We're Losing the War on Terror

First published in DNE on 11 November, 2014.

Last week numerous country representatives congratulated Egypt on its progress in improving human rights over the years in the latest Universal Periodic Review held by the United Nations. It was disheartening to hear such comments at a time of the most sizable regression in human rights in Egypt’s modern history. It was quite understandable, however, that much of the warmth expressed was due to politics in the region and the recognition that Egypt was fighting terrorism, but as several speakers pointed out, fighting terror was no excuse for violating human rights. Furthermore, much to our dismay and that of countries standing in solidarity with Egypt, we’re losing the “war on terror”.

The media often reports the death of ‘terrorists’ unquestioningly; denying us the courtesy of challenging government narratives, choosing a language that simplistically assumes the guilt of those targeted without trial. When it comes to the war on terror, few media outlets question the official government line and, just like many people, cheer it on. What is constantly overlooked in the news, however, is the birth of ‘terrorism’.

Somewhere along the way, the meaning of the word ‘terror’ is quite forgotten. The term is not well defined but its most significant feature is the widespread fear of harm befalling an individual or group without reasonable justification. In simpler terms, it is the targeting of innocent civilians who have every reason or right to be where they are while being targeted.

Indiscriminate targeting of individuals is terror even if done in a uniform. When such acts are performed by the state, whose mandate is to bring about justice, it creates an environment conducive to breeding extremists, and they in turn become ready to indiscriminately target anyone for revenge. Torture and inhumane treatment can easily dehumanise individuals and devalue their own lives, and with that comes the danger of terrorism.

There is a real threat of extremism in the region as people are being radicalised. Every day injustice is not deterred, or is inflicted by the state, the context becomes more conducive to radicalised reactions. When injustice befalls someone, they must choose what to do. They can chose to do nothing, escape, or fight. Many with little going for them, poor education and no hope of a better standard of life find solace in radicalised interpretations of religion and notions of revenge.

The regime has cut off most alleyways of peaceful resistance and left no space for those who oppose them to object peacefully. Instead of positively reinforcing the value of expression through art or peaceful protest, the regime has responded violently to its opposition using arbitrary detentions, torture, killings, and censorship. In effect, rulers have taught those who oppose them the value of violence which its security apparatus practices on a daily basis.

It is as though we are unable to convince those we are fighting that their ideas on violence are incorrect. There are no serious attempts from the government to counter their simple and non-appealing ideas, and instead the government entrenches such ideas deeper by using extremist approved oppressive tools such as moral judgment, silencing opposition, violence and injustice.

People from around the world are flocking to fight alongside the ‘Islamic State’, but we’d be mistaken to think they’ve rejected the values propagated by some governments; on the contrary, they’re embracing them, but simply cheering on a different side.

What’s worse is that we’re losing the war on terror because we are becoming like terrorists ourselves. We are accepting that innocent bystanders are arrested, tortured and sometimes killed and we accept that they may be collateral damage in the “war on terror”. The easiest explanation for deaths caused by the regime is that they deserve to die, and the simplest way to justify locking up individuals is that ‘they wouldn’t have deprived them of their freedom for such a long time undeservedly’.

Yet day after day we are seeing people proven innocent in a court of law despite the politicised judiciary and extended detention. We are accepting that damage, we are accepting what the extremists are accepting; that innocents are harmed along the way for the greater goal. We are accepting the crackdown on creativity and expression in the name of the fight against those who would censor us.

Television shows, live concerts and various artworks are being censored, creating an environment that is antagonistic to culture and artistic expression. It is this sort of environment that extremists wish to create, except that it is now being created by those who claim are fighting them.

To gauge its success in fighting terror, consider the Egypt that is trying to fight terrorism. It is an Egypt that cracks down on peaceful protesters using the pretence of the Protest Law. An Egypt that delivers ultimatums to civil society, smearing notions of human rights in its tightly controlled media. An Egypt that militarises its streets and universities, thereby teaching students violence instead of promoting critical thinking. An Egypt that imprisons journalists and human rights defenders without evidence.  An Egypt that places people randomly arrested under extended pre-trial detention. An Egypt that censors opposition, grants its security apparatus impunity, and does all that in the name of the fight against terror.

The opposite of terror was never terror, it was always an end to terror, but as long as we accept injustices as part of our war on terror then the true enemy is never defeated, it only goes stronger.

Khaled Said - 13th June Protest in Lazoghly

I went to protest to the cold blooded murder of Khaled Said by the Egyptian police in Alexandria and here is my eyewitness report with regards to the protest itself that took place on the 13th June of 2010 in Lazoghly square, Cairo:

(Photo by Sarah Carr)

I saw around 7-10 people getting arrested (they say around 20 overall were arrested), around five of the arrests that I saw were brutal. The people inside the police cordon were relatively unharmed except for a time when they took when they pressed against them forcefully so they couldn't breathe. There was a time when the police loosened the perimeter in order to grab three or four of the protesters from inside the cordon they secured. It was accompanied by wailing from many women and violent punches from plain clothed policemen as they were dragging some of the protestors to the police truck. The protestors and journalists within the perimeter were kept against their will in the perimeter till around 9 pm, from the approximate start time of the protest which was 5.00 pm.

I arrived a little late and was outside the police perimeter set up around various people. The police were in a hurry to disperse the crowd that was chanting and all the onlookers. They were rude and violent and all over the place including many plain clothes informers/policemen. Upon my arrival I was pulled by the shirt and threatened to be arrested and was about to be if the policemen weren't busy dragging two other guys to the police truck, but that's an insignificant event in the scheme of things. I have to make it clear that I hadn’t uttered a word when I had first arrived and that I was addressed with the most impolite names and a very disrespectful manner. I was threatened that I would be ‘taken’, anyone that was in the area would be ‘taken’, the policeman said before starting to drag me.

The two that were dragged upon my arrival happened to be in the area outside the perimeter. The police routinely confiscated cameras, and deleted all videos and images. To the best of my knowledge some cameras were given back and I cannot bear witness to the fate of the cameras. The policemen were all over the buildings and whenever chants would start, they'd give them a few minutes and then charge them.

A few people were injured, one of our friends was taken to a hospital, another person fleeing a charge from the police fell on his head and his face was covered in blood. They put him in a cab with what looked like a security person but I don’t know where he was taken.

There was fear in the air, fear of expressing any opinion in the protest, those officially surrounded had their view blocked by the men in black (amn markazy). For the police themselves it was business as usual, they didn’t care what was chanted, or who they were abusing.

I will post my analysis of the events surrounding this protest shortly.

The Galley

I'm a machine, making something I don't really care about, for people I don't really care about and earning money that I don't really care about. If only I could make something I love for people I love and earn something that I love. But I guess sometimes we do things we don't like for people we can't like in order to get things we care about. Survival, that's one thing that makes you do things you don't want to do. The only other thing is greed. But when does the search for money stop being survival and start becoming greed? Survival is such a loose word, what I really mean is sustainability of survival at no less than your current standard. But you have to progress, otherwise you will not survive. You're always in a change or die situation, but still, when does it stop being about progress and start becoming about greed.

It's as though the world instills greed in us. You have to take the job that offers you more money, it's insane not to take it. Is it insane not to be greedy these days? How can you turn down the gulf offers you keep getting, are you crazy? Is it crazy to try and go through life without selling out? It's a big word selling out, and it's used in so many ways that devalue it, but the truth is that we do it every day. We sell out, slowly, bit by bit. Our every day compromises are subtle form of selling out. They're very subtle and selling out is a big word.

We compromise what we care about, we lose the children we once were, we lose our innocent dreams and we start to become sophisticated as though that were something good. We dampen our senses and we cease to enjoy the simple things in life because they're not sophisticated enough, because they're repeated, because they're not intelligent enough. We take pride in being unable to be moved easily, we take pride in the simplicity we've killed.

We've killed our own roots, our branches have thought themselves superior to our trunk just because the leaves have so many intricate details. Branch, you fool, you would have never come into existence without the trunk that gave you life, and now you aim to destroy your root and yourself.

Isn't it a bit that way though? That we've destroyed ourselves? What traces are left of our original selves? Very little for some, more for others. But those who are sophisticated have nothing left within them perhaps, or just historical traces of a person they want to forget. The world manipulates us, it toys with us. It forces us to abandon what we love. The world makes it difficult for us to hang on to what we love, the means by which it does it is by forcing us to change in order to survive. We're being pushed, but the momentum is so strong that long after the world has stopped pushing, it's driving power forces us into greed. Greed is the aftermath of a world that makes it difficult to survive and greed is what fuels itself.

We've become greedy, and that's our new motivation. It's a manufactured driving force that we think we need. We're rewarded for this manufactured need by manufactured awards, pieces of printed paper, created by an entity without authority over your emotions ;pieces of metal; images that are supposed to resemble you, your name, words that have been printed by unfeeling machines of gratitude, sophisticated honors and degrees.

I'm not even a machine, I'm a cog in a machine oiled with greed. I'm turning and turning so as not be replaced, so as not to be destroyed. I'm going around in a circle for others to go to different places with speed. I'm a slave in a galley, moving an oar so that someone can fight a better war. If only excelling at it were the price for freedom... but the real irony of it is that all that we do in order to fit in, to gain credit, to be revered in the world is but a price to pay to buy servitude.

On the Paradox of Freedom

The amount of freedom we have is directly proportional the amount of privacy we have for our actions. This means that the more the people that are present simultaneously to experience our action, the less the freedom we have to act as we wish. It goes to say that the more the increase in population, the less likely we are to have privacy and the less likely we will be able to experience freedom in what we do. 

We know that by copulating or reproducing, we cause the population to grow. So the more we copulate, the more the chances of pregnancy and childbirth. The more we have the freedom to copulate the more the chances of a population growth. 

So now I'm faced with a paradox, freedom is inversely proportional to freedom to copulate. In other words, the more we have freedom to copulate, the less freedom we will have in the future.

But how can this be true if freedom to copulate is a subset of freedom? Could it be that there is a quota of freedom that should be used after which it will be depleted? Could it be that we should actually be wise in how much freedom we should use?

There must be something wrong with my reasoning.

Turkish March

Coming home after a very annoying day with traffic and crap I followed a show called 90 Minutes with Motaz El Demerdaash on a channel called El Mehwar. I saw a man with bruises on his face telling the story of how he was attacked by dogs in the movenpick hotel (media city) where the dishonorable prince Turk (or Turkey) resides. I hate relaying events with details but briefly this so called prince owns these vicious dogs and lets them loose in the hotel, and they eat with guests and basically he has made the whole hotel his palace irrespective of the guests. What happened is that some of these guys were playing football when one of the dogs felt like attacking and so they all ran, but one of them tripped and the dog bit his face. As scandalous as this is, that’s not what gets to me most.

What gets to me is that a few weeks back there was a little girl who was nearly killed by those dogs. I don’t mean the Saudis living in the hotel, I mean the dogs they own. Even though this was publicized nothing was done about it. To make matters even more annoying I found out that there were 90 other charges filed to the police. 85 of which were withdrawn by applying pressure and threats to the victims. If 90 cases reached the police, how many incidents did actually happen?

In any case the so called prince has stayed in Tunis but was kicked out after assaulting one of the workers there, not even a guest. He was kicked out of the Hilton as well after a series of disgraceful events. His body guards are accustomed to beating up anyone, people staying at the movenpick or the security guards there. He has become untouchable.

Now this was very brief, but the reason I’m writing about it is to convey my anger about this whole situation. The greedy bastards want his money at the hotel and so what if a few hundred ordinary lives are sacrificed for the prince’s money. It is also well known that he has investments in Egypt and that the government will not kick him out unless he commits a murder and even then I’m not entirely certain if they will. A few ordinary lives are worth much less than the money. So what if he harms people, he pays for their blood with his money. The government can live with it, the hotel can live with it and the people through their passiveness have chosen to live with it.

Let me ask this, why do we let corrupt people govern us? What happened to the good people up there (if there are any)? We really have no choice about whom we’re governed by and the truth is that good people have no power because the normal has been total disregard for human life. So why should Turk’s situation be any different? We’ve seen already in the constitution that they’ve sacrificed the well being of not just hundreds, but millions of lives so that those in power continue to gain more. Why should this be any different? Turk’s millions should account for hundreds of lives; after all we’re talking about hundreds not millions.

I have three reasons for stripping Turk out of his undeserved rank of prince. First and foremost because of a book by Thomas Paine called Common Sense that explains why monarchy is ridiculous (using common sense). Secondly I personally have no king or prince. Thirdly because the victim has also stated that such conduct is not befitting a prince. He said that on air and I jumped from my seat and I applauded him right then and there. I literally clapped several times, something I wouldn’t normally do even in some conventions that are cluttered with applause.

The funny thing is that the victim has stated very clearly that he expects nothing to be done, and right he is. How is it that the state of our affairs has become so miserable that we don’t expect any sort of justice? That’s even far worse than seeking justice and not finding it. It’s because we know that justice in this country is unattainable. If we’re continuously subjected to injustice by the same people who swore to uphold it, how can we expect them to give us justice when it is equal to being deprived of money?

A greedy lot we’ve become from years of deprivation. A defeated lot we’ve become from all the injustice. Suppose by some remote chance that after all the propaganda some sort of action is taken against Turk, that’s just pressure from the media. It just means that 85 previous cases meant nothing to them. It means that in ordinary circumstances you should not expect justice. It means that there’s no point in trying to play fair except for your own personal beliefs.

There must be a God to judge those few who have oppressed millions. If there is no God then they have the right to do anything and get away with it. Why not? If this life is all you can get and there’s no justice in this life, why even seek it? If that moral sense is not present then why not step on everyone? If you don’t believe in God then you must believe in Karma, otherwise you have no choice but try to be like them. Something in my heart tells me that there are so many things wrong with being just like them. Something tells me I’d rather fight for some sort of justice than be unjust to an entire nation. I don’t know if they have that same voice in their hearts or if they have hearts at all though.

Enough is enough. It’s too disturbing to keep hearing these stories. We live in a land that gives no justice, privacy, rights or even a chance to serve it in any way. If you don’t like it, leave… but even that is not an option. We’re trapped inside a very large prison.

This March doesn’t belong to Egyptians; even the days aren’t ours anymore. This March belongs to his highness prince Turk. So is it Government March, Saudi March or Turkish March? Either way this month, and probably every other, is not ours anymore.

Prince Turk owns a piece of land in a country that is allegedly mine. He has more rights, more respect and more of everything than I do. That is the case with most foreigners here because Egyptians are cheap. In the show and many others like it, people call in and say Egyptians are valuable, Egyptians are precious, we will not accept, etc.. etc.. But the victim on the show laughed, and I laughed too, because it’s all a croc. Egyptians are cheap and we know it. We might say we’re not and we might have some sort of false pride, but we know that Egyptians are cheap. They’re not worth a Saudi, not even in their home country.


Of course I’m not talking about the big guys. The big guys are valuable, untouchable just like the Saudi prince. I’m talking about us, the common folk. Yes even the Amn El Dawla officer reading this. He’s in no better state than we are. He has no choice but to think of the rest of us as inferior and think that he belongs to those with power.

Has Egypt changed so much since Saad Zaghlool said “Mafeesh Fayda?”(it’s useless)

I don’t know how to answer this question, are we better off or worse? For the first time I understand what it means that Egypt has been sold. It’s sold its soul to the devil in exchange of a few pennies and some power.

I sometimes wonder if we organized a protest to demonstrate against the horrid state that policemen themselves are in, would those poor soldiers who we’re protesting for beat us with sticks and try to silence us? I think they would, because they’re in such a horrible state that they don’t even know what they’re standing for. They’ve been deprived of thought and choice. We’ve been deprived of choice, the only thing we can choose to do is protest and get beaten and get arrested.

Conspiracy Theory

I've been following the news on the arrest of Abdel Karim, a blogger who seemed to have expressed his thoughts all too well, on a show called Al3ashera Masaa2an (10 in the evening). Of course the whole thing is just appalling, but if you're on this blog and reading then you must agree that being jailed for writing some inanities or opinions does seem extreme and far too unworthy of being imprisoned for a duration of four years. It must also feel that there are hands that want to go past your skull and through your brain to control all your thoughts by approving and codemning every thought. But that's not what I want to talk about.

What I want to talk about is a man on the show called Mostafa Bakry. This man was very annoying, not because of what he was saying, but because of he manner that he was saying it. I hate it when people on a show don't give the chance for any other guest to say anything by continuously interrupting them and by talking louder to overshadow what the other guest has to say.

Perhaps amidst all this charade, what really got to me most was his use of the 'Conspiracy Theory' argument by that man. He argued that AbdelKarim's thoughts could not have been his own and that they were fed to him and so on as part of a whole conspiracy to destroy the great nation Egypt.

Now my question is, what's there to destroy? Really, what kind of target can Egypt be? It doesn't pose any military threat, it doesn't pose any technological threat, it doesn't pose any economic threat and in short, there is nothing left to destroy because most of what could have been targetted to be destroyed already has.

The Americans don't hate us yet, we have a strong alleigance with them, and we have a peace treaty with Israel, God knows they don't want another enemy on their hands. So who and what is trying to destroy us? Why is it that we have this conspiracy theory all the time while the enemy is actually within. It is certainly much easier to point the finger than to take the blame, and I think that in places without freedom, there can be no real responsibility or accountability. The only emotion left is denial. We're left with lies that are forced down our throats. The false feeling of pride, acheivment, and importance, for how would Egyptians feel, if they woke up to realize that all the suffering they have gone through is self inflicted. How would people feel when they find themselves as Don Quixote fighting windmills, it's so much easier to have an enemy rather than a traitor. The thought control, the limitations of our creativity, that's the real conspiracy and it's happening from within our own country.

Don't get me wrong, this country does have its perks, but that's not what I'm talking about. It's just that Egypt is so distanced from any active map. It's a political catalyst at best and economically struggling. The corruption has eaten away at it from the insides and if it someone's enemy, it's an enemy that self destructs.

The conspiracy theory really kills me. What fake pride do people possess to think that we are emerging from the abyss to cause threat to others. It can't be that every person's thought is a conspiracy, every action taken by someone is a conspiracy. There's always a reference to those invisible hands, and while they might be present in some situations, they're always blamed for everything else.

Why do we have to look for faults elsewhere and act as though with a wounded pride when our faults are exposed? Any unorthodox politic is a conspiracy it seems and anything that skews slightly from the main doctrine approved by the government is heretic. It seem we're not allowed to think and we're not expected to think, so much so, that when someone seems to develop a thinking pattern it automatically falls under the category 'conspiracy theory'.

Speaking of thought, I was annoyed today as well by something on Elbait Baitak. When someone on the phone said that we should not put our children's thought in moulds and enhance their creativity and analysis, the response was that grade 5 wasn't the time to do that, they're much too young. Well, I think that even education is too determined to mould our children into lifeless thoughless beings so that if any creativity in thought happens incidentally, it would be easy to identify it as coming from an external source.

The real conspiracy is killing all kinds of thought in this country. Mostafa Bakry demanded the life of AbdelKarim. Now tell me, does it not seem like a conspiracy to frighten anyone who attempts to sway from what is approved?

24

24 is a brilliant TV show. I’ve always wondered, ever since watching a movie by the name of ‘Nick of Time’ why they don’t shoot some movies in real time where events can be seen as they happen. Well almost a decade later they did it with 24. The best thing about 24 is that it’s (almost) in real time. Each episode is just one hour and we can see what happens in that hour. It’s a real thriller too; you get entangled in its mesh provided you watch something like 3 episodes in a row.

Anyway the other night it was showing, Jack Bauer was hot on the terrorist’s trail and CTU (counter terrorist unit) had arrested someone who was their only lead to reach a terrorist who was trying to acquire a nuclear missile. Apart from the fact that it seems so easy now for individuals to acquire weapons of mass destruction, there was something else I found intriguing.

The man they arrested was a retired US marine who they suspected to have been a mercenary. He had no priors. So in order to hinder his interrogation, the terrorist (whose name is Marwan.. surprise surprise) calls ‘Amesty Global’ and asks for a lawyer so that CTU don’t torture that man into divulging the information that can lead to the capture of Marwan. That got me thinking of how far advanced Human Rights are to be able to have one lawyer easily obtain a court order so as not to violate this citizen’s rights. Are human rights organizations so powerful everywhere in the world? In Egypt it would take a phone call from the president to stop an act of torture, not just a simple phone call to any Amnesty. Human rights mean nothing in Egypt unless stated otherwise, totally unlike other places in the world. I’m not saying that this is the way it is in America, but I’m saying that it’s highly plausible that an American with no priors is saved from torture just by a phone call no matter how important he is to a case and how unimportant he is as a human being.

So anyway, after the lawyer had been sent, they call up the president since it is a matter of National Security asking him to intervene and let them do their job. The president fears to sanction such torture (yeah right!!) and asks them not to. At this point, with this only lead and their conviction that this man can provide them with information to save lives they had to reluctantly let him go, but good old Jack resigns and takes him on as a citizen.

Now the question here is: Can we sanctify torture if we’re sure that we can get positive results from those being tortured? There is no question that our rights (constantly violated over here) are important and that no man should be subjected to torture, but the situation described puts us in a dilemma nevertheless. In cases like these there seems to be a reason for torture, extracting answers that will save lives. After all, it’s not fair that terrorist should use these means on people and that when caught they get a five star treatment. Where’s the justice in that?

The trouble is that sometimes we should not be too rigid about our standards. I mean it’s great that we accept the right not to be tortured for everybody, but if breaking that rule meant saving thousands of lives, I would suppose that it should be acceptable. In any case it’s very hypothetical really, since we can never know what people actually know and what they don’t. In general it’s better to let the guilty walk free than torture the innocent and that’s why laws of human rights are there in general, so that we do not risk hurting the innocent. It’s just a very hypothetical question and I suppose it remains a matter of opinion if it is really worth it…