Category Archives: Egypt

Egypt says annual Israeli pilgrimage to Jewish tomb in Nile Delta ‘impossible’ this year

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Maybe the Israelis should try not letting Muslims get to their little temple in Jerusalem. That would get a little quid-pro-quo no doubt.

Washington Post:

       By Associated Press, Published: January 10 | Updated: Wednesday, January 11, 7:06 AM

CAIRO — Egypt’s Foreign Ministry said Wednesday it had told Israel that it would not be “appropriate” for Israeli pilgrims to make an annual visit to the tomb of a 19th-century Jewish holy man in the Nile Delta, as activists mobilized to block the pilgrimage route.Ceremonies at the tomb of Rabbi Yaakov Abu Hatzira have triggered yearly political sparring in Egypt throughout most of the last decade, with Islamists, nationalists, and others claiming that the government by allowing the pilgrimage is pursuing an unpopular policy of normalization with the country’s former enemy.

Egypt notified Israel two months ago that it would be “impossible to hold the annual ceremony because of the political and security situation in the country,” the official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press.

An Islamist politician involved in organizing protests against the march meanwhile said that visiting Abu Hatzira’s gravesite in the village of Daymouta, 180 kilometers (112 miles) north of Cairo would be a “suicide mission” for Israelis, because of popular opposition to their presence in Egypt.

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Muslim Brotherhood says will not honor peace treaty with Israel

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Sunday Jan 8 2012

Israel Hayom

Deputy head of Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party denies comments by U.S. State Department that Brotherhood made guarantees to honor peace deal with Israel, says, “treaty is not sacred and can and should be changed.”

Daniel Siryoti, Eli Leon and Reuters
The deputy head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, Essam Arian, says the party will not recognize agreements with “hostile entities.”

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Photo credit: AP

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, which claims it has won at least 41 percent of the seats in Egypt’s lower house of parliament in the third round of voting, on Saturday denied remarks made by U.S. State Department Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland that the Islamist group made guarantees to the U.S. that it would continue to respect Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel.

 In an interview over the weekend with the London-based Al-Hayat newspaper, the deputy head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, Essam Arian, said, “We never promised that we would honor the peace treaty with Israel. The treaty is not sacred and we can and should make changes in it.”

 Another senior member of the party told the London-based newspaper Asharq Alawsat, “The movement’s position is not to recognize the Zionist entity and not to recognize peace agreements with hostile entities, and this position will never change.”

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You go, girls: Egyptian women beat up “morality police”

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From Peole of Shambhala.
Egypt’s self-appointed morality police was chased off by a group of women yesterday. Modelled after Saudi-Arabia’s morality police, and reportedly financed by the Nour Salafi Party, the “Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice” was established in Egypt in December 2011 with the intention of imposing Islamic law (sharia) on Egypt’s women in particular.

According to Egyptian media, the vigilante group has been harassing shoppers and shop owners. Barbers were ordered not to cut men’s beards and shop owners were ordered not to sell “indecent” clothing, and threatened with punishment. The vigilantes also said they would… read more.

1330AMWEBY interview with Raphael Israel: Arab Spring brings Islamic “Democracy”

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This WEBY interview previews a talk by Israeli on Thursday evening, January 5th at B’nai Israel Synagogue in Pensacola. The subject of his talk will be Jews and Christians in Muslim Lands. As Mike Bates of WEBY opined at the start of the interview, the sub-text is “has the Arab Spring turn wintry for Jews and Christians in the Middle East.”

A native of Fes, Morocco who immigrated to Israel in his teens, Professor Israeli is a graduate of Hebrew University in History and Arabic Literature and earned a PhD in Chinese and Islamic studies from the University of California at Berkeley. Author of 30 books and some 100 scholarly articles in the fields of Islamic radicalism, Islamic terrorism, the Modern Middle East, Islam in China and Asia, and the Opening of China by the French.
Among the topics discussed during the WEBY interview with Israeli were:
  • the Arab Spring “democracy” is a vote for authoritarian Islam, not the Western liberal version;
  • the Obama Administration engagement and outreach policies could result in appeasement of fundamentalist Islamic religious autocracies;
  • the plight of persecuted Christians in Egypt and Iraq  could parallel that of Jews in Europe who failed to escape the Nazi Holocaust during WWII;
  • the rumored  Obama Administration retention of Muslim Brotherhood Spiritual Guide Yusuf al Qaradawi to assist in negotiating a peace deal with the Afghan Taliban indicates possible abandonment of the country to Islamic fundamentalists; and,
  • The Organization of Islamic Cooperation is denigrating Israel and Antisemitism by making Islamophobia the core of its global Caliphate agenda.

You may listen to all four segments of the WEBY interview with Israeli. Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4.

Egyptian blogger gets death threats for nude protest

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From European Son
Porn and religious fundamentalism just don’t mix. Or do they? Well, it appears so.

Take the case of Aliaa Magda al-Mahdy, 20. In protest against Egypt’s illiberalism and religious fundamentalism, in December, she and a male friend posted nude photos of themselves on their blogs. The Muslim-majority state exploded with shock, furor, debate, and assertions of medieval values.

Aliaa continued her protest against the oppression that she, and millions of women in the state experience on a daily basis. The twenty-year old blogger called for women to remove the hijab for freedom, and to send her two photographs to post on her blog, one veiled and one unveiled.

Enter the pious, the moral, and the self-righteous.

Aliaa has been threatened several times with rape and death for her self-expression, challenging Egypt’s oppressive conventions. But, as… read more.

Egyptian Muslims, Christians clash over prophet cartoon

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Times Live.za      

h/t A. Millar

 Sapa-AFP | 31 December, 2011 14:14
To match Feature EGYPT-ASWAN/

A soldier stands guard near the Saint Mary church which was set on fire during clashes between Muslims and Christians on Saturday in the heavily populated area of Imbaba in Cairo earlier this year.
Image by: ASMAA WAGUIH / REUTERS

Sectarian clashes broke out in the southern Egyptian province of Assiut after a Christian student posted a drawing of the Muslim prophet on the Internet, officials said on Saturday.

The clashes, which spread to three villages, saw several Christian homes burned and left five police officers injured, a security official told AFP.

On Thursday, dozens of Muslims tried to storm the home of the Christian student after the drawing appeared online.

Police were called to the scene, arrested the student and formed a cordon around the house to prevent clashes, Assiut governor Abdelrahim Borei said.

But on Friday, a group of Muslims set fire to a shop owned by the student’s father in a nearby village and another group burned Christian homes in another neighbouring village and clashed with its residents.

Borei has called for an emergency meeting with political and church officials as well as with recently elected MPs and members of ultra-conservative Salafi Muslim groups to try to defuse tensions.

“The situation is now calm in the three villages. We have deployed police in the areas in order to maintain order,” Borei told state television.

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Iran: liberal democracy “shaken” by Islam, as Egypt employs sharia

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From People of Shambhala

The recent revolutions in the Middle East appear to have given Iran a renewed sense of confidence. Iranian Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani has said that “The Islamic Awakening which has started in Islamic countries has created a political earthquake in the western countries,” according to Iran’s Fars News.

Larijani was addressing a meeting with Foreign Ministry top officials, as well as heads of the Iranian missions abroad and their ambassadors.

Fars News reports that Larijani believes that the “principles of the western liberal democracy have been shaken by Islamic thoughts[sic].”

“The quake,” says Larijani, “has… read more.

Egyptian female blogger: remove hijab for freedom

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From People of Shambhala.

Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda al Mahdy has risked harsh sharia punishments by calling for more freedom of expression.

Egyptian blogger Aliaa Magda al Mahdy and a male friend recently shocked the overwhelming Muslim Egypt when they posted photos of themselves naked. A coalition of 20 law graduates quickly called for the 20 year-old to be punished according to sharia(which would mean that she would be publicly whipped).

Ahmed Yehia of the coalition pointed out that “The former Constitution and the new articles in the new Constitution say that Islamic law is the basis of legislation, we therefore request that the two bloggers be punished according to Islamic sanctions.”

Yehia called their photos “an insult to the Revolution”and complained that they had “present[ed] themselves as revolutionaries [but were now] demanding sexual freedom.” In other words, for Yehia, and for very many other Egyptians, the former president was ousted not for more liberalism and democracy but because Mubarak’s Egypt was… read more.

The Salafist party’s plan for the Pyramids? Cover them in wax

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By Michael Burleigh

 

The Daily Mail:

Last updated at 11:06 AM on 23rd December 2011

The pyramids at Giza are the most stunning sight I have ever seen.

True, their lonely eminence is threatened by Cairo’s unlicensed building sprawl, with half completed houses inching their way towards them.

Surveying them at night as the calls to prayer multiplied into a thunder of sound from central Cairo already told me a few years back what was coming.

Wonder: The Pyramids at Giza are under threat from destruction or 'concealment' by covering them with waxWonder: The Pyramids at Giza are under threat from destruction or ‘concealment’ by covering them with wax

For now members of the Nour (The Light) Salafist party, which won 20 per cent of the vote in recent elections, are talking about putting an end to the ‘idolatry’ represented by the pyramids.

This means destruction – along the lines essayed by the Afghan Taliban who blew up the Banyam Buddhas – or ‘concealment’ by covering them with wax. Tourists would presumably see great blobs rather than the perfectly carved steps. Continue Reading →

Egypt to restrict duty free booze, close shops in country

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From bikyamasr

Egypt to restrict duty free booze, close shops in country

| 22 December 2011 | 3 Comments
New regulations have people worried in Egypt.

CAIRO: A finance ministry directive earlier this month went almost unnoticed as the Egyptian capital erupted in violence between the military and protesters. New regulations could have major affects on travelers to and from the North African country, however, as the ministry regulations state that upon arrival to Egypt, only one bottle of alcohol will be permitted, and only two annually from duty free shops abroad.

According to the ministry, and confirmed by local managers of duty free shops in the country, all alcohol will be removed from the shops in the coming months, but no clear timetable for the changes has been put to paper.

One ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to the media, told Bikyamasr.com that the move is not a push “to ban alcohol, but to boost local economy.”

He argued that by limiting the amount of alcohol that a tourist or Egyptian is able to bring into the country, “it means they will have to buy locally and this will help the economy a lot.”

However, Will Rensper, a German resident in Egypt, said that it is more likely in response to the growing conservative Islamic groups in the country.

“I believe that this is a move to help appease the Islamists who want to do their best to push drinking away from Egypt and make this country conservative,” the German teacher said, adding that he had recently come into the country with four bottles of alcohol and had no trouble.

It is unclear when, or if, the new regulations will be put in place, but earlier this fall, Egyptian officials announced that visas for foreigners would no longer be given upon arrival at airports, but less than 72 hours after the announcement, the move was revoked.

It is unclear if this will be the case for booze, but it does have foreigners and Egyptians alike worried that it is highlighting the pull of the Islamic groups in the country.

BM

Nazi conspiracy theories in Egypt’s new politics

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An edition of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion forgery published in Karachi, Pakistan, 1969

Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories have long been a staple of the Arab and Iranian press and consciousness. Haj Amin al-Husseini, an Arab nationalist and “Grand Mufti,” broadcast Nazi propaganda to Egypt during the Second World War. And the Nazi-inspired conspiracy theory of a Jewish-Freemasonic alliance, dominating the world, still appears frequently in the official media today.

For many in the West, the convergence of Egypt’s pro-democracy activists on Tahrir Square earlier this year was a welcome sight – as it should have been. Believing it to be a portent of a new era of liberal democracy and pluralism in the region, however, appears to have been too optimistic.

Reporting was partly to blame. The media covered the sexual assault of American reporter Lara Logan in Tahrir Square by a group of “thugs,” during the protests. But it largely chose to ignore the fact that the crowd was yelling “Jew! Jew!” at her during the assault. Logan was raped with the hands of the assailants while others photographed her with their mobile phones.

This 2005 Syrian edition of the Protocols claims that the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, were orchestrated by a Zionist conspiracy. Last week Egyptian presidential candidate Tawfiq Okasha went on television to invoke the other, largely ignored, gentile half of the anti-Semitic conspiracy theory par excellence. Asked why Canadian television presenter Michael Coren had “dedicated a large part of his show to an attack” on Okasha, the presidential hopeful responded, simply, that Coren was “a Freemason.”

Lara Logan isn’t Jewish, and Michael Coren isn’t a Freemason either. But that wouldn’t worry those who believe they are. The truth is a detail. And the Jew and the Freemason are archetypes in extremist Muslim and extremist Arab mind.

Ayatolla Khomeini outlawed Freemasonry after coming to power in 1979. As is occurring in Egypt today, Khomeini managed to subvert Iran’s pro-democracy revolution, and began suppressing every group that did not adhere to his clerical fascist vision. Saddam Hussein, head of the Arab national socialist Ba’ath Party, made membership of the Freemasonic fraternity a capital offense the following year.

The first hint, since the ousting of President Hosni Mubarak, that the Zionist-Freemasonic conspiracy theory was going to inform politics came on… continue reading.