tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-242564292024-03-07T13:37:15.279+02:00Notes from the UndergroundOh, gentlemen, perhaps I really regard myself as an intelligent man only because throughout my entire life <br> I’ve never been able to start or finish anything... <br> Every man has some reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends. He has others <br>which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. But finally there <br>are still others which a man is even afraid to tell himself...Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.comBlogger471125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-82070406796150895182023-11-16T00:16:00.001+02:002023-11-16T00:16:14.248+02:00Oppenheimer and the War on Palestine<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh3nNTwtyrfu48a4MpxoW4aB-nGlvJZZCjLA1WloiRhAvUhEnDwfGXCjw8sT2TibaxBpR-3kWO6x-8BGNt6DQhdJD1-Z7W4qLSkbhzRVYEMGD8RxmmTbfqpPVRhmzEc14tSwetQgPUT55Gfuwn13dhExN3R7lssq24EBu7p57jPdq_F4PjphA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="1200" height="284" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh3nNTwtyrfu48a4MpxoW4aB-nGlvJZZCjLA1WloiRhAvUhEnDwfGXCjw8sT2TibaxBpR-3kWO6x-8BGNt6DQhdJD1-Z7W4qLSkbhzRVYEMGD8RxmmTbfqpPVRhmzEc14tSwetQgPUT55Gfuwn13dhExN3R7lssq24EBu7p57jPdq_F4PjphA=w427-h284" width="427" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p class="MsoNormal">There is a scene in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer that is
considered by many the master scene. It’s after the atomic bomb has been used
and Oppenheimer delivers a victory speech to the cheers of a crowd. In the
scene, we can see his mind start to wander, to silence, to a recognition of
what he has done with the murder of over 200,000 people. That moment is his
awakening, the introduction of guilt, and for that reason, that he grew a
conscience, Oppenheimer was viewed as a hero. After all, this guilt meant that
he was human. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">But Oppenheimer is a true western hero. He is someone that
is fighting his guilt after the atrocity committed, not during, not before.
After they were all dead there is a sense of guilt. Yet in that movie there is
no humanization of those he killed, just the guilt at the forefront and the
celebration that such humane thoughts have seeped into his soul. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That afterthought, that guilt is the true mark of western
society. The protagonist is always them, it’s always how they feel, how they
process what they’ve done, it’s never about those they have hurt. That’s why we
can see the parallels in today’s world. Genocide first, and then perhaps when a
great many Palestinians have died, suffered and have been displaced, the
ancestors of western societies, or perhaps even their current leaders might be
again the true heroes when they feel a little guilt. Maybe invading Iraq was
wrong, maybe too many innocent people have been killed. Yet still Iraqis are
never human, Palestinians are never human. Humanity is reserved for the killers
and the compassion they might feel or even remorse after they’ve committed and
supported a genocide. <o:p></o:p></p><div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-58638684011695830712023-10-14T12:41:00.005+03:002023-10-14T12:41:51.201+03:00The War on Humanity<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI2-uZ_aGWYvm1gADcvDLYA376wFSuj9Rw1ID7jKZJ9ohVjU0GJT2Q4r4ZPQXcSpsOuEhjFkZ5SI_oZ9K-Is6L73wkWSNkGSS9DtCAaDlJHN_VyufHUvNgnMEkqDHoajPz_b4sWFNM7514NOH7OvOm3NT1ktgXylwVr6nF0puo1quiQRjFZQ/s2564/Palestine-DSCF8335.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1709" data-original-width="2564" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI2-uZ_aGWYvm1gADcvDLYA376wFSuj9Rw1ID7jKZJ9ohVjU0GJT2Q4r4ZPQXcSpsOuEhjFkZ5SI_oZ9K-Is6L73wkWSNkGSS9DtCAaDlJHN_VyufHUvNgnMEkqDHoajPz_b4sWFNM7514NOH7OvOm3NT1ktgXylwVr6nF0puo1quiQRjFZQ/w414-h276/Palestine-DSCF8335.jpg" width="414" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div> <i>A collection of tweets on Gaza<br /></i><p></p><p class="MsoNormal">I one asked a German friend to imagine that Gaza was
inhabited by Jews and that those placing their city under a blockade were
something else, bombing their civilians. Her answer was that she couldn’t, and
that to me epitomizes the problem we have today. The idea that you are not even
able to do the mental exercise of imagination speaks volumes of where we are
now. I think that is the current problem with those supporting the genocide in Gaza.
<br />
<br />
Peace is not possible if the oppressor continues to oppress, no matter how much
everyone in power convinces us that the status quo is fair. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The Ukrainians and Belarusians supporting the ethnic
cleansing to be carried out by Israel in Gaza are the most baffling to me.The
people in Ukraine have every right to fight for their freedom against those
trying to take away their land and agency. Now replace Ukraine with Palestine.Western
governments are Ukranian when it comes to Ukraine but are Russians when it
comes to Palestine. There are people who support Ukraine because they are
principled, there are people who support Ukraine because they are racist.
Palestine helps us understand who is which.<br />
<br />
Mainstream western punditry will pretend that Israel hasn't been an occupier,
hasn't been attacking Palestinians, hasn't been committing injustices and will
just condemn Palestinians, but what's new, they offer the same story no matter
what actually happens on the ground. So many people support Palestine in
western countries but their governments and media make it impossible to voice
their support to influence the mainstream. People in the west can lose their
jobs and likelihood if they support Palestine. Many live in fear.<br />
<br />
My solidarity with Palestine grew not because they're Arabs and not because of
any other mainstream narrative but because Israel has occupied their land,
deprived them of basic rights and continuously oppress Palestinians. My
solidarity is against injustice. Always.<br />
<br />
The EU stands with Israel. The EU strongly condemns Palestinians breaking out
of their cage and refusing to suffer and die in silence. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Bernie condemns Palestinians for breaking out of their cage.
I suppose he just thinks that everyone should stand up against those depriving
them of dignity and a better life but with the exception of Palestinians.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The dividing line in the Israel - Palestine conflict is
this. Do you accept all people in this region to have equal rights no matter
their ethnicity, race or religion?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Of course the west supports apartheid, they always have. Germany
has kind of outlawed BDS, a form of peaceful resistance against Israel's
continued abuses against Palestine and Palestinians.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Israel retaliates disproportionately, kill civilians, commit
war crimes and the international community will continue to support Israel and
never lift a finger to hold them accountable. But that happens anyway whether
Palestinians attacked them or not.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Collective punishment, carnage, indiscriminate killings,
targeting civilians, cutting off electricity, cutting off water. The west
cheers on.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I guess the world is now getting ready to sanction a final
solution regarding Palestinians.So much for the 'Never Again' motto.<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
<!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Funny thing, when Israel retaliates and commits the most
heinous crimes, the trope "has a right to defend itself" continues to
echo. When Palestinians respond to decades of oppression, international law is
invoked. The fact that people say Israel has a right to defend itself but
Palestine does not, is one of the most racist bigoted tropes of our time.<br />
<br />
Logic won't win an argument but the least we can do is have a sound moral
position. This means that we can't ignore things at will. Occupation factors
into every analysis. Ignoring it will turn Palestinians into aggressors,
including it will turn them to freedom fighters.<br />
<br />
Many are citing international law to condemn the attack on Israel, but the
greater majority ignore international law when it applies to Israel. They don't
recognize the right of Palestinians to fight for freedom and turn a blind eye
to Israel targeting children and journalists.<br />
<br />
We live in a world that legitimizes some types of murder and criminalizes
others. What a petty fight to determine what is the moral way of taking a life.<br />
<br />
There are two main reasons why people support Israel's apartheid practices and
settler colonialism. Ignorance or racism or a combination of both. In Germany
they can be combined with guilt.<br />
<br />
People are describing the events of last Saturday as an attack, but in reality
it's best described as a prison break. Now the wardens are bombing up the open
air prison they created, like they would a riot, except with no obligation to
keep the prisoners alive.<span dir="RTL" lang="AR-SA" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br />
<br />
</span>I think the people who understand the plight of Palestinians most are
Jews, when the world had turned their back on them and masses cheered for their
eradication. I hope one day it will be recognized how wrong it is now as it was
back then to cheer for their oppression and death.<span dir="RTL" lang="AR-SA" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br />
<br />
</span>EU aid to Palestine is conditioned on them being slaughtered in silence.<span dir="RTL" lang="AR-SA" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br />
<br />
</span>I agree with everyone about not targeting civilians, but what I find baffling
is shifting the focus to it only when it happens to Israelis and completely
ignore it when it's happening to Palestinians. Israel does this a lot more and
consistently gets away with it.<span dir="RTL" lang="AR-SA" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br />
<br />
<br />
</span>First Europe went after the Jews, now they go after the Palestinians.
Many today wonder how people in the past could support genocide. Those who
support the indiscriminate killing of Palestinians can find the answer within
themselves.<br />
<br />
Funny to see people trusting the same journalists and outlets that claimed Iraq
was building a nuclear bomb.<br />
<br />
The people who condemned the entirety of Gaza to death because of false reports
of beheaded babies, do nothing to condemn the targeting of children and
paramedics by Israel's strikes. It's as if they're only looking for excuses to
justify the murder of Palestinians.<br />
<br />
Berlin police violently put a child in cuffs yesterday on behalf of Israel.
These people are capable of becoming monsters in an instant and they raise a
flag of righteousness while they do this. It should be sickening to the world
but the world is thirsty for blood these days.<br />
<br />
The license for genocide is when those who are seen to uphold any kind of
morality stop caring about any of it. Do not be complicit in the genocide
planned for Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.<br />
<br />
After all the years of fighting, the real demand that can end this is equal
rights for all. It seems like not a lot to ask, but in reality it's asking for
the impossible.<br />
<br />
If this was a different topic, some people would have asked for Joe Biden to be
impeached for his brazen lies.<br />
<br />
The British Foreign Minister James Cleverly stood by while his counterpart
dehumanized Palestinian civilians. What a horrible racist.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><br />
We are witnessing ethnic cleansing in the making, I hope it is averted as
people realize they are repeating the ugliest history of the world.<br />
<br />
Western powers are lying, censoring, arresting, oppressing anyone who offers a
balanced perspective about Palestine and with all the war mongering and support
of ethnic cleansing, terrorizing people who have a different view point and yet
they dare call others terrorists.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Amnesty's Crisis Evidence Lab has verified that Israeli
military units striking Gaza are equipped with white phosphorus artillery
rounds. We are investigating what appears to be the use of white phosphorus in
Gaza, including in a strike near a hotel on the beach in Gaza City.<br />
<br />
Europe had the blood of Jews on their hand. Now they have the blood of
Palestinians on their hand.<br />
<br />
You think that permitting Israel to killing Palestinians in mass will undo the
mass murder of Jews that's embedded in Europe's history? It won't and it will
just add to the list of atrocities perpetrated by Europeans.<br />
<br />
A shit ton of corrections from news outlets and the Whitehouse about spreading
the lies about beheaded babies, yet none of them are calling for Israel to
cancel their ethnic cleansing plan. Racism goes on, don't let facts get in the
way.<br />
<br />
Israelis should be ashamed that the same rhetoric used to annihilate Jews is
being used by Israel against Palestinians.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Western leaders are probably thinking, let's support ethnic
cleansing now and then throw money at academic programs that study our
atrocious history later.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">End the occupation. End apartheid. Free all prisoners on all
sides. Equal rights for all.<o:p></o:p></p><div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-21008422528356395422023-01-25T22:55:00.005+02:002023-03-28T14:30:05.253+02:00Shattered Revolution<p> <br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhq89PDqxOKicXb3yplqSsVLi0qox2xDxsF3eUjbc_doUVShNQ4u-oBoeVbz7mFK2wPuGafSC68AhViHu6D8L6UU11K9DTkilEg1OraEVPdMK1tjjKuIBhEoH-wYhBYNBIr_QOxdzNairaENdjWB_7aVrLEQG68ZKhKs1KJ1q9ZXb9hNls/s3509/jan%2025.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2550" data-original-width="3509" height="404" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhq89PDqxOKicXb3yplqSsVLi0qox2xDxsF3eUjbc_doUVShNQ4u-oBoeVbz7mFK2wPuGafSC68AhViHu6D8L6UU11K9DTkilEg1OraEVPdMK1tjjKuIBhEoH-wYhBYNBIr_QOxdzNairaENdjWB_7aVrLEQG68ZKhKs1KJ1q9ZXb9hNls/w556-h404/jan%2025.jpg" width="556" /></a></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="font-size: small; text-align: center;"><i>#Jan25. Illustration by Ann Kiernan</i></div><div style="font-size: small; text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">With every passing anniversary, on the 25<sup>th</sup> of
January, we try and remember a day that shook the world, a day where young
people lead a defiance of years of apathy and depoliticization as well as a
brutal police apparatus to try and dream of a better future. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The act of remembering is often a snapshot. After all, many
other things that have happened in the world since then. So each year, there’s a
snapshot of politics, economy, the fine young revolutionaries being thrown in
and out of jail after a great many of them were killed. The state of police,
judiciary and military. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It is often difficult to remember or even imagine that the plethora
of images of Tahrir square filled with people numerous days during the active
revolutionary years are actually comprised of individuals, each with their own
story. The big picture is often seen in an aerial photo, a hastily written
article to meet the publishing deadline or a human rights report that details
victims and abuses by the state. Yet outside these bulletins, the lives of
these people that contributed to the mosaic-like photos continue and for the
most part remain under reported. But there is no real reason to report these
untold stories. Those living these stories know them and don’t need them
reported and the bigger picture remains clear with every human rights report
and every arms sale and business transaction between the west and Egypt’s
government. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Yet there is value in remembering that the large mosaic
image of the revolution and its defeat is made up of countless tiles of humans
who put their lives and futures on the line, many of whom still exist despite
the disappearance of the Egyptian revolution. They still form a mosaic image,
but one that is not captured in an aerial image or a news report. The image is
far less visible than the collection that once gathered in Tahrir, in fact,
it’s hardly an image, it’s faint dots dispersed all over the globe, barely
audible, yet the sound they make sometimes tells a story; of the rise of hope, the
euphoria of revolution and the survival following its defeat. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Often times using the term mosaic is a cliché, but in this
case, perhaps it’s adequate to think of the people who have been a part of the
revolution as shattered glass. Each of them unique, colored and sharpened by
their experiences and yet shattered. The picture they paint is that of defeat
and groups of them share some of the same attributes, some of the same colors,
some of the same flavors of escape. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">From a distance, you may look at those who have stopped their
politics, trying to get by with ordinary jobs, jobs that come directly in
contact with the military, who have turned business in Egypt into a monopsony,
a term used to describe an economy where there is only one client, where the
armed forces is the only client. There
are others who sought refuge in studying abroad, or finding work there. Others
have taken various different routes to survive. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I would not paint a picture based on these clusters, but
rather on where they are mentally with processing this experience. How can we
understand where they’re at? It’s unfortunate that there is no outlet for this
sort of study or information, but you can see it in the stories of people
you’ve known for a long time, on their presence or absence on social media, on
the quality of content they post, in their travels and in what topics they
choose to engage with. To those of us living the aftermath of the revolution’s
defeat, it’s clear simply by looking at ourselves in the mirror or at those
we’ve known along the years. To an outside observer the changes would be simply
observed at the moment of their observation if they’re not doing so over time. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Still there are pockets where you can find some of that
story, if you look closely enough. One such reflection of this ongoing story
was a podcast that has been narrowly circulated in 2019 called <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsQMiDTKsN0&list=PLz1vXNQfXiYUTc3QmTMY-5dOyl7pLa-Bn&index=1">Mesh
Masmou</a>, which means not heard. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In this podcast, we follow some of the voices from before
the revolution, into their experiences and then finally into how they processed
some of it and where they’re off to next. All of this is discussed on an
abstract mental level, without the details you would find in a feature article,
with some sort poster child. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">That mosaic audio is one of a shattered revolution, like a Rubik’s
cube gone into complete disarray, a far cry from the image painted by an
overflooded Tahrir square. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is the sort of snapshot worth taking today, the
shattered pieces of a shattered revolution. Maybe a conversation with those in
exile has been one angle, but more of the story is to be told looking at the
ordinary voices of extraordinary people who were present at some point during
the revolutionary years. What do they think of their past experiences? What do
they think of their present? Of their future? But what do they think of the
revolution itself. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Collectively we struggle, we fall and grow. At every point
in my personal journey through dealing with the revolution, I’ve seen others
who are going through something similar. We can still relate even though there
is no longer a common place to meet, or even a shared goal to achieve. The
places we keep remain in our minds and in our memory but more importantly in
our journey. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Paradoxically the revolution had given us all a glimpse of
what we could be and then took it all away. It allowed ordinary people to rise
to the ranks of creative heroes, knowledgeable experts with a fame mostly on
merit. They rose against the will of those in power. When the revolution was
quashed, they were targeted to vanish from the public sphere. Countless
talented people had no choice but to withdraw to obscurity or an even more
dumbed down version of their former self. The only way to survive is to return
to building once again from scratch. Many of those who stayed on in Egypt have
realized that success under these circumstances is not within reach. Silence
alone does not suffice. Compliance along with moderately positive statements
about Egypt is not enough. There is only room for the talentless, the
opportunists, the hypocrites. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The revolution now is a story of wasted potential. It’s the
story of all the things that could have been but have not, all the people that
could have been and have not. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It is a time where people are bearing the brunt of poor
economic policies throughout the years, and even some of the staunchest
supporters of the Egyptian state have realized the economic catastrophe. But
the people have already been divided and there is nothing new for old
revolutionaries who have seen this coming from the start. The fear is that the
greatest of dreams have turned into cynicism and in a sense, that would be the
true defeat.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Everything is boiling beneath the surface, but that surface
is fortified and no one knows how solid or brittle it is in the face of the
unknown, unseen, unheard quantities suffering beneath it. </span><span style="font-size: x-small;"><o:p></o:p></span></p></div><p></p><div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-89888517851418049642022-10-25T14:29:00.001+02:002022-10-25T14:29:13.995+02:00Rivo<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_vaeJyJX0Cf00pS8v-5c9U90OhqDyV-cawheDiQY0HC__Xu1RXPpjVF57S4WupZ1zojxJ6lCKE9FmQj4YPvZxN4nswlAr_S5GALVBCB8t7JoESubzTj-Pk5ATAIW5U1o06qkUaVUjqC7OmxPcGiEMntA0icWLBMr4C5AXFMHzgh474NM/s1439/Rivo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1439" data-original-width="1000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_vaeJyJX0Cf00pS8v-5c9U90OhqDyV-cawheDiQY0HC__Xu1RXPpjVF57S4WupZ1zojxJ6lCKE9FmQj4YPvZxN4nswlAr_S5GALVBCB8t7JoESubzTj-Pk5ATAIW5U1o06qkUaVUjqC7OmxPcGiEMntA0icWLBMr4C5AXFMHzgh474NM/w278-h400/Rivo.jpg" width="278" /></a></div><br /><i><br /><br />Spoiler alert, I would rather you watch Rivo than read this text because I don't review Rivo but I discuss the details which would only make sense if you have seen it. But if you've seen Rivo, please read ahead.</i><p></p><p>In recent times the quality of Egyptian shows produced has deteriorated so drastically that it has become nearly impossible to watch a show till the end. Everything produced has to be about something meaningless and divorced from reality or at least the political reality we live in so that it can be released. Writers and directors struggle how to do something within a context that does not allow for meaning. </p><p>A notable exception was an episode by Khairy Beshara on Netflix titled “National Day of Mourning in Mexico”. The episode is built within a fantasy land, and a very thinly veiled reference to the revolution. While beautifully shot and meaningful, that one episode lacks the emotional depth of what the revolution really means to those who made it happen, it contained some of the emotions that come with memory and trying to remember, it spoke about the resilience of memory and the determination to remember. </p><p><br /></p><p>I’m hesitant to write what I’m about to write next, or perhaps hesitant to make it public, because I’ve stumbled upon another open secret, a show that has recently produced and published called ‘Rivo’. I’ve always published my reviews without spoilers but this is not a review, this is me visiting the world of Rivo and basking in it with others who have. I cannot review this show in the sense of treating it like a production. I do not want to comment at length on the choices of camera work or sound editing or acting. All such commentary is useless in the face of what the show actually is. Though for what it’s worth, the show is a treasure trove of talent and attention to detail. You can really tell that it is a labor of love just by how every small detail was given attention. </p><p>Rivo is nostalgic emotive show that transcends the technicalities of production, and I say this with bias because I am a part of Rivo. Here I don’t mean the actual production, I have nothing to do with the show, but what Rivo represents. The story of Rivo is not about a band, but about us, those of us who consider ourselves the revolution that took place in 2011 and continued through the next ten years only to fade and disappear, much like the old footage referred to that seems impossible to restore in the recent production. </p><p><br /></p><p>The show is set to tell a story of a band in the nineties, a fictional band that had never existed, and we look at the past through a curious lens of discovery. The mystery around the past and the emotions that present has brought is authentic, yet why are we so drawn to it?</p><p>Perhaps it’s only in the final episode that it all became clear. I was watching with my mother and she asked, “Why did Shady have to die?” At that moment without a moment’s thought, it was clear to me, he had to die in the show because he actually really did. Shady is the best of us who fought with their life for a better future in the revolution, the chance to be different, the chance to express ourselves in a way we never had before. Shady is the revolution, a spark that came out of nothing and ignited the world around us and changed it forever, and was simply killed and crushed and even their memory is something to be silenced. </p><p><br /></p><p>The show doesn’t delve so much into the name of the band, Rivo, presenting it as some chance name based on the local asprin pill that the protagonist Marwan was taking on the day they were performing, but in fact, the name is an ode to the circular shape that binds us together, us being the revolution, the real band members who had no start and no end, gravitating towards an idea, a dream symbolized by Shady, the best of us, who had to die in the show, because he was killed in reality. </p><p>The aftermath of that crushing defeat, is the scattered band members who could not deal with what they lost along the way. They lost everything they had ever hoped for or dreamed of. Everything that happened, no matter how beautiful turned into bitter memories that they had to escape. We see revolutionary defeat through the eyes of Marwan played by Sedky Sakhr, a lone talented kid who thought he was completely alone, but little did he know that there were others like him. They were not exactly like him but he was part of them, no matter how different. He clawed his way out of isolation and finally learned that he belonged, that it was possible to belong. That’s why it hurt him so much when the dream had gone, because there was nothing to live for. There was no one to belong to, nothing to belong to. It was just the greatest moment that transformed him into everything that he could be, but it was taken away from him. It drove him to a death wish. After all what kind of life was possible without hope?</p><p><br /></p><p>Sakhr travels effortlessly between the various characters he plays, the dorky introverted young man whose life is lit up when he encounters Shady, to the hopeless shattered defeated man no longer willing to live and even later to Lazarus who has been raised from the dead.</p><p>But if we look at other band members, they represent something so diverse yet each, with all of their flaws are beautiful in their own way. Maged George, a drummer, a part of the circle, a part of the dream, perhaps the most level headed character portrayed masterfully by the Cairokee drummer Tamer Hashem. His name, casually Christian in a world where such names do not come up. There was no emphasis on tolerance, or even difference, he was just there, a part of them without the usual tired attempts impose a hypocritical message of integration. When it was all over, he went into exile and yet kept the beautiful memories. He lost something, he was injured, and yet he was able to still love his dream, his past. </p><p><br /></p><p>Omar, the talented guitarist who was not even a member of that middle class club they all belonged to, who took a chance using his gift to take a chance on a dream. When it was all over he had transformed almost completely into a conservative, and turned his back on his beautiful Fender guitar which he made cry and sing. Even Noaman, a pragmatist who went on with his life and at times seemed not to belong, had constantly made clear choices in favor of the dream that Shady represented. He was always so fickle because of his cynicism but deep down inside him he still wanted to be part of the dream and in the end, he wanted to revive that memory of the dream.</p><p>We see our story through the eyes of Mariam, the young woman who had no idea of her father’s involvement in that dream, in his inspiring words and actions that paved the way, it was only after his death that she even realized she needed to explore the past. The story is through the eyes of those who never lived the revolution or perhaps not even heard about it. She explores the story of strangers that she thought were remote, but the story wasn’t only about them, the story was about her too. She was also a part of Rivo without knowing it. At the time when Rivo was thriving, she could only find an old message left by her father damaged by time. He had wished she was old enough to experience how people had experienced the revolution. Her father’s work lead her to the story of her own life, a path of self-discovery. </p><p><br /></p><p>The show starts with a story and ends with a promise, and a reminder but I’ll get to that later. Mariam’s exploration of the past ignites hidden feelings in the band members that they thought they had lost forever. I watched the last episode and I identified with their feelings, because I too had loved Shady and wept for his loss. I too wanted Rivo’s story to be told and the legacy of Shady to be remembered with the love that I had for him as well. That love was inside each of them because Shady had left pieces of himself in them. Some of them had simply forgotten to love themselves, or that part of themselves. These feelings are just a memory of who they were, they were a circle of friends that shared a dream, no matter how different they were. </p><p>But where do we go when the dream is gone?</p><p><br /></p><p>The transformation of Marwan is perhaps the most telling arc of the story. From isolation to stardom and self-actualization and then into loss with a crushed dream. Yet maybe he owes it to Shady not to die just yet. Maybe they can never play again, but they can keep the memory of what they have done alive if it is told once again by Mariam. In the end he rises like a phoenix from the ashes to realize that Rivo still exists after all those years, in the friends that have gone their separate ways but have kept a piece of Shady within them throughout all their years of defeat. One day we shall meet again and stand side by side, not to play the music that we did, but to remind ourselves that we can be there for one another. </p><p><br /></p><p>Beneath the rubbles of old papers and a beautiful Fender guitar that had not been played, we find an old contract, an old pledge that they had long forgotten. That the members of Rivo have control over how their story is told, if they all come together, they can still tell their story in the way they want to. It was never a question about money, but about their inner demons and their own defeat. What can they hope for after the dream is gone, perhaps just the memory of what it truly was. Their choice is to come together, because Mariam needed them, and because they needed her to tell their story. They wanted to be seen through her eyes, because she was the future and she had also been there from the start. </p><p><br /></p><p>We’ve had to escape the memory of the revolution because of how much it has crushed us, but those of us who have survived must remember that it may be the most wonderful part of who we are today. We are the defeated, those who have lost hope, and cannot play anymore because we cannot touch the instruments that we played so masterfully, or parts of our arms have gone, or have lost the will to live, or even found success in pragmatism and killing off our passion. But one day we may live again if we are sought or discovered by those who we fought for, those who have been shielded from the story of Rivo or the story of the Rivolution. They are part of our story and it’s up to them to tell our story and theirs. But no matter how tough this will be, and it will be, we will be there for them. We owe it to Shady and Hassan and all of those who fought with their lives for the dream we all lost. </p><div><br /></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-79002166482217809482020-06-30T23:45:00.001+02:002022-05-07T09:55:39.815+02:00On Civil Disobedience - Tolstoy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />From Leo Tolstoy:</div>
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This year, 1896, a young man by the name of Van-der-Veer was summoned in Holland to enter the National Guard.</div>
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To the summons of the commander, Van-der-Veer replied in the following letter:</div>
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THOU SHALT NOT KILL</div>
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Mr. Herman Snijders<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" />Commander of the National Guard of the Middelburg Circuit</div>
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Dear Sir:<br style="box-sizing: inherit;" />Last week I received a document in which I was commanded to appear in the magistracy in order to be enlisted according to the law in the National Guard. As you, no doubt, have noticed, I did not appear. The purpose of this letter is to inform you frankly, and without any ambiguities, that I have no intention of appearing before the commission. I know full well that I subject myself to a heavy responsibility, that you can punish me, and that you will not fail to make use of that right. But that does not frighten me. The reasons that compel me to manifest this passive resistance present to me a sufficiently important counterbalance to this responsibility.</div>
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I, who am not a Christian, understand the commandment that is standing at the head of this letter better than the majority of Christians. It is a commandment inherent in human nature and in reason. When I was still a child, I permitted myself to be instructed in the soldier’s trade — the art of killing — but now I refuse.</div>
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More than anything else, I do not wish to kill on command without any personal impulse or foundation. This appears to my conscience as murder. Can you name to me anything more degrading for a human being than the commission of similar murders or slaughter? I cannot kill an animal, or see it killed, and therefore I became a vegetarian. In the present case I may be commanded to shoot men who have never done me any harm. Soldiers certainly do not study the military field manual in order to shoot at leaves on the branches of trees.</div>
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But you will perhaps tell me that the National Guard must also and above everything else cooperate in the maintenance of internal order.</div>
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Mr. Commander, if there really existed any order in our society, if the social organism were indeed sound, if there did not exist such crying misuses in our social relations, if it were not permitted that one man should starve to death while another enjoys all the lusts of luxury, then you would see me in the first ranks of the defenders of this order. But I unconditionally refuse to cooperate in the maintenance of the present so-called order. What is the use, Mr. Commander, of pulling the wool over each other’s eyes? Both of us know full well what is meant by the maintenance of this order. It is the support of the rich against the poor workers who are beginning to become conscious of their right. Did you not see the part that your National Guard played during the last strike in Rotterdam?</div>
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Without any reason, this guard was compelled for hours to protect the property of the business firms that were threatened. Can you for a moment suppose that I will surrender myself to take part in the defense of men who, according to my sincere conviction, are supporting the war between capital and labor, or that I will shoot at the working men who are acting entirely within the limits of their rights?</div>
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You cannot be so blind as that! Why complicate matters? Indeed, I cannot have myself cut out into an obedient National Guardsman such as you wish to have and as you need!</div>
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On the basis of all these reasons, but especially because I despise murder on command, I refuse to serve in the capacity of a member of the National Guard, and ask you to send me neither uniform nor weapons, since I have the steadfast intention of not using them.</div>
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I greet you, Mr. Commander,</div>
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I. K. Van-der-Veer</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-26095450704494961892020-05-16T15:06:00.000+02:002020-05-16T20:22:04.921+02:00Hani Shukrallah - A Very Remarkable Creature <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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When I first heard news of Hani Shukrallah’s passing, it didn’t quite sink in. He was in and out of hospital, and in many ways I had been dreading it and trying to deal with it internally. Every time he got out of the hospital it was a sigh of relief. Maybe I had been long preparing myself for his passing so that the blow would not be so heavy. It worked. I was almost smiling in his funeral, and perhaps it’s merely because I could not help but think of Hani smiling and laughing looking down on his own funeral. With all the loved ones around and some of the hypocrites that may have come to pay tribute, I could not wipe his smile off my brain. But perhaps I was also smiling because I felt immense love emanating from some very beautiful people I saw in the ceremony of his departure. In a sense you had to be beautiful in some way to love Hani that much.</div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>Photo by </i></span><i style="font-size: x-small;">Miguel Ángel Sánchez </i></div>
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Hani may not have been aware of how many people like me were silently going through their emotional rollercoaster as they heard about him, whether he had survived another visit to the hospital or finally with his departure. I was not close to Hani on a personal level and never present in his everyday life. I wish we had been closer, but we did have our deep personal moments which I capitalized on. I translated them into a special kind of closeness albeit one sided on my part. I had always felt an unshakeable closeness in spirit since we first met. It was probably just the usual for Hani, him being himself, and leaving a deep immutable imprint even with the briefest encounters with those he met.</div>
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To me his normal was special enough. I’ll take that. I feel blessed to have encountered his usual.</div>
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Hani Shukrallah was a beautiful man who mentored many and was able to live a full life. When I met Hani first in 2010, I was interviewing for a job at Ahram Online to write about film for a final sign off. I will forever be grateful to Ati Metwally for offering me the opportunity to be a part of that experience. He sat me down, looked at my blog, started reading a simple review I had written and then immediately hired me. He said I wrote well. Ever since, I've been learning more and more about what it means to think critically and what his journalism was about.</div>
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Hani stood out at a time and in a land of fallen heroes. I had gotten accustomed to those ‘big’ people letting us down. Yet there I saw a young revolutionary in an older man’s body but with the knowledge and wisdom of the years. I often wondered how he maintained that wonderful combination of seeing things as they are and yet being youthfully hopeful, resilient and persistent in pursuing his values.</div>
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I was at Ahram Online when mass protests started on January 25, 2011. We returned to our editorial meeting after the government’s five day internet shutdown ended. Hani Shukrallah was smiling, laughing, and quickly said, “I assume we’re all for what’s happening in Tahrir right now.” He said he understood why many decided to join the protests, but it was his opinion we had the opportunity, the role and the platform to do even more good as journalists by reporting and giving the events a much needed voice.</div>
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The words stuck with me and covering protests became part of what I did in the events that followed. It didn’t matter if I was going to protest, observe, report, blog or tweet. I witnessed protests and wrote about them. I was given space by Ahram Online to work on numerous critical pieces. Hani would later be sidelined under the Muslim Brotherhood and his newly established publication, Bel Ahmar, censored by the regime among hundreds of censored websites.</div>
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I don’t want to make Hani out and as an infallible figure who made no mistakes. I’m sure he made many and I didn’t agree with every position he had, but he remained a passionate thinker, reader and listener, willing to change his mind or reconsider his positions and even admit mistakes. Hani wasn’t primarily a journalist, he was an activist who happened to be a journalist particularly brilliant at his job. He was a gifted writer but behind those words were vivid thoughts and moving ideas. He excelled at both the thinking and the writing.</div>
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I’m sure Hani doesn’t need my humble testimony to his brilliance, but the point is that I admired who he was and aspired to be like him. In the newsroom he was daring, he said things as they were. One day as I was stopping by the office I heard Hani shout from inside his room, “Why are you quoting this guy!! He’s nothing but a security informant!” or “Amnagy”. The combination of excellent journalism and the courage to spell things out as they are was something I had not witnessed much. Most journalists I knew were afraid to have an opinion even when things were that clear.</div>
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He made sure that professional journalism backed what was said, even if it ran against an acceptable narrative. He was a field builder and an author of narratives. I will admit that it is delusional of me to think that Hani Shukrallah reflected some of what I saw in myself, so let me just say that he reflected what I hoped I could be. Still, I was not delusional enough to think I can be as funny or as charming as he was. I still believe though, that in terms of thinking, writing and integrity, it is worth aspiring towards what he had become.</div>
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When Hani wrote, I read. When he spoke I listened. I was lucky enough to have shared some of my pieces with him before he passed away. There was one which he insisted should be translated and published in Bel-Ahmar. I’m grateful for that. A while later I persistently asked him to meet. I finally passed by his place and we had a deep long conversation over coffee. We spoke of our past and our future and his prophetic article J'Accuse which he wrote the first day of 2011 in poetic and prophetic anger that spoke about things that have passed and things to come.</div>
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I'm grateful to have spent time with him. I feel blessed to have been able to tell him how much I admire him and how much I've learned from him and how much I wanted to be like him, despite how awkward it sounded to be saying all this to him in his living room unprovoked.</div>
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Hani was revolutionary in every sense of the word. He revolutionized English journalism and he adopted daring stances. He was a revolutionary long before he found his revolution.</div>
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There are endless things to say about Hani Shukrallah, and these words hardly do him justice. I can talk about more things that happened in Ahram Online, or wonderful ideas that have helped shape mine, but it’s very difficult finding words. In fact the words I write now are ones I’ve wanted to write for over a year since I heard of his death but could not string them together. When I heard of his passing, I could not help but think of these lines from ‘The Razor’s Edge’ by Somerset Maugham which had deeply moved me:</div>
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<i>“[He] is not famous… It may be that when his life at last comes to an end he will leave no more trace of his sojourn on earth than a stone thrown into a river leaves on the surface of the water. But it may be that the way of life that he has chosen for himself and the peculiar strength and sweetness of his character may have an ever-growing influence over his fellow men so that, long after his death perhaps, it may be realized that there lived in this age a very remarkable creature.”</i></div>
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In my mind, these words represented Hani, and I say this despite knowing full well that he is a giant in the field of journalism in Egypt, known well and respected, but I think that Hani’s real power is how deeply and intimately he has affected and touched those who have encountered him personally or observed “the way of life that he has chosen for himself.”</div>
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This text is long overdue, perhaps subdued for so long by the intense feelings of love and loss I’ve harbored over the years.</div>
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Goodbye beautiful man. We shall miss you immensely. I love you lots.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>A note about the video. The audio recording is from The Razor’s Edge, a film based on the movie. The words stuck with me, I wanted to be that man, but I really think something about it suits Hani. I collected the images from the internet without really knowing the sources, I apologize for that, but one of them used with very special lighting was taken by Miguel Ángel Sánchez in 2015 during a project that he and Nuria Tesón were making at the time. The interview with him is still not released, but the image captures a true hero at the time of darkness, a man holding on to his revolutionary spirit at a time where many others particularly from his generation had forfeited it. This video is how Hani feels like to me, my personal tribute to him.</i></span></div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-60284689084109098212020-04-27T02:54:00.003+02:002020-04-27T02:54:59.336+02:00The Missing O Key<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="text-align: left;">I write at night. Often in bed. Long before I was using a computer to write, I would read in bed and pick up my notebook and let all my thoughts flow. Back then I was just discovering the world. The world to me is not travels and people, but the inner world of thoughts and feelings, emotions and power dynamics. The world that I was discovering wasn't something they teach you in school. It was everything that was unspoken, not fully addressed. I sat most nights rediscovering what others had also rediscovered as they began thinking about the world on their own. Everything was novel. Discovering lies was novel. Investigating subcultures was novel. </span></div>
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I still write at night and in bed, but now on a computer. The same passion to share what I have discovered that's new about the world diminishing. I learned it the hard way, but I found out that it doesn't matter what I discover no matter how new or profound. Sharing it won't make much of a difference. Besides it isn't something that people don't know. On the contrary, a great many people who know certain things are actively working to drown them so that they lose prominence. </div>
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All of that doesn't matter, the whole point was that I write at night often and I take my computer to bed in order to do that. </div>
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I lack the motivatin to shut everything f and speak t my cmputer as I often spoke to the blank piece of paper in the past. As if that's nt enugh, I'm facing a new prblem. My laptp's keybard has brken dwn. Nt all f it, just ne key. It's the O key. I have to pound it hard as I type so that it wrks. Often it just doesn't and I have t delete and then write it. It breaks the flow f my thughts. So nw I try pounding and sometimes it types and other times it doesn't. Nw this paragraph is missing a lot f Os that I wasn't able t pound hard enugh. The words look weird but I wn't correct all f them. </div>
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It's increasingly difficult to write without that key. My usual writing all comes flowing, gushing from my mind, with my hands trying to keep up with the translation of my thoughts to words. For work I have an external USB keyboard but that doesn't work in bed. The missing O breaks the flow. I'm not as fast translating my thoughts to words. I have to go back to words I write and correct them, and then I can't remember exactly what I wanted to say next. </div>
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But long before losing that key it was difficult to write. I think the same way, I just don't share it. I guess it's only now that I realize that long before I lost the O key on the computer, I may have lost an O key in life that has made writing difficult for me. Somewhere along the line I lost something that made me have less hope in the meaning of sharing what I write. </div>
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I ordered a replacement keyboard that will arrive in around a week or two. If only my other missing key can be replaced. I'm tempted to say I lost that key in Egypt during the revolution, but that's not true. During the revolution, a two year lifetime, I had the passion to write and discover. I lost the key later, in Egypt and all over the world. I lost the key when I saw that striving for the truth was worth little in the face of manipulation, fear and self interest. </div>
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The masks of western rhetoric fell ungracefully as western government, much like the petty corrupt officials I saw in Egypt, raced to kiss military brass ass in Egypt in exchange for lucrative business deals. Whether it was Germany for their Siemens and submarines, the UK, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Greece, Spain, or the US for various other reasons, it was all the same. They were cheap and regarded their own values as cheap or perhaps just up for sale. </div>
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The diplomats, once revered in popular culture now appear to me as nothing more than mercenaries in suits. They are the front for the business henchmen behind who profit at the expense of other people's lives, not just in Egypt, but around the world. </div>
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Power is the same everywhere. I recognize it too easily now. That's my missing key. If only I didn't recognize the nature of power, I would still be hopeful and discovering the world, but more than that, sharing in the hopes that people seeing reality would help change it. </div>
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There's no vendor that sells the key to my writing and sharing. I think I'll just have to pick up the pieces and try and put it back together again. </div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-58502675691413771602020-03-19T06:13:00.000+02:002020-03-20T02:07:00.335+02:00Surviving Corona<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR7CtJaW6bgAjurVylwo2Ok-SZsNCZ1GwzaTK6xvHQl1qdd0huECpusiOxs1ImbkNcfS-EF5gomJuaBH67s99XFMbsh6YVOm_dRtEQrGlV0vjS17Bmo05T8ShoxHbGKzWyyg/s1600/brave-new-world.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" d src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR7CtJaW6bgAjurVylwo2Ok-SZsNCZ1GwzaTK6xvHQl1qdd0huECpusiOxs1ImbkNcfS-EF5gomJuaBH67s99XFMbsh6YVOm_dRtEQrGlV0vjS17Bmo05T8ShoxHbGKzWyyg/s320/brave-new-world.jpg" width="530" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;">It's late at night and there's news of coronavirus all over the world. It's the starting sequence of a sci-fi movie, these are just the few seconds. What will come next is probably going to be uglier, because those who control where the world is heading are ugly. There will be no humbling experience except for the humble. This is what we've toiled for all those years. So that on this rainy day, the rich and the powerful can protect themselves and get even richer and more powerful. They control the little tax payments you make to their private interest. Now that it's time for you to collect what you're owed, you'll be thrown under the bus. This tax money was for their rainy day not yours. Money and resources will go to those who already have money and resources. You will continue to pay for their well being with your blood and sweat.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">At a time when the world needs true leadership, those at the helm are anti-Science corporate bigots for the most part and those next in line are ancient relics whose only hope is to take us back 10 years ago when things were horrible but not disastrous. There is no collective hope to come out stronger as a society, but perhaps individual salvation is possible. We can recognize how fragile this world is, how meaningless businesses are in absence of life and health. We can recognize that race is a construct not respected by disease. We can recognize that we live in the disease of racism and xenophobia even though it's not biological. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Perhaps all these things are possible, but I lost hope in human's ability to learn from what they see. The reality is that emotions are stronger than rationale, and as sad as it is to realize it, if you keep pounding a message for decades, it becomes the truth, even if debunked by simple logic. Most of what we know is 'on authority', yet it surprises me how much people fight for something that's not their own, for a view that was force fed to them. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">What happens next in our world. A worthy question. We realize we don't need to travel that much, we don't need to have that many conferences even though they are fun. We don't need to go out every day, even though that's fun. We recognize that we share a lot more than we thought. We share transport, we share the roads and we share supermarkets. Yes, that place where there is no escape from disease. The person at the cash register touches all your items, and touches your money. Anything there will be transferred.<br />
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I have thought of a way to get through this time, but I think I need a bit of science to formulate a plan. If only covid19 doesn't mutate or doesn't visit you twice, I would have had a perfect plan. For now there is nothing left to do but wait and hope, and now everything is a game of chance. Life is a game of chance. More so for the elderly than the young. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">There's a moment when I realized we can all be potential killers. If we pass this to the vulnerable we can kill. I think that's true of many things. Our decisions, our votes. It was always so remote, but now it's closer. Your carelessness can cost lives. It won't be easy living with that, being the victim and the perpetrator, all at the same time. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">But isn't that how we always are? We're gentrifiers, we're privileged. Even the privileged are victims of their own privilege and their blindness which they're born with. It's not their fault. To be born with privilege is to be born blind to injustices that should really not happen. Privilege is an exceptional normal state. It ought to be normal not to face injustice based on your skin color, it ought to be normal not to face discrimination based on your gender. It isn't though. It's only normal for the privileged. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The privileged are born blind with the duty to see. Some don't fulfill their duty, and end up moderates in an extreme world, guilty of perpetrating the status quo. Others are worse, they seek to entrench their privilege and utilize the status quo, altering it to dig us deeper into that abyss of injustice. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Nothing can even the odds at this point. The powerful don't need to normalize lying for everyone, they just need it for a big minority that are able to suppress the majority. They need the blind, they need the privileged, they need those who cannot see how entrenched we are in an extreme status quo. They need not be supporters, they need only be moderates, they need only be ineffective, obsessed with law and order at the expense of justice. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The movie's opening seconds are apocalyptic. It's just a disease with a mortality rate of 2% some say. Certainly true, but there is a kindness in the nature of covid19 that we are yet to appreciate. It's a warning sign nevertheless. It targets, very clearly, the vulnerable. In some ways it is asking us to protect the vulnerable. But we will fail even this simple test. We have not had adequate training protecting the vulnerable. We have a neoliberal world order that exploits them.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Is it reasonable to think that all of a sudden a new found care for the vulnerable will be born? It will not happen. The vulnerable are expendable. That's disaster capitalism, that's what it has practiced for years, but without the same attention as the virus, because the killers had to be out of the news. Condemn the greed, but not the greedy, condemn the system, but not the actual people responsible for it. That's the way of the world.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is a small difference now though. The capitalists don't get to choose who they kill. The virus chooses and that's why they must rush to protect themselves, even at the cost of protecting the needy. Make no mistake, protecting the needy is a huge price for the rich and powerful to pay. Ordinarily they would not pay it. But in order to protect themselves, perhaps they must pay that ultimate price. Why not appear compassionate too while they're at it. They will find ways of profiteering from the disease anyway and the from the constraints that will be placed on the masses working for them.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">We're going to work to pay this debt in the future. How dare we be helped by the powerful. It doesn't matter, our taxes will mostly go to them. They will be bailed out when they fail to steal from us properly. They will be bailed out when they 'erroneously 'declare war because they 'learn' and 'grow', and their followers find that commendable. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">This is a crisis that offers an opportunity for us to grow and see the world for what it is. Just like I was exposed to the nature of power when I saw the streets of Egypt full of men with guns who wanted to enforce their rule and infiltrated all media to repeat their same old lies. I see the media around me full of these lies, they're a bit more clever, still not logical, but who cares. What really matters is that people don't care for logic and rational. They have their establishment 'intellectuals' feeding their egos, and filling their brains with status quo excuses. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Whether it's 1984 or a brave new world, it doesn't matter. It all looks the same after a while of observation. The brave new world is far superior of course. It's more fulfilling, it provides the illusion of freedom. But a moderate in 1984 and a moderate in a brave new world are the same. Nothing but fuel to feed the machines of control. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">After the first few seconds of this movie, I don't know what happens. Maybe there will be heroes and villains that shape the world, but in these type of movies it doesn't matter. What really matters are the individuals that survive these events. What do they take with them from the old world is up to them.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">To be honest, there's little to take from the old world except resistance to it. Maybe we can resist the inhumanity and injustices as we move forward. Maybe we can still fight against control and oppressive structures. That's still going to be worth something as we transition. I know that this is what I will try to take with me.</div></div><div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-68366753527401110322020-01-03T01:06:00.000+02:002020-01-03T01:06:13.575+02:00More of..<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
So much time spent in this world. So many experiences. Less time to explore now and more time to decide what I need more of. The irony is that I can't get what I want more of just yet. To get more of what I want, I have to do more of what I need to do.<br />
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But I know things I need more of in my life. They're clear but they're easier said than done.<br />
<br />I need to read more, I need to write more. I need to make more music. I need to spend less time on those what will not expand my ideas. I need more nature. I need to be at peace with myself. I need to work on myself. I need to dedicate more time to sports. I need to care less about changing the world. I need to focus more on who I want to be.<br />
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I failed last year to have a post each month. The last two months saw no writing. I've lots a lot of my anger and passion. I'm hoping to rebuild those.<br />
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New years are not reset buttons, they're just arbitrary points in time that we can use to count.<br />
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More of who I truly am this year. </div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-33257845195830638412019-11-01T23:50:00.000+02:002020-01-03T11:52:07.377+02:00Twitter's Censorhsip<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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This month I was busy documenting Twitter's censorship of Arab voices. With the help of other researchers we documented a mass suspension aimed at activists who spoke about Egypt. During the course of our investigation in order to verify our findings, we stumbled upon another pattern of Twitter falsely flagging responses to tweets as hateful conduct.<br />
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This forced Twitter to apologize for the mass suspensions but not for their misapplication of the hateful conduct policy.<br />
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I wrote an article in <a href="https://vww.almanassa.net/ar/story/13090" target="_blank">Arabic </a>and in <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/how-twitter-gagging-arabic-users-and-acting-morality-police/" target="_blank">English </a>to document this and it was covered by <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/meghara/twitter-egypt-protests-accounts-suspended" target="_blank">Buzzfeed</a>. I also dumped the images I collected in a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10162290263445386&set=a.10162290263215386&type=3&theater" target="_blank">Facebook album</a>.<br />
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-68771022901629235242019-10-14T11:53:00.000+02:002019-10-14T12:15:21.703+02:00Dear Lydia<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>This is one of the worst periods of Egypt's history. The next generation will ask us, how could you allow this. I wrote this letter addressing Lydia, one of my fascist friend's daughters some time back, envisioning what I would tell the next generation. My simple answer is that we tried.</i></div>
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Dear Lydia,<br />
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It is with great sorrow that I write this letter to you knowing full well that you may not trust or comprehend it, or even believe me. You may have grown up believing a narrative that runs contrary to the truth, in which case, this letter shall not have an effect on you, and you will feel bitter and angry at this letter and at me for writing it. But there's a strong chance, that unlike your parents, you will have come to understand the true history of what happened in the time before, a time of events, both I and your parents have witnessed up close and each of us took their route.<br />
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This letter will only make sense if you've ever come across the truth of the history that took place starting from 2011 and the repulsive turn into oppression in 2013 where injustice prevailed and massacres took place. It is only with the realizing of the ugliness of this history and trying to reconcile it with what people did that would give meaning to this letter.<br />
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Your mother was one of the staunchest supporters of the Sisi regime, because your uncle was a policeman, she was a vehemently opposed to anyone who pointed to police corruption. She supported the police as they killed thousands of people, and even though many have presented her with evidence that they were unjustified, she shrugged them off. She continued her support for police brutality in the face of logic and evidence of a declining sense of justice and a declining economy. She was happy to label anyone who opposed the crimes of these irresponsible tyrants as traitors, while the real treason was committed by those she supported.<br />
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Your father and I were closer, he was also more moderate, yet he showed great weakness, never engaged in trying to call out the criminals even though he may have seen their crimes. He was looking out for your future as any father would, but the cost was the future of many other generations and the history you have inherited. So many have been killed with the blessing of apologists and your parents were those apologists.<br />
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In answer to your questions as to whether our generation was aware of these atrocities that you learn about in school, the answer is yes, there was plenty of information. It is just that many did not want to believe or want to be confronted with the sad reality that their country was run by criminals, that their children's future was going to be determined by criminals. They would rather believe that those trying to rectify the situation were spies, rather than people who loved their country and valued its future enough to oppose the oppressors.<br />
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Torture was widespread, and to get a sense of how people reacted, they didn't care, as long as their own people were not affected, yet as we've come to learn it was only a matter of time before someone close to someone got hurt in some way or another. The country descended into lawlessness on account of police brutality, yet your parents and people like them were steadfast in blaming the victims of this brutality rather than the perpetrators.<br />
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There was a strong narrative that the country was fighting terrorism, but as we've come to see, the policies put in place by the oppressive regime did nothing but create more extremists who were fighting because of a growing extremist ideology or to attain some sort of justice against a regime that offered no civil way of attaining it.<br />
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I want you to believe me when I tell you I have tried hard to speak to your parents and convince them to take a different moral route, but they shunned me and chose to continue in their ways. I asked them to stand by their integrity for your sake, so that you will not view them as weak or immoral for allowing such atrocities, but to no avail. They were determined.<br />
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I do not know if there was anything more I could have done, I want you to believe that I have tried my best that you and many like you not inherit the country and the history that you did, not to inherit the parents that you did. We had many opportunities, if only people had learned to look beyond their selfish needs, we would have all been better off.<br />
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History cannot be changed now, you have seen what has happened, and the only thing I urge you to do dear Lydia is not to follow the same path taken by your parents, of apathy and justification for tyrants. Remember that all this is transient, all that remains is how much of your integrity you have maintained.<br />
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Lovingly,<br />
<br />
W.</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-29249129259949048102019-09-15T15:16:00.000+02:002019-09-15T18:05:25.881+02:00Fuck Their Palaces<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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This is about the spaces they take from us to give themselves.<br />
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Here I am with spaces all around me. In a city in Europe whose rich history covers its streets with darkness and brightness. I’m here in this space, with everyone enjoying the music and their freedom. But back home, there are few such spaces. They are building palaces at our expense. The cost of their space is ours. They have set out to take our spaces to make them their own. The cost of their freedom to steal is the freedom from our own, the very youth that would ever build our future.<br />
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Thousands in jail, the spaces they should be inhabiting stolen from them, and for what? For luxury palaces, gardens and special interests. For spaces that may end up abandoned but guarded. Empty spaces, as empty as their dreams for a future.<br />
The present I’m experiencing in those foreign spaces abroad is what we deserve back home. It’s what those thrown in prison deserve.<br />
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We live in a transmogrified past and the only way to reach the present is to travel. I never thought time travel was possible, but it is. You just have to leave the borders of this time warp, where its inhabitants are stuck in slavery. It’s not easy to leave. The wardens are not just our jailers but those very same foreign countries who arm the oppressors with weapons and technology to keep us locked in. The condescending view of us in their embassies as they forget about the riches they’ve stolen. That sense of entitlement for a better life even though its price is paid by our enslavement.<br />
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My friends are in jail so that some General’s wife can have her customized palaces. These palaces are not just built with the money they steal from us, but with our lives. Their fortress is not just the walls they put up, but the network of greedy interests that produce humans that stand in the way of justice to maintain the corruption that keeps them thriving.</div>
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We never asked for this, we would have been happy to dance. But what choice were we given? To dance away while trampling the rights and lives of others underfoot. To dance while trampling their dignity and ours. It’s not much of a choice. Both are a form of death. One of them closer to the literal sense of the word, our lives being destroyed if we speak, the other a literary death, the death of our conscience and humanity. <br />
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Fuck their palaces. We will dance when we can to counter their greed. We will speak when we can to counter our death. </div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-2170067947560618962019-08-30T12:39:00.000+02:002019-08-30T12:39:09.589+02:00Chocolate Cake Streets<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The streets reflect everything. They are the ripple effects of closed door meetings with decisions and actions that affect our lives. Our motivations are not as individualistic as we often think. Our motivations are set by the context we live in. Both the social and political manifest themselves in us.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">You're unique and special, just like everybody else. I would have liked to think my thoughts and my journey was special. After all I climbed out of the abyss of mainstream thinking, read history, questioned my reality and experienced so many things that many others may never experience in their lifetime. But that doesn't make me unique in character, there are at least about 400 other people out there that have my same characteristics. Critical, argumentative, expressive, angry, pensive and host of other qualities I don't know if I possess or not. The point is that I'm a result of what I've been given to deal with, but special in that it's me.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
Our lives are like recipes, each person has their own, but many people share the recipe. What really differs is that the quality of ingredients and their compatibility differ. So let's say I'm Cocoa, I would be put in the mix with butter, sugar, flour and milk. I would react with these ingredients, be subjected to heat, cold, chemicals and other elements till I finally look like a chocolate cake. I may taste slightly different, I may think that I've gone through a lot, but I'm still a chocolate cake like many others out there. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Perhaps my contribution is the quality of Cocoa that I am. The result is still not guaranteed, for what kind of butter, milk and flour came into contact with me? I'm not telling myself it's not worth it to try and be a better chocolate cake, but it would be simplistic to believe that I'm the only one.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">I walk through the streets and look at templates of people. Certain people come with bundled characteristics that make them similar to one another. The class joker, the swindler, the kind fool, the evil prick. They all follow patterns, but they sometimes come in various flavors. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">I walk down the streets and I see cheese cake, carrot cake, red velvet, vanilla icing cake and I try and recognize their patterns. It's impossible to figure things out about people with just a glance. But what's worrying to me is that people are being shaped. I look at changes in policy and society and they're quickly manifested in the faces of people I watch go by. Their recipe changes and sure enough, they react to the new ingredients put their way and transform or even transmogrify. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: justify;">There's not much I can do about it, the only thing I can hope for is be aware of where I stand and perhaps try and become a better ingredient.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-19137156317446434712019-07-30T16:46:00.001+02:002019-08-01T13:10:06.194+02:00Moving<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: #323639; line-height: 115%;">I woke up slowly, not rushing into any of the morning tasks that I have to do. I thought of doing a bit of work, perhaps to have an easier week later on. I put up my first poster in the new house since I moved, it's of pulp fiction. I know it’s a bit of a cliche, but it makes the place mine in some way. My friend got me plants, they change the space as they sit on the window sill. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #323639; line-height: 115%;">It’s odd how small things make a place more soulful like the fridge magnet I bought from a city I visited only for work. It's the little things that reflect who I am that make a difference in a space. I don't want to own many things here because I'll move, but at the same time I want the place to feel like it’s mine, like it reflects me.It's a tough trade off</span> that I haven’t quite figured out yet</div>
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<span style="color: #323639;">Days like these make me wonder what living somewhere means. We give our life meaning through the random things we encounter around us. The movies that are out, the music that we can choose from, the restaurants that are there and people that happen to be in our neighborhood. It's like these things are forced upon us and we have to somehow create meaning by arranging them into categories. This friend is closer than that. That street is better than this. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #323639;">My own thoughts are inconclusive so far as to what to make of the new things around that I've been given to organize. But maybe I've decided that no matter what the confusion, I'll continue to share.</span></div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-60897073688329741082019-06-09T03:31:00.004+02:002019-06-13T10:43:48.206+02:00The Funeral<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I went to a funeral at church tonight. I met some of the old
faces I abandoned several years back when I parted ways with the Orthodox
church which adopted a very clear counter-revolutionary stance. They wedged
themselves deeper into that moral abyss when Pope Tawadros was appointed only
to unquestioningly support the re-establishment of military rule after the
takeover in 2013. I left them all behind. The further I drifted the more
content I became. Meanwhile, I still had connections with the actual community on
social media. They read what I wrote. I responded to what they wrote. Quite
expectedly, we got into huge arguments that resulted in accusations,
unfriending and blocking. </div>
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The main moral confrontation was about their support
of a dictator as his regime crushed my friends and comrades. The dictator was
applauded alongside Jesus who they claimed to celebrate, while those who
actually adopted the values Jesus preached about were crucified. ‘Crucify
them,’ they said, and with the same breath they celebrated freedom for the corrupt
and murderous, like Hesham Talaat Mostafa, Habib El Adly and numerous others like
them. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I had never understood that part of the story in the gospels, that juvenile
part just before the crucifixion when Jesus was presented to the masses that welcomed him a year earlier and asked whether he should be pardoned, the people responded 'Crucify him'. Never understood how people could turn against someone who had done nothing but speak
truth to power in favor of better morals. Now I've seen it happen and that part of the story seems like the most realistic and authentic part. How simplistic real life can be as
well.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
This is the church that I got to know, that likened Sisi to
Jesus and linked him to the words of prophets about a savior. This is the
church that mocked those who used religion to manipulate people’s politics when
the Islamists did it, and yet its leader went out and supported the regime
despite every atrocity committed in violation of human decency. Its people have
sided with false gods and abandoned the morality preached. It’s not that they
preached against anything good, it’s that they demoted their beliefs to lip
service and mindless acts of worship. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It was the funeral of an old lady whose family I knew. It
wasn’t the saddest of funerals because it seems that the old woman had lived a
full life till she was very old. I never knew her, just her daughter and her
son in law who was also a priest that was close to my heart and I knew her
granddaughters and loved them dearly. They were all lovely people who hadn’t
quite followed the party line, nor excused atrocities. As soon as I entered and
I saw Father Ibrahim, I was filled with love. Some of these people were a
community I loved, but I was so angry at the bigger picture, at the rest of
everything that I was unable to visit that church much, not even ceremonially.
Despite the funeral not being very sad, I was full of sadness. I sat and looked
at the faces and wondered what I was so sad about. I realized that I was
mourning the death of that church for me and what it meant.<o:p></o:p></div>
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How far had the Coptic church drifted from its promises of
holding on to the moral teachings of Jesus. The church had offered resilience
in the face of persecution historically. Who knew that you did not need to kill
them for them to die. All you had to do is co-opt their leadership and the rest
would slowly decay. They would live by their fears instead of their values, they
would follow the crowd instead of their conscience. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I mourned the death of the church for what it represented
because I loved some of the people. It reminded me that people who have immoral
stances can still be lovely warm people who love those close to them and who
take care of their community. It reminded me that we can tell ourselves lies in
order to think of ourselves as good people. I wasn’t filled with anger when I
was there, I was filled with sadness for this lost potential. Even a cynic like
me has hope and believes that something better is possible. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It doesn’t matter now how many apologies I get from those
who have attacked me, it also doesn’t matter if people haven’t changed their
minds and continue to support a brutal murdering dictator. Something has been
lost and I have to remember that so many people I know are in jail because many
of those lovely fearful people made it possible. There are many beautiful
things about Jesus’ teachings that have been distorted by the Coptic community
and its church leadership. But as the anger subsides for a while, I’m full of
sadness and I’m also filled with love for some of the people who have stood
their ground and others who haven’t stood their ground but are paradoxically
kind loving people who want to do right by their community.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Anger is much easier, it removes a lot of the problems,
because beneath the question of morality, there’s a more complex question of
humanity.<span style="mso-bidi-language: AR-EG;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-63421124409707472322019-05-12T21:40:00.002+02:002019-05-12T21:49:41.835+02:00The Starts<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijyZiFY1knT6hChqeY6sK6nQV_ykggWkBsZPsQgmknq77JVoQ7-zRnCQ9ok2vK1wiR97AorK7LfiR0X4a2HSowrzxgo-Il2F2p55xuDkb8tRqWcue0Qvs1MTNuy9D1US91Gw/s1600/winter-of-discontent.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="252" data-original-width="448" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijyZiFY1knT6hChqeY6sK6nQV_ykggWkBsZPsQgmknq77JVoQ7-zRnCQ9ok2vK1wiR97AorK7LfiR0X4a2HSowrzxgo-Il2F2p55xuDkb8tRqWcue0Qvs1MTNuy9D1US91Gw/s400/winter-of-discontent.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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It’s often difficult to start. Sometimes it’s easy, but
other times it’s difficult. A start can come without expectations or it can be
coupled with hope for a certain finish. Experience can make it easy, but it can
also make it difficult. I think I’m at the worst place with starts. It’s
difficult to start, it comes with expectations and my experience hinders me
rather than saves me. My mind envisions all the paths to the hoped end, but
they keep getting blocked. I’ve been down this road, I’ve been down that road.
That’s what my mind does to my writing. The writing is blocked by cynicism and
by fear. What is there to fear about writing? That’s a fair question. It
differs from one person to another. I’ve heard about this fear from others but
could never relate. Now I think I relate to the sentiment although I’m not
certain that it is the same that others have. I fear my words will lead me down
a tired path. The quest for something new is hindered by my experience. It’s
not just experience. It’s exhaustion.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I would have loved to have been exhausted by writing itself.
I would then just quit and find something else to do with my time. But really,
I’m just exhausted with life. The futility of it all. The same old results. I
had wished this tired old path led me to something fruitful, but it has not. It
has lead me to a dead end and I need to figure things out before I am able to
write again. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
So I start again, in the hopes of evading some futility.
Maybe I’m just accepting it. What did it all matter in the end? The lesson that
I’ve learnt is that evil prevails. Good is just something that prevails in
literature or motion pictures. I use the non-nuanced terms of good and evil
because I’m too tired to make a sophisticated argument. The end result is that
evil prevails. This isn’t a Paulo Cohelo thing nor its inversion. I know the
world is more complex, but trauma is both simple and very complex. My intellect
is able to understand and regurgitate that jargon that analyzes these
sentiments, but my own emotions have been stripped down to a primal state, a
state of feeling something that does not tolerate the sophistications of
reality. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The whole point of expressing all this is purely
therapeutic. Can I really express my state of mind? It’s all jumbled up, but
this really does express it. It’s still not adequate, it is lacking. Is it
abstract? Perhaps a little, but that’s how my mind works. If anything, it’s too
simplified for what I’m thinking. I wonder how it sounds like to others. Is it
clear or does it sound pretentious? I only ask because my thoughts have always
been met with ‘But how do you really feel, concretely?’.. and this is how I’ve
always thought of my feelings. Feelings are thoughts. These are my thoughts.
These are my feelings. <o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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I realize I have avoided starting anything, but then again,
I’m almost finished.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It’s hard to make others understand, when you’ve questioned
the accepted norms. This isn’t just some progressive crap though. I’ve
questioned the conservative and the ‘progressive’. I’ve always thought something
along the lines of ‘Progressives have a dogma that only conservatives have a
dogma.’<o:p></o:p></div>
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I’ve used different building blocks for the structure of my
thinking. It’s not that different. I too am trapped by my own context and my
positionality. Still, starting from scratch is exhausting. Perhaps that’s why
I’m unable to start. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Over the years I’ve come round full circle to where I was,
writing about the inner thoughts. Yet the outside for me has changed so much.
I’ve come to see the world through a lens tainted with blood and power. These
are what shape my world. But I have never just been a simple observer. I’ve
engaged. These two are countered by the power of people’s integrity. I’ve seen
it up close. I shall never forget.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-8142169105854822172019-04-20T21:46:00.000+02:002019-05-12T21:48:34.504+02:00They Try and Change the Constitution<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<iframe width="320" height="266" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/UQvPnpU8Fsk/0.jpg" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UQvPnpU8Fsk?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">
sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-57989543191139706612019-03-30T10:38:00.000+02:002019-04-15T10:39:30.212+02:00Egypt’s Arrested Battlegrounds<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #272727; font-family: "pt sans" , "helvetica" , "arial" , "lucida" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Egypt on January 9, 2019 to outline President Donald Trump’s “America First” vision of an assertive US role in the Middle East for his audience at the American University in Cairo, adding that “America is a force for good in the Middle East. Period.” Pompeo’s speech made no reference to advancing human rights or democracy, nor to alleviating widespread poverty or reining in brutal police states—all issues at the heart of the Arab uprisings in 2011, and which appear even more out of reach in Egypt today than they did eight years ago. His speech indicated the US would effectively endorse crackdowns on the freedoms of citizens in the Arab world, such as that taking place in Egypt today, in order to pursue its animosity towards Iran and whatever else it perceives as in its best interests.</span></div>
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While mass arrests and arbitrary detentions are nothing new to Egypt, the escalation and widening pattern of arrests over the past year indicate that the authoritarian mindset of the Egyptian regime has significantly changed since President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the former head of military intelligence, took power in a military coup in 2013. Since then, Egypt has arrested or charged at least sixty thousand people, forcibly disappeared hundreds and tried thousands of civilians in military courts. Supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood have been killed, detained and targeted under the banner of fighting terrorism. Many dissidents have been accused of belonging to the outlawed group to justify their arrest.</div>
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The overall pace of arrests and detentions has only <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/01/17/egypt-new-moves-crush-dissent" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">escalated</a> in 2018 as part of a mass arrest campaign undertaken by Egyptian police and security forces of human rights workers, lawyers, journalists and political activists along with a growing number of former regime insiders and even supportive public figures. The government has also introduced restrictive anti-NGO legislation and bolstered its draconian anti-terror laws, among other measures, to silence speech and dissent of any kind. Torture and mistreatment are rampant in Egypt’s prisons and security facilities.</div>
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The Egyptian government’s escalating arrest campaign, however, is less about simply detaining the opposition than it is about eradicating any openings that may lead to dissent.</div>
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Egypt under the former dictator Hosni Mubarak, like many modern dictatorships, enjoyed a vibrant ecosystem of brutal security bodies, a ruling party, a controlled opposition and a media that masqueraded as free. Islamists were controlled through a mixture of covert deals and brute force. At times they were allowed space and at other times they faced intense security crackdowns. The judiciary was kept under control for the most part, but there were <a href="http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/02/22/egypt-s-judges-in-revolutionary-age/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">pockets of independence</a> afforded to judges if they chose to use them, particularly in areas like the administrative court and the court of cassation. Any opposition was targeted through an arsenal of weaponry that ranged from soft threats, business related pressures and even forced disappearances.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
But now, the older form of authoritarian governance is <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/2016/05/13/egypt-cairo-mubarak-sisi-455753.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">disappearing</a>. While the overall security apparatus is essentially the same as it was under Mubarak in terms of its tools and tactics, there is a marked strategic shift from Mubarak’s Egypt to Sisi’s Egypt in how these tactics are employed and by whom.</div>
</div>
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Under President Sisi, the regime’s approach is far less permissive of any dissent even within ranks that are loyal to the state and antagonistic to any form of revolutionary resistance. The government is no longer tolerant of even the simplest gestures of a faux democracy that were present under Mubarak, no matter how symbolic and meaningless they appear to be. There is no longer a ruling party, no tolerance for the role of opposition formerly played by regime supporters and not even the pretense of a free press. Accompanying this strategic shift in the targets of repression, there has been a major shift in the power balance among security agencies such as state security (now renamed Egyptian Homeland Security), general intelligence and military intelligence. Under Mubarak, state security controlled Egypt’s domestic space in terms of strategy and execution. Following the uprising in 2011, the balance between them shifted: The military stepped in to exert more influence over domestic affairs through its military intelligence branch, peaking with the overthrow of Mohamed Morsi in 2013.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
The regime, moreover, no longer cites terror and security concerns as a pretense for arrests. Opponents are targeted without a meaningful reason and without the flimsy paperwork that in the past justified these arrests. The most recent trend is to accuse the arrested of spreading false information and joining a banned group. This accusation ensures detainees are referred to state security prosecution, which allows for even less judicial oversight.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
There is no other time in Egypt’s modern history when the widespread government assault on rights has been <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/2016/05/13/egypt-cairo-mubarak-sisi-455753.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">more severe</a>. The state’s attempt to dominate the social and political field indicates a significant change in the current regime’s view of authoritarian governance in the aftermath of the popular uprising that broke out on January 25, 2011. Eight years later, despite the regime’s tight control of the street and state institutions, Sisi’s public <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OlpxVEHVIU" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">pronouncements</a> about the 2011 uprising often <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-politics/egypts-sisi-warns-opponents-as-calls-to-boycott-election-build-idUSKBN1FK363" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">warn</a> of a determination to prevent its reoccurrence: “What happened seven or eight years ago, will not happen again in Egypt. What didn’t work then, will not work now. No…it looks like you don’t know me well.”</div>
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This unprecedented state of repression would not have been possible without Sisi’s internal consolidation of power within Egypt’s state institutions since 2013, winning the support and complicity of the United States and the European Union (EU) along with the financial backing of Egypt’s Gulf allies such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the increasingly permissive international and regional environment for autocrats and authoritarians, firmly embraced by President Trump, outlined in Pompeo’s Cairo speech.</div>
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<h2 style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "pt sans narrow", helvetica, arial, lucida, sans-serif; font-size: 26px; font-weight: 500; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 10px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline;">
<strong style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Arresting Spaces of Dissent</strong></h2>
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There are a number of factors fueling speculation about why the escalating repression is happening now, particularly as most of the arrests are made with no clear charges, no evidence and in response to no threatening or illegal actions taken by most of those arrested.</div>
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Egypt currently faces growing economic hardships, which is often cited as a factor fueling the state’s desire to keep the street tightly under control. The so-called ‘economic reforms’ and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rJH2sTfNAc" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">mass printing of money</a> by the central bank have led to spiraling inflation and a lower standard of living for Egyptians on the whole. In addition, private businesses have suffered as <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/files/egyptian_armed_forces.pdf" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">military related businesses</a> have used the military’s hegemony over politics to grab a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.de/egypts-military-hijacking-its-economy-2016-3?r=US&IR=T" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">larger market share</a> in various industries. The military’s growing clout may explain why in every move that impoverishes the average Egyptian’s lifestyle, the government operates in a military-like fashion that views citizens as the enemy who must be coerced into accepting new policies.</div>
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There is also speculation that the government is preparing to alter the constitution to extend Sisi’s rule or that the government may be preparing the ground for a controversial embrace of the Trump administration’s much discussed ‘<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/03/world/middleeast/-egypt-sisi-trump-white-house.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">”deal of the century</a>” between Israel and the Palestinians, which may include a major Egyptian role in Gaza.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
Yet while these factors are certainly present, there is also a deeper factor at play. Sisi’s Egypt views the downfall of Mubarak as a cautionary tale for what might happen when too much space is allowed for opposition, even if it is controlled opposition. Hence a managed ruling party, a largely subservient judiciary and a media operating on a tight leash are seen as too permissive to ensure regime survival: politics itself is the enemy. The regime’s notion is that only a unified and singular political voice can and will take Egypt forward. What’s more, the regime’s crackdown goes beyond repressing overt or clandestine opposition: It has become a fight against existing and potential spaces where dissent might be possible in the future.</div>
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This broader transformation of Egyptian authoritarianism under Sisi is illustrated not only by the scale of the crackdown, but also by the broader pattern of arrests and repressive policies that have taken place since 2013, and have taken a harsh turn in the past year.</div>
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Upon assuming power in 2013, Sisi introduced legislation that blocked possible roads to dissent in order to cement his rule. Early examples include <a href="https://www.ifex.org/egypt/2014/06/27/23_anti_protestlaw_activists_detained/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">anti-protest law</a> followed by the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150611081857/http:/www.africa-confidential.com/angaza-file" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">long fight</a> to get rid of Hesham Genena, Egypt’s former chief auditor, which started with legislation to give the president the right to remove him. He was subsequently arrested and <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2018/04/24/news/u/military-court-sentences-hesham-geneina-to-5-years-in-prison/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">sentenced </a>to five years in prison.</div>
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Despite all the legislative power consolidated by Sisi to control dissent, arrests remain the central tactic for purging opposition voices, even from within ranks loyal to the state, and the scope of arrests has expanded far beyond traditional targets.</div>
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While many of the arrested figures who make the news are well known political activists or opposition figures like <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-44226464" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Wael Abbas</a>, <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-5392863/Egypt-arrests-ex-presidential-candidate-Abul-Fotouh-officials.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh</a> and <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2018/05/15/news/u/activist-shady-al-ghazaly-harb-brought-before-supreme-state-security-prosecution/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Shady El Ghazaly Harb</a>, the regime is also arresting lesser known individuals who have carved out social or political space in Egypt. For example Mohamed Radwan, known as <a href="https://www.alaraby.co.uk/medianews/2018/4/7/%D8%A7%D8%B9%D8%AA%D9%82%D8%A7%D9%84-%D9%85%D8%AD%D9%85%D8%AF-%D8%A3%D9%83%D8%B3%D8%AC%D9%8A%D9%86-%D8%A7%D8%B3%D8%AA%D9%85%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B1-%D9%85%D8%B3%D9%84%D8%B3%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%82%D9%85%D8%B9-%D9%81%D9%8A-%D9%85%D8%B5%D8%B1" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Mohamed Oxygen</a> for his Youtube channel Oxygen Egypt, was arrested in April 2018. His video blog consisted of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lC56JYvx5j4." style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">interviews</a> conducted on the street with ordinary people. The satirical blogger <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2018/05/06/news/u/lawyer-satirical-blogger-shady-abu-zeid-arrested-during-dawn-raid-whereabouts-remain-unknown/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Shady Abuzeid</a>, famous for a controversial video where he films himself distributing condoms to policemen in Tahrir on the revolution’s anniversary in 2016, was arrested even though he had been silent on politics since the video. Many <a href="https://www.change.org/p/egyptian-regime-torture-beatings-and-prison-for-galal-el-behairy-for-ramy-essam-s-balaha-freegalal" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">many young people</a> associated with the exiled singer Ramy Essam and the production of his song ‘Balaha’ (a mocking nickname for Sisi which means date) have all been arrested by state security forces.</div>
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Moreover, a number of former regime supporters and insiders have increasingly been targeted for arrest as well. For example, Ahmed Shafiq was <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-egypt-politics/former-egypt-premier-says-hes-fine-and-still-mulling-election-bid-idUSKBN1DY2OD" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">placed under house arrest</a> in the Marriott Hotel temporarily after being deported by the UAE for having announced his 2018 candidacy for president there, where he was quickly coerced into withdrawing from the presidential race. The regime imposed an even harsher measure against former Egyptian military chief of staff Gen. Sami Anan who was <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/01/23/egypt-arrests-former-general-sami-anan-planned-challenge-sisi/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">was arrested</a>, and remains in custody of the military prosecution, simply for declaring his intent to run for the presidency. A former ambassador and former military officer, Massoum Marzouk, was also arrested on August 31, 2018 for criticizing al-Sisi and calling for protests to take place.</div>
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Other actors within the regime such as <a href="https://marsad-egypt.info/en/2017/10/28/lieutenant-general-hegazy-ii-egypts-new-chief-staff/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Mahmoud Hegazy</a>, the former army chief of staff, <a href="http://www.manar.com/page-39953-ar.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Osama Askar</a>, Commander of the Unified Command in the Sinai, and <a href="https://egyptianstreets.com/2018/06/14/egypt-replaces-minsters-of-interior-and-defense-in-surprise-move/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Sedky Sobhy</a>, former minister of defense, have been the subject of repressive measures when their views were not completely aligned with command. Instead of being merely sidelined, as happened in the past, this new development is a sign that suppression extends beyond opposition and is now internal to the regime.</div>
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One controversial personality under arrest is Hazem Abdel Azim, who had been a strong supporter of Sisi and part of his presidential campaign at one point. Initially a supporter of the revolution, Abdel Azim took a sharp turn against it when Sisi came to power. Sometime after Sisi was sworn in as president, he took yet another U-turn and apologized for his support of Sisi. More controversially, he exposed how parliamentary elections were <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2016/03/14/feature/politics/anatomy-of-an-election/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">were orchestrated</a> behind the scenes and became a vehement critic of the Sisi regime. He also published a recorded phone call with someone allegedly from security services threatening him on his personal Facebook page.</div>
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Yet Abdel Azim is not the most surprising arrest. TV presenter Khairy Ramadan, a regime hardliner was also <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/egyptian-states-tightened-grip-media-burns-its-own-mouthpieces-601085439" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">arrested</a>. He was released on bail fairly quickly, but the move was a strong message that even within the regime’s ranks all messaging must be aligned and not go off script. Even Mubarak’s sons, Alaa and Gamal were <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-45534138" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">arrested</a> this September. A journalist close to the regime<a href="https://www.almasryalyoum.com/news/details/1323337" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;"> accused</a> Gamal Mubarak of trying to regain power and close ties with the Muslim Brotherhood, which became the pretense for his arrest.</div>
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The regime’s fight is no longer about simply suppressing dissenting voices but rather a targeted attack on all spaces and battlefields that may be used to voice dissent, whether political, social or physical. Because football stadiums had been one of the places of free, often subversive, expression, football fans have been <a href="https://www.thenational.ae/sport/football/egypt-to-allow-football-fans-to-attend-matches-at-stadiums-in-phased-manner-1.760058" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">banned</a> from attending matches. The government has also targeted <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2017/09/24/news/u/security-forces-close-downtown-cairo-bookstore-and-detain-2-employees/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">bookstores and media outlets</a> as well as <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2016/12/01/news/u/government-shuts-down-libraries-owned-by-rights-activist-gamal-eid/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">shut down libraries</a> that were started by the opposition figure and human rights activist Gamal Eid.</div>
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The elimination of all and even potentially oppositional voices and spaces so that only one can be amplified is a clear indication that there can be no semblance of opposition. Even when it was time for elections, whose results were a foregone conclusion, Sisi eliminated all competition. Had it not been for US Vice President Mike Pence’s condition that the presidential election in 2018 <a href="https://madamasr.com/en/2018/02/10/feature/politics/analysis-how-sisi-has-been-sidelining-his-opponents/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">must have a contender</a> Sisi would have run alone. When competition was presented, Sisi dispatched one of his supporters to run against him, a man who rallied for Sisi even during his own presidential bid.</div>
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<strong style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">International Complicity</strong></h2>
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None of these increasingly bold and repressive moves would have been possible without the support granted Egypt from the US, the EU and the Gulf states. President Trump’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/03/world/middleeast/-egypt-sisi-trump-white-house.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">praise for dictators</a> and disdain for human rights and democracy, along with rising authoritarian parties in a number of European countries, has enabled the Egyptian regime to violate human rights law with impunity. In addition, both Saudi Arabia and the UAE have been committed supporters of Egypt’s government and policies through their massive <a href="https://en.qantara.de/content/gulf-nations-throw-support-to-egypts-sisi-as-election-nears" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">economic support packages</a> and by lobbying western governments to recognize and embrace Egypt’s government without criticizing its human rights violations.</div>
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While it may be a permissive period for aspiring authoritarians, it is also the case that many Western countries have significant business and security interests in Egypt that not only reinforce their silence on its human rights violations but also cause them to offer open support for the regime.</div>
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The French president, Emmanuel Macron, for example, has been <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/20190118-france-egypt-macron-visit-labour-rights-abuses-military-deals" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">criticized</a> for <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-egypt/macron-avoids-lecturing-egypt-on-rights-sisi-defends-his-record-idUSKBN1CT2NT" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">refusing to speak</a> about Egypt’s human rights record particularly as Egypt has been the largest <a href="https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2018-03/fssipri_at2017_0.pdf" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">recipient of arms</a> from France between 2013 and 2017. France has also been supplying <a href="https://www.fidh.org/en/issues/litigation/egypt-a-repression-made-in-france" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">surveillance equipment</a> and other hardware used to target activists. Great Britain’s ambassador to Egypt John Casson has <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/07/uk-ambassador-to-egypt-criticised-over-agenda-for-mps-visit" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">come under fire</a> for his reluctance to talk about Egyptian human rights abuses even though the Great Britain is a major <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/aug/18/uk-2-million-pounds-aid-support-egypt-security-projects-deeply-disturbing" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">supporter</a> of Egypt’s security services as well. Many other interests bind it to Egypt, including the IMF loan which will pay <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/imf-loan-approved-uk-supports-egypt" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">arrears</a> to international oil companies, including British Petroleum.</div>
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Germany also has close business and security ties with Egypt and in return Prime Minister Merkel has <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-africa/merkel-under-fire-for-downplaying-concerns-about-egyptian-rights-idUSKBN1691O7" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">downplayed</a> the human rights abuses taking place in Egypt. Germany has established a <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/04/24/germany/egypt-agreement-risks-complicity-abuses" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">security agreement</a> with Egypt which has <a href="https://www.rosalux.de/fileadmin/rls_uploads/pdfs/Online-Publikation/03-18_Online-Publ_accessory_to_repression.pdf" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">deepened</a> despite the Egyptian government’s poor track record on human rights. Trade between Egypt and Germany remains lucrative, including the sale of a German-made attack submarine and an <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/siemens-egypt-power/update-1-siemens-signs-8-billion-euro-power-deal-with-egypt-idUSL5N0YP41Z20150603" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">eight billion euro</a> deal for the German company Siemens to build power stations, which Egypt granted directly without competition with other companies.</div>
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Greece and Cyprus have also been supportive of Egypt’s current government, and their representatives have blocked several attempts by the EU to take action against Egypt for its human rights abuses. The <a href="https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/greece-egypt-back-cyprus-gas-exploration" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">reason</a> appears to be the lucrative <a href="https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/ru/contents/articles/originals/2018/10/egypt-cyprus-natural-gas-deal-export-turkey.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">agreement</a> around the exploration and transportation of natural gas from Cyprus’ gas fields to Egypt for re-export to Europe.</div>
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Spain and Italy have also largely remained silent about Egyptian government actions, and it is also the case that they are set to be paid <a href="https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Egypt-Ordered-To-Pay-2B-To-JV-Over-Natural-Gas-Row.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">over two billion dollars</a> by Egypt over a natural gas dispute through their joint venture Union Fenosa Gas. Despite the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/15/magazine/giulio-regeni-italian-graduate-student-tortured-murdered-egypt.html" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">murder</a> of the Italian researcher Guilio Regeni in which the Egyptian government has been implicated, Italy has been trying to find a way to return to business as usual rather than seek justice for its murdered student. Just two and a half years after Regeni’s murder, Eni, an Italian energy company has been granted an <a href="https://www.eni.com/en_IT/media/2018/08/eni-granted-new-exploration-license-offshore-egypt" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">offshore exploration license</a> in the Mediterranean Sea by Egyptian authorities.</div>
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<strong style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">A Repressive Formula</strong></h2>
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While the Egyptian government’s widening campaign of arbitrary arrests and extended detentions have been mounting, the chances of fighting this repression has been diminishing. The Egyptian regime now aims to eliminate all existing or potential political or social battlegrounds rather than build state capacity to fight in these battlegrounds and win—employing <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22613" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">mass death sentences</a> that are sometimes carried out and <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/07/egypt-hundreds-disappeared-and-tortured-amid-wave-of-brutal-repression/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">enforced disappearances</a> that are not questioned. The recent measures taken by the regime have not only eliminated real or potential opposition figures but have also eradicated any space where it was once possible to conduct a battle for rights. In an autocratic state, there are often sites of contestation: the press, courts, elections and other sites. Battles erupt in these spaces. What the current regime is doing now is eliminating the ability for citizens to contest its rule through any of these traditional institution-based processes.</div>
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It seems that Egypt has mastered a mode of operation that eliminates battlegrounds instead of engaging with them. Internal consolidation of power is a meticulous process that involves making sure that both opposition and regime supporters fall in line, whatever the cost. At the same time the regime appears to be succeeding in fending off external pressure from the international community that could hinder the process of internal regime consolidation.</div>
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But Egypt’s repressive crackdown on political space has not come without a political cost. In order to secure international support, Egypt has strained its economy with debts, and inflation has hit an all-time high. Economic hardship for most Egyptians has negatively affected Sisi’s popularity, though dissatisfaction is being contained through a brutal security apparatus. At the same time, the mass arrests of its opponents, real or imagined, is creating more enemies for the regime. Once manically popular, Sisi is now cursed at even though people are painfully aware of the price of speaking out.</div>
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Egypt has succeeded in reestablishing authoritarianism in a manner that is far more brutal—and far-reaching—than Mubarak. It has managed to control the street while undermining its own judiciary and institutions. The military’s hegemony over the economy is turning into full-fledged domination. Once contested, albeit controlled, battlegrounds are decimated. The diminishing role of state institutions and structures has led to more centralized regime control over all aspects of governing, eliminating a governing process.</div>
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At the same time, people are governed through fear and are unwilling to risk the brutality that may accompany calling for their rights. This formula gives the appearance of relative stability. But with a deteriorating economy that affects the livelihood of the majority of Egyptians, will this be sustainable in the absence of state structures and institutions that have traditionally acted as a pressure release? Time will tell whether this attempt at a totalizing form of political control is a modern-day authoritarian’s winning formula, or a house made of cards that will readily crumble when a new crisis or event sparks mass outrage.</div>
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How to cite this article:</h4>
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<a href="https://merip.org/paupress/profile/20006" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #c30e0e; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Wael Eskandar</a> "Egypt’s Arrested Battlegrounds," <em style="background: transparent; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline;">Middle East Report Online</em>, February 07, 2019.</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-65362361365078809382019-02-22T03:08:00.001+02:002019-02-22T12:22:18.999+02:00Being in Cairo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFwE5cXXL9xedTHRKdXgr_wLQ_40HtS2FRv8ZLKVtlMVpzVsHlMUTAUnYx-VpC4K-7ncCf7bX-nvK4AMg3UVKqHV_VC_Z7O6zSRLtJ_eoO1kK7SJVs_TIN6a6f2ESBW6B5Ag/s1600/16585136_593100310878935_8877600033923399680_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1080" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFwE5cXXL9xedTHRKdXgr_wLQ_40HtS2FRv8ZLKVtlMVpzVsHlMUTAUnYx-VpC4K-7ncCf7bX-nvK4AMg3UVKqHV_VC_Z7O6zSRLtJ_eoO1kK7SJVs_TIN6a6f2ESBW6B5Ag/s400/16585136_593100310878935_8877600033923399680_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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It's a strange feeling to be in Cairo. Things are more convenient in a way and far worse in others. My privilege gives me protection from some parts of the ruthless city. A car, a flat and you're ready to shut out all those voices of inconvenience. I should be ready to step outside the car for a while and deal with the annoyances of the parking attendants, most of whom are government informers. I also have to deal with whatever bureaucracy exists in public as well as private enterprises. Everything is forbidden without reason, or rather a hidden reason or one that does not respect you. The private business owners have mimicked the top down government approach of asking their employees to follow instructions without questions.</div>
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Yes, questions are the enemy, because they demand answers. The biggest question is 'Why?' and the answers are what most people want to avoid because the truth is inconvenient. Why do I have to wait in line? Why is everything so inefficient? Why are there more hard drugs in the market? Why don't the police arrest criminals? Why do innocent people languish in jail? So many questions and the answers are known but not spoken. The answers are so dark that people prefer to pretend they are a mystery.</div>
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Yet a house and some money can go a long way to shield you from the idiocies of society. They can't however block news of injustice and they can't block the injustices you see each day when you step outside for a while and they can't bring back dignity, only buy you some cheap knock off that disappears as soon as your money does, or as soon as your opinions become inconvenient. </div>
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The guitar keeps me company. It creates a beautiful sound from touch. I get better at it. I pick the difficult pieces because they challenge me. I need some sort of challenge that I can take on. I can no longer do the moral challenges as immorality triumphs again and again. Let me look to the physical if I can. Maybe I can do more pull ups, more push ups, more sit ups. Maybe I can play harder pieces. Maybe I can build some furniture with wood. Maybe stain my wood better, finish it better. </div>
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This is Cairo for me now. An attempt to escape its brutal reality. It is constantly coping even at times when I'm just having fun. </div>
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At times I walk down the streets and it all overwhelms me, but that's a story for a different day. Right now it's 3 am and I'm happy to think of Cairo from the comfort of my quiet space. </div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-16890352564717492662019-01-26T12:40:00.000+02:002019-01-26T13:17:02.948+02:00Survival Is Also a Form of Resistance<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUjEnvG__3Jl58cl46zNxvKTkx9crs6TxUq19Z9uU6x7KeFJCisMXzqRTtj6h4XSV4vhxuc0huCH83gVJZDBoEbUtXAnf-1O49eocT1wtuPzGQMEPW-Uvu_Oc2dLnIR3FxMQ/s1600/aegyptische-revolution-jahrestag-rueckblick-repression.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="461" data-original-width="820" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUjEnvG__3Jl58cl46zNxvKTkx9crs6TxUq19Z9uU6x7KeFJCisMXzqRTtj6h4XSV4vhxuc0huCH83gVJZDBoEbUtXAnf-1O49eocT1wtuPzGQMEPW-Uvu_Oc2dLnIR3FxMQ/s400/aegyptische-revolution-jahrestag-rueckblick-repression.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div>
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It has been difficult for me writing this piece. I was asked to write something for the anniversary of the <a class="_58cn" data-ft="{"type":104,"tn":"*N"}" href="https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/jan25?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG" style="color: #365899; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration-line: none;"><span class="_5afx" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit;"><span aria-label="hashtag" class="_58cl _5afz" style="font-family: inherit; unicode-bidi: isolate;">#</span><span class="_58cm" style="font-family: inherit;">Jan25</span></span></a> revolution. I struggled. What was the point of writing. What was the point of sending this out as our world seemed beyond that which words can remedy. My first draft was a political narrative. Factual, impersonal, perhaps even accurate. The night before I couldn't just send that in. Our story was not about accuracy or simply facts. Our story goes on through our str<span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline; font-family: inherit;">uggle to escape hope and find it. I rewrote it when it dawned on me that the most important part of our struggle is personal, not public. I struggled with words, with emotions, these are eight years and our experiences are full of emotions and we're at different stages of grief, of recovery.</span></div>
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All the words seem lacking, but I tried to find them with the little energy I had to describe us. I'm aware they don't do us justice. Yet, with all the flaws of expressing where we're at, I'm grateful to have used some of my energy to document some of my struggles that I believe are shared by many. And on a day like yesterday, it felt that I was not alone struggling in the dark. We are all collectively struggling, everyone in their own way, a battle to remember, a battle to forget, a battle to survive.</div>
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Our memory has been resilient in the face of seemingly infinite resources trying to crush it. It's worth something to keep remembering. It's worth something to keep trying to survive. It's worth something to hold on to that one thing that was genuine in our lives, that we were blessed and cursed to witness and be a part of. I don't know what that something is, but I often feel it when we connect. We shared something real that is somehow beyond words.</div>
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I was never a romantic dreamer, and the reason I write these sentiments is because I've questioned them a thousand times over to make sure they were real and not just some naive romanticization.</div>
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The revolution continues in our struggle and our trauma, but perhaps what I never mentioned is that it continues in the integrity we hold on to.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; text-align: left;"><a href="https://www.zeit.de/politik/ausland/2019-01/egypt-revolution-repression-military-youth">https://www.zeit.de/politik/ausland/2019-01/egypt-revolution-repression-military-youth</a></span><br />
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-62136516674621031012019-01-01T21:43:00.000+02:002019-01-01T21:43:07.135+02:00Dispatches from Cairo<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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A long forsaken blog. Blogging might be dead in some way. Writing is not. I have allowed the blog to die over the years as social media started to take hold of distribution. A facebook status or a twitter post were a replacement. Mostly because the point was about influencing people at a time of political fluidity. The dreams of contributing to a positive change died slowly as people in Egypt turned their back, not to blogs, or social media, but to the question of morality as a whole. What is the point of persuading people who do not want to act based on morality but opt for an notion of pragmatism that is rather impractical and only serves to camouflage their moral bankruptcy. </div>
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As time has passed, the social media companies are controlling our content, siding with oppressive governments for an easy buck. It may not be the time to influence but to archive and document once again like the pre-revolution times. This year I will try and document some of the thoughts independent of transient social media. This platform now is far from perfect, but at the very least attempts to evade the continuous data games that are carelessly played by big social media companies who aim to control the spaces they once claimed were free. </div>
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My time in Cairo is full of observations, social now, less political. As I walk through the streets my mind wanders to various things from seeing the potholes, the frail infrastructure and the economically defeated faces on the streets. </div>
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Maybe I'll write once a month, or once every two months, but I will attempt to keep this going like once before and if I don't, I'm asking me to forgive me, because I know how overwhelming it has become to try and express myself in the face of trauma, depression and the frequent visits of hopelessness. I can only remind myself that even then it may have some value to express how I feel.</div>
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I'm hoping to be able to find more personal dispatches in the future worth noting. Or maybe this is just a brief awakening that won't last. Who knows.</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-60331320447519304032016-11-10T02:09:00.002+02:002016-11-10T02:09:30.447+02:00Hillary or Bust<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsmDf5J6fn5PYmyes3Iayt4m9mZe1toeH-85fXZZFa0dX38UD6cla2kREbEUmxPNMUb6GpesG1JcmzqyzTi6mFBaBNSP_gYAU264Y2J118wAxaUMoPindY655U2fsdbVuF1Q/s1600/hillary_clinton46-620x412%255B1%255D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsmDf5J6fn5PYmyes3Iayt4m9mZe1toeH-85fXZZFa0dX38UD6cla2kREbEUmxPNMUb6GpesG1JcmzqyzTi6mFBaBNSP_gYAU264Y2J118wAxaUMoPindY655U2fsdbVuF1Q/s400/hillary_clinton46-620x412%255B1%255D.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Early polling showed Bernie Sanders beating Donald Trump. In those early polls Hillary Clinton lost to Trump. I don't personally believe polls are accurate in general, but many do. What that means for believers, is that they chose a risky route. They wanted Hillary to win the primaries even though the DNC would have come to power more assuredly if Bernie was it's nominee. In fact those voters were Hillary or bust. They turned down the candidate who was closer to democrats on the issues because they gambled on Hillary changing her popularity. I'm not generalizing or judging motivations, maybe they thought she was a better candidate, maybe they didn't like Bernie, I'm talking about the practical implications. </div>
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When push came to shove Bernie rallied for Hillary because he realized the Trump danger early on. The DNC on the other hand, wanted to destroy Bernie. It was not because he wasn't aligned with them on issues, but because they had special interests. Maybe they thought Hillary was a better leader, maybe they thought Bernie wasn't capable of delivering, but still, they too gambled on liberal resources rather than weighed out what's more aligned with their platform.</div>
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One thing I respect about Bernie is that he stuck to the issues. Following her triumph over Bernie, Hillary shifted her focus to one thing, how she isn't Trump. Hillary was silent on most issues, she did not want to gamble her connections with big businesses once in the white house so that her words won't be used against her. In effect, she wasn't able to win over a bigger base.</div>
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People did their part and she won the popular vote, mostly out of fear of Trump. However, the question that that needs to be asked is: what did she do to try and win over those who wanted a better economy for themselves and who know for certain that the status quo wasn't good enough? Did she promise a better economy for them like Trump's empty promises? Not so much, and it's because Hillary knows the value of words and chose hers wisely. That is something we can respect Hillary for, she tried not to lie about her positions on issues so that they do not haunt her while in office, but that came at a cost. In effect, Hillary became silent about most issues that weren't instigated by Trump, she never called him out, she just responded to his silly ludicrous claims. She missed most opportunities outside the 'glad I'm not Trump' zone, and failed to comment meaningfully on something as obvious as the Dakota pipeline.</div>
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Hillary sat on the fence and hoped that Trump's stupidity would be enough. It wasn't. Mocking Trump and avoiding the issues gave his poor supporters no alternative but to challenge the status quo. The politics of fear were employed and even though fear of Trump did not deter voters, the politics of fear won. The real fear here for the working class was the continuation of the status quo. Hillary Clinton did not alleviate any of that fear.</div>
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Those who support Hillary are probably happy with the status quo to a great extent. There is currently a president from a discriminated group. I do not deny that a woman president would be progress, but to those whose lives will not be bettered it's cosmetic. Obama bailed out banks, lead drone wars, came after whistle blowers and under his presidency big businesses thrived and continued to make colossal profits. This simply isn't good enough for most. </div>
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I'm certain there are many who chose Trump for his racism, but what about winning over those who just wanted a shift in the status quo? What has been offered to them beyond cosmetic check boxes of progress? </div>
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There is something wrong with a country that would vote for a vile character like Trump simply because they are unhappy with the status quo. While people should be accountable for their bigotry, there are many reasons why they ended up that way. Media was sensationalist, catering to their base, on both sides. The liberal media focused on Trump and his crazy supporters. It may have been better to identify what is really wrong with the country rather than what is wrong with Trump and his supporters.</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-55233639149117965502016-11-05T11:09:00.002+02:002016-11-05T11:09:33.717+02:00Egypt Digs Itself Back To 1977<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Ahmed Kamal, a medical student, was arrested by police and delivered to his family the following day via the mortuary. Ahmed had been sentenced to two years in absentia and only recently arrested <a href="http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2016/08/31/new-victim-police-brutality-found-dead-arrest/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004a8f; text-decoration: none;">and killed by Egyptian police</a>, possibly tortured to death. Sometime in the past this may have been breaking news, causing outrage in Egyptian society, and perhaps even internationally. But in today’s Egypt, this is a repeated story, predictable in every way.</div>
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The state will cover up for its security apparatus, and as its ridiculous story is exposed, details may shift slightly until the whole ordeal is forgotten. If Giulio Regeni’s murder did not bring about any accountability for the Egyptian regime or its security bodies, it is highly unlikely that Ahmed Kamal’s murder will result in any better.</div>
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Security bodies will deny wrongdoing; forensics may end up fabricating a report like they did in the case of Khaled Said. Regime apologists at best will ask people to wait for meaningless investigations by the state. Even if the forensics report doesn’t appease state institutions and the evidence is found to be compelling, then arrests may be made, but only to silence public pressure. These arrests will not result in a condemning verdict, and if they do it will be repealed quickly.</div>
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The murder of Ahmed Kamal and the story that follows is not an isolated incident; it reflects the workings of a brutal regime whose institutions are complicit in crimes against Egyptians and works in perfect harmony to provide impunity to its members. This state of complicity and criminality is hard to digest even when witnessing it. Yet time and time again the regime has consistently proven that this systemic injustice is its modus operandi.</div>
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Police brutality is the government’s chosen means of looking out for its interests and enforcing policy. While political protests bore the brunt of re-establishing these means, the same will be applied to enforce harsh economic policies advocated for by Egypt’s ‘allies’.</div>
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An implicit agreement between the Egyptian government and the people was negotiated over the past six years, following the murder of Khaled Said whereby police brutality and government impunity became more or less accepted. Yet, even with the carte blanche provided by the regime’s supporters to use excessive violence, dire economic conditions may breech that agreement. Egyptians are angered by their struggle with the prices of basic goods, medicine, and cost of living.</div>
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Despite this anger, the people do not have the power, or perhaps the will, to attempt to change the regime or depose President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi. Any such attempt may start a new wave of harsher economic conditions that the people are not ready to handle. The people have willfully given up their right to protest this regime. Many feel compelled to live with the consequences having deprived themselves of influence. But can we call the inability to remove Al-Sisi or influence his regime’s policies ‘stability’?</div>
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Egypt needs reforms in order to address its ailing economy, but these reforms need to be political rather than strictly by the numbers. It’s disingenuous and far removed from reality to claim that a loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an answer to Egypt’s ailing economy. The incessant advocacy to impose IMF conditions, such as the value-added tax or lifting of subsidies, is far too reminiscent of the 1977 bread riots. Likewise, back then, subsidies were lifted causing a large wave of protests that left 79 dead and 566 injured. These austerity measures were taken without regard for the political backlash or the context which made these measures back-breaking to the average Egyptian.</div>
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Besides, the government is underperforming in most sectors, exhibiting even more incompetence than under Hosni Mubarak. No matter what the plan is, it is unlikely it can be executed efficiently, with the farfetched assumption these are the reforms Egypt needs.</div>
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What hope is there for a country whose economy is systemically worsened by pouring state money into a military economy that neither pays taxes nor contributes back to the state budget? How can any tax reforms be sustainable while the military continues to take money out of the economic cycle? What mechanisms or possible oversight could there be for a regime that has ignored its own laws as well as international treaties to further its own political and economic agenda?</div>
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Can any loan or condition stop the military from manipulating the market and muscling out competition to push forward its own products and services? What is there to address policies that favour the army’s air conditioning units, bottled water, and food products that cripple civilian competition? Can any condition be imposed to change the contracts that are being delivered directly to the army and revenue not being pumped back into the economy through taxes and parliamentary oversight?</div>
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For many in the Egyptian government, corruption is a way of life they’re not willing to give up. Economists advocating loan conditions fail to address these pressing issues that are key to Egypt’s structural economic problems. The present debate sidesteps some of the most important factors that are negatively influencing the economy. Some of these factors include political repression, lack of judiciary reforms, the police state, and military economic interests driving policy.</div>
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Ahmed Kamal is a recurring story, symptomatic of a security state that has turned criminal, motivated by narrow economic interests that favour an economic elite over the Egyptian populace. Ahmed won’t show up in the numbers punched up by experts, nor will the nonsensical story provided by the government be questioned.</div>
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The present regime has alienated numerous factions of society: doctors, lawyers, journalists, students, youth, businessmen, and even some civil servants. Meanwhile, Egypt holds its own future hostage. Youth are threatened constantly and barred from decision-making circles. Many are detained in jail, tortured or placed under solitary confinement without fair judicial process, and some, like Ahmed, are killed in police custody.</div>
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Egypt’s problems will not be solved by applying cosmetic reforms, they will only entrench Egypt deeper down an abyss, like a car stuck in the sand digging itself deeper when the accelerator is pushed hard. Further austerity, which comes hand in hand with state violence and repression, may cause the eruption of an already simmering street. What’s more, even if understated, Egypt cannot move forward as long as stories like Giulio Regeni and Ahmed Kamal and countless others persist. It will take real change and the unchaining of Egypt’s youth—its future—to dig it out of this hole that’s growing deeper by the minute.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>First<a href="http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2016/09/03/egypt-digs-back-1977/" target="_blank"> published in DNE </a>on 3 Sept 2016.</i></span></div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-51608029690039779112016-11-04T15:39:00.001+02:002016-11-04T15:39:15.129+02:00Where Hope Lies in Egypt<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: x-small;"><i>This article was <a href="http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2016/11/02/hope-lies-egypt/" target="_blank">published in DNE </a>on 2 November 2016.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">As calls for protests garner more attention from the media and citizens who have long ignored them, many serious questions about Egypt's trajectory arise. This is perhaps Egypt's most disheartening moment in recent history. Besides the unprecedented scale of human rights abuses, it is obvious to dwellers and onlookers that Egypt's economy is swiftly spiraling towards collapse. The leadership is struggling to keep its head above water, as the long sought after hope of political stability turns frail.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">What makes the moment more tragic is not the absence of hope but its fleeting presence. Egypt's path to recovery has long been clear. Yet, the economic interests of the policy makers have stalled any political will to execute them. Economic figures aside, future prospects are primarily based on trust. As conditions worsen and the interests of the political elite become clearer to the average citizen, trust in Egypt's present leadership withers.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Egypt's economic ills are but symptoms of its political ailments, and they require urgent redress. Egypt needs direct political reforms to establish a system capable of executing long-term plans beneficial to the country's future.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">At the moment, the majority of decisions are taken by non-elected officials belonging to one security apparatus or another. They have three major motivations: narrow individual interests, securing the present regime, and a revenge agenda against Islamist or secular opposition. Their decisions are not subject to oversight. The parliament's handpicked members are more a representation of security agencies than of the people.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Similarly, the entire political system lacks cheques and balances. There is no manner to challenge decision makers without paying a heavy price. Egypt's top auditor, Hesham Geneina, was removed from his post after releasing statements about his report's findings that indicated mass corruption. In theory, that ought to have triggered an investigation into the government bodies accused of financial violations, but the opposite happened and Geneina was referred to trial.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">The absence of balances has also corrupted the market in Egypt. While the army's role in the economy has long been established, the army is now, more than ever, directly involved in policy. This means that generals control the army's share of contracts and the shares of non-military owned companies in the market. Hence, it is not just the army's economic empire that affects the market, but rather the complete hegemony over economic and business policies.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Many civilian companies are subcontracted by the army, but they have no means to litigate against the army if they are extorted in some way or another or their payments delayed. When the army does business, it does not pay taxes; it utilises poorly paid conscripts, and its budget is not subject to parliamentary oversight. Even if the army produces goods or delivers construction projects at a lower cost, there's no way to ensure that profits made are pumped back into the economy. Money is taken out of the monetary cycle.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Private businesses have to compete with military industries that do not have to pay labour, taxes, customs, and transportation, and have no difficulty finding foreign currency to conclude their deals with partners abroad. This arrangement certainly doesn't consider long-term, economic growth.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Egypt's hope lies in the ability to challenge political, economic, and social policies. Egypt must prioritise the country's interests rather than a few individuals who enjoy impunity or corrupt rewards.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">To find hope, trust in the process and leadership must be restored. Opportunities must be afforded to clever, competent decision makers. In actionable, concrete terms, hope lies in a parliament comprised of fairly elected representatives of the people willing to challenge the government, in the immediate release of all political prisoners (estimated to be in the tens of thousands), in repealing the flawed Protest Law, in ending the targeting of civil society so that it is vibrant and able to call out abuse of power, and in abiding by the Constitution to call into account all extrajudicial decisions and actions taken by state officials.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-size: 14px;">These steps are where hope lies in the short term to instill trust, and in order to stand a chance, there's more. The army must gradually distance itself from its hegemonic role in the economy and allow for businesses to operate within a fair and healthy market. There must also be a commitment from the government to end brutal police practices and devise an organisational restructure with meaningful oversight. The judiciary must end punitive rulings that serve the regime.</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Egypt's youth, its most important resource and symbol for its future, are targeted instead of embraced. Many are defamed, imprisoned, disappeared, and sidelined. Instead of engaging with youth, the regime opted for a flashy youth conference held in Sharm El-Sheikh. The conference was insulting to many as it attempts to window dress systematic abuses against Egyptian youth each day. A more realistic youth conference would have been held in jails where many politically enlightened youth are being held. At this more legitimate youth conference, we would have witnessed Egypt's forcibly disappeared youth reappear and go home with their families.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #2c4f75; font-family: "tahoma";"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">Empty rhetoric and obstinacy is the regime's alternative to meaningful change. False promises for a better future only entrench Egypt deeper into its failing trajectory. Egypt's hope lies in investing in youth and accountability; hopes that Egypt's trajectory miraculously changes without real reforms are lies.</span></span></div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24256429.post-68054789051979307092016-07-31T03:02:00.001+02:002016-07-31T03:02:05.646+02:00Repitition<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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There's little real in politics to talk about which hasn't already been said. It feels as though people take a long time to catch up with what is happening. Each time I start writing, it feels I've said these things before and the repeat causes the sentences to be more robotic, less passionate, seemingly more rehearsed.</div>
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I read through my old stuff and I realize I gave it my all. Maybe someone out there has read what I tried my best to honestly reveal. Maybe someone out there was inspired to do the same. I'm tired of repetition and it feels I've been on a break from saying things how they are. </div>
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I'm not sure when I'll return.</div>
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sooner or later.. we all fall down..</div>Wael Eskandarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17685842195441037505noreply@blogger.com0