Egypt's Day of Rage as I saw it - Video

Video compilation of clips from Friday, January 28, 2011 in Cairo's Abdel Moneim Reyad Square, just steps from the now-iconic Tahrir Square.

"The military has thugs," he told me

The hoarse cry came from a man dashing across Cairo’s Abdel Moneim Reyad Square on Sunday night. “The military has thugs! The military has thugs!”

He paused long enough to reiterate the statement to myself and another female journo moving in the opposite direction – “The military has thugs!” – before continuing toward nearby Tahrir Square, the epicenter of Egypt’s January 25 Revolution.

Behind him, a group of military police became clearly visible as they rounded a corner. Among the uniforms were people in plainclothes carrying large sticks and clubs.

The clubs started to swing, and those still in the square ran for cover.

It was around 8pm. The clashes began hours earlier. “This feels like the 28th of January,” someone said, referencing Egypt's 'Day of Rage,' one of the most violent days of the uprising that toppled Egypt’s former regime earlier this year.

The cat-and-mouse game between military police and demonstrators continued into the night as wild rumors spread.

Near the Egyptian Museum, a group of four young people glanced between their cell phones and the scene around them, probably updating Twitter on the situation and their safety.

Twitter is a primary means for activists to keep tabs on each other during demonstrations in Egypt.

Earlier in the evening, the area by the Ramsis Hilton where the military police entered Abdel Moneim Reyad Square was occupied by demonstrators. This was where they carried the wounded from Maspiro, the nearby site of ongoing clashes between Coptic Christian demonstrators, military police and unknown plainclothes persons.

The clashes left at least 26 dead, according to the most recent figures from the Ministry of Health.

Some activists put the number much higher.

Clashes began when unknown persons attacked a Coptic Christian demonstration. When military police  finally intervened it was not to protect the demonstrators, according to eyewitnesses.

Christian demonstrators seeking refuge by the Hilton from the violence and tear gas told me, “The army is killing Christians.”

As the situation around the Hilton intensified, young men directed traffic away from the area. An armed personnel carrier and other vehicles burned, sending a dense black smoke into the air above the Nile.

A fire truck arrived, presumably to put out the fires. It was greeted with stones and rocks, but eventually allowed to pass.

Outside the Hilton, cries of the injured permeated sporadic chants of, “The people want the fall of the musheer,” Egypt’s military ruler, and “Where are our rights?”

One man’s screams faded into dull moans as he was placed on the ground after being carried from Maspiro on a blanket. A group of young men kept the crowd back to give the injured man air, only allowing me, as a photographer, near him, so I could document “what the army did to the Christians.”

A sudden stir in the crowd announced the arrival of Bothaina Kamel, the only woman to announce her candidacy for the Egyptian presidency so far. Wearing a bright orange reflective vest, Bothaina moved quickly through the crowd toward the Nile, the latest location of clashes between military police and demonstrators.

Many Muslims quickly joined their Christian brothers after clashes began. A Coptic man named Nabil told me that Muslims had saved his life twice that night.

Outside the Hilton, one Copt held a string of Muslim prayer beads along with his cross. “Both Muslim and Christian are here,” said another.

“Heard a Muslim guy urging other protesters, ‘let’s head to the front, I’m not gonna let the Christians take a bullet alone,’” tweeted activist Mosa’ab Elshamy. Such poignant moments are reminiscent of the early days of the Egyptian revolution, when Coptic Christians joined hands to protect their Muslim countrymen as they prayed in the streets.

Many Christians were angry, saying they felt they were being targeted. Coptic Christians comprise around 10 percent of Egypt’s population, and often say they are not treated equally to the Muslim majority.

“Christians will live in Egypt forever,” said one Coptic man, angrily blaming the extremist Islamic Salafi trend for being behind attacks against Christians. “They will not make us leave.”

While one man asked repeatedly, “Where is the United Nations?,” another insisted, “We are not asking for international protection.”

A number of activists reported a very different show of solidarity: “I cannot believe it the battle is over and the people who were hitting us from the other side have joined us,” tweeted Lilian Wagdy, an activist on the ground.

A few hours later, popular ‘tweep’ Mahmoud Salem, known on Twitter as ‘Sandmonkey,’ relayed a similar situation. He reported clashes between groups of Egyptians, all in plainclothes, with one side chanting, “The people and the army are one hand” and the other side “Muslims and Christians are one hand.”

Then, he tweeted, “In a very weird moment, both sides started chanting ‘one hand,’ stopped fighting, joined each other into one big marsh.”

At some point, the rumors started to fly, by word of mouth, on Twitter, and in the media.

Among the quickest to spread were claims that U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton had announced that the U.S. would send troops to Egypt to protect Christian churches.

While the United States and the U.S. Embassy in Cairo emphatically denied the rumor, it still made the front page of some Egyptian newspapers on Monday morning.

Another rumor that has proven impossible to confirm claimed someone – either thugs or military personnel – threw dead bodies into the Nile. I have been unable to locate an eyewitness to this incident.

“I say again, I saw three military police throw dead bodies in the Nile, and another body was under their feet,” wrote Mohamed Elmoshir on Twitter.

Some rumors were true: shortly before midnight, I witnessed a military soldier shoot live ammunition in Tahrir Square, and videos of military vehicles driving at reckless speeds through crowds of demonstrators quickly appeared on YouTube.

As Monday dawned, Egyptians were angry, scared, saddened, and, perhaps most of all, worried. What would happen next? What did clashes between the army and the people mean for the transitional period? Blame for last night’s events has been placed on everyone from the demonstrators to Salafis to elements of Egypt’s formerly ruling regime to the military to the ubiquitous “foreign hand.”

One image, provided to the AUC Caravan, perhaps best illustrates the divisions and solidarity on both sides of the battle. In it, a uniformed military soldier carries an injured boy down a debris-strewn street. Another boy and a man in civilian clothes follow the soldier.

In the background, military soldiers and civilians stand, motionless.

**A version of this post was originally published at Youm7 English Edition (offline since Jan 2012).

Egypt youth say NO to the SCAF

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has been in charge of Egypt’s administration for 101 days.

Today, Egypt’s young revolutionaries are calling for Egyptians to fight the army-imposed media blackout of the military. They have called on Egyptians to blog, tweet, and post anything which breaks the silence on the military’s violations of human and civil rights. They are trying to create a united front in an attempt to open the scene to frank discussion of the military, and to stop what they see as the military’s escalating violations.

Hundreds of Egyptians have answered the call. Twitter is bursting with tweets and posts tagged with ‘#NoSCAF’ about the military, its violations, and what should happen next.

Activist Mona Seif, one of the first to call for the ‘NO SCAF’ campaign, tweeted early this morning: “Waking up to an internet flooded with posts exposing #SCAF is just amazing.”

“If the SCAF wants to ‘punish’ us for ‘criticizing the military’ and ‘spreading rumors,’ then they will have to arrest hundreds of netizens,” wrote Egyptian activist Ramy Raoof via Twitter.

Journalist and blogger Mohamed Abdelfattah said, “Today the Egyptian blogosphere sends a message: WE ARE NOT SATISFIED WITH THE MILITARY COUNCIL.” He has also compiled a list of blog posts against the SCAF: as of 2pm, 140 bloggers had written posts against the military council.

“Blog. Tweet. Post. Be Free. Evaluate the #SCAF today. This is being documented,” tweeted Ahmed Abdulhassan.

Indeed, an Al-Jazeera English producer tweeted in the morning that he was compiling an article about today’s campaign. The tweets of Mosa’ab Elshamy are among the tweets he plans to include. Mosa’ab was arrested by the Egyptian army last week and only recently released. His tweets about what he witnessed in custody are poignant, disturbing, and certainly revealing.

Egyptians have entered what is likely to be a long war, of which the fall of the Mubarak regime was only one battle.

It is a war in which the uniforms are ambiguous, observers are constantly switching sides, and the majority of the combatants have no idea what the strategy is, or, indeed, who it is they are fighting.

Many are fighting undefined notions of the “former regime” or the “counter-revolution.”

Among the most ambiguous players on the scene is the Egyptian army. Hailed as saviors by the vast majority of Egyptians when they swept into Cairo on January 28, ending a long 'Day of Rage' of bloody battles between the police and the people, the army was then charged with the country’s administration when former president Hosni Mubarak stepped down on February 11.

Immediately some began to wonder if the military – and its Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) – would ever give up power. They wondered if, in fact, the SCAF would attempt to turn a true people’s revolution into a military coup d’état.

The army has now been in power for 101 days. Each day, mistrust has grown between the people and the army.

Stories of human rights abuses by the army are increasing. Citizens are calling out more frequently to end military trials of civilians. And most of Egypt’s young activists are well aware that Egyptian media is forbidden to write anything about the military without permission.

Yesterday, the SCAF released a statement on its Facebook page – created to communicate with the Egyptian people – saying unidentified websites were publishing false information about the army in an attempt to fuel chaos in the country and to divide the army from the people.

(The fact that the army releases all of its communiqués via Facebook is a story in and of itself.)

Egyptians have faced battle after battle in their fight for a secular, democratic country which will offer a better future – a “New Egypt” – for them and their children.

The war did not begin on January 25, 2011.

For many, it began decades earlier. Human rights lawyer Amir Salem participated in Egypt’s student demonstrations in the 1970s, and was arrested in the same Tahrir Square in which, thirty years later, he watched Egyptians gather by the millions to demand freedom. Salem has been arrested nine times but has tirelessly fought for the rights of prisoners, for activists, and was once the lawyer for Ayman Nour.

Prominent opposition figure Ayman Nour first began warning of the dangers of a continued Emergency Law twenty years ago, when he was a law student. As a young parliamentarian ten years later, he dared the Prime Minister to eat a piece of the rock-hard bread distributed to Egypt’s poor during a bread crisis.

Nour is one of millions of Egyptians who suffered under the hand of Hosni Mubarak: he spent four years in the infamous ‘Torah Prison’ for daring to challenge him.

Now, it is Mubarak’s cronies who are behind the bars of Torah Prison: those businessmen, politicians, and ministers who supported a corrupt regime which drained Egypt of its resources and dignity to provide greater and greater opulence to a smaller and smaller portion of the population. Even Mubarak’s sons are imprisoned.

But the battles are becoming increasingly hazy. Who is on what side? What is the so-called “counter-revolution,” who is behind it, and how can Egyptians unite against it? Everyone from young activists to political figureheads to religious leaders have called for Egyptians to unite together against the ‘counter-revolution’ – and then blamed each other of being part of it.

Police brutality on Qasr el-Nil Bridge, January 28, 2011

This footage shows the violence of police forces against demonstrators on the Qasr el-Nil bridge leading into Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt on Friday, January 28, 2011, Egypt's 'Day of Rage'.

Notable time markers:
00:33 - videos from Jan. 28 begin
01:34 - police trucks drives through demonstrators
03:41 - police use water hoses against praying demonstrators
04:45 - police fire tear gas in man's face

Looking back: Abdelmonem Riad Square on January 28

This video was captured on Friday, January 28, 2011, Egypt's 'Day of Rage,' from Al-Jazeera's offices overlooking Abdelmonem Riad Square in Cairo, Egypt. In it can be seen the battle between police and demonstrators, including tear gas, stone throwing, and rubber bullets.

Looking back - Tahrir on February 1

Friends,

The following is an article I wrote at midnight last night Cairo time, before Tahrir Square turned into the madness it is in now. Please, read and reflect on what the government is sanctioning here in Egypt.

Egypt Continues to Protest

Internet service in Egypt has been cut almost entirely since midnight Thursday. The government undoubtedly cut service to disrupt coordination among would-be demonstrators in an effort to dissuade Egyptians from protesting.

Two days earlier, on Tuesday, January 25, Egyptians went to the streets in numbers not seen since the 1970’s.

For human rights lawyer Amir Salem, the massive turnout of Egyptians demanding political change is something he never thought he would see. As a young man, Salem participated in the student demonstrations in Egypt in 1973 and 1977.

On the evening of January 25, Salem sat in Cairo’s Tahrir – Liberation – Square. “I was in prison for that demonstration in Tahrir Square” in 1977, he told me. “Now after thirty years I’m here watching the young people, and most of them are the age of my son and daughters. I am very, very happy.”

Wednesday saw a number of violent clashes between police and demonstrators across Egypt and a call for a major demonstration on Friday, January 28, nicknamed the 'Day of Rage.'

Activists frantically made phone calls late into Thursday night in anticipation of the government’s closure of mobile phone service, which indeed occurred around 9am on Friday morning.

“We arranged everything from yesterday because we knew what they would do,” prominent opposition figure George Ishak told me outside a café early on Friday morning. “We are now ready. The plan is ready.”

Some activists worried the lack of communications would stop Egyptians from going out on Friday.

It didn’t.

Egyptians braved tear gas, government thugs with sticks, water hoses, rubber bullets and buckshot-like live fire. In Abdelmonem Riad Square, behind the Egyptian Museum and steps from Tahrir, the afternoon saw a back-and-forth battle between demonstrators and police.

Police shot tear gas at demonstrators. The people kicked it away, threw it back, or tried to put it out. Police threw stones. Demonstrators threw them back. Police shot rubber bullets at demonstrators. Demonstrators set police vans on fire.

As dusk fell, demonstrators stopped retaliating. They lined up and began to pray, meters from where riot police with shields and guns stood in a ragged line. Shortly thereafter, a line of police trucks began moving out of the square and reports came that the army was moving in.

Watching from above, long-time opposition activist Gameela Ismail had tears in her eyes.

“I can’t believe what happened today,” said her teenage son, Shady. “The people beat the police. The police gave up.”

Student Sara Abed participated on Friday in Nasr City and then on the Qasr el-Nil bridge, which leads into Tahrir Square. “I think we made a clear statement to the government, although they are still denying it,” she told me in a café in Cairo's affluent Zamalek neighborhood on Saturday morning. “It’s our right to call for our demands. All the people will protest and they are willing to do it peacefully.”

“We’re not responsible for any damages,” she added. “It started by the government.”

Reports of looting and violence around Cairo had surfaced throughout the night. Downstairs in the café, the cashier was writing out orders and holding the cash in his hand because the cash box had been stolen during the night.

Egyptians have been extremely frustrated with the sporadic violent events. They stress that it is not the demonstrators or the Egyptian people who have been responsible for such acts, but government-hired thugs and plainclothes police officers attempting to convince the people to ask the police to return.

Al-Jazeera reported over the weekend that citizens had arrested a number of government thugs who had broken into the Egyptian Museum. The men, reportedly carrying secret security IDs, were then turned over to the army.

Abed reported seeing citizens standing arm in arm in front of the museum to prevent anyone from entering, something I also witnessed.

Since Friday, demonstrators have congregated in Tahrir Square under the watchful eye of the army. The army was greeted with relief by Egyptian citizens. While officially remaining politically neutral on the situation, the army has maintained the respect and appreciation of the people.

Around 5pm on Tuesday, February 1, two taxi cabs filled koshari, a typical Egyptian fast food dish, pulled up outside the military checkpoint leading into Tahrir Square. One of the cab drivers said the food had been paid for by the army and was to be distributed among the people.

Over a million Egyptians took to the streets across Egypt on Tuesday.

As night fell, Tahrir was still full of people. For the fourth night, people made fires, set up tents and other shelters, and settled in for the night. Groups continued to congregate. Posters with slogans in Arabic, English, and a dozen other languages remained scattered around the square.

Around 11pm, President Hosni Mubarak made a speech announcing he will not run for reelection this fall. As with other attempted concessions, such as dissolving the government and swearing in a Vice President, the statement was received with anger and disdain.

After eight days of protesting, Mubarak has made no indication of stepping down, which is foremost among the demands of the Egyptian people. The people are determined to continue their demonstrations until he does so.