Category Archives: Egypt

ISIS affiliate in Egypt claims responsibility for attack that killed 32 in Sinai

Reuters: Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi cut short a visit to Ethiopia for an African Union summit on Friday after Islamic State’s Egyptian wing claimed the killing of at least 30 soldiers and police officers in the Sinai Peninsula.

The four separate attacks on security forces in North Sinai on Thursday night were among the bloodiest in years and the first significant assault in the region since the most active Sinai militant group swore allegiance to IS in November.

Militant attacks in Sinai, while far from Cairo and tourist attractions, has crimped government efforts to project an image of stability to woo back foreign investors and tourists driven away by frequent political violence since a popular uprising four years ago that overthrew veteran autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Facebooktwittermail

The news website that’s keeping press freedom alive in Egypt

Leslie T Chang reports: On the afternoon of 17 June 2013, a group of friends gathered in a fourth-floor apartment in downtown Cairo. They sat on the floor because there were no chairs; there were also no desks, no shelves, and no ashtrays. A sign on the door, written in black marker, read “Office of the Artists Formerly Known as Egypt Independent”. What they had was a name – Mada, which means “span” or “range” in Arabic, had been chosen after much debate and many emails between 24 people – and a plan to set up an independent news outlet. Most of them had not seen each other since their former employer, a newspaper called Egypt Independent, closed two months before.

Lina Attalah, the venture’s founder and editor-in-chief, called the meeting to order. Designers were rushing to finish the website; a team was drafting a business plan; half a dozen grant applications were pending. “The update is: there’s no money,” she said, to laughter, “but we have a lot of promises. I’m working on the faith that the money will be there.” She signed off on 17 articles to be delivered over the next week. Lina is dark-eyed and fine-boned, with long black hair; she speaks in lengthy and well-wrought sentences that suggest a professor teaching a graduate seminar. Nothing in her demeanour betrayed the pressures she felt. The company had no cash to pay its writers. She was covering the rent and furnishing the office out of her own pocket. This would be, by her count, her seventh news venture; many of the previous ones had folded owing to the hostility of successive governments towards independent-minded journalists (“I have a history of setting up places that close”). Although she was only 30 and didn’t have a husband or children, Lina was accustomed to taking care of other people.

The website had to launch by 30 June, the day that a mass demonstration calling for the resignation of Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s president, was planned. Lina was determined about that – “I want everyone to be a journalist on that day” – but otherwise her timing could not have been worse. In the previous two and a half years, investment in Egypt had dried up; many foreign companies had evacuated their staff during the 2011 revolution and not returned. Morsi’s year in office had seen decreasing stability and a stagnant economy. Whatever came next – people were calling for the army to step in – could be more repressive.

“I think it could just be slow-motion state failure,” Lina said.

“Not state failure,” objected Dina Hussein, a close friend from college and the new website’s opinion editor. “Of course, the infrastructure is shit, there’s no electricity …”

“That’s what I’m talking about,” Lina interrupted. “Not complete collapse.”

“Lebanon, not Somalia,” Dina said.

“It could be state failure for the next 10 years,” Lina said.

Everything about the project belied this pessimism. Mada Masr would be an independent online newspaper, owned by employees whose average age was 25, in a country where news production was controlled by the government or large conglomerates. It would produce stories, in English and Arabic, and make money from online advertising and side businesses in research, editing and translation. The company would be run as a democracy – in a country that had never seen such a system, by employees who, by and large, had not experienced it in practice. Egypt was ostensibly on a parallel course of building a democratic and sustainable state; both ventures were perilous, fraught with uncertainty, and short of money. In the year and a half to come, Mada’s goals would prove more daunting than its founders imagined. A military coup, set into motion three days after the website launched, would lead to the ruthless suppression of dissenting voices. Mada would emerge as one of the very few independent news sources in the country. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Egypt: Power, the January 25 revolutionaries, and responsibility

H.A. Hellyer writes: During the 18-day uprising in 2011, the revolutionaries gained a certain type of power. Their theoretical perspective, though imprecise, became manifest through popular mobilization. With that, the revolutionaries were able to fundamentally disrupt the workings of the state, provoking and forcing it to change direction, resulting in the removal of Mubarak. At the same time, they also missed the opportunity to harness and develop that power.

In 2011, when the military’s transitional road map was put to a referendum, the revolutionaries had considerable political capital. That capital, however, was not capitalized upon. Revolutionaries generally mobilized for a “no” vote, but provided little in the way of a plausible alternative. They lost the vote. Their failure to properly express a well-developed political vision meant they missed a key opportunity to set the agenda of the post-Mubarak period.

A year later, the revolutionaries had the option of coalescing around a single candidate for presidential elections. It is likely that such a candidate would have prevailed. Instead, the revolutionary vote was split, leading to a run-off between Mubarak’s last prime minister, and the non-revolutionary Muslim Brotherhood. Some will claim the revolutionaries played a critical role in that run-off, by ensuring the former regime candidate lost. They did – but the very occurrence of such an abysmal run-off would have been impossible had there been a single, pro-January 25 revolution candidate.

Arising from that election was a presidency that the revolutionaries eventually, and correctly, opposed. Pro-revolutionary figures were the first to demand presidential elections: a laudable, democratic escape route from the prevailing political impasse, with revolutionaries en masse endorsing the demand. There were, however, other, less scrupulous forces that opposed the Brotherhood’s presidency. The key political party opposition umbrella was the National Salvation Front, which later backed the Tamarod group that called for the June 30 protests. More of the revolutionaries should have focused more intently on pressing Front members to distinguish themselves and the Front from more insidious forces, as well as interrogating Tamarod and its backers.

In short, at a time that could have made a critical difference, the revolutionaries did not realize the need to take initiative. As the protests to fulfill the democratic demand for presidential elections drew nearer, it was only a small group of revolutionaries that were dubious about the outcome. The rest merely made various public calls against military intervention when they should have focused on holding the main umbrella group, the National Salvation Front, to that anti-intervention principle as a condition, and established protocols to be followed if that intervention happened. That was their only leverage. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Shaima El Sabbagh and Sondos Reda Abu Bakr: Protesters killed in Egypt on eve of #Jan25 uprising anniversary

AFP: A female demonstrator was killed in clashes with Egyptian police during a rare leftwing protest in central Cairo Saturday, the eve of the anniversary of the 2011 uprising against Hosni Mubarak, an official said.

Shaima al-Sabbagh, who friends said was 34 and the mother of a five-year-old boy, died of birdshot wounds, a health ministry spokesman said.

Fellow protesters said she was hit by birdshot when police fired to disperse the march.

Prime Minister Ibrahim Mahlab said Sabbagh’s death was being investigated and vowed that “whoever committed a mistake will be punished, whoever he may be.”

A senior interior ministry official denied police had used birdshot to disperse the protest.

“No weapons such as birdshot or rubber bullets were used, it was a small protest that did not require the use of such weapons,” an aide to the interior minister, Abdel Fattah Osman, told AFP.

“Only two tear gas canisters were fired.”

The clash took place hours before state television aired a pre-recorded speech by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to mark the fourth anniversary of the popular uprising.

“I salute all our martyrs, from the beginning of January 25 (2011) until now,” said Sisi.

Al Jazeera: An Egyptian student was killed during clashes between anti-government protesters and residents in the coastal city of Alexandria, as demonstrations gathered pace days before the anniversary of the 2011 uprising.

The Freedom and Justice Party, the political wing of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, identified the dead woman on Friday on its Facebook page as 17-year-old Sondos Rida Abu Bakr and accused security forces of shooting her during a demonstration, Reuters news agency reported.

A security official in Alexandria said several people were wounded on Friday in clashes between protesters and local residents but denied that security forces had opened fire to disperse demonstrators.

At least 20 people were also arrested in Alexandria on Friday and 68 the previous day, security sources said.

Facebooktwittermail

Four years after the Egyptian revolution

Thanassis Cambanis writes: In the four years that I’ve been reporting closely on Egypt’s transition from revolution to restoration, I’ve seen young activists go from stunned to euphoric to traumatized and sometimes defeated. I’ve seen stalwarts of the old regime go from arrogant and complacent to frightened and unsure to bullying and triumphalist. And yet, so far, the core grievances that drew frustrated Egyptians to Tahrir Square in the first place remain unaddressed. Police operate with complete impunity and disrespect for citizens, routinely using torture. Courts are whimsical, uneven, at times absurdly unjust and capricious. The military controls a state within a state, removed from any oversight or scrutiny, with authority over a vast portion of the national economy and Egypt’s public land. Poverty and unemployment continue to rise, while crises in housing, education, and health care have grown even worse than the most dire predictions of development experts. Corruption has largely gone unpunished, and [President Abdel Fattah el-]Sisi has begun to roll back an initial wave of prosecutions against Mubarak, his sons, and his oligarchs.

[Basem] Kamel [one of the leaders of the revolution] has abandoned his revolutionary rhetoric of 2011 for a more modest platform of reform, working within the system. He was one of just four revolutionary youth who made it into the short-lived revolutionary parliament of 2012, and he helped found the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, one of the most promising new political parties after the fall of Mubarak.

He expects to run for parliament again with his party, but the odds are longer and the stakes lower. The parliament will have hardly any power under Sisi’s setup. Most of the seats are slated for “independents,” which in practice means well-funded establishment candidates run by the former ruling party network. The Muslim Brotherhood, the nation’s largest opposition group, is now illegal. Existing political parties can only compete for 20 percent of the seats, and most of them, like Kamel’s have dramatically tamed their criticisms.

“I think Sisi is in control of everything,” Kamel said. “Of course I am not with Sisi, but I am not against the state.”

That’s why he’s devoting his efforts to a training program for Social Democratic cadres, a sort of political science-and-organizing academy for activists and operatives that will take years to bear fruit. “It’s long-term work,” he said.

Still, something fundamental changed in January 2011, and no amount of state brutality can reverse it. Many people who before 2011 cowered or kept their ideas to themselves now feel unafraid. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Three Al Jazeera journalists remain in jail after Egyptian court orders a retrial

The New York Times reports: Egypt’s highest appeals court on Thursday ordered a retrial for three imprisoned journalists from Al Jazeera’s English-language service, implicitly acknowledging critical procedural flaws in a case that rights advocates have described, from the men’s arrests to their convictions, as a sham.

But the decision offered no guarantees that the journalists, who have been imprisoned for more than a year and now face a potentially lengthy second trial, would be freed anytime soon.

The convictions of the three men, Mohamed Fahmy, Baher Mohamed and Peter Greste, focused international condemnation on the government, drawing attention to a sweeping crackdown on news media freedom and political dissent since the military ouster of the country’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood.

And from its beginnings, analysts say, the case has perhaps had little to do with the actions of the journalists themselves. Instead, they suggest it reflects a bitter dispute between Egypt’s military-backed government, led by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, and Qatar, which owns Al Jazeera and has been a strong backer of his Islamist opponents in the Muslim Brotherhood.

The men were convicted in June on charges that included conspiring with the Muslim Brotherhood to broadcast false reports, though prosecutors presented no evidence for such claims. All three were sentenced to seven-year prison terms, but Mr. Mohamed received three additional years for possessing a spent bullet casing that he picked up at an anti-government street protest.

The case has drawn special notice partly because the defendants had reputations as experienced journalists and had in the past worked for other well-known international news organizations. But their ordeal, which the men have outlined in letters from prison and in messages sent through family members, has also highlighted the plight of thousands of Egyptians — including Islamists, leftist activists and other journalists — swept up by the authorities on charges that are widely viewed as politically motivated. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Hamas said concerned by Egypt-Qatar thaw

The Times of Israel reports: Hamas fears its ties with Qatar will be hindered by the reported reconciliation efforts between Doha and Egypt, London-based Arab paper Rai al-Youm reported Saturday, according to Israel Radio.

According to the report, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, who has been hosted by Qatar since leaving war-torn Syria in 2012, has reached out to Qatari leaders to receive clarifications on the matter, and has been assured that the amended ties with Cairo would not affect Doha’s relations with Hamas. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Abbas backs Egypt crackdown on Gaza tunnels

AFP reports: Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said he supported Egypt’s crackdown on tunnels linking the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip to the Sinai Peninsula and any other action the country took to protect itself from militants, according to a media report Thursday.

“We have supported all the precautionary measures taken by the Egyptian authorities to close the tunnels and stop the trafficking of arms and the passage of people between Gaza and the Sinai,” Abbas said in an interview with Egyptian magazine Al-Ahram Al-Arabi due to be published on Saturday, extracts of which were published by MENA news agency.

“We will continue to support any measure protecting Egypt from danger,” Abbas was quoted as saying. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

The Egyptian revolution isn’t dead because it never happened in the first place

Eric Trager writes: When an Egyptian court dismissed all criminal charges against former dictator Hosni Mubarak last weekend, many called it the final nail in coffin of the “revolution” that ousted Mubarak from power in February 2011. “Egypt’s revolution is dead,” CNN reported. “The January revolution is over; they ended it,” the father of an activist who was killed during the uprising told the New York Times. After the July 2013 ouster of Egypt’s first freely elected president and the subsequent rise of another former military general to the presidency, the end of Mubarak’s criminal case looks like the icing on Egypt’s counterrevolutionary cake.

Yet this narrative misunderstands what Egypt’s Tahrir Square revolt meant to many Egyptians, particularly those from the country’s political center, which is overwhelmingly rural and traditional, although not necessarily Islamist. Far from desiring the far-reaching – revolutionary – political reform that the “Arab Spring” narrative embodied, many of these Egyptians endorsed only the uprising’s two most basic goals: ending Mubarak’s 30-year rule and preventing the succession of his son Gamal. From their perspective, Mubarak had simply ruled for too long, and his apparent attempt to install Gamal as his successor reeked of pharaonism. For these Egyptians, the “revolution,” as they refer to the uprising, didn’t die with Saturday’s trial verdict, because Mubarak still isn’t president. And ever since Mubarak was overthrown, their goal has been to return to normalcy, even if that falls short of democracy.

It is difficult to establish just how widely this view is held: Polling in Egypt is notoriously weak; the Egyptian military used its control of the state media to discourage further revolutionary activity after Mubarak fell; and the current regime has quashed dissent substantially. But it is a sentiment that I have encountered repeatedly during the dozen or so research trips that I have taken to Egypt over the past four years, and it is useful for understanding the main reason the “revolution” didn’t die on Saturday: A true revolution never happened in the first place. This is what a crucial bloc of Egyptians wanted: stability, as they defined it, rather than the deep institutional reforms that a true revolution required. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Why everyone walked free in the Mubarak trial

Mada Masr: Judge Mahmoud al-Rashidy knew that the acquittal of former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly and six of his aides on charges of inciting and conspiring in the killing of protesters during the January 25 revolution would shock many.

He released a 280-page long judgment to mitigate the shock.

As Rashidy flatly dismissed the charges against former strongman Hosni Mubarak on procedural grounds, the judgment that was given to the media must be read, as his reasoning behind the exculpation of the interior minister and his aids.

The case largely hangs on the testimony of security officials and former regime officials. Incriminating testimony has been dismissed and individual acts are justified given the extenuating circumstances.

At the heart of it all, Rashidy argues, is a global conspiracy.

Below, we have laid out the key arguments in Rashidy’s judgment:

The conspiracy

Through the document, the judge moves beyond the scope of the case and gives his view of the events that occurred within the case’s time frame (January 25-31). Rashidy maintains that an American-Zionist conspiracy had been plotting to divide the country.

This claim, Rashidy continues, is based on the testimonies of “the nation’s wise men,” namely the late intelligence head Omar Suleiman, former Defense Minister Hussein Tantawy, Mubarak-era Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, his head of intelligence Mourad Mowafy and other top officials, in addition to journalist Ibrahim Eissa.

The Muslim Brotherhood were key conspirators, helping groups like Hamas and Hezbollah to sneak into the country. These actors, the court concludes, executed a choreographed plan on January 28 to bring down the state. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Egyptian activists protest Mubarak verdict online and outside sealed Tahrir Square

Robert Mackey reports: In the hours after an Egyptian court dropped all remaining charges against former President Hosni Mubarak on Saturday, activists who supported the uprising that drove him from power in 2011 jeered the ruling online and in the streets near Cairo’s Tahrir Square, which was closed by the security forces.


After a judge acquitted Mr. Mubarak of corruption and dismissed murder charges against him for the killing of hundreds of protesters, relatives of those killed by the security forces in 2011 were outraged, but dozens of the former president’s supporters applauded in the courtroom and others cheered his return to the military hospital where he has been held. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Egyptian judges toss out remaining charges against Mubarak

The New York Times reports: An Egyptian court on Saturday removed all remaining charges against former President Hosni Mubarak, raising the possibility that Mr. Mubarak could go free for the first time since he was removed from office in the 2011 uprising that defined the Arab Spring.

During earlier hearings in the various proceedings against Mr. Mubarak human rights lawyers demanded harsh punishment for his three decades of brutal autocracy, but Saturday’s court session was packed with Mubarak supporters who erupted in cheers at the verdict.

The 86-year-old former leader, who has been held at a military hospital and appeared in court on a stretcher, remained stone-faced as the chief judge, Mahmoud Kamel al-Rashidi, read the verdict. Only after that did he allow himself a smile as his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, hugged and kissed him in celebration. Both were acquitted of corruption charges along with their father.

Judge Rashidi, who led a panel of three judges, did not elaborate from the bench on their reasoning, insisting that any commentators read at least a 240-page summary of their 1,340-page explanation of the case.[Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Why some Arabs are rejecting strict interpretations of Sharia

BBC Trending reports: A growing social media conversation in Arabic is calling for the implementation of Sharia, or Islamic law, to be abandoned.

Discussing religious law is a sensitive topic in many Muslim countries. But on Twitter, a hashtag which translates as “why we reject implementing Sharia” has been used 5,000 times in 24 hours. The conversation is mainly taking place in Saudi Arabia and Egypt. The debate is about whether religious law is suitable for the needs of Arab countries and modern legal systems.

Dr Alyaa Gad, an Egyptian doctor living in Switzerland, started the hashtag. “I have nothing against religion,” she tells BBC Trending, but says she is against “using it as a political system”. Islamists often call for legal systems to be reformed to be consistent with Sharia principles, and some want harsh interpretations of criminal punishments to be implemented. Dr Gad says she is worried about young people adopting the extremes of this kind of thinking. “You see it everywhere now, Islamic State is spreading mentally as well as physically” she told BBC Trending. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Egypt closes schools in Sinai towns as area inches toward open war

Reuters reports: Egypt has indefinitely shut schools in two border towns in northern Sinai as the army prepares to intensify a battle with Islamist militants that turned the daily trip to lessons into a “journey of death”.

Local people say children’s education has fallen victim while the military stages air strikes against jihadists, who are targeting soldiers and police, and have started beheading army informers.

“We are putting our lives at risk on a daily basis,” said Mohamed, a teacher who lives in the town of Sheikh Zuweid. “Sometimes there is fire between gunmen and the armed forces and sometimes stray bullets hit some of us.”

Militancy has surged in the Sinai Peninsula, which borders Israel, Gaza and the Suez Canal, since the army ousted an elected Islamist president last summer. At least 33 security personnel were killed last month and one Sinai-based group has pledged its loyalty to Islamic State, which has overrun large areas of Syria and Iraq. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Egypt prosecutor asks for death sentence for ousted President Morsi in espionage trial

The Associated Press reports: Egypt’s state news agency says prosecutors have asked for the death sentence for ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi and other Muslim Brotherhood leaders on trial on espionage charges.

Prosecutor Emad el-Sharawy said in closing remarks Wednesday that Morsi and his aides leaked state security documents to foreign intelligence agencies, naming Iran, while in office for one year. The military removed Morsi from office in July 2013 following mass protests against him accusing him and the Brotherhood of monopolizing power.

El-Sharawy said the defendants, who include Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie and 34 others, cooperated with militant groups, including Gaza’s Hamas, to destabilize Egypt. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

ISIS colonies expanding across North Africa

Der Spiegel reports: The caliphate has a beach. It is located on the Mediterranean Sea around 300 kilometers (186 miles) south of Crete in Darna. The eastern Libya city has a population of around 80,000, a beautiful old town and an 18th century mosque, from which the black flag of the Islamic State flies. The port city is equipped with Sharia courts and an “Islamic Police” force which patrols the streets in all-terrain vehicles. A wall has been built in the university to separate female students from their male counterparts and the disciplines of law, natural sciences and languages have all been abolished. Those who would question the city’s new societal order risk death.

Darna has become a colony of terror, and it is the first Islamic State enclave in North Africa. The conditions in Libya are perfect for the radical Islamists: a disintegrating state, a location that is strategically well situated and home to the largest oil reserves on the continent. Should Islamic State (IS) manage to establish control over a significant portion of Libya, it could trigger the destabilization of the entire Arab world.

The IS puts down roots wherever chaos reigns, where governments are weakest and where disillusionment over the Arab Spring is deepest. In recent weeks, terror groups that had thus far operated locally have quickly begun siding with the extremists from IS.

In September, it was the Algerian group Soldiers of the Caliphate that threw in its lot with Islamic State. As though following a script, the group immediately beheaded a French mountaineer and uploaded the video to the Internet. In October, the “caliphate” was proclaimed in Darna. And last week, the strongest Egyptian terrorist group likewise announced its affiliation with IS. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

Militant group in Egypt vows loyalty to ISIS

The New York Times reports: They have slaughtered hundreds of Egyptian soldiers and police officers, recruited experienced fighters and staged increasingly sophisticated raids from the Western desert to the Sinai Peninsula. They have beheaded informants and killed an American in a carjacking, say Western officials familiar with intelligence reports.

On Monday, Egypt’s most dangerous militant group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, also pledged obedience to the organization that calls itself the Islamic State, becoming its first significant international affiliate in the bet that the link will provide new money, weapons and recruits to battle the government in Cairo.

The affiliation could pull the militant group away from its current, almost exclusive focus on attacking Egyptian military and security forces toward the Islamic State’s indiscriminate mass killings of civilians. The pledge alone could undermine the government’s efforts to win the trust of Western tourists, a vital source of hard currency.

The decision injects the Islamic State into the most populous and historically most influential Arab nation, a milestone weeks into an American-led bombing campaign against its strongholds in Syria and Iraq. The endorsement is a major victory for the Islamic State in its rivalry with Al Qaeda — a group with deep Egyptian roots — and could now help recruit fighters and affiliates far beyond Egypt. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

With little warning, Egypt destroys 800 homes displacing 10,000 people in security operation

The New York Times reports: With bulldozers and dynamite, the Egyptian Army on Wednesday began demolishing hundreds of houses, displacing thousands of people, along the border with Gaza in a panicked effort to establish a buffer zone that officials hope will stop the influx of militants and weapons across the frontier.

The demolitions, cutting through crowded neighborhoods in the border town of Rafah, began with orders to evacuate on Tuesday and were part of a sweeping security response by the government of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to months of deadly militant attacks on Egyptian security personnel in the Sinai Peninsula, including the massacre of at least 31 soldiers last Friday.

That assault was the deadliest on the Egyptian military in years, and a blow to the government, which has claimed to be winning the battle against insurgents. The resort to a harsh counterinsurgency tactic — destroying as many as 800 houses and displacing up to 10,000 people to eliminate “terrorist hotbeds,” as Mr. Sisi’s spokesman put it — highlighted the difficulties the military has faced in breaking the militants as well as the anger that operations like Wednesday’s inevitably arouse.

“Our house in Rafah is more than 60 years old,” Hammam Alagha wrote on Twitter on Tuesday, detailing his family’s eviction in a series of widely shared posts. After an army officer told the family to evacuate — and Mr. Alagha said he refused — the officer “said tomorrow we will bomb it with everything in it.”

Mustafa Singer, a journalist based in Sinai who was near the border on Wednesday, said that while residents had met with officials in recent weeks to discuss compensation, the evacuation order on Tuesday — delivered over megaphones — took people by surprise. [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail