" Since Lara is missing some front teeth and has a visibly broken nose you are doing your cause great harm. Souk mentality does not fly.
ReplyDeleteWhy not track down the Mukhabarat thugs and permanently deprive them of their manhoods?It would take but a few seconds.
Eh? Who says she has a broken nose and missing teeth?
ReplyDeleteThe sexual assaults on New York Times photojournalist Lynsey Addario, and on the Libyan woman named Iman Al-Obeidi are widely being perceived in the West as part of the same pattern as Lara Logan's ill treatment, and the Egyptian army's virginity tests for young women protestors.
ReplyDeleteMum On Middle East Misogyny
"Muslim men are using the unrest in Libya and Egypt as an excuse to sexually assault Muslim women and U.S. journalists... How many more stories of gang rapes and beatings?... "freedom-loving" troglodytes in Tahrir Square... in Egypt, which is notorious for sexual harassment of foreign women, this is accepted behavior... female genital mutilation... Yusuf al-Qaradawi has warned that women who fail to wear the headscarf are asking to be raped..." and so on and so on.
Lots of similar articles are appearing. This is only an example.
Reader-provided links enabled: Ms. Logan in D.C. on March 10th and Amnesty International on 'virginity tests'. I seem to remember that Zeinobia gave the Amnesty link a while back but I could be wrong.
ReplyDeleteJulia's links: In Cairo, angry mob assaults women’s rights marchers and Lara Logan beaten and sexually assaulted in Egypt by Tahrir Square mob from February 15.
Jeanvaljean, I can't find anything about Lara's broken nose or teeth in Google. And she looks fine in the picture in D.C. Can you link something?
By the way, the interesting D.C. article says Lara did not mention her Tahrir Square ordeal in her first public appearance since the assault.
I've just read Zeinobia's post and all the comments, and it never ceases to amaze me how violence just breeds hatred and more violence. The Egyptian revolution was successful in removing Mubarak because the protests were non-violent, and we all saw with our own eyes how Muslims and Copts and secular Egyptians stood together so bravely in the spirit of unity. It was so powerful and moving.
ReplyDeleteMs Logan and others who were attacked should be shown compassion and the culprits brought to justice. But it pays also to remember that they survived to tell their tale. Too many peaceful protesters died in Egypt, and continue to die in countries around the world as I write this.
While whole populations are denied human rights, how can we expect individuals to respect the rights of others?
I'm an Australian, and I have dear friends in both the US and in Egypt. I know first-hand the warmth and generosity of both cultures. But in both countries, as well as in all other countries including my own, women, men, children and animals are victims of violence every day.
Decent people everywhere, no matter what race, religion or level of education, are outraged and appalled by violence and want a safer world for our children. We are all victims of the world's violence.
The solution is not to accuse and condemn each other, but to work individually and together for justice and peace - in our own homes, in our societies and globally. That's very hard work, when people we love have been harmed by the Other. It calls for great personal courage.
It's so much easier to blame and hate and justify, saying that our own violent actions were provoked by the behaviour of the Other. It is a cycle that never ends. We will never find peace through the barrel of a gun. None of us.
Love and tolerance are the only weapons that will ever bring peace and safety for our children. Love and tolerance aren't feelings, or unrealistic ideals, they are ACTIONS. We are in control of our own actions, even if we can't control how the Other acts. Like the Egyptians did in Tahrir Square, we must all stand together against violence - we know it can be done.
To kill/rape/assault/abuse another human being diminishes not only the victim, but the perpetrator. Lara Logan is somebody's beloved daughter and she didn't deserve to be harmed. The men who attacked her are somebody's beloved sons and they should be brought to justice, but with mercy, despite their unmerciful behaviour.
Egyptian, American, Israeli, Palestinian, Congolese, Libyan, Arab, Jew, Christian, left-wing, right-wing - these are all labels and all they do is divide us from each other and perpetuate the cycle of violence.
If we want human rights, we must first acknowledge that we are all human beings. We are all somebody's beloved. We are capable of building pyramids and flying to the Moon. Surely we can defeat the tyrant inside ourselves.
You don't have to pray the way I do for me to love you. You don't have to be the same colour as me or the same gender, age, economic bracket or level of education to be worthy of my respect as a fellow human being. We can disagree without violence if we are mutually respectful.
Please, let's stop the violence first in our own minds, which is where it always begins. Let's try to rise above violence, and teach our children to respect others, so we can all be safe one day.
As John Lennon said, "you may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one".
Thank you Zeinobia for such a thought-provoking blog.
Peace.
@tweetmags
@Anonymous 4/07/2011 09:28:00 PM
ReplyDeleteCool story bro.
I’ve been curious about what happened to Lara Logan in Tahrir Square on Feb. 11th. I’ve done research on this and think there’s a conspiracy of sorts afoot. In what terrible detail I don’t know and frankly don’t care, but Lara Logan WAS viciously attacked in Tahrir Square. And she was targeted.
ReplyDeleteLara Logan was in Egypt week before. You can watch her dispatches from Alexandria during that week. Her last report – maybe her last report ever – was made from her hotel room in Alexandria because Mubarak’s security apparatus had every journalist holed up (back around the 4th, when they tried the camel-crackdown). The next day she was detained in Cairo for ~24 hours and deported. Logan got the Intimidation Tour too: Blindfolds, interrogations, photos, threats, the works.
She went back to interview – according to last public statement she ever made in interview while boarding her flight back to Cairo – Dr. Hossam of NDP, the new apparatchik who was final ‘concession’ by Mubarak before he punched out. Yet plans somehow changed by time her flight landed. Now she was to interview Wael Gholim. Logan never made it, a Harry Miller filled in for her after she got whacked. Logan was very clear about having contacted Egyptian Embassy back in the ‘States to get presser-credentials and all that. Even stated she felt safe after going back because after all, she was going to interview head of NDP.
Undoubtedly same goons who detained Logan before were tracking her from wheels-down in Cairo. Her ‘file’ I’m sure was hundred pages long already. I think during her previous detainment she somehow – maybe just being herself I don’t know – managed to really piss her goons off. When they took her to airport first time I’m sure it was lovely conversation, and those particular regime goons must’ve been like “WHAT!?” when they heard she was coming back.
That’s what happened to Logan: Her goon detail from Egypt Army apparatus (EBID agents I bet) took their chance in Tahrir Square once regular army (draftees on side of people) abandoned checkpoints and Mubarak-ers flowed into end of square by the Museum. Logan wasn’t attacked by random mob, she was picked out, separated, and whisked into the only group of Mubarak-supporters around: over by the dark construction zone of the unfinished Ritz-Carlton, by the Arab League building. That’s the part Temoris saw in progress.
It also explains the quiet around this media-wise. Police-staters are good at taking cameras away, not waving them around. They were over in the dark zone between the League and the Ritz. Logan might’ve had a glimpse of the Nile as she was beaten senseless and maybe worse. And here’s the real conspiracy: Nasser was Army guy, Sadat was Army guy, Mubarak was Army guy (Air Force but its all Army in Egypt). The army has been running Egypt since Farouk got the axe and it is the real puppet of America. And the Army still runs Egypt and will decide its fate.
You think US Admin would rock boat with Egypt Army – especially with Libya falling apart next door, treaties and certain tiny country to the east in the balance – over some five-star reporter getting thwacked by Egypt Army security apparatus middle-management? Nope. Not publicly. Might’ve already been taken care of the way Egypt Army knows how: car battery, alligator clips, and .45 ACP to the skull Stalin-style.
And Logan? She’s a Believer in the cause, you see it in her reporting. She’s huge fan and defender of not just American soldiers, but military-industrial complex that runs America and ultimately runs Egypt. When President called her, it mighta been to ask Lara to ‘take one for the team’ you know what I mean? Keep this mess under wraps. And Lara Logan is a good little trooper, isn’t she? Yeah, that’s what I think happened.
Sorry about the rant but by God there’s so much crap flying around about what happened to Logan on the internet, and its all tripe, some of it lurid and perverted. But written above is my two cents. Will be interesting to see how this all goes down – is stage managed – as Logan re-emerges into public eye.
Dear TheZeitgeist,
ReplyDeleteWhy did you force me to wade through screenfuls of your deranged maunderings to reach the crazy-pearl treasures? You need an editor. If I were your editor I would have pared it down to this, which summarizes your stupid self-delusion perfectly:
"There’s a conspiracy of sorts afoot. Logan was whisked into the only group of Mubarak-supporters around."
Haha. Cool story bro.
@TheZeitgeist, great blog you've got there by the way.
ReplyDeleteThat isn't my blog. Wish it was, but someone already had the name.
ReplyDeleteAnd in so much as my stupid self-delusion, I might be stupid enough to write it; but you're even stupider for reading it. Welcome to the food chain.
"...which summarizes your stupid self-delusion perfectly"
ReplyDeletezeinab, why do you allow jidf filth like jason to post insults on here, but you clearly censor many arab and muslim responses to him? Stop trying being nice to the white man
Zeinab censors some of my posts too, so I think you are wrong to take it personally. Anyway it's her blog and her judgment should apply.
ReplyDelete"jidf filth"
Haha, Jewish Internet Defense Force. ;) I had to look it up. I'm not Jewish by he way.
"Stop trying being nice to the white man"
What's that all about? You are a nasty piece of work.
@Zeinobia, I don't think you're censoring to spare my feelings, but if you are, it's not necessary.
The Wikipedia entry on the JIDF has an amusing anectode. On Facebook, "Palestine" appeared on a drop-down menu of countries one could be from. JIDF started a Facebook group, "Palestine Is not a country ... Delist it from Facebook as a country!" Someone responded with an "Israel is not a Country" group, etc. ROTFLMAO. (I admit if I lived in MENA I might not think it was funny.)
ReplyDeleteThe Lara Logan assault has absolutely nothing to do with Israel. Her being called "Jew!", "Agent!", etc. is just her being called a spy. It's not about race. And, her being labelled a spy has more to do with a corrupt government and its propaganda machine than the Arab world's disdain for Israel. The government's influence here was a problem, whether they were directly involved in the attacks or not. Portraying foreign journalists trying to shed light on the cause of the protesters as "spies" was dirty. If the government baltagiya or secret police were involved that's reprehensible. Either way, this attack only lends credibility to the cause of the revolutionaries. It's got nothing to do with racism. Journalists from around the world were attacked by pro-Mubarek groups.
ReplyDeleteThe rapists weren't pro-Mubarak. By that stage of the revolution, Mubarak's supporters were besieged and overwhelmed and had far more pressing problems than Ms. Logan and her camera crew. The revolutionaries, however, were exulting in their new-found power, which manifested itself in raping a pretty Western lady with impunity while shouting "Jew" and "spy" at her. Mubarak's opponents had long accused him of being a tool of the West, a lapdog of Israel, etc., so their treatment of Ms. Logan is entirely consistent with this Occam's razor explanation.
ReplyDeleteJason, That's complete nonsense. Just scroll back through this thread and you'll see plenty of evidence to the contrary.
ReplyDeleteThe evidence that Mubarak supporters did it is the same as the evidence that 9/11 was an inside job and the Jews didn't show up for work that day.
ReplyDeleteBullshit. Mubarek supporters attacked 140 journalists from around the world during the revolution. The anti-Mubarek protestors attacked zero. Anderson Cooper, Christiane Amanpour and other reporters clearly identified their attackers as pro-Mubarek. It's been reported that security became lax at the gate to the square separating pro-Mubarek protesters and anti-Mubarek protesters just before the attack on Ms. Logan. It's been reported that a mob of 200 men or more swept into the square and started causing trouble that night. This "200" CBS talks about doesn't represent the thousands at the protest but a specific group of angry men that poured into the crowd from the gate as security was dropped. Look at the footage of pro-Mubarek protestors attacking the square throughout the week.
ReplyDeleteFor anyone to assume it was the anti-Mubarek protesters (based on no evidence whatsoever) would be borderline retarded in light of all these facts. You either have the reasoning capacity of a five year old or you've read practically nothing about the incident. Sorry for being blunt but... you're pretty much an idiot.
A clue to the identity of the attackers is their choice of crime scene. They dragged her to their preferred venue for the public gang-rape. A place they felt safe. The venue they chose was in... Tahrir Square, the nexus of the anti-Mubarak revolution. Not a police station. Not NDP headquarters. Not even a dark alley.
ReplyDeleteI support the revolution, but there are bad apples in every barrel.
Jason, you talk as you were there and know every single detail. Enlighten us about the evidence of this "gang-rape" with SOURCES. Not even one word from Logan herself to this supposed crime is heard.
ReplyDeleteYou fuckin know nothing.........as we all
Jason,
ReplyDeleteThere are only three options: 1.) She was attacked by pro-Mubarek protestors, the same guys whoraped 60 women at the outset of the protests and attacked 140 journalists, stabbing them, ripping their clothes off, beating them with sticks, throwing rocks, etc; 2.) She was attacked by rowdy miscreants from the outskirts of town filtering into the crowd to cause trouble (it's widely known the Egyptian government outsourced coercion to gangs from the slums on the outskirts of town); 3.) It was the anti-Mubarek protestors who hadn't attacked or harmed any journalists or raped anyone or attacked anyone during the revolution.
I think, really, pretty much any rational adult is not going to assume it was the anti-Mubarek protestors. Unless you've got some footage or some eye-witness testimony, assuming it was the anti-Mubarek protestors is not only stupid but irresponsible. It also shows you have an agenda that you're willing to ignore facts to promote. Lame.
Jason, you need to grasp the massiveness of Tahrir. It's not just the roundabout and in fact Logan was attacked off Tahrir near Maroaf street(see Google maps), that's between Tahrir and Ramses, it isn't an isolated area but in the midst of the commotion of that day, an attack at that area -which again isn't at the heart of Tahrir- may have gone unnoticed which explains why she was beaten for some 30 minutes before rescue arrived presumably when one of her crew fled and called for help.
ReplyDeleteIt has also been suggested she was dragged off to a further remote location (an enclosed alley or a construction site). Even the Temoris account says she was pushed and dragged away through a street by a hostile group of men, though he only saw her for a few seconds as she was rushed by him.
ReplyDelete"Jason, you need to grasp the massiveness of Tahrir. It's not just the roundabout and in fact Logan was attacked off Tahrir near Maroaf street"
ReplyDeleteThat infamous photo of Logan right before she was attacked has a banner in it. You can figure out exactly where Logan was (and went) based on that and Temoris Grecko's experience of watching her get hustled by.
Logan got taken over to the construction-zone which surrounds the still-building Ritz Carlton. There's an alleyway between that and the Arab League building. Beyond that is the Nile River. Those places collectively were the darkest least populated places in the Tahrir area that night. Whatever happened to Logan went down in those parts somewheres.
On Lara Logan Facebook, "An apology from egyptians" someone claiming to have been there said the assault lasted 20 hours. Is there any plausibilty to this? or is this an exaggerated hoax?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.facebook.com/notes/an-apology-from-egyptians-to-lara-pert/brief-about-lara-logan-pert/154080577988522
everything is possible. no official comment, apparently something went wrong.
ReplyDeleteYou are right, anything is possible. the official statement by CBS is "seperated from her crew", we do not know what that means. did it happen right there as 200 men came between logan and her crew, or was she dragged a 100 yards away or was she draagged to an abandoned construction site? If we look at pictures of Tahir on google, you can see there is all kinds of construction going on. CBS has never made it clear what "seperated" means.
ReplyDeleteI find it ominous that after nine weeks, there have been no credible eyewitness accounts except for temoris greko's account, and actually he only saw a very brief portion of it, when the attack began, thats it.
ReplyDeleteI figure, with such a fiasco happening and Egyptians trying to intervene, that dozens of people would have witnessed portions of the attack. That after nine weeks, not one person has come out and said either, "yes, it happened like CBS stated" or "no, it happened much different"
Does anyone have an answer to this? I am curious as to what really happened. Although I am NOT looking for "pornographic details", All one needs to know is how long they had Logan, the rest can be infered, (30 minutes or less-bad, but not too bad, an hour or more-I will get the picture.
Here's a recent article I found. It's thought provoking and makes for a good read, even if it is rather long. If anyone reads this, what do you make of it? It's Definately a different perspective. I never really considered this before.
ReplyDeleteA CBS and Murdoch Hoax? The “Sexual Assault” on Lara Logan
http://www.dcdave.com/article5/110413.htm
I have been conducting an online investigation since this story broke - to try and uncover 'the truth'. I do have some stuff to share..if you guys want it?,
ReplyDeleteDon't be too excited, I don't have any photo's or videos - but I have followed through some vital leads. Let me know if you wish me to post it all.
Well we have discussed all theories and all findings so it will be be great to know what you have found
ReplyDeleteYeah, TruthSeeker...I'd be interested in what you've found as well. Leads are dead on this thing. Only angle I could see for any information on this remotely would be the Australian journalist for AU's Channel Seven who had the story before anyone else. His queries to CBS were what prompted their now-infamous statement to head off any speculation - or scoop in a way - from a competitor. I've always wondered how he came across that information at all...and that's where a trail of sorts starts.
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, I'm curious in what you've got.
During my online investigation I've made contact with some pretty reputable people, including eye witnesses in Egypt.
ReplyDeleteHowever, appreciate that the information below, is only the testimony of leads telling me. I have just their word.
One of my regular contacts has been in contact with a woman who is personal friends with a CBS producer. The producer in questions is a friend of Lara Logan's own producer.. a guy called Max McClellan.
(If you checkout Max McClellan on FaceBook, you'll find him with CBS next to his name. Look at his friends and you'll find one Lara J Logan-Burkett.
The woman testifies that the producer she is friends with has given her the following direct information: (see next comment..it was too long!)
Allegedly, Max McClellan has shared the following:-
ReplyDeleteIn a nutshell CBS want this whole story to "fade to black as soon as possible". He says Lara is now physically 100% recovered, but she has got mental issues and also problems within the family (see below).
He says apparently that on the night of the attack on Lara, she had become seperated from her crew as the crowd was infiltrated with pro-Mubarak supporters.
Targetting the whole TV crew (ie not just Lara because she was a female), they became violent towards the whole crew. For a 30 minute period, the whole crew were physically roughed up, during which tim Lara was dragged right away from the scene.
as the army personnel stepped in after 30 minutes, the crew realised that Lara was not around..and so began a frantix search by the crew, army and peaceful Egyptian supporters.
Some 90 minutes later, Lara was found and a fight ensued between the army and the thugs that had her. (I have no further detail on this).
Once recovered and transported back to the Four Seasons hotel, I'm told that Lara was in need of medical attention and was, "switching between a state of being catatonic and hysterical". She flatly refused any medical attention (which throws into doubt, the allegations of a Cairo medical record existing).
In the hotel, they did manage to sedate her.
CBS seniors were informed, plus another media org'had got some detail of the attack and were considering breaking the story.
In response, CBS network organised a chartered flight back to the US..which took until morning to arrange. They also began to script a statement.
Now, back in the US...I'm informed that key to the media blackout - is one Mr Jason Burkett, Lara's husband. Apparently he is extremely pissed at three things!
1) That she returned to Egypt against his wishes, after her previous detention and mis-treatment
2) The security cock-up which cost her so dearly
3) That whilst CBS writers were penning the statement, he expressly instructed that NO MENTION be made of anything of a sexual nature...and through a mis-understanding, the infamous CBS statement WAS released with the reference to 'sexual assault'. he tried desperately to have the statement retracted, but too late - it was out there.
As a result, both Burkett and CBS have refused to release anything further whatsoever.
The contact further informs, that at the fight with the army, to save Lara - some recording equipment (camera-phones) were confiscated from people and handed to CBS. The contact says her producer friend has not seen the footage, but Max McClellan has. No detail on this BUT...suffice to say, as a result of not being 100% certain that they have confiscated ALL material, CBS are in no position to be able to release a concrete rape denial statement
I have also made contact with one of the Egyptian people who was present that night. He has sent me a photograph of pro-Mubarak supporters (the 'mob') from the previous day. In the photo, they are scarf-clad and are hurling missiles at the peaceful revolutionaries, ie at the guy taking the picture. It proves that these guys were present in force - and were hostile.
regarding the actual attack on Lara, I asked him if he knew anything. He told me that if the crew were rushed by the pro-Mubarak thugs and attacked where the stood, in his opinion there was no way Lara could have been raped. Impossible. he went on to say that if she was taken away and was missing for 90 minutes or more..then very possible.
I want to re-iterate. I have no conclusive proof on the above matters. The allegations about Max McClellan are the testimony of what I have been told online.
Personally, I hope that there's some exaggeration here - and that Lara did'nt suffer as brutally as it appears she may have.
The above sounds credible to me. If not, there's some people with sick minds making stuff up. My investigation continues.
Allegedly, Max McClellan has shared the following:-
ReplyDeleteIn a nutshell CBS want this whole story to "fade to black as soon as possible". He says Lara is now physically 100% recovered, but she has got mental issues and also problems within the family (see below).
He says apparently that on the night of the attack on Lara, she had become seperated from her crew as the crowd was infiltrated with pro-Mubarak supporters.
Targetting the whole TV crew (ie not just Lara because she was a female), they became violent towards the whole crew. For a 30 minute period, the whole crew were physically roughed up, during which tim Lara was dragged right away from the scene.
as the army personnel stepped in after 30 minutes, the crew realised that Lara was not around..and so began a frantix search by the crew, army and peaceful Egyptian supporters.
Some 90 minutes later, Lara was found and a fight ensued between the army and the thugs that had her. (I have no further detail on this).
Once recovered and transported back to the Four Seasons hotel, I'm told that Lara was in need of medical attention and was, "switching between a state of being catatonic and hysterical". She flatly refused any medical attention (which throws into doubt, the allegations of a Cairo medical record existing).
In the hotel, they did manage to sedate her.
CBS seniors were informed, plus another media org'had got some detail of the attack and were considering breaking the story.
In response, CBS network organised a chartered flight back to the US..which took until morning to arrange. They also began to script a statement.
Now, back in the US...I'm informed that key to the media blackout - is one Mr Jason Burkett, Lara's husband. Apparently he is extremely pissed at three things!
1) That she returned to Egypt against his wishes, after her previous detention and mis-treatment
2) The security cock-up which cost her so dearly
3) That whilst CBS writers were penning the statement, he expressly instructed that NO MENTION be made of anything of a sexual nature...and through a mis-understanding, the infamous CBS statement WAS released with the reference to 'sexual assault'. he tried desperately to have the statement retracted, but too late - it was out there.
As a result, both Burkett and CBS have refused to release anything further whatsoever.
The contact further informs, that at the fight with the army, to save Lara - some recording equipment (camera-phones) were confiscated from people and handed to CBS. The contact says her producer friend has not seen the footage, but Max McClellan has. No detail on this BUT...suffice to say, as a result of not being 100% certain that they have confiscated ALL material, CBS are in no position to be able to release a concrete rape denial statement
I have also made contact with one of the Egyptian people who was present that night. He has sent me a photograph of pro-Mubarak supporters (the 'mob') from the previous day. In the photo, they are scarf-clad and are hurling missiles at the peaceful revolutionaries, ie at the guy taking the picture. It proves that these guys were present in force - and were hostile.
regarding the actual attack on Lara, I asked him if he knew anything. He told me that if the crew were rushed by the pro-Mubarak thugs and attacked where the stood, in his opinion there was no way Lara could have been raped. Impossible. he went on to say that if she was taken away and was missing for 90 minutes or more..then very possible.
I want to re-iterate. I have no conclusive proof on the above matters. The allegations about Max McClellan are the testimony of what I have been told online.
Personally, I hope that there's some exaggeration here - and that Lara did'nt suffer as brutally as it appears she may have.
The above sounds credible to me. If not, there's some people with sick minds making stuff up. My investigation continues.
Allegedly, Max McClellan has shared the following:-
ReplyDeleteIn a nutshell CBS want this whole story to "fade to black as soon as possible". He says Lara is now physically 100% recovered, but she has got mental issues and also problems within the family (see below).
He says apparently that on the night of the attack on Lara, she had become seperated from her crew as the crowd was infiltrated with pro-Mubarak supporters.
Targetting the whole TV crew (ie not just Lara because she was a female), they became violent towards the whole crew. For a 30 minute period, the whole crew were physically roughed up, during which tim Lara was dragged right away from the scene.
as the army personnel stepped in after 30 minutes, the crew realised that Lara was not around..and so began a frantix search by the crew, army and peaceful Egyptian supporters.
Some 90 minutes later, Lara was found and a fight ensued between the army and the thugs that had her. (I have no further detail on this).
Once recovered and transported back to the Four Seasons hotel, I'm told that Lara was in need of medical attention and was, "switching between a state of being catatonic and hysterical". She flatly refused any medical attention (which throws into doubt, the allegations of a Cairo medical record existing).
In the hotel, they did manage to sedate her.
CBS seniors were informed, plus another media org'had got some detail of the attack and were considering breaking the story.
In response, CBS network organised a chartered flight back to the US..which took until morning to arrange. They also began to script a statement.
Now, back in the US...I'm informed that key to the media blackout - is one Mr Jason Burkett, Lara's husband. Apparently he is extremely pissed at three things!
1) That she returned to Egypt against his wishes, after her previous detention and mis-treatment
2) The security cock-up which cost her so dearly
3) That whilst CBS writers were penning the statement, he expressly instructed that NO MENTION be made of anything of a sexual nature...and through a mis-understanding, the infamous CBS statement WAS released with the reference to 'sexual assault'. he tried desperately to have the statement retracted, but too late - it was out there.
As a result, both Burkett and CBS have refused to release anything further whatsoever.
doesn't seem to be working??????? I paste my text..then the comments box is empty??
ReplyDeleteThe fact that this came through the internet, does hamper its credibility and I would not run to the bank with this story. But it sounds credible.
ReplyDeleteIf you think about it, a woman who is 5’2 enveloped within rowdy groups of thugs moving down the street, once 30, 50 or 100 yards away, bystanders at this point would be unaware that Logan was within that mob. Most likely, people would purposely avoid these thugs. From that point on it becomes a search and rescue.
The information regarding her home life sounds believable, but that would be information that would come from a relative or very close family friend. I am sure there is a wall of secrecy within her inner-circle. I cannot see one of them blabbing on the internet. Alhtough we must remeber information is pourus!
Thanks for posting this by the way! That obviously took hours and hours of work.
Truthseeker, thank you for this update. This seems much more believeable than the sensationalist BS I've read on other blogs. Good luck in your investigations. It seems that at least some truth is now starting to leak out.
ReplyDeleteTruth,
ReplyDeleteThat's actually the most plausible account I've heard. I mean, it's not like anyone was timing the incident (so any time frame is a guess) but the fact thet Temoris says he saw her rushed by him on the street, if nothing else, confirms she was relocated away from the place the initial assault took place. It would have taken a while to find her and those who found her would have to wait for back-up. The fact that it took so many soldiers to free her... ninety minutes or more sounds about right. It's very likely, in light of these conditions, and the UK media report that she was stripped and that her wounds were consistent with being whipped with poles from hand-held flags and viciously pinched and groped and so on (wounds that would more likely happen after you were stripped) and... if there were people filming something of interest (the phones you said they confiscated) then it had to be rape. It just seems to make the most sense.
Nothing I've heard or read so far makes as much sense as what you're saying here. It coincides with the best information I've found. Also, I just got this sick feeling when I read your comment. It's the first time something on this story has effected me that way. I'm literally shaking for the first time in two months of amateur research.
Another credible aspect to it is the fact that there are no “pornographic details”. Now that it’s been nine weeks since the attack, and not one witness has come forward to say, they were there, and saw Logan getting stripped and beat with flagpoles (not even on the internet).
ReplyDeleteAll the supposed “insider” information has all been descriptions of porno movies, and are far beyond the scope of believability. Egyptians would not have stood around and watched her get completely degraded for X amount of time, and do nothing. I strongly believe that this attack was done in a way that was secluded. I strongly feel that only Logan and the perpetrators know “exactly what happened”.
Although, if this story is to be believed, we could see a divorce within the next year. More than likely, all sorts of information will come out. Logan is probably being made to choose between career and marriage.
But as Truthseeker said, I hope this is a hoax. Unfortunately it sounds credible.
her silience indicates that the worst scenario took place
ReplyDelete"some recording equipment (camera-phones) were confiscated from people and handed to CBS"
I dont believe it.In the midst of chaos nobody would care to remove cell phones etc. There were soldiers and "women" that rescued her. Why to put yourself in danger and to fight with those thugs?
"handed to CBS" no CBS representative at the scene. the other crew members were beaten as well. this statement does not make any sense.
I think there are videos and that's the reason of silence. no official coverage at all, no any report by egyptian or other authorities. even her public appearance (one month ago) kept without any media coverage.
one of the interesting bits of information that I have learned is the possible role the army played in the attack. If one looks at the photos and videos of the Egyptian troops during that week, one can see there is a different unit deployed on the day Logan was attacked - there was a shift from the units that were deployed through the week, with a new unit deployed on Friday.
ReplyDeleteThe unit that was deployed on Friday is an Intelligence battalion, and has been linked to the "para-thugs" that Mubarak and the Army would often use to do dirty work. I am not sure, but I think that it was the same battalion that detained Lara the first time around...but I have not been able to verify it. I do know that battalion WAS in the city when lara was detained the week prior.
In case you are curious how I have been able to identify units, I was able to do so by zeroing in on individual soldiers and finding unit and battalion patches, then cross-referencing those battalions with information about the Egyptian Army, to see what each battalion is primarily trained for.
Good find.
ReplyDeleteAbout the battalions and patches: I thought she was detained earlier in Alexandria and not in Cairo.
ReplyDeleteShe was - sorry about the unclear earlier post. The battalion that was re-deployed to the checkpoints on Friday in Cairo was the same battalion that was in Alexandria when Logan was detained. The battalion that was deployed at the start of the protests remained for the entire event, save for Friday, when they were pulled back to an outer perimeter deployment, and the Intelligence battalion was ordered to take up the checkpoints
ReplyDeleteeven odder, I can not find evidence that the battalion remained in Cairo after Monday, following the attack. I am not sure where they were sent, but they were no longer in the streets in a deployed fashion.
What is interesting is that a couple days after the infamous CBS “brutal and sustained” announcement, the Wall Street Journal reported that Logan was “NOT RAPED”, WSJ is a reputable MSM outlet, and it was based on a source close to Lara. I wonder if that was Burkett doing damage control.
ReplyDeleteIf you think about it, the few bits of info that have come out since, “whipped with flagpoles and saved by Egyptian woman and soldiers”, “Lara getting better daily”, everything has been “sources close to Lara”. Logan has yet to make any official statement of any kind.
In late February the National Enquirer reported that sources close to Logan say they worry about her mental state. They want her to give up being a correspondent. That psychologist say that returning to this kind of work may cause a breakdown. Burkett again?
In people’s opinion, how long will Lara stay silent? And how much longer will her silence have to last until the internet begins to really buzz about Where’s Lara? What really happened?
WSJ statement:
ReplyDelete"The separation and assault lasted for roughly 20 to 30 minutes, said a person familiar with the matter, who added that it was "not a rape." A CBS News spokesman declined to comment beyond the statement."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704409004576146661656309184.html?KEYWORDS=lara+logan
Does that mean this source "familiar with the matter" was also the CBS spokesman that declined to comment further or does that mean they spoke to someone "familiar" with the matter and then asked the spokesman and he/she refused to elaborate, or are they saying Katie Couric (a CBS spokesman) said on the news that they would not be commenting further? Quotes like this are so ambiguous. It' quite unclear.
Africa OnLine:
“'The attack was so sudden' Logan told her distraught family in Durban, where she was born. She had “no chance of escaping”. In the crush, she was separated from her crew. During the attack that followed, her clothes were ripped off, she was kicked and punched, her hair pulled out and she was sexually attacked. She said she had escaped being raped because of the intervention of a group of women who threw themselves on top of her, protecting her from further harm."
http://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/logan-tells-of-tahrir-square-assault-1.1029312
Is this article saying that family said she said she wasn't raped? Her husband? A distant relative who heard things from immediate family? Unknown.
NY PosT:
"CBS went public with the incident only after it became clear that other media outlets were on to it, sources said.
'A call came in from The [Associated Press]' seeking information, a TV-industry source told The Post. 'They knew she had been attacked, and they had details. CBS decided to get in front of the story.'
Most network higher-ups didn't even know how brutal the sexual assault was until a few minutes before the statement went out.
'We were surprised it stayed quiet' as long as it did, one source said.
Another source insisted that Logan was 'involved in the process' of deciding whether to make her attack public, and ultimately understood why the statement had to be released."
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/cbs_reporter_cairo_nightmare_pXiUVvhwIDdCrbD95ybD5N
London:
They weren't even going to tell people at all. I can imagine, in that light, that they'd try to keep as much detail as private as possible.
"Logan has broken many taboos in making her attack public. 'She signed off the CBS report,' Matcloff confirms, so she not only agreed to make it public but she okayed the strong sensationalist and graphic language used in the description of her attack. 'Lara is not scared of being a lightning rod for controversy, she's not a shrinking violet.'"
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23924199-lara-is-never-scared-of-being-a-lightning-rod-for-controversy.do
This source claims she was definitely involved in the process. Same article:
ReplyDelete"A friend of mine was on Tahrir Square on the same day, with a foreign reporter," says Sarah Naguib, a 25-year-old Egyptian activist, blogger and a freelance journalist. "She told me they were surrounded by at least 100 men who started endlessly groping them". The men became violent as the girls tried to fight back. They managed to get video footage but the foreign journalist is still considering whether she wants her attack made public.
According to Colvin, "the tanks were usually checking IDs, but the night Mubarak stepped down, the army opened the flood gates, everyone was allowed into the square. The gangs who came into Tahrir Square that evening were a new crowd from God knows where, and didn't have any experience with Tahrir Square."
Who are these men? "They were completely random people, not thugs but not protesters either," explains Naguib. She had been on the square continuously for two weeks and noticed a change in dynamic on the days that the announcements were made by Mubarak and then Omar Suleiman. "The square started to have a touristic feel about it."
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23924199-lara-is-never-scared-of-being-a-lightning-rod-for-controversy.do
So... some of the supposed eye-witness accounts from that night may have been from entirely separate incidents. *shrug*
I know and believe that most of what happened that night will be revealed hopefully people who witnessed this in Egypt will start to come forward and tell the truth. I think that if the media intrest in this goes away then Lara logan will make an appearence since she does not want to be made a victim to the public. Her silence says rape and until her or someone comes forward with the truth then she will always be viewed by this tragedy. We need to clearly investigate this because a serious crime was commited and justice needs to be served. My hope is that the people of Egypt will shed light on this since I have a feeling even though they do not reveal much on many internet blogs and forums is because of the shame that goes with the sensitive subject of rape especially during the celebration that was going on at the time. This cast a bad light on the meaning of what was a historic moment in Egypt.
ReplyDeleteHer official FB has a post that she (apparently) wrote about the two photographers who were killed in Libya.
ReplyDeleteFirst, Lara Logan wasn't detained in Alexandria...but Cairo, 'in front of Israeli Embassy.' Which is odd given Israeli Embassy is suite on top of twenty-story building.
ReplyDeleteSecond, I think Lara Logan was targeted by same people who detained her week before. Obviously not '200' of them, but I think a group of men who knew what they were doing hustled Logan south on the square, into the most dangerous elements, inciting them with generic accusations of having a spy, or a Jew.
Third, that's why its so quiet. Cameras and such can be confiscated by the cops rather easily in a police state. The U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - hardly a minor figure - sent a 'team' of 'diplomats' to Cairo to find these perps. And nothing at all became of that endeavor that I know of.
Fourth, there are reasons the USA would rather not embarrass the Egyptian Army given the political situation there. And I think any accurate telling of what happens to Lara Logan leaves some of their shadier security personnel - hated by Egyptians as much as anyone - as the primary instigators of this. So put a lid on it.
At some level, that is the why and who of what happened to Lara Logan and why its so quiet.
Truthseeker's account could very well be accurate and yet what I say above does not disagree with it.
And Logan will be back. I'm sure some of the many posters here have seen this: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/04/19/cbss-lara-logan-not-defined-by-assault-in-egypt.
Give her previous life experiences, I think she will be fine in the long run.
First, Lara Logan wasn't detained in Alexandria...but Cairo, 'in front of Israeli Embassy.' Which is odd given Israeli Embassy is suite on top of twenty-story building.
ReplyDeleteSecond, I think Lara Logan was targeted by same people who detained her week before. Obviously not '200' of them, but I think a group of men who knew what they were doing hustled Logan south on the square, into the most dangerous elements, inciting them with generic accusations of having a spy, or a Jew.
Third, that's why its so quiet. Cameras and such can be confiscated by the cops rather easily in a police state. The U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - hardly a minor figure - sent a 'team' of 'diplomats' to Cairo to find these perps. And nothing at all became of that endeavor that I know of.
Fourth, there are reasons the USA would rather not embarrass the Egyptian Army given the political situation there. And I think any accurate telling of what happens to Lara Logan leaves some of their shadier security personnel - hated by Egyptians as much as anyone - as the primary instigators of this. So put a lid on it.
At some level, that is the why and who of what happened to Lara Logan and why its so quiet.
Truthseeker's account could very well be accurate and yet what I say above does not disagree with it.
And Logan will be back. I'm sure some of the many posters here have seen this: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/04/19/cbss-lara-logan-not-defined-by-assault-in-egypt.
Give her previous life experiences, I think she will be fine in the long run.
There are no credible witnesses that have come forward to say they saw the "rescue". The way it is being reported, has you believe they got swarmed by thugs, Lara seperated from her crew, maybe by 30 or 50 yards, surrounded,"beaten, stripped and whipped with flagpoles".
ReplyDeleteThat would have been a public spectacle, yet nobody has come forward or been found on the internet that says "yeah, I saw the attack or I saw the army guys come in and break up the attack". Nor have I heard of anyone who "knew somebody" that saw this.
It would have been a very noticable event, this leads me to believe that the "sexual assault" and rescue took place in a secluded area. (there is a lot of construction in Tahir)
Who ended up with her panties? I should think they would be worth a fortune on ebay.
ReplyDeleteI think, really, its a sure thing that any of the supposed witnesses giving accounts on random comment streams around the Internet have to be completely fake. For one thing, any Egyptian educated enough to speak a second language and interested enough to care about what the American public thinks about anything isn't going to write/talk in broken English like a stereotypical token foreigner from an Adam Sandler movie. I mean, look at the Egyptians posting on this blog; they all write in perfect English.
ReplyDeleteAnd, come on, every single one of these supposed witnesses has some porn fetish to push: they say her attackers were old or young or black or that they urinated on her or whatever else. And, really, a few of these same accounts appear on a number of forums so it's the same half a dozen people doing it over and over. Obvious fakes.
This claim that a producer told another producer who told a friend and yadda yadda... also highly suspect, man. Any unnamed source (even in an established newspaper) is highly suspect. Anything in a tabloid is unreliable. We really know next to nothing after two months and it's really disappointing and frustrating on many levels.
I was hoping this woman would own up to what happened, charge through it, knock it down, pounce on it, defeat it, etc. I was hoping she'd stand up proudly and say, "Yes! I was raped! I was abused! I was attacked! It doesn't change who I am. I am not shamed. I was the victim, not the criminal so why should I be ashamed!? It happened. Let's move on to the next thing. Let's not let this hold us back."
A woman is raped and that means she can't resume her career? Can't be on television anymore? Can't be respected and admired for her work anymore? Why? Of course she can. She didn't do anything wrong.
She's going to hide it? She's going to pretend it didn't happen? She's going to lie about it? What message does that send out to all the rape victims all over the world? Doesn't it tell them they should hide what happened to them over pressing charges? Doesn't it tell them they should be ashamed they survived such an attack? Doesn't it affirm the power men have over women to use sex as a weapon to disgrace and discredit them?
As humiliating as her experience must have been, she has the opportunity to show everyone that a woman can rise above something like that and work and live and thrive without letting it ruin her life. I don't think she should be afraid to speak publicly about what happened. I don't think the details should be kept secret or left to our imagination. I think she should own it and transcend it.
I have to ask since we have been exploring all facts and possible rumors as to whatever happened to Lara Logan. Can any Egyptian eyewitnesses reply to this blog and clear the air? Silence nor apologizies will ensure justice not just in this case but for all Egyptian women. I feel that this will stain the whole hope for change from the demonstrations and people will view the Arabic world as never progessing. Speak up people in Egypt if you saw anything!
ReplyDeleteI don't get why there isn't at least one representative of the Egyptian media pursuing this story, interviewing witnesses, etc.
ReplyDeleteThe,
ReplyDelete"First, Lara Logan wasn't detained in Alexandria...but Cairo, 'in front of Israeli Embassy.' Which is odd given Israeli Embassy is suite on top of twenty-story building."
I don't see how that's odd in any way whatsoever. She was detained in front of the building. How would you say it... "Lara Logan was detained in front of the building where the embassy is located." What difference does it make?
Anon,
"She was - sorry about the unclear earlier post. The battalion that was re-deployed to the checkpoints on Friday in Cairo was the same battalion that was in Alexandria when Logan was detained."
Haha. Busted.
"I don't see how that's odd in any way whatsoever. She was detained in front of the building. How would you say it... "Lara Logan was detained in front of the building where the embassy is located." What difference does it make?"
ReplyDeleteIt makes a difference because there is a side-story there.
If Logan was under consistent harassment in Alexandria (as her last dispatch from Egypt made clear) then how did she get freedom of movement to drive seventy miles to Cairo with a whole news-production team the very next day?
According to her own account, what got her detained in Cairo was her possession of a camera - identifying her as a journalist - as they hustled through checkpoints in Cairo, but she had to have been followed by regime peeps from Alexandria given they were already consciously harassing her whole group. By Logan's own account again, when she was detained they were very explicit in telling her they knew who she was, she was being followed, etc. Logan's personal 'file' was already dozens of pages long by time she got back to Cairo.
There is article, about a month old, profiling one of her cameramen. Its for a newspaper local to Louisville, KY where the guy is from, but the exact link escapes me. The only thing he mentioned about the whole return-trip disaster to Egypt was a good anecdote from the airport: People were trying to take his camera away etc. as soon as they were off the gate going through the terminal.
The same people who undoubtedly followed Logan from Alexandria are the same people who detained and deported her and I'd wager the same people who instigated her misfortune in the square.
It also explains all the relative quiet - especially from the Egyptian side of things - given recent developments there obviously demonstrate the security apparatus is very intact, protective of itself, and empowered despite that revolution. It all ads up that way.
That is correct! Despite the demonstrations the secret police are still in control and that is why there is silence not one credible eyewitnesses have come forward and probably will never tell. Lara Logan at this point does not want to reveal whatever happened to her and she was raped to the point she cannot remember what happened.
ReplyDelete"Despite the demonstrations the secret police are still in control and that is why there is silence not one credible eyewitnesses have come forward and probably will never tell. Lara Logan at this point does not want to reveal whatever happened to her and she was raped to the point she cannot remember what happened."
ReplyDeleteI can't comment one way or another on gory details of what happened to Logan...that's her business.
But, I am curious about all the open threads on this event. For instance, Hillary's diplomats. If what I say is true, Logan at some level recognized the people who did this to her probably. And could subsequently provide enough info to make a positive ID on the instigators (but probably not the whole 'mob'). And yet nothing has come from Clinton's special little task-force sent to 'get justice' for Logan. There either is some significant technical or social obstruction to that effort. Did they give up? Return empty-handed? Find something out and then table it for ulterior reasons? All interesting questions, far more interesting than how sexually devious the assailants were with Logan frankly.
I wish at some point some reporter would just ask what became of that State Dept. effort - even if its just with the flack at the daily State Dept. press conference - just to get an indication if they're even still there trying to figure anything out.
And that puts another thought in my mind: There could be a lot going on behind closed doors about this. Logan herself - laying low as she seems to be - could very well be working on some special story or piece about tracking down her attackers, seeking justice, and the nature of the new-even-if-transitional Egyptian regime.
Lara Logan just might have a surprise up her sleeve in the works, and CBS would be salivating at the ratings 'Lara Logan: Return to Egypt' could/would get. I have no idea one or another, but I wouldn't put it past CBS or Lara Logan.
I am sure that the State Department is still working on it. I doubt there gonna give constant updates to the media. We supply every bit of equipment to the Egyptian military. We have influence with the military and regime. (not control though).
ReplyDeleteI am sure the CIA has people in the military who give information, and an investigation is quietly happening.
When Logan got treated at the Embassy, she came in beaten pretty bad, I bet the White House got a call. Which is why Logan got a call from Obama.
Now did Lara get raped or not raped? With all the information overload from the internet, I could make a strong argument for either sides of the argument. I can’t help wanting to know the truth though.
I have since read several psychology articles on rape since the attack. Even if Logan was not raped, it is still common to suffer from PTRS (post traumatic rape syndrome) from the type of sexual assault that was reported. Even without rape. Her silence is not necessarily an indication of rape.
Doubtful I think this may never be solved and you can forget any media investigating they are a close knit group and out of respect for Lara they will let this go away.
ReplyDeleteI believe the key to deducing whether there was rape or not is to find out what “separated” means. If the attack took place in close proximity of where the attack began, out in the middle of the street, then it probably all went down as the MSM has reported. (no rape).
ReplyDeleteIf “separated” really means “kidnapped” than the time frame of attack will be well over 30 minutes. And it’s anyone’s guess then to what happened.
Based on a forensic nurse weblog, It is more than twice as likely in gangrapes than in single perpetrator rape, for the victim to be insulted, forced to perform fellatio, for breasts to be pulled, bit or burnt, putting semen on victims body, demanding manual masturbation from victim, and the amount of aggression and degradation increases after each person takes their turn.
This of course does not mean that all these things would definitely happen, just more likely. But consider these men where “whipped into a frenzy”. I guess the question is, if Logan was forced to perform fellatio to several men, and/or the amount of men that raped her was very high, say 15-20, would Logan Ever divulge these details? Or ever talk about any of it?
Do you guys really believe the CIA, the military, Obama and even the egyptian people have nothing better to do with their time and no more urgent problems than the rape or not rape of an american journalist?
ReplyDeleteI'm fairly convinced the course of action Ms. Logan and her network are planning to take is to let this story fade away and I don't think its very smart. I think, really, taking the "no comment" route will keep this mystery hanging over her for the duration of her career. People will always wonder, always ask, always want to know more. Instead, confronting it, exposing it for what it was (and then moving on with courage) is probably the best way to get past it. Time only heals the wounds you mend. Ignored wounds tend to either get infected or bleed out.
ReplyDeleteIf they continue with this course of action, man, I just don't know if we'll ever hear the end of it. I'd rather she do an expose and write a book than try to pretend it never happened. Confront it. Move on. You can't just try to move on without confronting it, not when it's already out there.
I think information will surface. People are offering big money for footage. I'm sure a verifiable eye-witness account could garner some sort of big reward. I'm sure her faithful cameraman and producer (her team in Cairo was just three men) and her security team won't talk but someone will talk. I mean, this is just too salacious a story for people to not talk about it forever. I'm sure people in the intelligence community know every detail by now and they have friends and family and people are asking them questions. And, I mean, there will be people trying to write books or make movies about this stuff. It might take a while but this story will come out. It will.
I do think the Egyptian government or para-government was involved in the attack. I don't think, however, that they would need to make deals to protect those involved. They'd just deny it. Logan was blindfolded during her captivity in Cairo (as was her crew). They took pictures of her while she was blindfolded -- perhaps so the gangs would know who to attack. Heck, what did they do to her in captivity that caused her to get so sick that she needed an IV? Was she clothed for the pictures? And, really, how could she be sure whether it was the army, the police, the secret police, the autonomous police units, the gangs, etc.? She was blindfolded. But, come on, there is no way she's going to be able to identify these guys. And, if she did, who is going to take her word over there? And, really, so a few police get punished, does that make it better? They beat the shit out of her for 30 min. or 90 min. or whatever. They most likely whipped her like an animal. They probably did gang rape her and in every way humanly possible. How do you even get revenge or justice for that? What do you do?
[continued]
ReplyDeleteI have the utmost respect for Lara. I admire her a great deal for her work and her character. Heck, at this point, after studying this incident and her career for two months, I pretty much love her like a friend or family member. Still, I'd prefer the full story came out. Heck, I'd rather see the full video of the gang rape, whipping and bloody battle surface and go viral than hear people blather on forever about how it's a hoax or how she just wanted attention or how it was her own fault or it was the peaceful protestors who did it or whatever else. I'd rather everyone know the truth. That might not be what's best but for anyone involved but it's pretty much the only way the rest of the world is ever going to fully understand what happened to her and appreciate how badass she is for surviving it and going on with her life and her career and her passion for journalism.
I mean, maybe that's a little extreme. If she'd maybe talk about it or something that might be enough. Not that she owes anyone but I think it would be the best move for her. Pretty much everyone thinks she was raped anyway. We all saw the Daily Mail story about her being whipped with sticks (caned/flogged) and her body being covered in welts. We all know she was naked and being groped and pinched. Is it really going to humiliate her further if people know she was gang raped? Id being gang raped worse than being whipped like an animal, like a schoolgirl, like a slave, or whatever image comes to your mind... like Jesus(?). he got whipped. They beat the shit out of her. She got owned. They savaged her. Is that still up for debate after the information that has come out? No. We all know that happened. How is talking about it somehow still going to be taboo at this point? How is it going to surprise anyone? Is it going to be more embarrassing? More humiliating? How? We're already there. It already happened.
I want her to be happy and successful and confident and in control of her life. I want her personal life to be perfect. I want her career to be right back on the tracks. How does she get there? By ignoring this or by blasting right through this?
She says she doesn't want this to define her. Yea. Well. It is always going to be one of the things that does define her. But, it can define her as a victim who denied and hid and pretended it didn't happen or it can define her as someone who suffered but rose above it and kicked its ass.
I'd go with the ass kicking option. It may not be easy. It may not be instinctive. But, trust me, growing up in the public eye, I know from experience that the "no comment" option never ever ever helps anyone... unless they are guilty of a crime and commenting will incriminate them. And, she did nothing wrong.
"I am sure that the State Department is still working on it"
ReplyDeleteWho knows? That's the question. Again, wish someone would ask at the daily State Dept. briefing, just curious as to status much less results of their efforts on that front.
"Doubtful I think this may never be solved and you can forget any media investigating they are a close knit group and out of respect for Lara they will let this go away."
I don't believe that for five seconds. Lara Logan has tons of professional 'enemies,' especially on the progressive left of the press. Nil Rosen is good example of that. The entire staff of Rolling Stone because of Logan mouthing off about their McChrystal-busting reporter being somehow out of line is another example. Ditto for numerous previous co-workers of hers. Logan makes enemies, quickly and often. I've wondered if that same peculiar quality to piss various people off - a quality Logan obviously has - is root of malice that was her undoing in Tahrir Square actually.
But that notion aside, Logan's got enough 'pressenemies' out there that if they had something salacious or contrary to what's known, they would blow Lara Logan out of the water with it...especially the Brits who are particularly vicious. The National Enquirer was obviously sniffing all over this thing and walked away from it. And those folk are tenacious, and write checks for info...a powerful motivator on the Egyptian street that obviously didn't work.
It was military/cops/security organ of Egypt that did Logan in, that's the only nut in that society too hard to crack from that perspective. Or it was the Brotherhood, but seriously? If they had done it the Army would be all over advertising that, at least a little. It was the Army or one of their myriad security-organ appendages for sure.
(All-CAPS are mine)
ReplyDelete"I have the utmost respect for Lara. I admire her a great deal for her work and her character. Heck, at this point, after studying this incident and her career for two months, I PRETTY MUCH LOVER HER LIKE A FRIEND OR A FAMILY MEMBER Still, I'd prefer the full story came out. HECK, I'D RATHER SEE THE FULL VIDEO OF THE GANG RAPE, WHIPPING AND BLOODY BATTLE SURFACE and go viral than hear people blather on forever about how it's a hoax or how she just wanted attention or how it was her own fault or it was the peaceful protestors who did it or whatever else."
Alright, this obviously is getting a little nutters out here with well, the complete nuttiness. I'm out, dig this egyptianchronicles blog though. Sorry about the crazies on your thread man. Whoa.
As far as US influence is concerned you can forget it! The USA does not have the influence in Egypt despite what they want you to believe when Hillary Clinton visited she was not able to meet with those really running the country. Egypt is in a state of transition and do not think those in the know about what happened will tell. So the one with the answers is Lara Logan herself and if she decides to tell is up to her time heals all wounds!
ReplyDelete...Maybe what I said was a little extreme but I stand behind the idea that the truth coming out isn't going to hurt her. She's not the criminal in this case.
ReplyDeleteI was wrong, I think. maybe she's right to keep quiet and let this blow over so she can get back to work. I'm just frustrated by this case and so... I should probably refrain from further comment on the matter. Lara can handle herself. She knows what to do. She'll be fine. *sigh*
ReplyDeleteWhat most people are fogetting especially with any traumatic event is PTSD she will have to deal and admit to what happened in order to heal properly. If she chooses to hide and ignore this than I fear she will self destruct eventually. Her rushing back to work and not addressing whatever happened most likely will lead to more issues. And by the way I was a victim of a traumatic event and from my therapy was told key to my healing was to acknowledge what happened to people around me. Lara Logan sad to say does not get to have this much privacy due to her job she is of the media and this crime was at a high profile event.
ReplyDelete(Assumed) PTSD + fame = complicated. If we care about her, we'd do best to stop talking publicly about this and let *her* own her own story in her own time, in her own way (which may include not saying anything, ever, publicly, about it). The story is not ours. It's hers. I wish her the best and know that although this *affects* her, it does *not* define her.
ReplyDeleteQuestion to the previous comment, I have read that the first stage after rape (assuming she was) is denial, trying to pretend it never happened, this stage is filled with great emotional trauma, deep depression, cannot mentally function . Talking about it and accepting it is the road to healing. The next stage.
ReplyDeleteDoes she necessarily have to tell the public everything to heal, or just those closest to her? Is the public necessary to get to that healing stage?
I saw someone on another thread call this the "sex crime of the century" and I can't help but agree with her there. Lara's recovery is the most important thing but saying this is not the public's business to get the full story is a bit much. This is the 911 of sex crimes. This is a fucking international incident, my friend. Go ahead and keep quiet but people are not going to forget about their favorite news lady getting gangbanged in the streets of Cairo. How does anyone think ignoring it till it goes away is even an option? Explore other options.
ReplyDeletePoint taken this is what most people fail to realize this was and is an international incident that required President Obama's attention. Let us also not forget that if this same set of circumstances had happened to a regular woman from any country visiting during the celebrations in Egypt and was sexully assaulted you can take it to the bank that all of the media networks would have covered the incident extensively and there would have been no thought of privacy for the victim. Lara logan is and will always be due to the nature of her profession be in the spotlight and all of this talk of just let if go away is not reality not in this internet day and age. The problem will be that another media organization soon is going to set aside her privacy and will want answers from her and those close to her and money being offered for a scoop will come into to play if she does not clear the air soon. That is just the ugly nature of the beast and it may not be what we want to hear but, life can deal you a bad set of circumstances and this is just one of many issues that not only Lara Logan will have to deal with but her husband and her family and you would have to believe that her employer CBS is probaly swamped with media requests for answers and I bet that they are even monitoring the blogs to see the pulse of this story that they want to go away.
ReplyDeleteTelling the public is NOT necessary to get to "that stage". And it is, indeed, NOT the public's business.
ReplyDeleteThe 9/11 of sex crimes?
ReplyDeleteI guess there are some really sick people in this obsession with Lara Logan.
The entire world has seen stolen videos of Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian giving their boyfriends blow jobs and those women have survived just fine.
ReplyDeleteWhen I look at the original CBS post on Feb15. I notice two things that bother me.
ReplyDelete1. there is no mention of the stop to the embassy, (several posts up), I think that is a very important detail.
2. there is no time frame. I start wondering, what else did CBS leave out of the statement?
It’s like there trying to hide something without lying.
“she and her team and their security were surrounded by a dangerous element amidst the celebration. It was a mob of more than 200 people whipped into frenzy. In the crush of the mob, she was separated from her crew. She was surrounded and suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating before being saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers. She reconnected with the CBS team, returned to her hotel and returned to the United States on the first flight the next morning. She is currently home recovering”. Cbs.com
In between “surrounded” and “suffered”, is there a horrific story?
Temoris Greko on his website gives testimony from one of his friends, Abdulrahman Elsayed.
ReplyDelete“We formed a human chain to protect her. Only young people, 10 or 15, all men. We surrounded her. People behind us were pushing and trying to grab her, someone might have touched her. I saw her top was uneven. There was a women and children’s tent (Tahrir sq. had become a campsite) and we tried to take her there, but we couldn’t because of the pressure. Someone had a taser and he held it high, making electric noises and threatening the attackers. He told them to move away. So we could go to the Museum’s military post and deliver her to the soldiers. Then we stood there blocking the people who tried to follow her. We brought her two doctors, first a young male, then an older female. The doctor and Lara were the only women around.” http://temorisblog.wordpress.com/2011/02/21/rape-women-stripped-what-really-happened-to-lara-logan/
First of all, where does a pro-democracy Egyptian get a “taser”? Tasers cost like $350-$500. Go and google “Egyptian police tasers” and you will find several posts about how Egyptian police use tasers to torture detainees. The point is they carry them. GDP per capita in Egypt is $2270 in 2009. Which means a taser would cost anywhere from two to four months of salary for your average everyday Egyptian.
He never states whether he got to the museum. Although we assume so, where did the doctors come from?
The Temoris account is completely invalid except for the 10 or 20 seconds during which he witnessed a hostile mob of men rush a woman rushed by him. Everyone he quotes (every single person) are really just random people who posted supposed things on his Facebook wall (one of them, since deleted, admittedly so). Aside from himself and his friend Ferky, none of it can really be verified or even placed in any sort of time frame -- what they witnessed (the stuff with the tazer and the tents) could have taken place hours after what he witnessed. I've now heard that she: saw no doctor in Egypt, saw a doctor at the hotel, saw a doctor in a tent, saw a Marine doctor in the Embassy, etc. Who the hell knows for sure?
ReplyDeleteI've heard supposed witnesses say her attackers locked their elbows together to keep people from saving her and that the soldiers had to fire guns and physically attack her attackers to get close enough to rescue her. If nothing else, the fact that it took 20 soldiers means it was hard to do (and probably involved a small group of soldiers finding her and waiting for back-up or leaving to get back-up which would have taken some time).
It could be that Ferky was led to believe these men were protecting her or taking her to the Army at the museum (during the half a minute or so he followed before giving up) but were instead taking her to the alley or the construction site as some have claimed. Obviously, seeing as how the Marines at the embassy said she had the shit beaten out of her, something happened between what Temoris saw and her return to the embassy/hotel/whatever. She was in the hospital for five days. Also, the Daily Mail, NY Post and South African media have all said she was stripped of her clothes so the account of her shirt being messed up and her being escorted by one man to a tent and rescued from there is either blatantly false or entirely inaccurate... unless they walked around picking her clothes up off the ground in the dark. I'm sure if she were not stripped then someone would have said so when they also claimed it wasn't a rape (unnamed source, WSJ).
If the picture the IMI published of her speaking engagement one month after the attack is new (and not stock from a past speaking engagement; not sure if she's spoken at AU before) then the damage wasn't too severe when it comes to her face so maybe the Marine was referring to the welts from being whipped and beaten with sticks. The picture of her speaking at AU does feature a podium with a different graphic than the other speaker pictured along with her so it could be an old picture (maybe). Maybe not. Regardless, she doesn't seem to have a broken nose or missing teeth or anything though there could have been plastic surgery -- one of many reasons she'd rush back to the states for treatment rather than see Egyptian doctors. The main reason, of course, being that other journalists had been abducted from the hospital and her security could not be guaranteed.
So, really, the Temoris account does more to add credibility to the idea that there definitely was a brutal attack than dispel that notion. His account, what he witnessed, tells us she was relocated from the scene of her abduction by people hostile to her, an organized group of men. If she was taken away for the 90 minutes someone has said then she was probably raped. Medical sources have described wounds consistent with being whipped; that definitely happened. She was naked in a crowd of men groping her and pinching her private parts. I mean... yea... they could have whipped her in the street. They took her somewhere so they could rape her. But, of course, sources claim it wasn't a rape. Is that damage control? Is it true? Who knows.
I just wanted to clear up the whole Temoris thing. He saw almost nothing. The rest is hearsay.
For me, talking about this sort of thing is not as uncomfortable as it must be for others. I think, maybe, it will take a while for people to feel like they can talk about this in any meaningful way. It's hard waiting because (like many) I really do care about this a great deal. I'm going to try to let this go until new information is released. Most of what we're saying right now has already been posted in this thread, in the thread under the Temoris blog post, on YouTube, etc. I'll be around but I'm not going to comment unless it's something new like this Marine's statement... which is interesting. "They beat the shit out of her." If nothing else, that confirms that she was beaten severely so those who claim it was a hoax are left contradicting a Marine who was at the scene. Anyway, I've got other stuff to focus on right now. More later. Peace. 9
ReplyDeleteI don't have much to add to this forum, but I came across some new photos of Lara Logan when she gave the keynote speech at some conference at the American University in Washington DC. This occurred last March 10th, about a month after the incident in Tahrir square. Looks like TruthSeeker was right; she looked physically 100% healed even then.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5634494747/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5635075654/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5635075504/in/photostream
More pictures of her speaking at American University on March 10th have surfaced. I saw them posted on another forum. Notice the red mark on her chest here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5635075654/in/photostream/
Wow! I posted this and I didn't even notice it! Enlarge the photo 5634494747 and you can also see the mark on her chest. It looks like it is in the process of healing, but just looking at it makes me feel pain. What a tough and strong woman she really is! I have no doubt she will come through this and be back better than ever!
ReplyDeleteThis is all so crazy.
ReplyDeleteHang On!!!!!! Look at the American University photo's. Lara's wearing the same pearl necklace that she's wearing in the photo's on the day she was attacked in Egypt! Are you telling me - that if her alleged terror was the gangrape in the alley scenario...that her delicate pearl necklace would have survived! No chance!
ReplyDeleteAlso..think about the marine's blog. 'Beat the shit out of her'. No mention of 'she was naked, distraught, etc'
Plus..what I have a lead who maintains she wore her own clothes when she was seen in the Four Seasons. I'm coming round to thinking this isn't the hell that we feared!. hope so.
The obvious: something bad happened. The next obvious: one can have more than one pearl necklace. The next obvious: you can put your clothes BACK ON.
ReplyDeleteLogic. And restraint in interpretation.
Reader-provided links enabled:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dcdave.com/article5/110413.htm
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704409004576146661656309184.html?KEYWORDS=lara+logan
http://www.iol.co.za/news/africa/logan-tells-of-tahrir-square-assault-1.1029312
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/cbs_reporter_cairo_nightmare_pXiUVvhwIDdCrbD95ybD5N
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23924199-lara-is-never-scared-of-being-a-lightning-rod-for-controversy.do
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2011/04/19/cbss-lara-logan-not-defined-by-assault-in-egypt
http://castrapraetoria1.blogspot.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5634494747/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5635075654/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/americanuniversity/5635075504/in/photostream
If we can find out what time she arrived to the embassy, would tell us alot about what actually happened.
ReplyDeleteI figure, before 3 AM, happened as reported
if its closer to 4:30-5:00 AM, then there are a lot questions to answered
Well, it appears we will get some answers - Lara Logan will be telling her story this Sunday on "60 Minutes."
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/04/28/60minutes/main20058368.shtml
Hey folks, all the speculation can cease very soon now:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/29/business/media/29logan.html?hp
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/04/28/60minutes/main20058368.shtml
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/29/business/media/29logan.html?hp
From the NYT article: “For an extended period of time, they raped me with their hands,” Ms. Logan said in an interview with The New York Times. She estimated that the attack lasted for about 40 minutes and involved 200 to 300 men... Egyptian colleagues who were accompanying the camera crew heard men nearby talking about wanting to take Ms. Logan’s pants off. She said: “Our local people with us said, ‘We’ve gotta get out of here.’ That was literally the moment the mob set on me... My clothes were torn to pieces,” Ms. Logan said.
ReplyDeleteIt's all over the Internet.
USA Today, NY Post, Business Insider, HuffPost, WSJ Blog, Fox News, Daily Mail, NY Daily News, Newsday, The Frisky, Sun-Sentinal, The Atlantic
Finally. *sigh*
ReplyDeleteThe fact that there were 300 shows conclusively that they were rank-and-file Tahrir Square protestors as I said all along. Hosni did not assign 300 thugs to strip and diddle her. I take no pleasure in saying this.
ReplyDeleteI think you had a bad scene at that end of the square where Mubarakers we're flowing in, and I still think some people who had some kind of score to settle did Logan in through inciting the rest. There's always some instigators in mob-events like this and that's still my conviction here.
ReplyDeleteEither way, its cool Logan's back to doing her thing and seems alright, not huddled up in a room somewhere on meds having flashbacks or whatever.
Maybe with all the self-reflection and angst over dying and leaving her kids makes the suddenly-vacant slot for CBS anchor look like a great job to her. Wouldn't be surprised if she's the 'face' of CBS News in couple months. It'd help their ratings for sure...given they're dead-last with Miss Terminally Perky.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@Jules When she is saying "they raped me with their hands", she is alluding to being sexually grabbed
ReplyDeleteNo. She isn't "alluding" to being "grabbed" or anything else, dumbass. She's saying that hundreds of men penetrated her vaginally with their fingers over the course of 40 minutes.
In a crowd that size, don't you think there would have been DOZENS of cellphone users READY to film such an incident?
ReplyDeleteJason,
ReplyDeleteI don't see why you'd assume that to be the case. The fact that these 200 or 300 are distinguished from the rest of the crowd alone lends credibility to the idea that they were a separate group.
Jules,
Can you produce this supposed Egyptian crime report? These witnesses? None of this seems to be anywhere on the Internet. I mean, look, there is that false "no penetration" report on YouTube which is completely fabricated but where is this mythical Egyptian crime report? I think your sources sound made up.
Who are you people anyway? I was going to ask this last week? It seems like the same people have been posting over and over again on here - people that were not here before. And then their posts are followed by a ton of Anonymous comments in agreement. It is really bizarre. I honestly was about to jokingly pose the question - "Is Lara Logan about to talk about her attack and you guys were hired to stir up excitement?"
ReplyDeletehttp://media.brisbanetimes.com.au/news/world-news/lara-logan-tells-of-attack-2332504.html
ReplyDeleteshe is in very bad shape
Please understand that Lara Logan is not the issue in the story. Egypt sttod up against a dictator with US support and they won. Not only that, but they did so peacefully. The rest of the Mid East is following.
ReplyDeleteThis has challenged the colonial foundations which have major implications for colonizers. They have to counter the image that came across quite clear in the media that Egypt is ready for democracy, it is so past due that they took to the streets and demanded it! Also. it challenged global perceptions that Arabs and Muslims are violent, they did this in peace even when attacked. This challenges how colonizers rationalize what they are doing and they do not want an awakening of their own people to that which is already being challenged by social media, youtube etc.
Afterall that took place in Egypt, the Lara Logan story was meant to take away from the reality of what occurred.
I respect that Egyptians know their society and best and which issues they need to tackle whether now or later, so please give me the credit of understanding my own nation as well.
PKT from USA
Today..my heart is SINGING with happiness. At the end of a marathon trail to uncover the 'truth' (yes I'm TruthSeeker)- this feels like closure. I'm so sorry that Lara was attacked in the way she was. I'm so sorry Lara has been sexually abused. I'm so sorry that Lara endured some humiliation and pain. I'm so sorry that Lara genuinely feared for her life.... BUT Thank Goodness that our WORST fears are not true.
ReplyDeleteThis GREAT lady will overcome this. She will (she is already) rising above it.
She couldn't have survived the 'worst case' scenario.
The fact that a 'rape hit-squad' didn't infiltrate the area to target her and drag her to a planned rape hell is SUCH A RELIEF.
No rape videos, no naked photo's.....thank goodness!
Lara Logan - you are a legend. Welcome back. You are my HERO.
May your millions of fans give you the strength and conviction to get stronger each day.
Incidentally, in my previous posts as 'TruthSeeker', I did mention 'other contacts' i'd been acquiring. Just today, i was was going to paste something I'd received from a genuine guy I've befriended on FaceBook. He's Egyptian, he was in Tahrir Sq. He DID NOT see the attack on Lara..but told me he was 100% convinced she was not raped. he told me that the allegations of lots of derelict areas of construction is not true..and that he has been told by eyewitnesses to the attack, that it was exactly as not seems happened. She was surrounded by jubilant male supporters who became excited by her female presence and turned their sexual attention towards her...groping, pulling, ripping, touching, etc.
Unfortunately, until freedom and respect is established in the Arab Nations where freedom of speech is respected (a matter of decades), and as long as there is no respect for freedom of speech anywhere where a point of view is met by reprisals, most comments you receive here will be "Anonymous". Most Anonymous writers and repliers, feel they have something to say but feel that for one reason or another they will suffer because of what they say, or how they say it,so they do not disclose their identities its a fact. The best thing that could happen in this blog, is not to criticize them and turn personal on them, and instead to express your point of view without hostility to them, you know what? this is freedom of speech, this is democracy, its part of growing up into a mature free democratic citizen, and encouraging others to become so if they are not.
ReplyDeleteAn innocent woman was separated from her people. Her clothes torn off. Beaten. Molested. By a group of 200 men. All this playing over and over for her husband and child to see.
ReplyDeleteMost likely because of the color of her skin and her gender.
That was disgusting.
You people are idiots. She says her clothes were "ripped to shreds" and that a crowd of 300 angry men viciously beat her with sticks and punched her in the face and practically fisted her goddamn pussy for forty minutes straight shoving their fingers and their thumbs up her vagina and her asshole and slapping and sucking her tits for forty minutes and she's butt naked the whole time in a cracked out crowd of dumbass thugs getting beat half to death and you're fucking retarded motherfucking hearts are singing in relief because there were no actual cocks harmed in the making of this rape? Fucking retarded mother fuckers. Half those dudes probably had fingers bigger than her husbands cock shoved knuckle deep and halfway to China. What the hell difference does it make to her whether it was a cock or a finger inside her pussy? I'm sure some of their fingers were as big as her husband's cock anyhow. Your hearts are full of shit. Egypt is free of that asshole dick tater whatever you're still a bunch of goddamm racists that deserve to burn in hell motherfuckers. I hope camels stampede Cairo and sodomize every last one of yous motherfucking bitch motherfuckers.
ReplyDeleteWe would love to believe that this new construct of Islam is peaceful and respectful but we know in the UK it's not.
ReplyDeleteShe was raped while over 200 men stood by and watched, cheered and even joining in. This is what we in the civilised world call rape.
What kind of a religion promotes such vile attacks on women. Islam needs to reform or face condemnation from the west. Everyone is equal and every belief needs to accept and tolerate the wishes of others. It's called love something this world is clearly
lacking.
You know, in 2005 along with my sister, we went to Egypt as part of a group holiday and I wish we did not, everywhere we went there were men following us, trying to talk to us, in the Taxi we were cheated out of our money as the driver went angry and started to spit at us so we stopped him and got out quickly for fear of our lives. When we went to look at the local market, young men kept touching and above all everybody was looking, and looking and looking like if we were animals. We did not feel safe and we hated it. In 2007 we went to Tunisia in a place called Monastir, and in a day trip to Tunis, the same thing took place, we were followed from shop to shop in the Medina and those young people would not leave us alone, we were assured before, that in a Muslim country, people respected women and nobody will bother us, but I did did not see that respect, what I saw was the opposite. I think whatever that women suffered must have some truth to it, and I also think nobody helped her because of personal experience, nobody in Egypt or Tunisia offered to help us when we were terrified, the police in Tunisia just told us to grab the first taxi and go to the hotel but never offered to help, we never went back. Did things change since? I do not know but I will not try to find out.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous "She was surrounded by jubilant male supporters who became excited by her female presence and turned their sexual attention towards her."
ReplyDeleteAre you trolling, or what? Is it only Western infidels like me that could puke reading that? If this is how Muslims think, then Debbie Schlussel is right.
Now because this is going out of control and turns in to some racial Islamophobic , there will be new rules here specifically
ReplyDeleteAny insult to any race or religion is not welcomed or tolerated.
Rape and sexual harassments happen in every place in the world including the United States itself if I am not mistaken.
Rapists and sexual harassers believe or not got no specific religion or nationality in the book
The Lara Logan incident will not be turned to a wagon for right wing blockheads to attack Islam
That's fine, Zeinobia, but I wish you also had some words of condemnation for those who refer to gang rapists as "jubilant male supporters". As a woman do you not take offense? Never mind the Islam connection.
ReplyDeleteMore than 850 Egyptians were killed in the revolution and another 200 paralysed for life... but who fucking cares?!, Lara Logan has been attacked in a job with risks she knew about them and accepted them reporting in a country on the brink with absolutely no security presence on the streets, she could have been raped or she could have been killed like many others. Get a life people.
ReplyDeleteWhat a stupid explanation.
ReplyDeleteWell, Jules, at first I was concerned about Lara. I mean, the idea of being in a situation where one is surrounded by hostile strangers whose sole thought is to inflict pain, and one has no idea how this is going to turn out seems rather frightening...
ReplyDeleteLuckily for everyone involved, you desensationalized it. I am equally sure that Lara will be vastly relieved to hear that you have given the full report and she no longer has to be troubled by the incident.
I agree, we should not be celebrating. some comments make it seem as if since no one ejaculated in Logan it was not that bad.
ReplyDeletewhat we have already learned from NYtimes and 60 minutes 40 second promo is pretty gutwrenching bad. It sound sounds like she was "fisted" for a long period of time. and they became more violent as the attack went on.
There are probably more details on 6o minutes which have not been disclosed, which we will learn sunday. that will make your stomach drop.
There will be details that she will never disclose. This will be a heartbreaking interview. but it will finally end the saga.
Of course it won't take long until supposed "undislosed details" will come out from people who claimed to have witnessed the assault. (all bogus of course)
I bet within the next year we will see a lot of female reporters come forward with stories of rape.
It will be interesting to see wheher they discuss video footage? If they do, then you know they were monitoring the internet very closely.
She was groped, beaten and they were ripping at her clothing. Which is terrible, but it's not being stripped and raped. Let me try and make this simple. The New York Times interviewed Lara Logan yesterday. Here is the article:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/29/business/media/29logan.html?_r=2&hp
This article is the source of the "they raped me with their hands" quote. The original source. Right before this quote, the NYT translates what Logan is saying:
"a group of men who tore at her clothes and groped and beat her"
She is implementing figurative language when she states that they raped her with their hands. I know it's hard to understand because most people do not use figurative language when describing a sexual assault. You can also find this strange use of wording in the press statement where she writes that she suffered a "brutal and sustained sexual assault". That kind of sounds like gang rape, but it's just a figure of speech. She is from a different culture, possibly they talk like this in South Africa.
You need to ask yourselves why there is so much confusion surrounding this story. And how that confusion seems to always lead people in the direction of thinking she was raped. Just an observation.
Jules,
ReplyDeleteLara Logan was on your side. In America, she was among the most outspoken advocates of your cause. What motive could she possibly have to cast your revolution in a bad light?
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/02/02/eveningnews/main7311469.shtml
She had nothing to gain from sensationalizing this story. There is no motive. She's long been one of the most widely respected and recognized journalists in the world. She's been at the top of the food chain for years. She stood nothing to gain from any of this in any way. Absolutely nothing. She was as beloved and respected as any journalist on television.
She's absolutely telling the truth this Sunday. Stop trying to claim you have information to contradict her when you don't. Just admit she was wronged, apologize to her and do your best to make Egypt and the world a better place for all people of all races and cultures.
Also, yes, many suffered during the revolution. We all mourn them together. I'm just asking you to stop trying to pretend this crime didn't happen. Stop trying to pretend it's unimportant. She should be counted as honorable along with the rest who sacrificed and suffered to bring peace and freedom to the people.
"Who are you people anyway?"
ReplyDeleteI think the new people this past week are here due to this page being newly linked to this video on YouTube. See the "information" section.
http://youtu.be/wVtv4Ldx-eo
Jules, I see your point, I re-read the NYtimes article. Its just that when the same article has phrases like "raped with hands", "merciless", "enjoyed my pain" amd "incited them to more violence" you tend to come up with the worst case.
ReplyDeletebesides, these men had total control of her for 40 minutes, its really anyones guess as to exactly what happened. but I see your point.
besides, these questions will all be answered soon enough!
Jules, if Lara Logan, who has 18 years of experience reporting on the front lines, and has reported countless times while under fire from hostile forces....says she was digitally-penetrated by hands and fingers, then I believe her. Rape can be more than just by a penis - it involves any forced penetration....which sounds like what happened to her.
ReplyDeleteCombine that with the absolute terror she must have felt during the experience, not to mention pain...and yes, what happened to her was frightful and not the embellishment you suggest it is. Why on earth would she want to embellish? What possible reason? In case you are not aware, sexual assault invariably is bad news for the survivor, because people like you discount their experiences and claim, "it wasn't so bad - quit lying!" Combine that with the prejudices that exist for a female reporter and her career could have been over as a foreign correspondent. Practically ALL female journalists who have reported similar events never say a word -because of that fear they will not be believed and their supervisors will not send them on assignment.
But I tell you what. If you believe Lara's experience was not a bad one and is just a publicity stunt, then I suggest you replicate what she experienced, and get beaten and assaulted by a mob of people whom you do not understand...and maybe, just maybe, someone will help you...or maybe they won't. That will be half the fun - you not knowing if you are going to die or if you will make it.
After you have experienced that, then I will be happy to write a blog saying what a liar you are. Perhaps then you can actually be in the same league as Lara.
[what we have already learned from NYtimes and 60 minutes 40 second promo is pretty gutwrenching bad. It sound sounds like she was "fisted" for a long period of time. and they became more violent as the attack went on.]
ReplyDeleteI just googled "fisting" and OMFG! Are you serious! I'd rather be raped by 200 penises than "fisted" by even one full grown man and his entire hand and forearm. I didn't even know that was possible let alone so common a practice. My God! That's worse than getting raped with baseball bats. She may as well have been giving birth.
No, it wasn't so bad. According to several posters here, being fisted for over 30 minutes is just typical shenanigans....but it certainly isn't rape....*coughs* All Lara is doing is just blowing this out of proportion for publicity purposes. After all...what does a woman do to advance one's career after close to 20 years being a correspondent than making-up a scenario that sees them being gang-raped by dozens, if not more, people.
ReplyDeleteYep. That is why Lara created this story. For publicity.
Yeah, don't Google "fisting". :(
ReplyDeleteZeinobia, can we get a new Lara Logan thread? This one's getting unwieldy.
If Lara wanted publicity, why does she choose the weekend of the royal wedding to tell her story.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that it is this weekend, says she is trying to keep it off the front page as much as possible.
she does not want to be defined by this incident, this will also be her last interveiw on this topic,
Jason, I am the one who used the term fisting. perhaps it was too strong of a word. maybe inappropriate.
ReplyDeleteI just strongly disagree that "raped with hands" means aggressive groping.
we will all find out soon enough, then we can end all this hairsplitting of words and phrases.
and move on!
For allahs sake, Jason and your right wing TeaParty posse, why didn't you get your own bloody blog where you can push you up with fantasy stories of an hour long gang fisting?
ReplyDeleteTHERE WERE OVER 800 PEOPLE MURDERED DURING THE REVOLUTION AND EVEN MORE INJURED,BUT YOUR ONLY PROBLEM IS THIS WHITE BLONDE LADY? Where were all you moral hipocrites whem the AmnDawla fucked protesters in their ass??
You make me puke.
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/36514/lara-logan-liar-claims-she-didnt-know-muslims-abuse-women-300-muslims-raped-me-w-their-hands-for-40-mins/
ReplyDeleteWell, Uprising, you are right that sexual assault is generally dismissed in the majority of cases, as is evident by postings in this blog. Logan's case is prominent because Logan herself is prominent, and like it or not she has just become the face of survivors worldwide. For many people who do have never experienced sexual assault personally or have a loved one that has been assaulted, what Lara is going through is always "someone else."
ReplyDeleteWell, guess what. Now survivor issues are front and center because of the prominence of Lara Logan. Now everyone knows that the true hell of being assaulted comes after the assault, when scores of people demean, ridicule, dismiss, and question the survivor...and never the attacker. Look at how many posters claim she is either lying or just "sensationalizing" her story...as if because she wasn't "really" raped, then she wasn't raped at all.
Quite frankly, that is crap. The woman experienced an absolutely terrifying experience and it appears according to some posters it wasn't terrifying or brutal enough to truly qualify for the "attention Lara seeks." As for blog postings, perhaps if people didn't make blog posts insisting that other people white-wash what happened to Lara, then other people wouldn't come to those blog posts to call such tactics what they are: Despicable.
@uprisingworld
ReplyDeleteIsn't Amn Dawla the State Security? Are you being literal or figurative? If you are being literal, I don't know that story. Anyone?
"For allahs sake, Jason and your right wing TeaParty posse, why didn't you get your own bloody blog where you can push you up with fantasy stories of an hour long gang fisting?"
ReplyDeleteThose defending the honor of the victim here are not representatives of the Tea Party or the Right Wing and neither is Lara Logan (he is known for being very critical of the Right). You seem unable to grasp the concept that people can defend the truth without political objective.
Yes, some on the Right have used this incident to fan the flames of racism but I've only seen one or two commenters do that here. Most of the people trying to tell you that you're idiots for trying to spread the blatant lie that this attack was trivial or meaningless (or that it's being sensationalized beyond its scope) are just appalled that you'd throw this woman under the bus for YOUR political purposes. We're calling you out for covering up the truth. This woman was very obviously attacked and she is very obviously telling her story. Try as you might, you have no ground to stand on when you accuse her or CBS of having ulterior motives. SHE WAS A FERVENT SUPPORTER OF YOUR REVOLUTION throughout and brought your cause before the American public. She was on your side in this conflict. It's absolutely absurd to accuse her of crafting this story to make you look bad. Get over yourselves. A woman was raped. Come to her aid and support her the way she came to your aid and supported your revolution.
"THERE WERE OVER 800 PEOPLE MURDERED DURING THE REVOLUTION AND EVEN MORE INJURED,BUT YOUR ONLY PROBLEM IS THIS WHITE BLONDE LADY?"
Oh, fuck you. Just fuck you. You are the racist here. You are the one trying to say we should ignore the rape of the white woman while we focus only on the sacrifices of Egyptians. Do you know how many foreign journalists were attacked trying to ensure your revolution succeeded? This many and more:
http://abcworldnews.tumblr.com/post/3089328425/weve-compiled-a-list-of-all-the-journalists-who
Americans were deeply moved by the losses of the Egyptian people and the cause of your revolution. For you to turn around and belittle the contribution of our journalists is insulting. You didn't achieve this alone. We're all proud of your efforts but without international pressure you'd have all been gunned down in the streets. Without the cameras, no one outside of Egypt would have even known or cared you were protesting.
"Where were all you moral hipocrites whem the AmnDawla fucked protesters in their ass?? You make me puke."
You are the only hypocrite here. The ONLY REASON you aren't holding this woman in high respect along with the many others who suffered for your freedom is because she is white. YOU ARE THE RACIST and you are the liar here.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteReader-supplied links enabled:
ReplyDeleteOK, Zeinobia deleted the reader link I enabled, so I am re-submitting this post without it. It was to a humorous but tasteless ebaum's world music video titled "I fisted a girl" and doubtless those who want to see it can Google it up. It is neither very explicit nor very funny, however. It has about 120,000 views.
Debbie Schlussel's take on the Lara Logan thing. She has contempt for Lara:
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/36514/lara-logan-liar-claims-she-didnt-know-muslims-abuse-women-300-muslims-raped-me-w-their-hands-for-40-mins/
@Anonymous 5/01/2011 02:05:00 AM I just strongly disagree that "raped with hands" means aggressive groping. I agree completely.
@Anonymous 5/01/2011 06:08:00 PM YOU ARE THE RACIST and you are the liar here. I agree completely. Uprisingworld is the racist.
@everyone, The 60 Minutes with Lara airs today I think so we may learn more.
I've avoided this group for a little while but I think this video lends some perspective so I'm posting it here. It's is a statement by rape victim advocate groups praising Lara Logan for speaking out about the assault: http://wusa9.com/news/article/148838/373/Victim-Advocates-Praise-Logan-For-Speaking-Out
ReplyDeleteShe's a brave and honorable woman and she deserves to be respected for how she's handled all of this and respected for how she's conducted herself throughout her entire career. She's a fine journalist.
She's going to tell her story on 60 Minutes tonight. There is no point in arguing about this much further. Unless some creep releases the video at some point, this should be the end of it for any rational person. She should have the final word on the matter.
In addition to Sunday's television broadcast , Logan will also appear in an interview on 60 Minutes' webcast, 60MinutesOvertime.com.
ReplyDeletehttp://frontpagemag.com/2011/02/21/a-war-crime-in-cairo/
ReplyDeleteNot to state the obvious, but this blog is inundated with trolls.
ReplyDeleteThey showed up after Logan spoke and have been lurking around ever since. These people are all Anonymous, have nothing to add to the conversation, don't appear to have heard of Temoris or read Zeinobia's blog for that matter, are just hanging around making bizarre accusations and for some unknown reason trying to convince people that this journalist is really great.
Latest reader links enabled.
ReplyDeleteRape victim advocate groups praising Lara Logan for speaking out about the assault: http://wusa9.com/news/article/148838/373/Victim-Advocates-Praise-Logan-For-Speaking-Out
FrontPage Mag calls the Logan case "A War Crime in Cairo": http://frontpagemag.com/2011/02/21/a-war-crime-in-cairo/
60 Minutes Overtime has a bit more detail than the earlier reports. Five minutes long. Logan in tears: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504803_162-20058581-10391709.html
If anyone finds a link to the full 60 Minutes episode, please post it.
Au contraire, Jules, I have read both Temoris and Zeinobia's blogs and quite frankly, I dismissed both of them. Temoris even states on another blog post, which you conveniently ignore, that he believes she was "viciously attacked." Viciously. Not, "jostled." Not "bumped." But VICIOUSLY. Now, why pray tell do you think he would use that term "viciously" if she was not "viciously attacked?" Or do you believe he is also just using "word play?"
ReplyDeleteTemoris' testimony is not first-hand, but is based on unreliable accounts. What about those witnesses who state she was repeatedly raped for over three hours? Why not include their testimony about what they stated they have witnessed? What about those witnesses who are counter to what you believe happened? Why not include those witnesses?
The fact of the matter is your assertion and by default Zeinobia's assertion that Logan is just making up the story is absolutely counter to everything that we do know of the assault, and events prior to the assault. Logan did not go to Cairo to do a slam-piece on the Egyptian protesters. The very same person you are conveniently throwing under the bus is the same person who was reporting the protests were a movement by a people who wanted self-determination and a representative voice in their government.
It was because of journalists like Logan who reported on the ground what they were seeing, that the MASSIVE move by interests like Fox News failed. Fox and the Right Wing who was doing everything they could to portray the movement as another Iranian Revolution. They tried to place Mubarak as the victim and the USA needed to help him CRUSH the protests. Logan reported the real scene, and it was because of journalists like her that the American people saw the truth.
Right now, Logan is telling what happened to her, and yes - her clothes were TORN off her. Your sickening attempt at using semantics to "desensationalize" what she went through is absolutely deplorable. And now, you want to bleat that the reason people are here is because they want to promote a right-wing agenda?
I'm sorry, jules - the reason I am here is to speak out against cretins like you who want to do everything they can to whitewash what happened to Logan. She sacrificed herself so that the truth could be heard. The least you can do is listen to what she says.