Egypt's oldest pyramid's SOS

I can't wait till I fix my old laptop or get a new one to write this post. I want to write a comprehensive post about the disaster awaiting Egypt's oldest pyramid "The pyramid of Djoser" in Sakarra but I feel that I can not wait any longer.

Now I think you have read that the 4500 B.C years old pyramid of Djoser in Saqqara area, Giza may collapse because of bad restoration works that added more damage to the old amazing building that needs urgent rescue.

The pyramid Djoser by Heba El-Kholy

Earlier this week the UNSEC demanded the Egyptian government to present a full report about the situation of the pyramid and its condition after renovation or to be accurate during the unfinished disasterous restoration work

Of course the government or rather the minister of antiquities claims that there is nothing wrong with the pyramid and that those who are making a noise about it in Egypt are members in the Muslim Brotherhood who we're staying in Raba'a sit in !!! Yes the minister pulled the MB card as usual.

Al-Masry Al-Youm published a shocking report with photos about the whole tons of rocks fall now from that old pyramid

Also there are lots and lots of question marks about the company responsible for the restoration works , El-Shorbagy for restoration works which is a subsidiary of El-Shorbagy For constructions. Now despite the company claims to be Egypt's no.1 in antiquities' restoration while archeologists say the opposite. Needless to say I have never heard about it in restoration works.

Amazingly I listened to one of the managers from the company speaking about the pyramid in Akhar Kalam TV show on ONTV show and aside from being weak in his answers , we found out that the company did not have a full map or a blue print of the pyramid and that they did not know about the different paths inside the pyramid or the old wells outside it !!

This is just the tip of the ice-berg. I am mad and fierce because besides everything wrong in this crazy country we got one of the oldest pyramids on the verge of collapse because of lack of transparency, corruption and incompetence.

We cry about how evil IS destroy monuments in Syria and Iraq while we destroy Egypt's world heritage. This pyramid is not owned alone by Egypt but it is owned by world heritage. It is not just a pyramid but rather another leap in human civilization and our government is destroying it by its usual incompetence.

 

 

 

 

#Dyingtolive : They are still on hunger strike

The group of hunger strikers from detainees and Prisoners in Egyptian prisons are still insisting to complete their strike despite the regime and media's neglect.

Mohamed Soltan has hit a record in his hunger strike , unprecedented in Egyptian history with 242 days. Of course the price he has to pay for this or rather his freedom is health if not his life. Soltan's life is in extreme danger now. His family could not see him last week at prison and the court adjourned his case as usual refusing to release him for health condition pending the trial.

As he is the son of outspoken controversial MB preacher Soltan does not find a lot of support in Egyptian media outside the young activists-sphere. I am extremely worried about his life now.

Nevertheless sometimes I believe even if there is a huge noise for him like famous activist Ahmed Douma who is imprisoned for breaking the unconstitutional protest law and also on a hunger strike, he would face the same treatment like Douma. Douma's requests to be transferred to hospital are rejected. His request to the court panel of his cabinet hq clashes "December 2011" is also rejected.

Douma has been hunger strike for a month now. Earlier today the ministry of interior "MOI" claimed that he stopped his strike but his wife Nourhan Hafzy denied that. I believe Nourhan more than the MOI with its long history of lying.

El-Sisi claimed that in New York that there were freedoms of expression and media ..etc in Egypt, I do not know what to say that the world is small village now and he cannot fool anyone with slogans that only work with his local supporters in Egypt

Reminder the strikers will continue their hunger strike till their release and the cancellation of the protest law. It is worth to mention after US Secretary of State John Kerry there was a strong talk that the protest law would be amended within days but soon enough we know officially it will remain as it is.

 

Welcome to the New Egypt

For the first time ads and billboards about Egypt show up in New York's times square this week. The same week where president Abdel Fattah El-Sisi is in the Big Apple participating in the UNGA summit. The ads show the pyramids,Suez Cana and an ancient Egyptian temple with the words "peace , prosperity, growth" over the big bold words : The new words {The New Egypt}

I see this back in Cairo and I wonder what new Egypt they are speaking about when the same old faces of Mubarak regime are renovating themselves in a new presidential cult era.

I wonder what kind of peace , prosperity and growth we will have in Egypt when a police state is being enforced day after day through a set of laws restricting freedoms of expression , media and assembly as well press and NGO funding. Thousands of detainees are arrested because of unconstitutional law and hundreds are sentenced to death in highly politicalized trial and TV shows are cancelled because of censorship while the newspapers are demanded by the president to stop criticizing the government. That new Egypt is quite promising !!

Since when police state or military state has ever brought peace or prosperity or growth throughout history for real not to mention in country suffering of corruption for decades. Freedom and democracy bring peace and prosperity as well growth and we got many examples in the world

These ads and billboards in New York City are allegedly paid by steel tycoon Ahmed Abu Hashima who is in NY also to support the new president. Abu Hashima is really smart , he managed to sort his matters during Mohamed Morsi's rule striking deals now with the Turkish and Qatari businessmen and now he is supporting the Field Marshal strongly in the States.

 

Posted with Blogsy

These are the law enforcement men

Last week we knew that a local police force attacked a small village in the heart of Miniya governorate. The small population of that remote village "Gabl El-Tir" is mostly Christian.That local police force stormed the houses of the citizens there smashing doors, destroying furniture and attacking the people whether they are women or children or elderly.

They rounded up the men and youth whose hands were tied to their backs. In the village's public square the police mocked the men and called them "infidels" and "animals" beating them in front of their wives and children.
All this started from two weeks ago when a Christian housewife mother of 5 suddenly disappeared and as usual we got the same old story that a Muslim man "who is a friend of her husband" from another village seduced her. Last week a group of angry Christian youth protested at Samalout police station against the neglect of the authority to the case.
They hurled rocks at the police vehicles and destroyed the facade of the police station as I understand in a failed attempt to storm it. Fourteen protesters were arrested in that incident.
Then came the collective punishment to the citizens of "Gabel El-Tir" , the revenge of the police force in Samalout.

The people of the village spoke to the media but no one listens because we are in war on terrorism least we become like Syria and Iraq. Well Christians in Egypt are attacked in their villages but not by crazy extremists but rather policemen !!!!!!!
According to friends in Upper Egypt , this is the not the first time something like that happens. A similar incident happened in Sohag governorate also from couple of weeks ago in a small village. The villagers in that Sohag village mostly from Muslims and currently the elderly are trying to contain the anger of the people.
Now according to what I know about Upper Egypt , I will say that anger is not contained but is kept to one hell rainy day.
Nothing in the Egyptian laws or traditions justify what happened in Miniya or in Sohag and yes I am bringing up the traditions as we speak about Upper Egypt where the traditions rule. In fact such attacks against whole villages and innocent people including women,children and elderly usually cause tribal fights that can keep going on for days if the elderly do not interfere wisely.
The police thinks in this way it restores that fearful status it had in Egypt more than the law and order after the 25 January revolution. It does not care that much about the law and order ,it cares more about that state of fear. Donot be shocked but many policemen in Egypt believe that the only way to deal with the people is through fear and discipline.
Of course I can not neglect the "infidels" part, this part shows a clear sectarian problem whether you like or not , yes our law enforcement men got some serious sectarian problem
The head of Miniya security directorate defended his men and said the people started by attacking the police first. Now Christian activists demanded that he would be held accountable and to be dismissed. Something many believe that it won't happen.
In the end many people believe that this incident will be forgotten and no body will be held accountable officially. Of course just imagine a similar incident to happen to Christians in Egypt during the time of Morsi and the anger it would produce in the media and how the media is acting modestly now.

Posted with Blogsy

#DyingtoLive : The hunger strike goes on

The hunger strike launched by a group of detained of political activists including Alaa Abdel Fattah is stil going strong , even after the release of Abdel Fattah, Wael and Nouby.

Over 100 activist inside and outside the Egyptians prisons as well inside and outside Egypt are on hunger strike now demanding the release of the detainees imprisoned because of the unconstitutional protest law as well its cancellation.

Now I can not ignore the health condition of the hunger strikers. US Egyptian detainee Mohamed Soltan is in very critical health condition according to his family that failed to see earlier this week along with a representative from the US embassy. Supposedly the Tora prison gave them a permit to visit him tomorrow. Now Soltan needs to be transferred to a hospital, a real hospital not a prison's hospital. Mohamed Soltan has been on a hunger strike for more than 230 days now.

Nasserite activist Ahmed Douma who has been on a hunger strike also needs to be transferred to hospital immediately. There are lots of pleas to transfer him but the government is not interested.

Interestingly after the visit of John Kerry and his statement that his talks with the Egyptian regime included amending the protest law , now it became a matter of fact that the Egyptian government would announce amending the infamous law sooner. Yes ministers and officials speak about amending the law shamelessly publicly in Egypt. Some speculate that it will happen within days .I think it has to do with El-Sisi's visit to New York.

Nevertheless that unprecedented hunger strike plays a role as a pressure.

I know this post is not comprehensive as usual but I still got no laptop and I blog using an ipad instead.

 

 

Posted with Blogsy

Alaa and the rest of the #Shura detainees are released "Updated"

Huge development I didnot expect to be honest. A Cairo criminal court has ordered the release of Alaa Abdel Fattah , Wael Metawally and Ahmed Abdel Rahman "Nouby" aka the Shura council clashes detainees on bail. The court also referred the personal videos shown in court by prosecution illegally to prosecutor general to be investigated in order to know who was responsible for this scandal.

Alaa and Wael happy in cage by Sherif Abdel Kaddous

Here is a video for the session.
The court's judges also decided to step down for embarrassment. Ok now an explanation for all this.
Alaa and 24 other protesters and activists were sentenced 15 years in jail for breaking the protest law , assaulting police officers and stealing a walki-talkie as well in absentia.
This is the photo of the day indeed.

The happiness of the Abdel Fattah family "Ravy Shaker"

Alaa was sentenced 15 years in jail because of unconstitutional protest law that many demand now either to be amended or to be cancelled.

Mona Seif hugging another girl in court today
"Sherif Abdel Kaddous"

Alaa Abdel Fattah , Ahmed Abdel Rahman and Wael Matewally were arrested outside the court on that day and were sent to prison. The absentia means there would be a retrial and according to the law the defendants can be released in the retrial.

The rest of the defendants in the case
"Sherif Abdel Kaddous"

For months we had this retrial with lots and lots of adjournments.Alaa demanded the judges panel to step down because he didnot trust the judge who was accused of elections fraud during the judicial supervision of elections 2005 if I am not mistaken.

Of course you know that Alaa's renowned lawyer Ahmed Seif El-Islam passed away from two weeks ago.

Nouby with the victory sign in the cage
by Mohamed El-Shahed/AFP

The last session of the retrial was full drama starting with the contradicting eye witnesses' testimonies " from police officers" to the video news reports that prove nothing to the fact that the Egyptian prosecution used personal videos taken from Alaa's personal laptop without any right to incriminate the prominent activist. One of those videos was showing Manal Hassan, Alaa's wife dancing in some family event !!!
Showing the personal videos in the court illegally by the prosecution made many people angry.
When security forces stormed Alaa's house last year arresting him and physically assaulting his wife ,the laptops in his house were confiscated without any prosecution's warrant.
It is worth to mention last session Alaa want to address the court but the court refused to listen to his word which was published online. His letter was an emotional eloquent demand to the judge to release him pending the trial and to step demand.
Podcaster Matar El-Ghawai presented it in audio, it was great. Alaa has been on a hunger strike demanding his release for more than 20 days. Nouby has been on hunger strike for 20 days while 'Wael Matewelly has been on hunger strike for about 4 days if I am not mistaken.
Now Alaa , Nouby and Wael will be released today inshallah after paying the LE 15000 bail each. I am so happy for real.

 Updates : 

• The trio was released earlier from Tora prison and they went to their homes. 

Alaa with his mom "Unknown source"

• Needless to say they look fragile and thin. Here is Nouby below among his friends in Abdeen , downtown Cairo. As you can see he lost a lot of weight.

Nouby among friends by Nazly Hussein 

• Here is a video by Nazly Hussein showing Nouby and his reception in Abdeen 

• Here is the photo of Wael Matewally following his release with famous Egyptian blogger Mahmoud Salem aka Sandmonkey. Matewally lost a lot of weight too. 

Wael Matewally with a friend and Mahmoud Salem
"Sandmonkey"

• The hunger strike is still on , yes Mona and Alaa as well other activists announced that they will continue the hunger strike till the release of all detainees imprisoned because of the protest law and the amendment or cancellation of that unconstitutional law. 
• Alaa is back to his family and he is tweeting in solidarity with other political detainees on hunger strike like Ahmed Douma who is extremely sick. Here is the photo of Alaa with his wife Manal by his sister Mona Seif 

By Mona Seif 

• Alaa tweeted the following hours after his release calling for the freedom of all detainees.

الحرية لكل المعتقلين. و احنا اللي دهنا الهوا دوكو و خليناه يتنحى بعدها. و تصبحوا على خير وحشني حضن مراتي
— Alaa Abd El Fattah (@alaa) September 15, 2014

• Ahmed Douma and. Mohamed Soltan are extremely sick. Mohamed Soltan was transferred to the ICU but Douma has not been transferred to hospital despite He should.Douma's wife Nourhan Hazy's issued an emotional plea to El-Sisi to release her sick husband. 

Posted with Blogsy

#EgyHungerstrike : Dying to live

For weeks now the the hunger strike movement started from few weeks in different Egyptian jails by political detainees accused in cases related to the infamous protest law has gained more supporters.

Today it is being escalated with tens of journalists and activists declaring their partial strike at the journalists syndicate demanding the cancellation of the unconstitutional protest law.

More people from activists , journalists and youth are joining the hunger strike as well pro-Jan26 revolution parties " The Constitution party , Strong Egypt Party, the Popular current , The bread and liberty party, Thr Egyptian social Democratic Party, the popular socialist alliance" and movements like April 6 Youth movement and Revolutionary Socialists.

Despite the hunger strike movement originally started earlier this year by detainees like Abdullah El-Shamy " who is free now" and Mohamed Soltan who became an icon , the hunger strike gained media attention with the announcement of Alaa Abdel Fattah that he would start a hunger strike to object his imprisonment. The movement is now called "جبنا آخرنا" {we had enought} quoting the prominent blogger activist who was sent to jail during the time of Mubarak, SCAF, Morsi and now El-Sisi.

Abdel Fattah was followed by other activists and protesters including his sister Sana'a imprisoned in protest law related cases.

Here are some numbers and names related to the hunger strike :

• Today September 13 there are 60 detainees in Egyptian prisoners are on full and partial hunger strike.
• Outside the prisons there are 80 citizens who started full hunger strike.
• There is hunger strike movement in Tora prison , Al-Qantar prison, Qena general prison , Fayoum prison, Abu Zabaal prison.
• The most prominent figures in that strike : Mohamed Sultan "226 days- has been transferred to the ICU" , Ibrahim Yamani "154 days" , Alaa Abd Fattah "26 days" , Nouby "18 days" , Sanaa Abdel Fattah "15 days" and Ahmed Douma "15 days".
• There are detained journalists participating in the hunger strike Ahmed Gamal Ziyad "who works in Yaqeen network" and Mahmoud Abu Zaid "Shawkan, the freelance photographer"

Now we got a movement that can't be ignored. In the end I want to say that those young people who are thrown in jail demanding liberty and democracy are dying so we can live in a better Egypt.

Here is a photo gallery from the event at the journalists' syndicate.

}

 

Posted with Blogsy

Well They are all canals after all

And I did not write a single post about the so-called New Suez Canal project because I feel I have not fully understood all the project's details technically but I can not keep myself from this.

Egypt's Post authority issued a special stamp commemorating the new canal.The stamp is sold for two pounds.

Amazingly the new canal got the same design of Panama Canal !!!!! The photo of Panama Canal being used to celebrate the new canal.

Ferdinand de Lesseps could not be much happier to see his plans like that !!!

By this is not a new Suez Canal , it is only a new branch to the original canal and it is not the first one of its kind there so I do not understand this craze in the media that reminds me with the Toshka project.

Or to be honest somehow I understand , El-Sisi is simply searching for a Mega-project to associate his name with. The problem is that before spending billions on mega-projects , he should spend millions on upgrading and re-building our basic infrastructure. In fact mega-projects need a strong infrastructure. Historically the modern infrastructure of Egypt whether Electricty to telegrams to railways were all associated with old Suez Canal.

Another point the New Suez Canal bonds issued by the government , I am not amazed about the billions Egyptians are keeping for rainy days as much as I am amazed that nobody in the government cares that the internal debt is increasing madly with those bonds.

 

Posted with Blogsy

1600 square kilometres in Sinai

And Egypt has officially denied the rumors spread in Israeli and Palestinian media that El-Sisi proposed a plan to Mahmoud Abbas aka Abu Mazen, the head of the Palestinian authority by which Egypt gives up 1600 square kilometres from Sinai to Palestinians especially the Palestinian refugees. The Palestinian authority also denied these rumors officially.

Now interestingly the source of that rumor was The Israeli army radio according to Jerusalem post  about the so-called El-Sisi's proposal and quoted Israeli officials who praised it as it were real.

I do not think that the Israeli officials are fool enough to believe that El-Sisi is going to propose Sinai or any part of it to the Palestinians and so I am amazed at how the Israeli media is covering the matter as if El-Sisi actually proposed it.

Of course the Egyptian state has not got the best record when it comes to honesty but there are red lines any Egyptian president knows not to cross. El-Sisi is not a fool to propose such a proposal except if he wants a revolution or coup.

The Israeli tweeps are actually attacking Egyptians on twitter just for saying that Egypt officially denied this.

Amazingly since the time of Mubarak we had this rumor with the same 1600 square kilometer. Here is a scan from Nationalist Weekly "Al Osboa" of Mostafa Bakry that goes back to year 2005 about that awful scenario Israel was trying to push and force allegedly on Egypt : To give 1600 square kilometres from Sinai to the Palestinians to solve the problem of Palestinians especially the refugees once and for all.

The Arab regimes fight #IS or So They say

The Arab ministers of foreign affairs held an emergency meeting today in Cairo where they declared that they would fight ISISI/ISL/IS with all possible ways joining officially that international coalition forming to fight the pseudo caliphate in Levant.

It is a good decision but one must ask : How will these countries fight IS when their regimes , their dictatorship corrupted regimes helped in founding such organization and feed it with angry fighters ??

How will these countries fight IS and its thought ? I am not speaking about the military police solution that has never put an end in our time to radical terrorist groups and the examples are many worldwide starting with Nazis , Taliban and Al-Qaeda. I am speaking about the social remedies.

Are we going to fool ourselves that IS' radicalism is another product of the Wahabi thought originated in Saudi Arabia and spread throught the Gulf money and media ? Are we going to fool ourselves and neglect the fact that our sheikhs and our political regime reject to modernize the religious discourse as well political discourse for fear they would lose power over the masses ?? Are we going to fool ourselves on how the Shiites are attacks in the mainstream media as agents of Iran and how for decades the Kurds are considered evil Israeli supporters who want to divide Iraq ? Do I need to speak about women's rights in the Arab world ? Do I need to speak about the human rights records of the Arab countries when it comes to freedoms ?

Watch this : #ISIS is our daughter

I want to write about ISIS or ISIL or IS or whatever you like to call it but unfortunately I do not have the time now. Thankfully Saudi tweep Abdel Rahman Shehri made an interesting video discussing nearly the same ideas I wanted to discuss about the world's last nightmare.The video is called ISIS is our daughter and please watch it till the end.

By the way all respect to British Muslims who attacked IS for real and without fear.

Posted with Blogsy

Where were you when the lights went off in Egypt ?

First of all I have got an announcement to make , my laptop is technically dead and I am searching for a new one now so there will be less posts in the blog for the time being till I buy a new one. I am currently using my ipad for blogging and actually it is a hard thing to maintain a blog through your tablet. "Blogger app is still behind wordpress app as expected :/ " 

Anyhow I should stop complaining when we got bigger issues in the country , I mean since early morning Egypt reached the peak of power outage this summer with our grand nationwide power outage that started from 6.30 am Thursday morning in Cairo and spread all over the country. The power outage affected Cairo , Giza , Suez, Alexandria and various parts of delta and nearly 5 governorates in North Upper Egypt. 

I woke up this morning to find I got no water and later no electricty. Yes many people suffered from water cuts as well because water supply stations in Cairo and Giza needed power and it took hours before they were re-operated by additional diesel fueled generators. 

Of course many houses have got no water up till now because they got roof water supply storage which is operated by electricty . Yes up till that late hours many Egyptians in Cairo and outside it suffer from constant power outages after the major morning power outage. 

The economic losses of the day are far more than anyone estimated for real. The financial losses in Suez where we got Red Sea ports as well Suez Canal itself and heavy industries factories like steel have reportedly reached to one billion Egyptian pound !! Yes one billion and this is one small governorate, imagine Cairo and Giza. 

Already today while in work I tried to order food from two restaurants, both suffered from power outages for hours. Not all the shops and restaurants have bought emergency power generators or even can afford or find diesel easily.

Of course financial losses can not be compared to the human losses, people were scared on the patients in the ICU in public hospitals as well babies in neonatal units. 

The only bright side in that dark outage was that the power was cut for some hours at Egypt's media production city and some TV channels from those spreading hate and lies all the past months were off the air for couple of hours. 

It is unprecedented nationwide outage. We have not seen something since 1990 despite all the outages we suffer from through out the the summer season in the past 5 years. 

For  the record the minister of electricty Ahmed Shaker apologized to the Egyptian people for the power outage , a thing that is considered rare in our Egyptian governmental culture. Shaker announced today that Egypt's electricty production went from 20,000 megawatts to 10,000 megawatts !!! Yes by the half suddenly. 

Needless to say there was technical talk about what caused that huge outage. At first some officials were speaking about what they called " a maneuver" to shift loads that went wrong !! Then hours later they began to speak about some technical malfunction. 

Of course the Pro-ElSisi supporters claim as usual that that devious plan made by the Muslim Brotherhood agents in the ministry of electricty despite the ministry of electricty officials and electric companies "following the state" across the state made it clear that preliminary investigations showed that it was a technical malfunction and not a terrorist attack.

From what I read and understood that outage was going to happen sooner or later. The outage problem in Egypt is not caused only by lack of fuel or high electricty consumption I am afraid but mainly because our electric grid and Electricty power stations are extremely old and need to be upgraded. Those old stations can not take it anymore just like the rest of the infrastructure in Egypt. 

Already before we speak and invest billions in mega-projects , why we should invest first in upgrading our infrastructure.Already I know mega-projects need a strong infrastructure in the first place !?!!

Right on Democracy Track Indeed

Many people are speaking now that Egypt is on the right track of democracy and when I hear this I wonder where that democracy path they are speaking about already !!

I do not think that we are on the path of democracy at all in Egypt and there are many indicators that we are on the opposite direction starting from the laws issued to regulate the so-called for political life.
Starting with the Protest law or rather the anti-protest law issued last November and caused the imprisonment of thousands so far. 

That law does not affect protesters alone , in fact it affects political parties also because it regulates political assembly. Now parties need to be granted the permission of the ministry of interior if it wants to organize any sort of public assembly or public meeting. 

I don't think that the MOI will approve opposition meetings  in the streets during the elections for instance. 

In new born democracies such law does not exist , of course the government insists that our current protest law is not different than protests laws in the states or European countries forgetting the simple fact that those countries are established stable democracies not corrupted failed states. 

#FreeAJAStaff : Sawiris demands the release of Fadel

Egyptian renowned businessman Naguib Sawiris  demanded in video message the release of Mohamed Fahmy Fadel , the Al Jazeera International TV channel's  Cairo bureau currently imprisoned in Egypt.

Naguib Sawiris is asking the president to pardon Mohamed Fadel insisting that he is a good patriot Egyptian who was just doing his job without breaking any law. He also insisted that Fadel was not working in the evil Al Jazeera Mubshar Misr inciting hatred but rather Al Jazeera International.

Updated thanks to Andrew Reid : Interestingly enough Sawiris defended the government decision to arrest Fadel , Baher and Greste in a CNN interview last January !! 

This is the second video made by Egyptian celebrity demanding the release of Mohamed Fadel.
By the way I hope that people pay attention to the rest of the defendants in the case like Peter Greste , Baher Mohamed and the students who were sentenced in the case.

I wish that he mentioned them in the video as well. Please do not forget the others