The deal of the century : Feeling angry, helpless and frustrated

I am angry and frustrated.

I already knew that the so-called deal of the century to solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in the Mideast by Trump and his son-in-law administration would be so bad.

I did not expect anything good from it but it still feels like humiliation seeing Trump speaking about “Aqua Mosque” in reference to “Al-Aqsa Mosque” which is the third holiest site for Muslims.

But still, it was like a slap to the face. After all, we got a US president who believes that Arab countries should apologize for fighting Israeli Zionist gangs in 1948 too !!

It is a sad irony to find the current US administration and Israel determine the fate of millions of people without a true real representation of those people aka Palestinians and please do not tell me that the Palestinians did not want to go because since day one Trump and his son-in-law do not’ recognize Palestinian people as humans in the first place.

They do not know or do not even recognize the fundamental fact that the Palestinian people have the right of self-determination.

I feel angry and helpless as Egyptian, Arab, Muslim and above them a human to see the map of Palestine according to that Plan and you find how Palestine dissolves and disappears !!

Palestine and how it is dissolving since 1947 

This is just the tip of the iceberg, I have not gone yet deeper in the 181-pages plan on the White House website.

Needless to say, this anger and frustration are shared by millions of Arabs and Muslims who followed the news Tuesday evening around the globe and you can know that by checking the social media.

Heliopolis’ great trees massacre : Be ready for bridges

“ There are many things to laugh about in Egypt but it is laughter that is close to crying” famous Iraqi medieval poet Al-Mutanabbi once said in one of his poems about Egypt describing in a perfect sense this unique black comedy situation we have had from a long time.

I remember this verse when I read the news about how the current minister of environment Yasmine Fouad decided to designate the month of January in Egypt as the month of afforestation.
The environment ministry launched a nationwide campaign for afforestation called “Be ready for the green” or “Live Green” or as in Arabic “اتحضر للاخضر”

It is never too late to launch such campaign but at the same time, it comes when Cairo’s upscale Heliopolis has witnessed a sad trees genocide.

A before and after photo for a street in Heliopolis
"Ghadeer El-Rafeey"  

In the past three months, the government and Cairo governorate decided to build not less than 9 bridges in what so-called the “Masr El-Gadida or Heliopolis development plan”.
The project is implemented by the army’s Engineering Authority which is racing to finish those bridges as soon as possible as it seems.

The plan included widening the streets in the district turning some of those streets into highways in the heart of residential areas.

To make this happen in 100 days in order to have a rapid achievement, the government and the governorate wiped out almost all the green spaces and garden islands in Heliopolis.

According to the citizens of Heliopolis, not less than 90 Feddans of green spaces were wiped out completely in that plan.

#Jan25 …. in Baghdad … in Beirut and in Cairo

It is 25 January 2020, folks

In Cairo, there is a huge security presence and the police forces are celebrating their national day by distributing flowers and sweets on the public.

There is a huge security alert because on the virtual world, Long time army contractor/one-time actor/whistleblower/political activist in exile Mohamed Ali called for a huge revolution on that day.

Unsurprisingly it did not happen and Ali declared that he quit politics and he will focus on construction as well as his acting career.
Despite the majority of the people know that there will be no anti-regime massive protests, the authorities are worried because last September no one would have imagined that some people would go and chant against the regime after all those years.

Needless to say, the mainstream media is celebrating only the day as the Police National Day while all the TV hosts are cursing the revolution and it is not a shock anymore
There is no big change on how the media covers the media now, in fact, I will be surprised if the mainstream media speaks nicely about the 2011 revolution.

There is sadness and despair that the January revolution did not make it as it should. I am trying not to fall in to this as much as I can “I will be lying if I say I did not”.

For me, the 25 January revolution is not fully dead and it is still alive as part of that thing still going on in our part of the world that the West called “The Arab Spring”.
Here is Baghdad’s Tahrir square rocking with protesters who standing high and firm despite they are facing corrupted political system backed by deadly regional and international powers.

Seen in Downtown Cairo : Omar Effendi's Abdel Aziz street branch

Omar Effendi branch in Abdel Aziz street 

Once upon a time, this was the most famous branch of Egypt’s and Mideast biggest and first department store and it used to be known as Omar Effendi.

This Neo-baroque building was designed by French architect Raoul Brandon. It is officially registered as monumental building and thank God for that.

That famous branch was inaugurated in 1909 by the chain founder Hungarian Adolph Orosodi under the name of Orosodi Bek then in 1920 he sold it to another businessman who changed its name to Omar Effendi and the rest is history with branches in Levant and Turkey.

Lebanon’s first woman defense minister : The superficial Women empowerment of the Middle East world

Zeina Akar 

Lebanese Zeina Aker has become Lebanon’s first female defence minister in history.


The member of President Michel Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement “FPM” is also the first female defence minister in the Arab world and near Middle East when I checked Wikipedia “You should click the link to know how Asian women beat the Western women and became defence ministers before them” too.

The new deputy prime minister holds a BS degree in Social Sciences in Marketing/Management from the Lebanese American University.

Akar and her husband renowned businessman Jawad Adra founded together “Information International” Research company.
The Greek Orthodox Christian is its executive director.

Seen in Downtown Cairo : Grand Hotel's Art Deco building "Updated"

Seen in Cairo's Downtown: The other Real Grand hotel in Downtown Cairo of Egypt.

Grand Hotel in Downtown Cairo 

A 3-stars hotel, Grand Hotel is known for its unique Art Deco architecture style. Some say it was inaugurated in 1950 while others say it was open for business in 1939. 

Further evidence found below may prove it was inaugurated in 1939 for real.

The name of Grand hotel became a popular one due to the success of Egyptian TV series "Grand Hotel", which is based upon a Spanish TV series with the same name.
"Both are available on Netflix and both are good" 

There is not much information about the hotel and its owners except that it is a 3-stars hotel.

Still, I stumbled by coincidence in Pinterest on Grand Hotel of Cairo's Luggage label and it is mesmerizing at least for me.

Remembering Nabil aka @Ternz : Too early to leave

I do not know how old he was or now much about him in real life except that his name is Mohamed Nabil and he was a talented online cartoonist on Twitter.

The famous avatar of Ternz on Twitter

for years 

That young man whom I knew through Twitter passed away last week in a road accident that made all those who followed him for years in a shock.

I do not recall when exactly I started to follow Mohamed Nabil or as commonly known on Twitter as Nabil or @Ternz but I remember it was during the 2013 craze and he was among the reasonable funny voices on online.

His Twitter alias then was very unique and interesting “ I am a Salafist and I do not hate you”.
Yes, he was Salafist and he had this famous and cool avatar made by Egyptian cartoonist Sherif Adel aka Barbatoz.
Yes, his name was “Salafist” and he did not hate anybody. On the contrary, he was not your stereotype of Salafists who reject arts or music or even science.
He changed into Blue in solidarity with the Sudanese revolution later.

He made very beautiful and smart black comedy cartoons about social and political issues in Egypt.

#Egypt_is_happy a cartoon about the inauguration of the

Suez canal extension in August 2015