Ad blocker detected: Our website is made possible by displaying online advertisements to our visitors. Please consider supporting us by disabling your ad blocker on our website.
Horus wrote:So now we have a man who sets himself on fire outside the parliament building in Cairo, a similar incident triggered the protests in Tunisia, could this be the spark everyone is waiting for?
Really, I've not seen anything on the main news here!
Strange! It's all over the news here in Norway
"One band, two oil barrels, three chords, four dreams, five lies, six ties, seven deadly sins and eight ways to stay alive. They know who you are, they know where you live, they're the Kaizers Orchestra~"
Well, well, so now our British residents may realise how THEIR news is not quite as newsy - - nice piece of video and the bread man in his hospital bed - -
One of my friends is convinced that democracy is going to break out all over the region, including Egypt. She can't remember any other leader but Mubarak; she is 37. There is a great deal of reaction to recent events from young Egyptians on the internet on such sites as Facebook. If matters do escalate, I fear the widespread violence that will certainly be the result and the possibility that I will have to leave my home.
This is an interesting article from Robert Fisk in yesterday's Independent:
The end of the age of dictators in the Arab world? Certainly they are shaking in their boots across the Middle East, the well-heeled sheiks and emirs, and the kings, including one very old one in Saudi Arabia and a young one in Jordan, and presidents – another very old one in Egypt and a young one in Syria – because Tunisia wasn't meant to happen. Food price riots in Algeria, too, and demonstrations against price increases in Amman. Not to mention scores more dead in Tunisia, whose own despot sought refuge in Riyadh – exactly the same city to which a man called Idi Amin once fled.
If it can happen in the holiday destination Tunisia, it can happen anywhere, can't it? It was feted by the West for its "stability" when Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali was in charge. The French and the Germans and the Brits, dare we mention this, always praised the dictator for being a "friend" of civilised Europe, keeping a firm hand on all those Islamists.
Tunisians won't forget this little history, even if we would like them to. The Arabs used to say that two-thirds of the entire Tunisian population – seven million out of 10 million, virtually the whole adult population – worked in one way or another for Mr Ben Ali's secret police. They must have been on the streets too, then, protesting at the man we loved until last week. But don't get too excited. Yes, Tunisian youths have used the internet to rally each other – in Algeria, too – and the demographic explosion of youth (born in the Eighties and Nineties with no jobs to go to after university) is on the streets. But the "unity" government is to be formed by Mohamed Ghannouchi, a satrap of Mr Ben Ali's for almost 20 years, a safe pair of hands who will have our interests – rather than his people's interests – at heart.
For I fear this is going to be the same old story. Yes, we would like a democracy in Tunisia – but not too much democracy. Remember how we wanted Algeria to have a democracy back in the early Nineties?
Then when it looked like the Islamists might win the second round of voting, we supported its military-backed government in suspending elections and crushing the Islamists and initiating a civil war in which 150,000 died.
No, in the Arab world, we want law and order and stability. Even in Hosni Mubarak's corrupt and corrupted Egypt, that's what we want. And we will get it.
The truth, of course, is that the Arab world is so dysfunctional, sclerotic, corrupt, humiliated and ruthless – and remember that Mr Ben Ali was calling Tunisian protesters "terrorists" only last week – and so totally incapable of any social or political progress, that the chances of a series of working democracies emerging from the chaos of the Middle East stand at around zero per cent.
The job of the Arab potentates will be what it has always been – to "manage" their people, to control them, to keep the lid on, to love the West and to hate Iran.
Indeed, what was Hillary Clinton doing last week as Tunisia burned? She was telling the corrupted princes of the Gulf that their job was to support sanctions against Iran, to confront the Islamic republic, to prepare for another strike against a Muslim state after the two catastrophes the United States and the UK have already inflicted in the region.
The Muslim world – at least, that bit of it between India and the Mediterranean – is a more than sorry mess. Iraq has a sort-of-government that is now a satrap of Iran, Hamid Karzai is no more than the mayor of Kabul, Pakistan stands on the edge of endless disaster, Egypt has just emerged from another fake election.
And Lebanon... Well, poor old Lebanon hasn't even got a government. Southern Sudan – if the elections are fair – might be a tiny candle, but don't bet on it.
It's the same old problem for us in the West. We mouth the word "democracy" and we are all for fair elections – providing the Arabs vote for whom we want them to vote for.
In Algeria 20 years ago, they didn't. In "Palestine" they didn't. And in Lebanon, because of the so-called Doha accord, they didn't. So we sanction them, threaten them and warn them about Iran and expect them to keep their mouths shut when Israel steals more Palestinian land for its colonies on the West Bank.
There was a fearful irony that the police theft of an ex-student's fruit produce – and his suicide in Tunis – should have started all this off, not least because Mr Ben Ali made a failed attempt to gather public support by visiting the dying youth in hospital.
For years, this wretched man had been talking about a "slow liberalising" of his country. But all dictators know they are in greatest danger when they start freeing their entrapped countrymen from their chains.
And the Arabs behaved accordingly. No sooner had Ben Ali flown off into exile than Arab newspapers which have been stroking his fur and polishing his shoes and receiving his money for so many years were vilifying the man. "Misrule", "corruption", "authoritarian reign", "a total lack of human rights", their journalists are saying now. Rarely have the words of the Lebanese poet Khalil Gibran sounded so painfully accurate: "Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another with trumpetings again." Mohamed Ghannouchi, perhaps?
Of course, everyone is lowering their prices now – or promising to. Cooking oil and bread are the staple of the masses. So prices will come down in Tunisia and Algeria and Egypt. But why should they be so high in the first place?
Algeria should be as rich as Saudi Arabia – it has the oil and gas – but it has one of the worst unemployment rates in the Middle East, no social security, no pensions, nothing for its people because its generals have salted their country's wealth away in Switzerland.
And police brutality. The torture chambers will keep going. We will maintain our good relations with the dictators. We will continue to arm their armies and tell them to seek peace with Israel.
And they will do what we want. Ben Ali has fled. The search is now on for a more pliable dictator in Tunisia – a "benevolent strongman" as the news agencies like to call these ghastly men.
And the shooting will go on – as it did yesterday in Tunisia – until "stability" has been restored.
No, on balance, I don't think the age of the Arab dictators is over. We will see to that.
Tunisia Shows the Way | The American Muslim
Jan 17, 2011
By Hasan Zillur Rahim
When the history of the downfall of Arab dictators is written – ten years, twenty years, even 50 years from now – one name will find an honored place in it: Mohammed Bouazizi of Tunisia.
The 26-year-old with a degree in computer science couldn’t find employment, a fate he shared with 200,000 fellow Tunisian graduates in a population of 10 million. Driven to despair, he tried to sell fruits and vegetables to make a living. The corrupt, repressive police arrested him for lack of a “license” to operate as a street vendor and repeatedly harassed and tortured him. Unable to cope with the indignity, he set himself on fire on Dec. 17, and died on Jan. 3.
The flame that consumed Bouazizi ignited a mass movement throughout the country as Tunisians gave vent to their pent-up feelings against the dictatorial regime of Zein el-Abidine Ben Ali.
For 23 years, Ben Ali and his family and cronies looted the treasury, building beachfront villas and taking a cut from every business while the young population (half of Tunisians are under 25) lived lives of deprivation. A ruthless network of enforcers and informers, drawn mostly from the ranks of the army and the police, kept the populace at bay.
But the self-immolation of Bouazizi changed the equation. Social networking sites, particularly Twitter, helped spread the word and the Jasmine revolution was underway.
The unthinkable happened, a first for the Arab world: Ben Ali and his entourage fled the country.
Tunisia has rarely been in the news in America. Occasionally we heard stories of how Ben Ali was our ally in the fight against terrorism and how Tunisia was a model of democracy. France was even more aggressive in propagating this lie because of its historical ties with the country.
The recent Wikileaks, however, revealed to the world what every Tunisian had known for years, that the regime of Ben Ali was corrupt and authoritarian beyond imagination.
But why did the U.S. go along with the status quo? For the same reasons that our country has gone along with gross human-rights violations in Arab countries: preference for sugarcoated stability to trumped-up threats of radical Islam.
All a dictator like Ben Ali had to do was dangle the specter of Muslim extremists taking over, and the United States turned to jelly. Consider how long some of the Arab dictators have been in power - Libya’s Moammar Gaddafi, 42 years, Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh, 33 years, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, 30 years – and ask yourself, “Is it that these countries have no worthier candidates than these aging autocrats who are already grooming their sons (never daughters!) to continue their dynastic decadence?”
The answer, of course, is no. But by running police states while keeping the United States happy with manufactured anti-terrorism crackdowns, the dictators continue to rule unchallenged. Thus, there are no new ideas in these countries, no innovations in education, science and technology, and no programs to meet people’s aspirations.
But the game is up. It may take years but business as usual in the Arab world has run its course. Could anyone predict only a few months back that an Arab dictator could be toppled by street riots and demonstrations? As Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote:
“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
The U.S. is showing signs that it is finally beginning to read the handwriting on the wall. In a visit to Qatar this month, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned Middle Eastern leaders that “in too many places, in too many ways, the region’s foundations are sinking into the sand … Those who cling to the status quo may be able to hold back the full impact of their countries’ problems for a little while, but not forever. If leaders don’t offer a positive vision and give young people meaningful ways to contribute, others will fill the vacuum. Extremist elements, terrorist groups and others who would prey on desperation and poverty are already out there, appealing for allegiance and competing for influence. So this is a critical moment, and this is a test of leadership for all of us.”
Lip service is easy. What is needed is action. Unless it aligns its foreign policy with its values instead of with political expediency, and starts recognizing the legitimate aspirations of the Arab populace, particularly the educated young, U.S. influence will dramatically shrink in the region.
There is no turning back. Tunisians have shown that they can write their own scripts. The Egyptians, Moroccans, Syrians, Jordanians and others have taken note. Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech now has an Arab resonance and the “fierce urgency of now” has already begun to animate the Arab youth. Change is indeed afoot.
Horus wrote:So now we have a man who sets himself on fire outside the parliament building in Cairo, a similar incident triggered the protests in Tunisia, could this be the spark everyone is waiting for?
Really, I've not seen anything on the main news here!
Strange! It's all over the news here in Norway
I've just seen on the news here that a third man has set himself on fire - so two now in Cairo and one in Alex.
People are seriously disaffected by the state of things - I was just in the shop and saw veal ribs at 93 LE a kilo. Just paid a whopping amount for a bit of mince and a frozen chicken. Only had a few things in my bag and it came to 150 LE, which is a serious amount for an Egyptian for a few things.
I cannot believe a 3rd person as set light to themselves and still not even a mention on BBC and Sky news!
Obviously a minimum price to be set on Alcohol here in the UK is far more important than a human life!
Seems a few other countries are having similar cases too. I did see a report on the BBC yesterday on tv talking about the number of suicides in Egypt. It said a ridiculously small number (or so it seemed to me) either 500 or 800?? Can't remember which.
I have also been following the events in Tunisia closely though not on the BBC. I turned on the news just after the President had fled and there was one sentence about this and the rest was all about the lack of council houses in the UK. Some news reports never even mention it. I've been using the Web and Facebook quite a bit and being able to speak both Arabic and French has also helped find interesting stuff.
One article I read on BBC News online highlighted a key difference between Tunisia and Egypt saying that the high percentage of university educated young people had added to the discontent. But apart from this key difference I can only see similarities between Tunisia and Egypt. I'm with Glyph on this one. All this reminds me so much of the events of 1989. Once regimes started to collapse the rest quickly followed and what so many of us had thought was impossible then happened. The cracks in the regimes were all there and the same can be said of so many Arab countries today. The reign of fear and repression could not control the people in Tunisia. Will it be enough to continue to support the fragile regimes elsewhere? The people of Tunisia deserve better. They are not the only ones!!!!
Yeah in a country where the majority believe that God in in control and only God can decide when one lives or dies, I think that this is a very high number of suicides. For me this indicates real desperation and despair.
Last stats I saw on suicide when that guy hung himself on the bridge I believe were in the thousands, which certainly was more realistic than the last stats which came from the 80s and were less than 20 a year, but may still have been low.
However, suicides and attempted suicides have been a daily occurrence in this country long before any of them made the news. When my husband was working in an emergency room here 8 years ago or so they had several attempted suicide cases brought in every week. Most were females with some failed love story though. But like many things, this was just one of those problems that are hushed up here.
Claire wrote:
One article I read on BBC News online highlighted a key difference between Tunisia and Egypt saying that the high percentage of university educated young people had added to the discontent. But apart from this key difference I can only see similarities between Tunisia and Egypt. I'm with Glyph on this one. All this reminds me so much of the events of 1989. Once regimes started to collapse the rest quickly followed and what so many of us had thought was impossible then happened. The cracks in the regimes were all there and the same can be said of so many Arab countries today. The reign of fear and repression could not control the people in Tunisia. Will it be enough to continue to support the fragile regimes elsewhere? The people of Tunisia deserve better. They are not the only ones!!!!
I saw that article too. It was written by someone who obviously hadn't spoken to any Egyptians. Egyptians have become emboldened big time in the last few weeks and although they haven't taken to the streets en masse yet, one needs to keep in mind that this is exam week for students and no one, students or their families, is going to take the focus off the exams to go out and protest immediately. However, the calls for protests on January 25 will have a great potential for turnout, with schools and universities out of session and workers off of work due to the holiday. In the meantime, lots of people are expressing their frustration publicly on Facebook and in person to an extent I have never seen before. Everywhere I go these days people are expressing contempt for something or someone related to the government. Today I was with someone who told me she got out of her car and got in a fight with a policeman yesterday, who had stopped her in traffic on a bridge because the minister of the interior was passing by and of course required a buffer zone between himself and the citizens.
What happened in Alex really brought Egyptians together rather than drive them apart. Muslims are upset about what happened to the Christians and a Coptic woman I know was even expressing frustration about what happened to the Salafi who was arrested in Alexandria. I think people are at a point where they realize everyone is in the same sinking ship together and so the only thing to do is to work together to bail it out.
I have been saying for about 5 or 6 years now that there are strong similarities between what has been going on in Egypt and pre-Revolutionary Iran. In fact, I see far more parallels at least in the run-up to now in Iran than one could find in Eastern Europe. So really, I wouldn't be in the least bit surprised if there was a revolution here too. The stars are aligned in the same way. Of course, there is one difference. Mubarak is unlikely to find refuge in Iran like the Shah did in Egypt!
You are right Glyph the tragic events in Alex did have a unifying effect but how long will this last? But all Egyptians are affected by the current economic and political problems, rising prices being the most obvious. Maybe people are starting to speak out but the people I know in Cairo are still very cautious and scared to speak out. Noone wants to get on the wrong side of the police. The memory of what happened to Khaled Said is still a very vivid one. I also know of problems faced by different bloggers who have raised their voices and paid the price for this. I think there are difficult times ahead for Egypt. So things could get worse then Glyph once the pressure of exams is over. It would be very interesting to see the international response if there was a popular uprising in Egypt.
For the past week or so I have been plagued with Yahoo Group problems! :( I belong to a few restricted Groups and overnight everything changed. The format is unrecognisable; the time is wrong -...
Last post
Thanks folks. It's not just my pc though. It's happening on my tablet, pc (running XP), laptop (running Windows 8) and even on DH's desktop! :cry: So it seems to be a general thing with Yahoo. I've...
An elderly Floridian called 911 on his cell phone to report that his car has been broken into.
He is hysterical as he explains his situation to the dispatcher
They've stolen the stereo, the...
So it's a firm(ish) victory for the MB presidential candidate but has anyone on here got any prognostications or intuitions on which way Egypt will go now? What will ultimately be the fate of the...
Last post
I would imagine that things like Orfi marriages and any other relationship that does not come under the Islamic religious code could well become a target for scrutiny in the future. It all depends...
nice piece of video and the bread man in his hospital bed - -
