You may find this interesting...an inside report from a woman living in London whose family lives in Cairo. The family is well-to-do and has something to do with the movie business. "Ami" is working on her doctorate at the London School of Economics.
January 29, 2011—11:53 AM
I have been trying for the better part of two days to call my father in Egypt. On Thursday, the Egyptian government blocked all mobile phone and internet communications in the country and I wondered if they were able to watch satellite television to see what was happening. I finally got through this morning. Service had just been restored. I had one of the most memorable conversations with my step-mother and father that I have ever had. There is little doubt that we are now witnessing history in the making.
I didn’t know how my family would view the protests and I thought they would stay as far away from the action as possible. On one hand, they may be targeted or attacked by the protesters, as part of the elite that had kept the mid-lower classes from developing. On the other hand, if they joined in the protests, they could be easily identified by Mubarak’s secret police and if the current regime stayed in power, my family could find themselves woken in the middle of the night and taken to jail. As all Egyptians know, this is to be avoided.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. I can best describe the tone of their voices as elated, excited and proud. They were excited by the events of past week and extremely proud of the vanguard of young people who are, in their view, uniting to bring Egypt forward. In the most nationalist of nationalistic ways, it seems, Egyptians of all classes, ages and religions are united in a joint effort to end the 30 years of emergency rule under President Mubarak and bring a ‘real’ democracy to Egypt. It is truly amazing.
The protests were organized and being led entirely by young people — aged 20-35. Modern technology was used to generate support in the masses, and for the first time in Egyptian history, this is an uprising FROM the people. It is as ‘grassroots’ as it possibly gets. It is difficult to imagine how Mubarak could think he would be able to reclaim control or authority after this week’s events.
The internet and mobile phone communications systems were cut by the government before the planned demonstrations on Friday. The protests were organized primarily through Facebook and text messaging, so it was a clear attempt to prevent further organized protests. The ability of the Egyptian youth to harness this technology and use it as a tool of popular protest is being hailed by the local media as the most historic and significant aspect of what is happening. It is, they say, a new tool of mass revolution.
For me, it isn’t the use of technology that is so impressive…it is the fact that the Egyptian people are exercising democracy in its truest form. Unlike the Iraqis, for example who have had democracy imposed upon them from outside, the Egyptian people are bringing democracy from within. They are not being driven by religious zeal, fanatical tendencies, or partisan objectives, but by a shared basic belief that they have a fundamental right to live and work in a nation in which they have liberty and freedom. It is difficult not to have respect for that. Particularly when you see the numbers…there are hundreds of thousands of them. They have only one mantra: ‘Go, go, go…Mubarak must go.’
As I said earlier, I couldn’t have been more wrong about how my family would react to the events. My father and step-mother drove to central Cairo yesterday to join the protests. They were only able to get as far as the Sixth of October bridge — a bridge that links Mohandessein/Giza with Tahrir Square where the main protests are taking place. They got out of their car and joined in. My step-mother was immediately recognized by the other protestors, was lifted onto the shoulders of two young men, and was soon leading a large group across the bridge chanting the mantra of the protests. It encouraged them, I think, to see a figure they recognized among them. The army, on the other side of the bridge began firing tear gas on them and they ran across the bridge in retreat.
My father described seeing young men blinded by tear gas. He saw others who were walking, shirtless, among the protestors with their torsos covered in welts and bruises from where they had been shot by rubber bullets. They refused to go home and wore their welts with pride in front of the crowd as if to show the army that they would not be stopped. A 26 year old woman was killed while holding an Egyptian flag. Of course there have been many others.
Perhaps the most interesting story he told me involved the famous Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square. 25 army officers in plain clothes had been instructed to break into the museum and steal artifacts. (Presumably so that the protesters would be blamed.) There are no police in Cairo at the moment and nothing to stop them. The officers were spotted by a group of protestors who somehow realized who they were and stopped them from breaking into the museum by literally creating a barricade of human bodies in front of the museum doors. The protestors were adamant that they would not allow the government to take away their culture and heritage.
The last revolution in Egypt occurred in 1952 when Nasser and his Free Officers took over the country from King Farouq. Since he had lived through both, I asked my father how this revolution compares to the last. He responded that there was absolutely no comparison. The Free Officers Revolution was, he argued, a revolution of the military elite. The people had nothing to do with it, really. This revolution, he argued, was from the people...directly from the voices and hearts of the people.
So what will happen next? It appears that all eyes are on Mohamed Elbaradei, the Egyptian Nobel Prize laureate and former head of the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency). My family feels that Mubarak dealt himself a final blow in last night’s news address in which he dismissed all of his government—except himself! While I was on the phone with them, it was broadcast that the curfew had been extended and all of Cairo was on 24 hour lock-down. They were told that if they broke the curfew, they would be shot. The protestors, my family feels assured, will not leave. Many of the young people in the streets have been there for two or three days and are refusing to leave until Mubarak steps down.
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