A must-read by a real hero
6 Comments Published by Tom Gara on Monday, May 28 at Monday, May 28, 2007.
Egyptian blogger Wael Abbas - a guy who has real, actual courage, in a world where the word is too often applied to describe movie stars who take risky roles or CEO's who make bold decisions - had a sharp, well written editorial in yesterdays Washington Post. He calls out the Egyptian government for its fairly well known shortcomings, and US taxpayers for passively funding one of the nastiest police regimes going round.
Abbas is one of the truly fearless group of Egyptians who have the passion - and the guts - to speak up about what is going on here. He has so much to lose - and his compensation for taking such a risk is tiny - but in the long run, the Egypt of the future will look back on people like him as real heroes.
Abbas is one of the truly fearless group of Egyptians who have the passion - and the guts - to speak up about what is going on here. He has so much to lose - and his compensation for taking such a risk is tiny - but in the long run, the Egypt of the future will look back on people like him as real heroes.
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The comments on the original pice in he Journal are really harsh and it seems like other Egyption bloggers disagree with him and are angry that he is Pro USA / or at least asking the USA for awarness/help...is that the case?
Enjoyed the piece and mirror your admiration for the risks these guys take. One question, why don't foreign press or foreign bloggers to cover the events- utlising their immunity etc? I also assume that Egyptians can blog under the protection of anonymity, right?.
"I disagree with the Muslim Brotherhood and its manipulation of Egyptians' religiosity to achieve its political goals. But if we want a democratic country, we can't exclude any political sect."
Isn't this viewpoint on the challenge of enlightening the people to overcome the danger of religious groups undermining a fledgling democracy a bit light? Surely it's a momentous challenge with very real and lasting dangers?
Peace, Salaam
Frances - Maybe the comments got deleted - I could only see a few and they look like they were written by 5 year-olds.....
But yeah, the dislike for the US here is strong enough that it can weaken anybody closely associated with it. Which is a pity, because the US embassy in Egypt does some good work with its human rights reporting, USAID does some very decent, respectable stuff and a lot of US-based or funded NGO's are really good.
Arthur - a bunch of bloggers do it anonymously - although that is not so anonymous. Quite a few of the better ones are also "real world" activists or journalists, and so the split between their blog and their everyday public stuff is quite tight, meaning keeping a fake name would be difficult.
Re the religious groups and democracy - I think in Egpyt, all opposition groups, Islamic, secular, socialist, whatever, have their eyes on the main prize, and that has helped them look at each other in a different, more positive way. My prediction, which might turn out totally and utterly wrong, is that this will turn out to be very useful in the long run.
A common enemy can do wonders, especially in terms of making people who would otherwise be enemies realise the good things about each other...
Tom,
Would foriegn bloggers and/or foreign journo's be immune from the risk that Abbas writes about?
Any cases that come to mind of relgious political parties in the region who have maintained a secular democracy when they came to power?
arthur,
there hasn't been many changes of power in the region for a fair while...
foreign bloggers or journalists could still have problems, but i very much doubt they would ever get the kind the kind of problems that could happen to an egyptian.
they have fucked around with reuters cameramen and international journalists before, but i dont think it has extended much past confiscating/destroying cameras and scaring people away from protests..