It is pouring video clips and statements from here and there.
I should have spoken earlier about that distrubing video, yes the video all Egypt was speaking about.: The IS' special video in Sinai.
From a week ago IS released a 30 minutes video showing its affiliated militant group " Agnad Beit Al-Maqdis" or "ABM" and their operations against the Egyptian army.
In an extremely graphic video showing several operations against armed forces , the ABM is showing off its capabilities whether in media or in combat. Using Go-Pro cameras installed on rifles and high definition quality video , these guys know how to make a short documentary to shake the morale of their enemy.
They included several of their operations against the army and police whether in North Sinai or even in North coast , in West of Egypt last summer. Yes the operations we know about and the operations we do not know about in daylight.
They also included horrifying footage from the deadly attack on an army checkpoint in Sheikh Zowaid last October where over 30 army personnel have been killed.
It is truly shocking and sad video. Heartbreaking to say the least.
The army said that it was investigating the video and its pro-media claimed that it was filmed by Hamas as usual. The sad reality is that the locals in Sinai identified those suspects who turned to be killed by the army from several weeks ago allegedly in some security against terrorist groups. I fear that we are losing our first and most important defense line in Sinai : The locals who are facing hell because of that war.
Committing human rights crimes won't help you in your war against terrorism , it has never been helpful and it won't be. Simply almost all terrorist groups in the Middle East flourish thanks oppression and lack of human rights. They present themselves as the savior for those oppressed. Part of winning the war against them is to fight all those reasons of their existance including oppression and injustice.
The videos filmed by ABM showed our soliders and officers untrained in a distrubing way forcing us to ask about their training. Needless to say this is a pscyhological warfare video so you expect your enemy to show you like that.
By the way the video does not show that ABM elements are highly trained either.
I know that our army , a conventional army is fighting an enemy that depends upon the gurriella warfare. Conventional armies rarely win guriella warfare as long as they do not go unconventional. I think the army people know that better than me .
Without doubt the video raises many questions about the military and security strategies adopted in Sinai and whether we are on the right track if there are any real strategies at all. If we were a truly democratic country with freely and democratic elected parliament with a true national security committee , we would have public hearings or even secret ones discussing those 30 minutes.
In any other country all those responisible for the Sinai file in the past decade including the president himself would be standing in hearing sessions to speak about what is happening in Sinai for real. All the ex-military turned in to Strategic analysts are claiming the video was actually a proof that the army is winning the war. The problem is that those are the same strategic analyts who are claiming that the whole universe is plotting against us.
If we were truly democratic country , our fellow Egyptians' blood would not be so cheap whether citizens from Sinai or security personnel.
The ABM video was removed from YouTube due its extreme graphic content but you can find it in other places.
This video comes after the announcement of Beit Al-Maqdis that it pledged alliagance to the notorious group claiming the Caliphate in Levant. ABM has changed its name now to become "Sinai state"
The video also comes after that mysterious unprecendent attack against the Egyptian navy in the Mediterranean sea. Up till this moment we do not know exactly what hapened on that day. The Egyptian armed forces' morale department has not issued a single official statement about what happened leaving it to rumors and speculations. We already got several theories and versions of what happened. All of them are scary.
The morale department has not officially issued an official statement about the attack at Sheikh Zowaid checkpoint either.
Aside from the daily statements at the Official spokesperson about the endless "elements" that are being killed and endless tunnels destroyed , the morale department released a video to fire back at the ABM's video.
The video is a production of old propaganda school and had mistakes like for instance using aerial footage of some air strike in Western desert instead of air strike in Sinai. The one who spotted that mistake were the social media users who checked the coordinations in the footage and found out it was in the West desert and not in Sinai.
Sometimes I feel that in this unconventional war , we do not need videos from Morale department to fire back at IS but rather video messages from groups like Mosireen.
Now Pro-regime "any regime in Egypt" Al-Mahawar TV network produced a pathetic TV ad starting a group of Egyptian celebs from actors , singers and TV hosts saying no to terrorism and to IS.
Of course in this ad we found out that terrorists killed Police General El-Batran , unleashed the great prison break on 28 January 2011 and killed Shiekh Emad Effat during the cabinet HQ clashes in December 2011. Yeah History is being edited in front of our eyes. Ministry of truth does not waste time in Cairo.
Anyhow that "No to terrorism" ad turned in to a meme among young Egyptians. It had to turn in to a meme with spoof videos. The video is actually a black comedy.
Needless to say , we are facing a media war and unfortunately we are losing it as usual. Our regime still thinks that is in 1960s not even in 1990s , we are in the 21st century.
I fear on Sinai and our people there whether from locals or security. I fear we will have another 1967 setback if we continue to use that 1960s mindset.
May God bless the souls of our martyrs.
I know that our army , a conventional army is fighting an enemy that depends upon the gurriella warfare. Conventional armies rarely win guriella warfare as long as they do not go unconventional. I think the army people know that better than me .
Without doubt the video raises many questions about the military and security strategies adopted in Sinai and whether we are on the right track if there are any real strategies at all. If we were a truly democratic country with freely and democratic elected parliament with a true national security committee , we would have public hearings or even secret ones discussing those 30 minutes.
In any other country all those responisible for the Sinai file in the past decade including the president himself would be standing in hearing sessions to speak about what is happening in Sinai for real. All the ex-military turned in to Strategic analysts are claiming the video was actually a proof that the army is winning the war. The problem is that those are the same strategic analyts who are claiming that the whole universe is plotting against us.
If we were truly democratic country , our fellow Egyptians' blood would not be so cheap whether citizens from Sinai or security personnel.
The ABM video was removed from YouTube due its extreme graphic content but you can find it in other places.
This video comes after the announcement of Beit Al-Maqdis that it pledged alliagance to the notorious group claiming the Caliphate in Levant. ABM has changed its name now to become "Sinai state"
The video also comes after that mysterious unprecendent attack against the Egyptian navy in the Mediterranean sea. Up till this moment we do not know exactly what hapened on that day. The Egyptian armed forces' morale department has not issued a single official statement about what happened leaving it to rumors and speculations. We already got several theories and versions of what happened. All of them are scary.
The morale department has not officially issued an official statement about the attack at Sheikh Zowaid checkpoint either.
Aside from the daily statements at the Official spokesperson about the endless "elements" that are being killed and endless tunnels destroyed , the morale department released a video to fire back at the ABM's video.
The video is a production of old propaganda school and had mistakes like for instance using aerial footage of some air strike in Western desert instead of air strike in Sinai. The one who spotted that mistake were the social media users who checked the coordinations in the footage and found out it was in the West desert and not in Sinai.
Sometimes I feel that in this unconventional war , we do not need videos from Morale department to fire back at IS but rather video messages from groups like Mosireen.
Now Pro-regime "any regime in Egypt" Al-Mahawar TV network produced a pathetic TV ad starting a group of Egyptian celebs from actors , singers and TV hosts saying no to terrorism and to IS.
Of course in this ad we found out that terrorists killed Police General El-Batran , unleashed the great prison break on 28 January 2011 and killed Shiekh Emad Effat during the cabinet HQ clashes in December 2011. Yeah History is being edited in front of our eyes. Ministry of truth does not waste time in Cairo.
Anyhow that "No to terrorism" ad turned in to a meme among young Egyptians. It had to turn in to a meme with spoof videos. The video is actually a black comedy.
Needless to say , we are facing a media war and unfortunately we are losing it as usual. Our regime still thinks that is in 1960s not even in 1990s , we are in the 21st century.
I fear on Sinai and our people there whether from locals or security. I fear we will have another 1967 setback if we continue to use that 1960s mindset.
May God bless the souls of our martyrs.
I sense the dismay in your piece and the criticism, of course, which I understand.
ReplyDeleteHowever, ot seems that Egypt, itself, is now associated with the regime. I'd have liked to see "May God bless Egypt," too, at the end of your piece. So let me say it: "May God bless Egypt" first and foremost.
Again it is tragedy:
ReplyDeleteMuslims Kill Muslims.
May God Save Our Country.
I read your column and got it's theme. The question is : why should our leaders trust you ? (by you I don't mean you personnally but rather the revolutionist movement)
ReplyDeleteIf you want to have influence you must first inspire trust. Unfortunately you have done everything possible to make it exceedingly difficult to begin to trust you. Since June 30, even before July 3, you all decided to declare war on the army while the army had done nothing against you. In front of the whole world, you attacked those who took every personal risk at the request of the anguished people of Egypt to save us all including you, from the brotherhood and islamist terror. You attacked them gratuitisly while, at the very least, they had done nothing against you. In doing so you added to their sense of being at risk personally. You attacked them from the very beginning of the people revolution on June 30 for the narcissist reason of giving a free reign to your visceral hate about them. By now you know: they got your message loud and clear.
You did not only lose their trust but also the trust of the majority of your compatriots because you appeared to be ready to throw us all under the bus in order to take revenge for Mahmoud Salem, forgetting your senseless own provocation of assaulting the MOI for a whole week because you objected to the people plea of having you, at long last, vacate Tahrir .
What did you want exactly on June 30 ? did you want the armed forces to keep quietly in their corner while you all would replace them in assuming the risk they took to defend us ? How many of you have paid your blood tax defending us since ? How many of you have denounced the brotherhood atrocities in their sit ins, their savage killings and atrocities in Kerdasa, Delga and the more than eighty burned churches ? You wanted us to believe you had a better solution while we all knew that at the end of the day you would line up with the terrorist brotherhood and islamists as you always do? You have a huge, huge redemption to achieve before we start to trust you again, if ever.
And that's too bad for all of us because once in a while you still have good ideas.
I hate to say it but this is a good argument. In fact, Z herself actually voted for Morsi.
DeleteI give this round to the anonymous commenter.
It is amazing how you did not get a single fact right. Since you are talking about trust, let's look at the facts. The free youth started the whole movement in 2011 while the army and police where the co-oppressors of the regime. Tantawy and Annan and their council took power, ruled for their own good and at the end made a deal with the Devil and brought the MB to power after a rigged election(in my opinion). Mean while they continued the same violations of human rights and made no attempts to restore humanity to Egyptians. The same thing happens in 2013, 30 million take to the streets, one man takes the fruit of all this. Again under the name of fighting terrorism, he violates every possible right for the Egyptian people. Using unconstitutional laws to arrest youths who dare question his practices and silencing the rest. Talking about the blood tax, how many died in 2011, in Maspiro and Mohammad Mahmoud while defending our rights to live free not to gain power? and you are still talking about trust. Get serious. Just remember one thing, the rule of law is what protects us from terrorist acts like Delga and Kerdasa, not the rule of dictators. Trust me this time, fair laws and human rights are a necessity not just empty words.
DeleteSisi and his idiot supporters are continuing to facilitate the destruction of Libya by arming militias and fomenting civil war and hatred in that country. They are getting very close to provoking genocide in the Nafusa Mountain range and apparently want to destroy the Amazigh cities in a stupid quest to help their proxies rule over a wasteland. Only the deluded believe that laying waste to Tripoli/Gharyan/Kikla/etc. and attacking civilian airport facilities has anything to do with stopping IS or AQ. These idiots just today attacked a residential area in Tripoli in the name of their own terroristic ideology.
ReplyDeleteSisi, like Putin, is an imperialist terrorist trying to encourage warfare in a neighboring country. He should cut off all arms shipments and training to forces fighting in western Libya. He definitely should not provide an sort of air support for terrorist attacks upon cities in western Libya.