What happened to Apple's FaceTime in Egypt ??

Move aside dear Signal because it seems that Apple's FaceTime is blocked in the country as well.
Since the beginning of the week, Apple's iPhone users in Egypt reported that they can not FaceTime in the country anymore.
I tried twice with a friend of mine two days in a row and found the following:

Apple's FaceTime and its big moment in the Middle East
last year in Turkey

You can call your contact whether using video or voice chat and he or she will receive that call.
Once he or she answers the call, you can not see or hear her or him.
You can see yourself only if you are having a video chat.
This is what we have concluded from our experience.
We tried this on TEData Wi-Fi and Orange mobile networks.
I do not know about Etisalat and Vodafone thought.
If you are iPhone user in Egypt , please try it and share your experience in the comments section. 

Egypt returns back to the state of emergency

Late Sunday following the terrorist attacks on Egyptian Orthodox cathedrals that killed at least 46 in Alexandria and Tanta, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi held an urgent meeting for Egypt's National Defense council.

Hours following the meeting, El-Sisi addressed the Egyptian people in a recorded speech telling to "bear the pain" criticizing at the same time the terrorist attack's coverage in mainstream media.
He also announced that he gave his orders to the Egyptian armed forces to help the police in protect vital infrastructures and facilities.

Then President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi announced the emergency law in Egypt after following the legal conditions

Once again, we are back to the emergency law.
Technically, we lived under emergency law in Egypt in most of our lives in the 20th Century.
We have been living under the state of emergency for the past 83 years. From the 1910s till 2010s, we got only 17 years in total we have lived without the state of emergency.

It is like a curse left by the British occupation just like the infamous bureaucracy that we can not get rid of it.
On Monday, PM Ismail Sherif announced that State of emergency would be in effect starting at 1 PM Cairo local nationwide.
At the same time, he announced that he sent to the House of Representatives asking its members to approve the State of emergency.

President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi on Sunday at the National
defense council meeting "Egyptian Presidency" 

According to the constitution's article no.154, the House of Representatives must approve within 7 days on the State of emergency.
Just as all the country expected on Monday that the parliament would approve the state of emergency, its speaker and MPs surprised us by sending the Tiran and Sanafir agreement to the legislative committee and approving the amendments to the protest law.
Yup, against all odds the Parliament speaker sent the Tiran and Sanafir agreement to the legislative at 2.05 PM Cairo despite the High Administrative court order.

The Martyrs of Policewomen force in Egypt : Remember their names

Among the 46 martyrs killed who lost their lives in those suicide bombing attacks targeting Egyptian Christians in Tanta and Alexandria on Palm Sunday.
Those three ladies are the first Egyptian policewomen to die on duty as well in a terrorist attack.
Here is a quick post with the names and pictures of those ladies.

Police Colonel Nagwa El-Hagar

The first woman to die in that horrifying suicide attack was Colonel Nagwa Abdel Allim El-Hagar.

Late Colonel Nagwa with her son 

Abdel was married to a police general and had two young. The eldest son is a police officer as well.
Sadly , it turned out that her second son died in less than a year. He joined the police academy like his father, mother and brother.
Her younger son passed away while training in a sports club in Alexandria.
He did not die in a terrorist attack as some Pro-Police/army/Sisi/regime Facebook pages claimed.

Police corporal Asmaa Hussein

The Black Palm Sunday "Updated with videos"

From Tanta's Cathedral 

This Sunday, millions of Christians around the globe celebrated the Palm Sunday and the start of the Holy Week. In Egypt and the Arab world, Arab Christians and Churches call the Holy week in Arabic "The Pains week".

This Sunday was officially the start of "Pains week" in Coptic Orthodox Churches in Egypt in a sad irony.

As you may have known, two Egyptian Churches were attacked earlier in two different cities during the Palm Sunday. At least 40 people killed and over 100 others were injured in both attack.
At 9.05 AM Tanta local time, the first explosion took place at St.George Cathedral in Tanta city.

According to early reports, the explosion took place at the first and front rows full of men during the Palm Sunday service.

Already the Palm Sunday service started at 6 AM and should have ended at 12 PM.
It never ended because of the explosion that killed over 29 people and injured not less 70 others.
Here is the moment when the explosion took place on the CCTV as aired on TV channels.

#سيناء24 قناة العربية تبث لحظة انفجار كنيسة مارجرجس في طنطا، ويأتي الانفجار قبل أيام من زيارة سيقوم بها بابا الفاتيكان، فرنسيس، لمصر pic.twitter.com/Rrb1qeDaKs

— سيناء 24 NEWS (@newsinai24) April 9, 2017

The victims include a judge, doctors, some members of the Church Choir, grandfathers and fathers.

The victims of Tanta bombing from
Tanta Cathedral 

The photos and video resurfaced online showed horrifying scenes. Reports also came speaking about a severe head that most probably belongs to the Suicide bomber.
The St. George Cathedral is considered the biggest church in the Nile Delta governorate.
Interestingly, from 12 days ago the Cathedral which hosts the bishopric of Tanta spoke about how security forces dealt with an unknown suspicious object found in front of it.

Egyptian X-Files : Who sent that SMS ?

I want to write about that war crime in Syria as well El-Sisi's historical visit to D.C
I also want to finish that report about the new media empires in Egypt and at the same time upload tons and tons of pictures and videos to share with you.

Yet suddenly something happens in Egypt to change all your plans.

The SMS 

On Tuesday evening, many Egyptians got on their mobile phones a strange news SMS that in other countries can turn things upside down.

At 9.41 PM Cairo local time, Subscribers of Al-Watan Daily Newspaper' Breaking News SMS service received a message claiming that Pro-Ahmed Shafik army commanders started a military coup.
Yes, the subscribers of the Pro-regime Daily Newspaper got that SMS puzzling them. The country was quiet and everything was normal on Wednesday. Yes, the President is abroad but things are calm.

Honestly, I was worried that something would happen at night.
President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi is currently visiting Washington and he met with Trump on Monday.
Soon, Al-Watan newspaper said that its Breaking News SMS service was hacked and hacker sent that SMS.

The newspaper's publisher Mohamed Al-Amin is said to be currently in the United States as part of the media delegation covering El-Sisi's visit to D.C. I can imagine him after knowing what happened back in Cairo.

Seen in Alexandria : The Naval unknown solider memorial

Seen in Alexandria : The Naval unknown Solider Memorial.
Originally built as memorial to Khedive Ismail by the Italian community in Alex , the memorial's status changed to become for Egypt 's fallen Naval soldiers after the 1952 coup/revolution exactly in 1964.
There used to be a statue for the Khedive in the middle. It was removed and transferred to Alexandria's faculty of art.
The Memorial is under the supervision and care of Egypt's Navy forces.
Alexandria hosts Egypt's main naval bases for its navy fleet.

From Instagram's Egyptian Chronicles 

Tiran and Sanafir isles : Back to the courts fight "Updated"

The Egyptian two red sea islands are back to the court on Sunday in Cairo as the Urgent matters said the Egypt's Supreme administrative court had no jurisdiction over the decision to hand Tiran and Sanafir islands to Saudi Arabia in a new episode of the Isles saga.

The urgent court's verdict does not say whether the isles are Egyptian or Saudi but it says that the Supreme Administrative court has no jurisdiction over the whole matter.

President Sisi and King Salman at the Dead sea last week
"SPA" 

Thus, it annuals accordingly the Supreme Administration Court's final Non-appealable verdict in January rejecting the government's appeal and upholding the original verdict to annual the Egyptian Saudi demarcation deal.
In case you forget from a year ago , in April 2016 the Egyptian and Saudi governments announced a new maritime demarcation deal, by which places the strategic Tiran and Sanafir Red Sea island under Saudi sovereignty.
In last December and against the court orders and public rejections, the Egyptian government sent the agreement to the Parliament to approve it.
In January, the Supreme administrative court issued its historical verdict annulling the agreement.
Despite the court orders, the government or rather the regime is insisting on going forward with the deal and decided to challenge the verdict in front of the court of urgent matter as well the Supreme Constitutional court directly and indirectly.

What do I mean about "indirectly"?
Well, I mean lawsuits filed by concerned citizens against the Supreme Administrative Court's verdict  with no direct relation to the government just like our case here.
Suddenly, we found "concerned citizen" and lawyer Ashraf Farahat filling a lawsuit in front of Cairo Urgent Matters court claiming that the Supreme Administrative court has no jurisdiction over the Islands case.
Already it is a known game for the government since the time of Mubarak and his National Democratic Party "NDP", if the administrative court annuls the results of parliamentary elections, a concerned citizen goes to the court of urgent matters to stop this verdict.
Do not ask about the legality or constitutionality of this because the law and the constitution are the last things to be respected in this matter.