Religion Dispatches
…othing of it, but took whatever potential it had and drowned it in the Nile. Those who failed so many times before are not suddenly going to succeed. Because, as we saw yesterday, and as we saw so many times before, the Egyptian military does not care about Egyptians. It cares about itself. It’s no different than so many of the institutions and movements that claim to empower the Arab world and Middle East, but do nothing for it….
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…ypt’s most prominent Coptic Christians and the founder of the new, liberal Free Egyptians Party (FEP). In recent weeks, the altered Mickey and Minnie image had been widely circulated. An email with the title “This is the future of Egypt” had been bouncing around Cairo’s inboxes prior to its use by Sawiris. Kim Fox, a journalism professor at the American University of Cairo, believes that the uproar should be viewed in the context of ongoing sectar…
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…ive role in the new government, and that the days of religious violence in Egypt are over. Later I met with an old friend, one of Egypt’s leading sociologists and human rights activists, Saad Eddin Ibrahim, who had been imprisoned by Mubarak’s regime. After his release he was threatened with new charges, which led him on a self-imposed exile for several years. When he returned, he met with some of his old cellmates, also released, in a sort of reu…
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…d full of light, and which I saw many times at the Sultan Hassan mosque in Egypt, where his own teacher (the current Mufti of Egypt), often gave the sermon. Yet, despite our limited interaction, his killing touched me in a profound way. I was not the only one. Within a few hours of the shooting, Twitter and Facebook were on fire with expressions of sadness and outrage, in a way I have never seen. The funeral of the shaykh al-thawra (the shaykh of…
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…cedented wave of attacks and hate comments. Faghal is considered the first Egyptian woman to come out publicly as a lesbian living in Egypt. She has received violent backlash from some social media users who saw her sexual orientation as a violation of the conservative Egyptian society and its Islamic ideals. Despite the fact that many launched an attack against Faghal, other users expressed support through messages and comments. Feminists and oth…
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…lidarity, in Arabic and English. One is the newly formed Alliance of Queer Egyptian Organizations, which coordinated protests outside Egyptian embassies and consulates on Oct. 19. My.Kali, one of the region’s first L.G.B.T. magazines, started publishing in 2008. In July, a video went viral showing an Egyptian lesbian (who lives in the United States) talking about her relationship with a woman and her father’s reaction to her coming out. … Morality…
Read More…s would turn out. One thing is clear, however: for the protests to topple the regime, the numbers on the streets must reach into the millions—not an especially far-fetched goal for a nation of 80 million. But whether or not Mubarak goes the way of Ben Ali, something has changed in Egypt and in the region. A young, Harvard educated Egyptian lawyer put it best, writing the following on Facebook the morning after: “As I walked back from work, everyth…
Read More…to realize it’s not good.” He then goes on to compare what’s happening in Egypt to the Islamic revolution in Iran — a theory that Haroon Moghul has ably debunked here at RD. Then Christian talk radio host and evangelist Michael Youssef announced that he would be appearing on CNN through out the day: “Before you judge the motives of the protesters, you must know who is really behind those young people on the streets,” stated Michael Youssef, Ph.D….
Read More…d liberals. While they certainly play significant and influential roles in Egypt, Egypt is far more Muslim and religious. Judging by independent polls, the overwhelming majority of Egyptians probably want that clause to stay, or something similar. Its not Islamist, but it is conservative—and the ultra-puritanical Muslim preachers, that belong to the minority Salafi trend, made sure that Egypt was reminded of its “Islamic identity.” There were even…
Read More…ld fight against Radical Islam and violent jihadism; and instead stand for freedom of religion and conscience and for the equality of women. In Egypt, strong advocacy by the United States for meaningful democracy which protects the rights of minorities, including Copts, would have promoted our security and interests and the security of our ally Israel. Tragically, a great opportunity has been missed. We cannot afford four more years of naive and p…
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