Violence At the Libyan Embassy in Cairo

For the second time this week, Libyans and Egyptians descended upon the Libyan embassy in Cairo to hoist the free Libya flag. And for the second time this week, the Egyptian army and police responded with violence. The outcome yesterday was hardly a surprise. Rather, it was completely expected.

On Monday night, Libyans learned a lesson their Egyptian compatriots have known for a long time: the security forces in Egypt are willing to use force, even when no force is necessary. About fifty protesters gathered in front of the embassy, chanting anti-Gaddafi slogans and singing songs about Egyptian-Libyan unity. Without warning, the police and army fired into the air. The demonstrators ran from swinging truncheons and zapping tasers of the security forces, pouring into a busy thoroughfare of the normally peaceful neighborhood of Zamalek.

Protesters claimed security forces had fired live rounds into the air before I arrived.

Islamists in Tahrir Square

This Friday Tahrir Square was turned upside down. In what were likely the largest protests since the fall of Mubarak, hundreds of thousands of Islamists descended upon the square and completely overwhelmed the secular sit-in that has camped there since July 8th.

The Tahrir I had gotten to know changed overnight. As I write about here, Tahrir had become an exciting and even fun affair. Parents enjoying roasted nuts as their children get their faces painted. Animated political discussions sprouting up and dispersing. Revolutionary concerts and films to entertain and educate the crowds in the evenings. A small school for the children. A barber for those who have stayed since the beginning or for those who just wanted to talk shop. And underlying it all: a shared passion to complete the revolution that transcended political, religious, age and gender lines – even as they passionately debated what exactly such a revolution should bring.

That Tahrir was gone when I went to the protests on Friday. Bearded men and the occasional niqabi woman flooded the square. The average age of the protesters seemed to increase by at least a decade. Unity was dismantled one sectarian chant and one provocative sign at a time. The day before, all revolutionary groups whether secular or Islamist had agreed to a shared list of demands. The Islamists, and especially Salafists, did not uphold the end of their deal. In what was a surely coordinated effort from their leadership given the number and professionalism of their signs and banners and the fiery preaching of their stages, they completely ignored the deal they had just agreed to only 24 hours prior. The outnumbered secular protesters had no choice but to withdraw from the square entirely.

Much of the reporting has focused on the extremism of the Islamists and especially Salafists, but some of it has been sensationalized. For example, some outlets mentioned vendors selling pictures of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. This is true, but they were also selling pictures of Sadat, Gaddafi, Che, Nasser, and pretty much every other political leader. These vendors weren’t trying to make a political statement; they were trying to make a living. Moreover, as this picture I took on July 11th shows, they’ve been there for a while. But to be clear, many of the Islamist demands were anything but reasonable. Dozens of signs demanded the release of “political prisoners” like convicted terrorist Omar Abd al-Rahman and organizers were collecting signatures on a petition to achieve that release. My friend was yelled at a few times for not covering her hair.

There is no doubt Tahrir became a more sectarian, conservative, and volatile place Friday. Popular chants from the revolution like “Raise your head high, you’re Egyptian” became “Raise your head high, you’re Muslim.” The people no longer demanded the fall of the regime, but the “implementation of God’s Sharia.” There was an odd moment as I listened to anti-Western, anti-American, anti-liberal, anti-secular, and anti-Jewish chants and realized I was all five of those things. Yet despite the anger and prejudice of the chants, I was always greeted by the protesters warmly – hearty assalaamu aleikum greetings with kisses on the cheek were the norm.

Legitimate concerns that Tahrir would devolve into chaos and violence did not bear out – perhaps simply because there were so few seculars for the Islamists to confront. As the sun began to set and the evening call to prayer began to rise, the Islamists started to file out of the square. Buses were waiting to take them home, unknown numbers destined for locations far outside Cairo. Seculars began to regain their strength. Chants for Islamic rule were increasingly met with counter-chants for a civil state. By nightfall, the concert stage and cinema were once again up and running, as if the Islamists had never come at all. As one Egyptian told me: “Don’t be discouraged by the loud voices today in Tahrir. The vast majority want a civil state.”

After some reflection about the day’s events, I’ve come away with the following take-away points:

1. Islamism deserves a voice – Any political or religious trend that can mobilize tens and hundreds of thousands of people to descend upon Tahrir Square deserves a voice in molding the future of Egypt. In fact, any political or religious trend that can mobilize only tens or hundreds of people deserve that same right. Whether we like it or not, Islamism represents a significant portion of the population. A truly democratic Egypt will have to find a way to accommodate them, so long as they agree to play by the rules of the game. In the long-term, I have an admittedly hard to prove hunch that the most unsavory Islamists will fail to thrive in a prosperous and free Egypt.

2. Islamists need honesty to build trust – Islamists currently suffer from a deficit of trust in greater Egyptian society and especially the political elite. After all, some of the groups on the square were unabashed terrorists only a few years ago. Moreover, the goals of the Islamist project and their potential ramifications on Egyptian society raise legitimate concerns about Islamist intentions. Of course, the secular protesters face their own deficit of trust for different reasons. To quell such anxiety, Islamists will not only have to carefully calibrate their public messaging, but they must also change the way they interact with the rest of Egyptian society. By reneging on the unity deal, the Salafists have only confirmed widespread fears that they cannot be trusted. And if they cannot be trusted for something as simple as sticking to a list of agreed-upon chants, how can they ever be trusted with the reins of government? Political effectiveness is part grandstanding for sure, but it’s also about deal-making and keeping one’s word. Only the Islamist political parties who can balance the desires of their constituency while also projecting a trustworthy voice to the rest of Egyptian society will succeed during and after Egypt’s transition to democracy.

3. The Muslim Brotherhood is under pressure -As much as yesterday was about Islamists projecting their strength to others, it was also about an internal struggle over who best represents the voice Islamists deserve. The Muslim Brotherhood proved the most trustworthy yesterday, and therefore they proved the most effective representative of the Islamist voice. For example, a leader of their political party criticized his Islamist brothers for breaking their pledge to stick to a unity script. Yet at the same time, many of their chant leaders also broke the agreed upon script, and their image outside the Islamist camp may be tarnished along with the Salafists as a result. Yesterday was not the first or last time competing political forces will pull the Brotherhood in competing directions. Their ultimate goal of establishing an Islamic state naturally aligns them with the other Islamists that took over Tahrir Square yesterday. Yet their wealth of political experience and flexible pragmatism pulls them towards cooperation with secular partners. As Egypt democratizes, the Brotherhood will continue to be pulled in divergent directions, and such stress on the organization will exacerbate pre-existing fractures within the group that have already begun to widen. With their most skilled political operators and youth leaders already striking out on their own, the Brotherhood may be forced to rely increasingly on their Islamist allies, further alienating some of their own members and creating an opportunity for other groups to fulfill the role of, for lack of a better term, “Moderate Islamist.”

4. Nothing has changed – Not surprisingly, many secular Egyptians and especially those encamped in the square have expressed their dismay and even fear of yesterday’s events. But nothing about yesterday should come as a surprise. The protests proved that the Islamists are well-organized, loud, and sometimes a little scary. We knew all of this before yesterday. We’re just not used to seeing the truth so up close and personal. The biggest mistake the secular Egyptians (and international actors for that matter) could make is to overreact to yesterday’s events. The Islamists came, made their voice heard, and left. Business has now returned to usual and it’s time to refocus on the tasks at hand.

5. Tahrir is overrated – Regardless of what happened yesterday, the real battle between and within the secular and Islamist camps are outside Tahrir Square. Protests are about symbols. Elections are about results. The secular camp should take yesterday’s events as a wake-up call. As they discuss politics in Tahrir, Islamists are actually doing politics outside Tahrir. That is why Islamists can fill the square when they want to and that is why they will do well in the November elections. They have done the painstaking but essential work at the grassroots level. Secular groups – and especially the liberals – have so far failed to do the same.

You can see my pictures from the protest here. Below, I've embedded some video I took during the day.

UPDATE: Today has been a weird day. The protesters have announced the sit-in will end, but not everyone agrees so it's not clear how many will remain if any. Meanwhile, the military used sticks to disperse a protest outside the parliament. And finally, a group of merchants and vendors threatened to open traffic in the square by force before being talked off the ledge. Check out this post by Amr Bassiouny about why the protesters need to change strategy and this post by The Big Pharaoh about why the Muslim Brotherhood played Friday's protests perfectly.

 

Shoulda Put a Ring on It

Last week at my job, I was reading the State Department’s annual human rights report for Egypt when I came across a depressing study.

A survey by the Egyptian Center for Women's Rights (ECWR) found 83 percent of Egyptian women and 98 percent of foreign women in the country have been sexually harassed and half reported they endure harassment on a daily basis. According to the State Department’s report, “women reported men staring inappropriately at their bodies, touching them inappropriately, making sexually explicit comments, and stalking them.” Furthermore, the ECWR found that only 2.4 percent of Egyptian women and 7.5 percent of foreign women decide to seek help from the police. Worse yet, some police officers reportedly mocked or harassed the women brave enough to come forward.

Last week when I wondered whether I was safer living in Cairo or here in DC, I was asking the question as a guy. For women living in Egypt, the situation is entirely different, sometimes even scary. Not one of my female friends escaped sexual harassment. The longer I lived in Cairo, the better I became at staring down sketch balls and using my body as a shield against would-be gropers on the sidewalk. One of my friends, fed up with the constant badgering, clocked a guy over the head with a bag of bread. Lesson learned? Probably not.

So why is sexual harassment so pervasive? There are a few reasons. The first results from the perfect storm of conservative values, marriage and unemployment. For most Egyptians, sex before marriage is taboo (but it does happen). Meanwhile, Egyptian culture dictates that a man cannot marry until he can sustain himself and his would-be family. Normally this would not present a large problem, but because Egypt suffers from overwhelming unemployment, men often cannot marry until their late 20s or early 30s. Thus, young Egyptians constantly struggle to maintain their outward piety while restraining their inevitable internal urges. In the process, sexual tension is released in unhealthy ways.

But this phenomenon only helps explain why unmarried Egyptian men might sexually harass women, but unfortunately they are not the only culprits. Therefore, a second factor is the cultural acceptance of sexual harassment. If you grow up seeing your father sexually harass women, you’re likely going to do it too. And if you start doing it while you’re young, you’ll likely do it for life – and eventually become the father who serves as the bad example for the next generation.

Furthermore, Egyptian society has yet witnessed a women’s emancipation movement as we saw in the West. But that doesn’t mean one is impossible. It was only a few decades ago that sexual harassment was rampant in the United States, as any episode of Mad Men demonstrates. Currently, plenty of Egyptian women are standing up and powerfully asserting their rights.

This implicit endorsement of sexual harassment by Egyptian society also helps explain why the government hasn’t been responsive to the women who choose to stand up against their assailants. After all, an Egyptian police office is often little more than a bunch of bored men smoking cigarettes in a hot, crowded room. But just as women are standing up for their rights, the government has also begun to (slowly) come around. While there is no law specifically prohibiting sexual harassment, the government has prosecuted cases under the statute called "Public Exposure and the Corruption of Morals." In the first case of its kind, a man was sentenced to three years of hard labor last year after he groped a woman on the bus.

Finally, foreign women face additional harassment for two reasons. For one, sexual harassers don’t need to worry that the victim’s Uncle Ahmed will come seeking retribution the next day. There’s no fear of shame. Second, there is a pervasive misunderstanding about Western morals. Namely, a lot of Egyptians think we have none. For many Egyptians, America is best exemplified by The Hills, Lady Gaga and Las Vegas, not Seventh Heaven, Taylor Swift and Birmingham, Alabama. A recent concert by Beyonce stirred incredible controversy in Egypt, with the Muslim Brotherhood calling it an “insolent sex party.” This misunderstanding of Western culture leads to unrealistic and unhealthy expectations about Western women in general. But if Egyptian men only listened to Beyonce’s lyrics, they would know “you shoulda put a ring on it” first.

While sexual harassment currently poses an incredible problem for women in Egypt, there is reason to hope things will improve. As the indigenous women’s rights movement gains steam, as the government grows more responsive, and as increased cultural exchange between Egypt and the West helps erase damaging stereotypes, the cultural acceptance for sexual harassment will begin to wither. And none too soon.

Fixing Traffic in Cairo

The Egyptian government has finally decided to fix downtown Cairo traffic.

I have plenty of personal experience in the unique joy of sitting in unrelenting Egyptian gridlock as the hours (no exaggeration) tick slowly away. Everything is a battle. One lane against another. One honk against ten others. The pedestrian against the car. The bus against anything that's foolish enough to get in the way. The cigarette smoke against the car exhaust. The stereo blaring the Qur'an against the other car blasting pop music against the twenty other radios in earshot. Negotiating the taxi fare. Then negotiating it again. And once more.

I once was stuck next to an ambulance, siren screaming. We moved ten meters in as many minutes. Though knowing how bad Egyptians hospitals can be, that delay just might have saved that person's life. Okay, probably not.

So, it's about time the government did something. Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif has called for a comprehensive plan to redevelop downtown into large pedestrian squares, complete with open-air restaurants and cafes. Traffic will be banned or channeled into massive, underground parking garages.

I'm immediately skeptical. Remember Boston's Big Dig? Well try it in a poor underdeveloped country, where corruption, nepotism, and incompetence permeate every level of government. For nearly a decade, the Egyptian government has been promising the completion of the Grand Egyptian Museum, a highly ambitious project that will attract nearly 5 million visitors per year. Well, not only has the government failed to deliver the museum on time, but even the official website, as of today, is not up and running.

Putting the government aside, I'm not sure that building a few garages will substantively change the level of traffic. Admittedly, many streets are lined on either side by a row (sometimes two rows) of parked cars. These lanes could be used for moving traffic if the cars were parked in a garage. But I don't understand why such garages need to be underground and centered only in downtown.

If the government were really serious about traffic, it would:

1. Raise gas prices. The government currently subsidizes gasoline below market prices, largely to garner public favor. Quite simply, if people cannot afford to drive, there'll be less cars in the street. Notably, Cairo's ~100,000 taxi drivers would be disproportionately hurt by such a hike in prices. They could either receive a rebate, or as many cabs have already done, use natural gas instead.

2. Increase public transportation. Buses are inconsistent, overcrowded and often not even buses at all, but glorified Astro vans called microbuses. The money saved on decreasing the gasoline subsidy could be used to fund more public transportation options.

3. Establish the rule of law. Besides a seat belt law that is rarely enforced, Cairo's streets are a completely lawless, Hobbesian nightmare. But with order, comes efficiency. With efficiency, traffic flows. So install traffic lights, establish lanes of traffic, introduce speed limits, create pedestrian crosswalks and, no kidding, prohibit donkey carts on large streets.

Below, I've included my friend's picture of Cairo's streets (one of the less crowded areas) that depicts a car accident and the resulting melee between drivers. Just one chaotic intersection among countless thousands in the Egyptian capital.

Let Them Wear Veils

The Grand Imam of Egypt's al-Azhar University, Sheikh Mohammad Sayyed Tantawi, recently told a female student to remove her niqab (a veil that covers the face) during a lecture, ostensibly because he had trouble hearing her. After he faced outrage from conservative Muslims, Sheikh Tantawi went ahead and banned the niqab from the university. Now, a group of Egyptian MPs, lawyers and human rights group have sued the Sheikh to reverse the decision.

The New Republic's Marty Peretz took this development as an opportunity to blast President Obama for his speech in Cairo, where the President said, "I reject the view of some in the West that a woman who chooses to cover her hair is somehow less equal." According to Peretz, "President Obama's indiscriminate endorsement of these curtaining contraptions is an intrusion into an active debate in the Muslim world, a reckless intrusion." Furthermore, Peretz suggests Sheikh Tantawi's decision is a "retort to Obama's intrusion."

I have to disagree on this one. President Obama sought to heal the relationship between the U.S. and the Muslim world in Cairo. For too long that relationship has been governed by mutual fear, instead of the "mutual interest and mutual respect" President Obama seeks to cultivate. Given Obama's purpose in Cairo and the millions of Muslim Americans the President represents, he has every right to speak about the veil. After all, why wouldn't the President speak about America's fundamental values of democracy, liberty and, yes, religious tolerance?

Part of the process of ameliorating our relationship must begin with the recognition that the veil is a legitimate symbol of Muslim piety. Many Muslim women choose to wear the veil, in the exact way many Orthodox Jews choose to wear kippot. There is no moral difference. However, there are certainly Muslim women who are forced to wear the veil against their will. Clearly, this is unacceptable and the U.S. must push for their right to dress as they please.

While Peretz brags about how many books he's read on the topic, he clearly hasn't spoken to many Muslim women. When I attended President Obama's speech at Cairo University (Peretz mistakenly says the speech took place at al-Azhar), it was obvious to me how excited the Muslim women were to hear the President's support for the veil. The comment drew some of the loudest applause of the entire speech. Nor were the women all conservative Muslims. Roughly half were students of the secular Cairo University, while many more women included Egypt's pop singers, movie stars and socialites (not exactly known for their religiosity).

Furthermore, it's outlandish to think Sheikh Tantawi would make such a fundamental decision only to retort the American president, as Peretz dubiously claims. After criticizing President Obama for inserting himself into an internal Muslim debate, Peretz oddly minimizes the validity of that debate with such an accusation. In addition, while al-Azhar University is considered one of the premier institutions of Sunni thought, it simultaneously carries a stigma of too closely following the Egyptian government line. It is impossible to understand the niqab ban without considering the long-lasting struggle between the Egyptian regime and Islamism. Just last week the Egyptian government detained 24 members of the Muslim Brotherhood, the leading Islamist opposition group.

When Westerners like Peretz fixate on the veil while discussing women's rights, they do little to help real Muslim women. In fact, they only obfuscate the real problems Muslim women face every day, like economic inequality and insufficient education. That is the ultimate tragedy of arguments like the one Peretz lays out. Out of a desire to help, he only hurts the cause.

To see what real Muslim women are like, check out this photo album of Saudi women from Time Magazine and read this article by Sumbul Ali-Karamali about a recent Muslim women's rights conference in Malaysia. And if you're really interested, I wrote a comment to that article as well.