Gamal Kotb's book cover art [Flickr]
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Gamal Kotb's book cover art [Flickr]
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Gamal Kotb's book cover art [Flickr]
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Gamal Kotb's book cover art [Flickr]
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Farewell Gamal Kotb , Egypt's top Book cover artist
Egypt lost last Sunday one of its most talented as well underrated painters and artists , Gamal Kotb.
The 1930-born painter passed away last Sunday in Cairo quietly as only his fans and students from artists mourn him.
Despite as a painter he may not be famous I think like other Egyptian artists in the 20th century , Gamal Kotb can be or actually is Egypt's top book cover artist.
Originally from Gharbia , Gamal Kotb graduated from the faculty of arts in Cairo.
He joined Dar El-Hilal press institution when it was still a great publishing house.
His name as an illustrator began to become famous in Egyptian press the 1960s thanks to Dar El-Hilal's publications.
Gamal Kotb's real fame came as the cover artist of Naguib Mahfouz's novels as well other prominent writers and novelists like Ihsan Abdel Quddous since the 1960s thanks to publisher Abdel Hameed Gouda El-Sahar.
Yet, his name has become a synonym to Mahfouz's books cover artist thanks to his beautiful retro romantic illustrations.
His style was a mix of noir and pulp fiction , very distinguished that you recognize it without reading his signature.
I am a huge fan of Kotb's book covers.
I am proud that I own books he illustrated their covers.
The man did lie that his work entered almost every Egyptian house in the past 50 years.
Millions of houses got his work in their libraries.
still, the man was underrated as a Painter. Recently , I knew he had paintings and exhibits but unfortunately our press in Egypt limited him in the role of Book cover artist.
According to his biography , one of his paintings are among Queen Elizabeth's private collection. I would like to see that
Needless to say , he became a legendary book cover artist but still he was and is underrated.
I have been searching for days for his paintings and I could not find anything except two paintings.
Aside, his work as a painter and book cover artist , Kotb was a professor in the Arts academy in Cairo.
Gamal Kotb's daughter is Dr. Heba Kotb , the famous sexologist by the way.
May he rest in peace , Gamal Kotb as his art is still alive in Egypt thanks to his amazing book covers.
The 1930-born painter passed away last Sunday in Cairo quietly as only his fans and students from artists mourn him.
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| Gamal Kotb in a photo that goes back to 2010 |
Originally from Gharbia , Gamal Kotb graduated from the faculty of arts in Cairo.
He joined Dar El-Hilal press institution when it was still a great publishing house.
His name as an illustrator began to become famous in Egyptian press the 1960s thanks to Dar El-Hilal's publications.
Gamal Kotb's real fame came as the cover artist of Naguib Mahfouz's novels as well other prominent writers and novelists like Ihsan Abdel Quddous since the 1960s thanks to publisher Abdel Hameed Gouda El-Sahar.
Yet, his name has become a synonym to Mahfouz's books cover artist thanks to his beautiful retro romantic illustrations.
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| A collection of Naguib Mahfouz's novels and their original covers by Gamal Kotb |
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| Another batch of famous Mahfouz's novels covers by Kotb |
I am a huge fan of Kotb's book covers.
I am proud that I own books he illustrated their covers.
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| Mohamed Hussein Heikal's "Zeinab" cover in 1996 by Gamal Kotb |
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| Taha Hussein's "Tortured of the earth" cover in 1996 by Gamal Kotb |
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| Youssef Idris' "Incident of honor" book cover by Kotb in 1997 |
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| Mahmoud Taymour's " The call of the unknown" book cover in 1997 |
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| Yahia Haqqai's "Um Hashem's lantern" book cover in 1997 |
Millions of houses got his work in their libraries.
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| A collection of Ihsan Abdel Qudduos' romantic novels cover art by Kotb |
According to his biography , one of his paintings are among Queen Elizabeth's private collection. I would like to see that
Needless to say , he became a legendary book cover artist but still he was and is underrated.
I have been searching for days for his paintings and I could not find anything except two paintings.
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| A painting by Gamal Kotb |
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| A painting by Gamal Kotb |
Gamal Kotb's daughter is Dr. Heba Kotb , the famous sexologist by the way.
May he rest in peace , Gamal Kotb as his art is still alive in Egypt thanks to his amazing book covers.
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National Youth conference week and 8-seconds GIF !!
"P.S: This is belated post"
Currently , the resort city of Sharm El-Sheikh is hosting a 3-days conference organized by Egyptian presidency dedicated to Egyptian youth.
It is just like the old Mubarak and NDP's youth conference but not for a single day but for three days with really bizarre quotes.
That conference comes in a very strange timing as the conference celebrates youth as well freedom of expression in Egypt according to its session on media on Wednesday.
On Wednesday ,the speakers in the so-called "Youth media" panel unleashed another attack against Social media users who "think that they can change the country" according to the index on censorship 2010 award-winning journalist Ibrahim Eissa. "Fair enough he criticized the state during the session in some theatrical performance"
Ironically a small incident happened earlier this week and proves that some people got a big problem with social media.
Earlier Monday , Cairo's prosecution ordered the release of a popular comic Facebook page administration pending investigations without a bail after his arrest and detention for nearly 48 hours on charges of "insulting state institutions".
Only on Sunday it was known that popular comic Facebook page administrator Khaled Mokhtar aka "Shiko Biko" was arrested from his house and accused of "insulting state institutions", inciting protests on November 11 and obstructing security and public peace despite it is known that Mokhtar has not political activity of any kind !!
In early Monday , it was initially announced that he would be detained 15 days pending investigations. His family did not want the news to spread at first as they hoped that he would get out less in than 24 hours but the news went out thankfully.
Khaled's brother, Waleed told Mada Masr that his brother was arrested from their house on Friday by a "huge security force"
Mokhtar is the admin the popular Sarcastic Facebook page 'Tamt targrama' {Translation cleared } that got over one million fans from all over the Arab world. He has been featured in newspapers , magazines and websites as well interviewed openly in several TV channels.
"Tamt targrama" focuses only on Foreign films and their comic translation away from politics since its launch by Shiko Biko aka Khaled Mokhtar in 2013.
Aside from being the admin of one of the Arab popular Facebook sarcastic pages, Mokhtar works as a copywriter in popular Abla Fahita show.
Now despite officially we know the charges Shiko is currently accused of while he has not political activity at all according to what we know , all the fingers are pointing to the fact that in September he made fun of Egypt's President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and posted on his personal Facebook profile !! His personal Facebook profile was closed but he re-activated it.
Following Sisi's speech in late September where he told the Egyptian people to spare the small change left cover in bank transactions to fund national development projects, Shiko joined millions of Egyptians who reacted to the call with mockery on social media.
A talented video editor, he posted on his personal profile an-eight-seconds gif mocking El-Sisi showing him as some sort of Asian automated piggy bank that snatches change automatically.
He deleted the post with the gif now .
It was taken and posted on other FB pages as well social media networks like twitter thousands of times.
I followed Khaled Mokhtar's personal Facebook account after his hilarious Sisi GIF and I found him hilarious who makes fun of actors and celebrities along with his friends.
I do not know honestly why he would be arrested. If it were for the 8-second gif ,then the Egyptian regime and its security services must rethink their position. Khaled Mokhtar is not a terrorist.
Ironically, the 8-seconds gif was re-shared once again online thanks to Khaled Mokhtar's arrest and those who did not see it , have seen it.
Some say that the arrest of Khaled Mokhtar happened as part of the on-going campaign against activists before the so-called 11/11 peasants revolution that nobody knows its origin.
For weeks now , we have been seeing calls for having massive protests against the current regime on 11/11 with no true source. It is unclear who really started those calls or stands behind it. Yes, the Muslim Brotherhood has jumped into the wagon but still it is not theirs.
The regime media is freaking out about those calls and honestly many people now suspect that the regime itself would be behind the calls to have another round of activists crackdown .
Back to Khaled , I think his incident speaks and says a lot about youth , media and social media in Egypt.
By the way, human rights activists in Egypt launched a parallel online social media conference called "Where_have_all_the_young_ones_gone?" in Arabic and in English.
Currently , the resort city of Sharm El-Sheikh is hosting a 3-days conference organized by Egyptian presidency dedicated to Egyptian youth.
It is just like the old Mubarak and NDP's youth conference but not for a single day but for three days with really bizarre quotes.
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| El-Sisi and the youth in a marathon on Wednesday "Egyptian Presidency" |
On Wednesday ,the speakers in the so-called "Youth media" panel unleashed another attack against Social media users who "think that they can change the country" according to the index on censorship 2010 award-winning journalist Ibrahim Eissa. "Fair enough he criticized the state during the session in some theatrical performance"
Ironically a small incident happened earlier this week and proves that some people got a big problem with social media.
Earlier Monday , Cairo's prosecution ordered the release of a popular comic Facebook page administration pending investigations without a bail after his arrest and detention for nearly 48 hours on charges of "insulting state institutions".
Only on Sunday it was known that popular comic Facebook page administrator Khaled Mokhtar aka "Shiko Biko" was arrested from his house and accused of "insulting state institutions", inciting protests on November 11 and obstructing security and public peace despite it is known that Mokhtar has not political activity of any kind !!
In early Monday , it was initially announced that he would be detained 15 days pending investigations. His family did not want the news to spread at first as they hoped that he would get out less in than 24 hours but the news went out thankfully.
Khaled's brother, Waleed told Mada Masr that his brother was arrested from their house on Friday by a "huge security force"
Mokhtar is the admin the popular Sarcastic Facebook page 'Tamt targrama' {Translation cleared } that got over one million fans from all over the Arab world. He has been featured in newspapers , magazines and websites as well interviewed openly in several TV channels.
"Tamt targrama" focuses only on Foreign films and their comic translation away from politics since its launch by Shiko Biko aka Khaled Mokhtar in 2013.
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| Khaled Mokhtar |
Now despite officially we know the charges Shiko is currently accused of while he has not political activity at all according to what we know , all the fingers are pointing to the fact that in September he made fun of Egypt's President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and posted on his personal Facebook profile !! His personal Facebook profile was closed but he re-activated it.
Following Sisi's speech in late September where he told the Egyptian people to spare the small change left cover in bank transactions to fund national development projects, Shiko joined millions of Egyptians who reacted to the call with mockery on social media.
A talented video editor, he posted on his personal profile an-eight-seconds gif mocking El-Sisi showing him as some sort of Asian automated piggy bank that snatches change automatically.
He deleted the post with the gif now .
It was taken and posted on other FB pages as well social media networks like twitter thousands of times.
I followed Khaled Mokhtar's personal Facebook account after his hilarious Sisi GIF and I found him hilarious who makes fun of actors and celebrities along with his friends.
I do not know honestly why he would be arrested. If it were for the 8-second gif ,then the Egyptian regime and its security services must rethink their position. Khaled Mokhtar is not a terrorist.
Ironically, the 8-seconds gif was re-shared once again online thanks to Khaled Mokhtar's arrest and those who did not see it , have seen it.
Some say that the arrest of Khaled Mokhtar happened as part of the on-going campaign against activists before the so-called 11/11 peasants revolution that nobody knows its origin.
For weeks now , we have been seeing calls for having massive protests against the current regime on 11/11 with no true source. It is unclear who really started those calls or stands behind it. Yes, the Muslim Brotherhood has jumped into the wagon but still it is not theirs.
The regime media is freaking out about those calls and honestly many people now suspect that the regime itself would be behind the calls to have another round of activists crackdown .
Back to Khaled , I think his incident speaks and says a lot about youth , media and social media in Egypt.
By the way, human rights activists in Egypt launched a parallel online social media conference called "Where_have_all_the_young_ones_gone?" in Arabic and in English.
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It is time for the annual heavy rains season in Egypt " Update"
The time has come !! The annual time of heavy rains seasons in Egypt especially in Red Sea mounts range, Sinai and Upper Egypt governorates.
More than 15 people were killed in the past 48 hours following the heavy rains in three governorates.
Eight people including children were killed and 23 others were injured after heavy rains and flood hit the town of Ras Gharib in Red Sea governorate.
Updated : The ministry of health announced on Saturday that the death toll increased to 26 people while 72 were injured in four governorates.
Since early Friday early hours, tweeps from Ras Gharib were asking for urgent help on social media to help them as heavy rain waters flooded their streets and buildings.The mainstream media is off on Friday and will return to work on Saturday.
This is an aerial view of the town shot from an oil company plane.
Only after six hours help began to reach to the town. Schools are suspended currently in Ras Gharib.
In Sohag governorate, 8 people were killed and 34 others were injured in car accidents on a highway between it and Qena governorate.
In Assuit governorate , 2 people including a child were killed by electric shocks because of floods as well.
In Ismailia governorate , 2 people were killed by electric shocks as result of thunder.
It is the annual time to have floods in those areas so the streets and highways are destroyed. The annual time of thousands of houses as well acres of agricultural land destroyed.
Since Thursday and videos as well photos pouring the social media from everywhere in the Red Sea and South showing the floods destroying the highways and streets.
In other words , the floods are destroying the infrastructure that cost the country aka the State millions of Egyptian pounds.
Even the resort cities like Ain El-Sokhna , Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh did not survive the heavy rain and floods.
Yes , it happens every where including Europe and the United States but even there ,there are precautions and civil defense teams helping people !!
For God's sake, the people of Ras Gharib stayed in that flooded hell for six hours till help came !!
In the past decades , the heavy rains and flood came at the same time by the end of October and early November.
Egypt's Meteorological authority warned about that before and before.
What is the use of building new cities above them the new so-called administrative capital when there is a weak infrastructure all over the country that collapses every year in seasonal heavy rain !! ??
I am tired about writing about this every year !!
More than 15 people were killed in the past 48 hours following the heavy rains in three governorates.
Eight people including children were killed and 23 others were injured after heavy rains and flood hit the town of Ras Gharib in Red Sea governorate.
Updated : The ministry of health announced on Saturday that the death toll increased to 26 people while 72 were injured in four governorates.
Since early Friday early hours, tweeps from Ras Gharib were asking for urgent help on social media to help them as heavy rain waters flooded their streets and buildings.The mainstream media is off on Friday and will return to work on Saturday.
This is an aerial view of the town shot from an oil company plane.
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| Ras Gharib in an aerial view by Mohamed Soliman |
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| Ras Gharib on Friday after the heavy rain by Mohamed Soliman |
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| Ras Gharib flood as seen from above earlier Friday |
Only after six hours help began to reach to the town. Schools are suspended currently in Ras Gharib.
In Sohag governorate, 8 people were killed and 34 others were injured in car accidents on a highway between it and Qena governorate.
In Assuit governorate , 2 people including a child were killed by electric shocks because of floods as well.
In Ismailia governorate , 2 people were killed by electric shocks as result of thunder.
It is the annual time to have floods in those areas so the streets and highways are destroyed. The annual time of thousands of houses as well acres of agricultural land destroyed.
Since Thursday and videos as well photos pouring the social media from everywhere in the Red Sea and South showing the floods destroying the highways and streets.
— مدثر سباق (@modasser_sebak) October 28, 2016This is video shot earlier Friday shows the Ras Gharib-Hurghada highway.
In other words , the floods are destroying the infrastructure that cost the country aka the State millions of Egyptian pounds.
Even the resort cities like Ain El-Sokhna , Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh did not survive the heavy rain and floods.
Yes , it happens every where including Europe and the United States but even there ,there are precautions and civil defense teams helping people !!
For God's sake, the people of Ras Gharib stayed in that flooded hell for six hours till help came !!
In the past decades , the heavy rains and flood came at the same time by the end of October and early November.
Egypt's Meteorological authority warned about that before and before.
What is the use of building new cities above them the new so-called administrative capital when there is a weak infrastructure all over the country that collapses every year in seasonal heavy rain !! ??
I am tired about writing about this every year !!
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The case of Saad Lamjarrad's and how innocent until proven guilty is taken out of context
"Updated : This post was written before the incident of the fish seller rocks Morocco for real"
For four days now , Moroccan and Arab social media universe have nothing to speak about Moroccan singer Saad Lamjarrad and his case in Paris in the worst way ever.
On Wednesday , the French authorities arrested 31-years-old Lamjarrad in Paris for an alleged sexual assault.
Yes, the Moroccan rising star was arrested for an alleged sexual assault of a French girl. He is currently detained as far as I understand from the news reports coming from Paris till
This is not the first time , Lamjarrad is facing those charges.
In 2010, he faced similar charges in the United States as he was accused of beating and raping a woman in New York.
He left the States after paying a bail and never came back.
In May 2016 , the case was reopened.
The Pepsi Arabia face is denying all those allegations whether the NY incident or Paris incident
Saad Lamjarrad hit regional fame when his song "LM3ALLEM" became the most viewed Arabic song on YouTube with more than 400 million views. "do not ask me why"
Anyhow , personally I believe in " innocent until proven guilty" and I deal with the matter with extra cautious because we are speaking about sexual assaults and rape charges here twice with very disturbing details in the French newspapers.
Yet,I am more than shocked to see how "the innocent until proven guilty" is taken out of context in Morocco and across the Arab world.
Actually, the whole matter turned into a big circus.
We are seeing a Regional Nationalist support for his innocence that reached to an official level in Morocco that is close to the Royal Palace itself.
Already , Saad Lamjarrad was honored by King Mohamed IV in August 2015.
There is a huge nationalistic mobilization in Morocco for him already.
Almost all Moroccan stars and singers declared their full solidarity with Lamjarrad.
Several Arab singers declared their support as well heading to Paris to support the popular Moroccan star vowing that he is innocent.
His fans in Morocco and Arab world launched since day one very provoking hashtags in Arabic like #We_Are_Saad_Lamjarrad "Yes , just like we are Khaled Said !!" , #Freedom_For_Saad_Lamjarrad and #Saad_Lamjarrad_is_a_victim , in English like #Freedom_For_Saad and #WeareallSaadlamjarrad and in French "#Je_suis_saad_lamjarrad"
You find posts like "We are going to defend and support our country's boy Saad" ...etc.
Needless to say , there is a disgusting victim shaming in the Moroccan social media when it comes to the accusers whether in France or in the United States as French girls and American girls are being smeared !!
You know this incident comes in a very critical time when it comes to celebs and sexual violence worldwide.
It also reached to the level of disgusting conspiracy theory that Lamjarrad's lawyer accuses Algeria , which is Morocco's nemesis of standing behind what happened to his client because he is a Moroccan icon.
Misogynism , ultra-nationalism and racism are widely expressed in those hashtags
It is just madness. I do not know how this case will end but whether he is guilty or innocent for real , this case shows the tip of ice-berg.
At the same moment , you see this blog post you must know there are protests currently in several Moroccan cities in solidarity with the death of poor fish vendor Mohsen tragically in garbage compactor because of police on Friday.
Now #We_are_all_Mohsen "the name of the poor fish vendor"in Arabic is trending as well as "#Crush_his_mother".
#Crush_his_mother are allegedly the order the policeman gave to the garbage compactor driver when Mohsen jumped into the vehicle to save his fish !!
I think the case of Mohsen is much important that Lamjarrad for real.
For four days now , Moroccan and Arab social media universe have nothing to speak about Moroccan singer Saad Lamjarrad and his case in Paris in the worst way ever.
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| Saad Lamjarrad |
On Wednesday , the French authorities arrested 31-years-old Lamjarrad in Paris for an alleged sexual assault.
Yes, the Moroccan rising star was arrested for an alleged sexual assault of a French girl. He is currently detained as far as I understand from the news reports coming from Paris till
This is not the first time , Lamjarrad is facing those charges.
In 2010, he faced similar charges in the United States as he was accused of beating and raping a woman in New York.
He left the States after paying a bail and never came back.
In May 2016 , the case was reopened.
The Pepsi Arabia face is denying all those allegations whether the NY incident or Paris incident
Saad Lamjarrad hit regional fame when his song "LM3ALLEM" became the most viewed Arabic song on YouTube with more than 400 million views. "do not ask me why"
Anyhow , personally I believe in " innocent until proven guilty" and I deal with the matter with extra cautious because we are speaking about sexual assaults and rape charges here twice with very disturbing details in the French newspapers.
Yet,I am more than shocked to see how "the innocent until proven guilty" is taken out of context in Morocco and across the Arab world.
Actually, the whole matter turned into a big circus.
We are seeing a Regional Nationalist support for his innocence that reached to an official level in Morocco that is close to the Royal Palace itself.
Already , Saad Lamjarrad was honored by King Mohamed IV in August 2015.
There is a huge nationalistic mobilization in Morocco for him already.
Almost all Moroccan stars and singers declared their full solidarity with Lamjarrad.
Several Arab singers declared their support as well heading to Paris to support the popular Moroccan star vowing that he is innocent.
His fans in Morocco and Arab world launched since day one very provoking hashtags in Arabic like #We_Are_Saad_Lamjarrad "Yes , just like we are Khaled Said !!" , #Freedom_For_Saad_Lamjarrad and #Saad_Lamjarrad_is_a_victim , in English like #Freedom_For_Saad and #WeareallSaadlamjarrad and in French "#Je_suis_saad_lamjarrad"
You find posts like "We are going to defend and support our country's boy Saad" ...etc.
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| We are all with our country's son Saad Lamjarrad |
Needless to say , there is a disgusting victim shaming in the Moroccan social media when it comes to the accusers whether in France or in the United States as French girls and American girls are being smeared !!
You know this incident comes in a very critical time when it comes to celebs and sexual violence worldwide.
It also reached to the level of disgusting conspiracy theory that Lamjarrad's lawyer accuses Algeria , which is Morocco's nemesis of standing behind what happened to his client because he is a Moroccan icon.
Misogynism , ultra-nationalism and racism are widely expressed in those hashtags
It is just madness. I do not know how this case will end but whether he is guilty or innocent for real , this case shows the tip of ice-berg.
At the same moment , you see this blog post you must know there are protests currently in several Moroccan cities in solidarity with the death of poor fish vendor Mohsen tragically in garbage compactor because of police on Friday.
Now #We_are_all_Mohsen "the name of the poor fish vendor"in Arabic is trending as well as "#Crush_his_mother".
#Crush_his_mother are allegedly the order the policeman gave to the garbage compactor driver when Mohsen jumped into the vehicle to save his fish !!
I think the case of Mohsen is much important that Lamjarrad for real.
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And ElBaradei is speaking up about what happened in summer 2013
Recently , Egypt's former VP Mohamed ElBaradei has been very active on his twitter account criticizing directly and indirectly what is happening in Egypt. As usual , the Pro-regime media slams him spreading lies about him day and night.
There is nothing new about that but something happened on Tuesday turning the table upside down.
On Tuesday afternoon, ElBaradei issued a long statement on his official Facebook page in Arabic slamming the Pro-regime media directly and the regime indirectly.
In his statement ,the former vice-president spoke about his role starting 3 July until 14 August 2013 including his short time as the vice president of interim president Adly Mansour.
Here is the statement after the break.
I think most of what was mentioned in the statement , ElBaradei said it before but there are some points I think he did not mention it before and they are extremely interesting.
He revealed that he and other political powers and parties representatives only knew about the detention of former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi by the army during their meeting with "SCAF" on the morning of 3 July 2013.
"The options then became extremely limited and of course having early presidential elections was no longer an option." ElBaradei said defending himself "I guess for the first time" against critics.
Many people have been asking about the fate of the first demand of 30 protests "having early presidential elections" and ElBaradei gives us a hint on what happened.
He also revealed that the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party leader was invited to that SCAF meeting but he did not show up as Morsi was detained.
"According to the new reality, there were a detained president and millions in the squares protesting , my priority then was to avoid civil unrest and keeping it peaceful through the political transitional road map." He said in his statement.
He spoke about the forcible dispersal of Pro-Morsi sits-in especially in Rabaa.
ElBaradei resigned on the same day if you remember on 14 August 2013.
He also revealed that from 30 June till 3 July , there were secret talks between SCAF and the Muslim Brotherhood.
"Maybe , if the secular powers knew about those talks , they could have tried to reach a solution between the two parties."He said.
"There is a lot of examples I can add regarding deception and lies as well how the {25 January} revolution was hijacked , a thing that led to what we suffer from now" He added in the end.
"I am stopped only by this critical time the nation is passing through." He said dropping the mic and referring to the economic crisis indirectly.
ElBaradei defended the International Atomic Energy Agency "IAEA" and its role in Iraq.
He denied for the zillion time the rumors spread by the regime media whether in time of Mubarak or Sisi that He "ElBaradei" and IAEA were behind the invasion of Iraq.
He also slammed on how his personal telephone calls were aired on MP Abdel Rahim Ali's TV show "he did not mention his name" including his call with a US official asking the US government to aid Egypt financially.
Ali claimed that that telephone call was between a CIA officer and ElBaradei !!
Anyhow, the statement became the talk of the Egyptian social media especially on twitter in short time for his release.
Up till the early hours of Wednesday , #ElBaradei hashtag in Arabic was top trending in Egypt.
As expected such statement angered many people above them the regime supporters as well the Muslim Brotherhood supporters.
The MB supporters say that he is too late to speak about what happened in July 2013 especially when it comes to Morsi's detention.
They are angry that he did not apologize for turning against Morsi from their point of view.
None of them though bothered to speak about the secret talks between the Muslim Brotherhood and SCAF in secret which ElBaradei , who always speaks about national reconciliation mentioned it in his statement.
The Pro-Sisi regime supporters are furious.
The Pro-Sisi TV hosts band including names like Ahmed Moussa and Khaled Sala opened their fire and spread lies about ElBaradei.
It is worth to mention from couple of weeks, Moussa published a false tweet for ElBaradei made of nearly 172 characters calling the Egyptian people allegedly to carry arms against the current regime in Egypt !!
The Pro-Sisi Tamarod boys began their attack against ElBaradei as its founders began to call him a liar.
Say whatever about ElBaradei but the old man got more creditability than Mahmoud Abdel Aziz and Mahmoud Badr.
Personally , I am asking myself that same question many are asking and can't find an answer now.
Why now ?
Why does ElBaradei choose this time to address those points with the Egyptian people ?
Time will answer that question of Why !!
And Just like what he said in his long statement "God protect Egypt and its people"
There is nothing new about that but something happened on Tuesday turning the table upside down.
On Tuesday afternoon, ElBaradei issued a long statement on his official Facebook page in Arabic slamming the Pro-regime media directly and the regime indirectly.
In his statement ,the former vice-president spoke about his role starting 3 July until 14 August 2013 including his short time as the vice president of interim president Adly Mansour.
Here is the statement after the break.
I think most of what was mentioned in the statement , ElBaradei said it before but there are some points I think he did not mention it before and they are extremely interesting.
He revealed that he and other political powers and parties representatives only knew about the detention of former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi by the army during their meeting with "SCAF" on the morning of 3 July 2013.
"The options then became extremely limited and of course having early presidential elections was no longer an option." ElBaradei said defending himself "I guess for the first time" against critics.
Many people have been asking about the fate of the first demand of 30 protests "having early presidential elections" and ElBaradei gives us a hint on what happened.
He also revealed that the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party leader was invited to that SCAF meeting but he did not show up as Morsi was detained.
"According to the new reality, there were a detained president and millions in the squares protesting , my priority then was to avoid civil unrest and keeping it peaceful through the political transitional road map." He said in his statement.
He spoke about the forcible dispersal of Pro-Morsi sits-in especially in Rabaa.
ElBaradei resigned on the same day if you remember on 14 August 2013.
He also revealed that from 30 June till 3 July , there were secret talks between SCAF and the Muslim Brotherhood.
"Maybe , if the secular powers knew about those talks , they could have tried to reach a solution between the two parties."He said.
"There is a lot of examples I can add regarding deception and lies as well how the {25 January} revolution was hijacked , a thing that led to what we suffer from now" He added in the end.
"I am stopped only by this critical time the nation is passing through." He said dropping the mic and referring to the economic crisis indirectly.
 |
| Mohamed ElBaradei "Reuters" |
ElBaradei defended the International Atomic Energy Agency "IAEA" and its role in Iraq.
He denied for the zillion time the rumors spread by the regime media whether in time of Mubarak or Sisi that He "ElBaradei" and IAEA were behind the invasion of Iraq.
He also slammed on how his personal telephone calls were aired on MP Abdel Rahim Ali's TV show "he did not mention his name" including his call with a US official asking the US government to aid Egypt financially.
Ali claimed that that telephone call was between a CIA officer and ElBaradei !!
Anyhow, the statement became the talk of the Egyptian social media especially on twitter in short time for his release.
Up till the early hours of Wednesday , #ElBaradei hashtag in Arabic was top trending in Egypt.
As expected such statement angered many people above them the regime supporters as well the Muslim Brotherhood supporters.
The MB supporters say that he is too late to speak about what happened in July 2013 especially when it comes to Morsi's detention.
They are angry that he did not apologize for turning against Morsi from their point of view.
None of them though bothered to speak about the secret talks between the Muslim Brotherhood and SCAF in secret which ElBaradei , who always speaks about national reconciliation mentioned it in his statement.
The Pro-Sisi regime supporters are furious.
The Pro-Sisi TV hosts band including names like Ahmed Moussa and Khaled Sala opened their fire and spread lies about ElBaradei.
It is worth to mention from couple of weeks, Moussa published a false tweet for ElBaradei made of nearly 172 characters calling the Egyptian people allegedly to carry arms against the current regime in Egypt !!
The Pro-Sisi Tamarod boys began their attack against ElBaradei as its founders began to call him a liar.
Say whatever about ElBaradei but the old man got more creditability than Mahmoud Abdel Aziz and Mahmoud Badr.
Personally , I am asking myself that same question many are asking and can't find an answer now.
Why now ?
Why does ElBaradei choose this time to address those points with the Egyptian people ?
Time will answer that question of Why !!
And Just like what he said in his long statement "God protect Egypt and its people"
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↧
And "it" hit the fan finally !!
And you know "it" hit the fan finally.
The Central Bank of Egypt "CBE" issued its decision early Thursday to freely float the Egyptian pound and raise the key interest rates as part of the government's economic reforms.
In its statement issued earlier , the CBE announced that it temporarily devalued the Egyptian currency by 48 percent to LE 13 to the dollar.
It is up to the banks move the price of the dollar to within a10-percent margin above and below the above-mentioned exchange rate until the next exceptional forex auction .
Since then the prices at the Egyptian banks including the ones I know whether public sector banks or private/foreign banks between LE 13.01 to 15.99 to the dollar.
And it was a chain reaction.
It started rapidly with an increase in customs and tariffs then air flights tickets by 40%.
At 9.30 PM , media began to speak about how the prices of fuel would increase at midnight. This created a frenzy and thousands of people took their cars and headed to gas stations creating traffic jams till early Friday hours !!
Before the midnight , the prices of fuel increased officially in Egypt.
The 80-octane gasoline fuel "used by lower and lower middle classes" price increased by 46.8% while the 92-octane gasoline fuel price increased by 34.6% and diesel price increased by 30.5%.
Of course, the increase of diesel prices means the increase in the prices of food especially vegetables and fruits as they are transferred by trucks that use diesel.
According to what I understand this increase has to do with the price of the US dollar and not with the subsidizes which El-Sisi should lift according to the IMF recommendations.
It was just the beginning as Egyptians had nothing to speak about except the floating and devaluation of the Egyptian pound.
Yes , floating the Egyptian pound is an important step theoretically to for economic reforms in Egypt but I think realistically as well theoretically, you can not have successful free floating of your currency without a true and correct economic and political reforms.
You can not speak about the devaluation of your currency and lifting subsidizes when you spend billions of dollars on unneeded mega-national projects and endless arms deals.
You can not speak about the devaluation of your currency and lifting subsidizes for real without having a real plan to help your middle and lower classes, without having tourism to have foreign currency as well industry back to have exports back and without having true austerity measures that would start with the statesmen and government before anyone else.
With my due respect to the great economist Mohamed El-Arian and IMF experts , the economic reforms proposed currently will crush the middle class in Egypt before the lower classes which already were living on the margin.
I do not have the same knowledge like those great economists but this is what I think.
P.S according to IMF Middle East Chief Masood Mohamed in an interview on CNN earlier this week , Egyptian officials were the ones who proposed the floating of the Egyptian pound.
It is worth to mention all the Pro-Regime media and social media accounts were claiming on Wednesday that the price of the dollar dropped about 7 pounds suddenly and allegedly in the Black market.
They were promising that the US dollar price would drop later but as usual next day , it was the biggest shock for them.
They are still living in denial.😑😑😐
On twitters , the hashtags of "Black Thursday" , "Central Bank" , "Tarek Amer" , "Middle class", "Fuel" and "Floating the pound" in Arabic were trending all day long in Egypt.
The Hashtag "#Alaa_Morsi" was trending as well. Alaa Morsi is a famous comedian whose angry leaked phone to some bank over a car loan went viral over his angry and rude insults to the CBE and his governor. "Was not Tarek Amer but that audio call was brought back to express the angry feelings towards Amer"
Personally, I am extremely worried , so worried.
This post will be updated on Friday as I can not keep my eyes open. We speak about nothing in Egypt except that.
The Central Bank of Egypt "CBE" issued its decision early Thursday to freely float the Egyptian pound and raise the key interest rates as part of the government's economic reforms.
In its statement issued earlier , the CBE announced that it temporarily devalued the Egyptian currency by 48 percent to LE 13 to the dollar.
 |
| Taken earlier Thursday in some Egyptian bank in Cairo "Reuters" |
It is up to the banks move the price of the dollar to within a10-percent margin above and below the above-mentioned exchange rate until the next exceptional forex auction .
Since then the prices at the Egyptian banks including the ones I know whether public sector banks or private/foreign banks between LE 13.01 to 15.99 to the dollar.
And it was a chain reaction.
It started rapidly with an increase in customs and tariffs then air flights tickets by 40%.
At 9.30 PM , media began to speak about how the prices of fuel would increase at midnight. This created a frenzy and thousands of people took their cars and headed to gas stations creating traffic jams till early Friday hours !!
Before the midnight , the prices of fuel increased officially in Egypt.
The 80-octane gasoline fuel "used by lower and lower middle classes" price increased by 46.8% while the 92-octane gasoline fuel price increased by 34.6% and diesel price increased by 30.5%.
Of course, the increase of diesel prices means the increase in the prices of food especially vegetables and fruits as they are transferred by trucks that use diesel.
According to what I understand this increase has to do with the price of the US dollar and not with the subsidizes which El-Sisi should lift according to the IMF recommendations.
It was just the beginning as Egyptians had nothing to speak about except the floating and devaluation of the Egyptian pound.
Yes , floating the Egyptian pound is an important step theoretically to for economic reforms in Egypt but I think realistically as well theoretically, you can not have successful free floating of your currency without a true and correct economic and political reforms.
You can not speak about the devaluation of your currency and lifting subsidizes when you spend billions of dollars on unneeded mega-national projects and endless arms deals.
You can not speak about the devaluation of your currency and lifting subsidizes for real without having a real plan to help your middle and lower classes, without having tourism to have foreign currency as well industry back to have exports back and without having true austerity measures that would start with the statesmen and government before anyone else.
With my due respect to the great economist Mohamed El-Arian and IMF experts , the economic reforms proposed currently will crush the middle class in Egypt before the lower classes which already were living on the margin.
I do not have the same knowledge like those great economists but this is what I think.
P.S according to IMF Middle East Chief Masood Mohamed in an interview on CNN earlier this week , Egyptian officials were the ones who proposed the floating of the Egyptian pound.
It is worth to mention all the Pro-Regime media and social media accounts were claiming on Wednesday that the price of the dollar dropped about 7 pounds suddenly and allegedly in the Black market.
They were promising that the US dollar price would drop later but as usual next day , it was the biggest shock for them.
They are still living in denial.😑😑😐
On twitters , the hashtags of "Black Thursday" , "Central Bank" , "Tarek Amer" , "Middle class", "Fuel" and "Floating the pound" in Arabic were trending all day long in Egypt.
The Hashtag "#Alaa_Morsi" was trending as well. Alaa Morsi is a famous comedian whose angry leaked phone to some bank over a car loan went viral over his angry and rude insults to the CBE and his governor. "Was not Tarek Amer but that audio call was brought back to express the angry feelings towards Amer"
Personally, I am extremely worried , so worried.
This post will be updated on Friday as I can not keep my eyes open. We speak about nothing in Egypt except that.
↧
When Sisi congratulated Trump on the phone
After announcing that Donald Trump has become the 45th president of the United States by two hours , the Egyptian Presidency announced that President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi was the first leader to congratulate him in a telephone call.
During the call according to the readout released by the Egyptian presidency , Sisi invited Trump to visit Egypt. "I do not know if he visited it before".
In return , the new US president-elect told Sisi that he was looking forward to see him soon.
It is worth to mention that Trump met El-Sisi in New York during the United Nations General Assembly "UNGA" in September.
El-Sisi was quite impressed by the Republican nominee then that he did not care much about insulting and disturbing statements about Islam and Muslims.
It is not a secret that Trump expressed his admiration with El-Sisi and his war on 'Islamic terrorism' from his point of view.
I think this has to do with the fact that his national security ex-General Michael Flynn praises El-Sisi whether in his book or in is talks.
Also, his top expert on the Middle East and terrorism issues Walid Phares also praises El-Sisi.
Phares is too open to the Egyptian media as in the past months , he used to give statements in Pro-regime media.
On Wednesday , he told Egyptian media allegedly that Trump would issue a law designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization.
Yes , it is all about the Brotherhood. They do not mind having an alliance with the devil itself to get rid of the Brotherhood.
Interestingly , the Pro-regime Egyptian media ignores the fact deliberately that Phares is neocon with bloody radical history in the Lebanese civil war.
You know, I wonder if Phares was the one who told MP Abdel Rihm Ali that Trump's role model was El-Sisi !!
It does not matter for them as now a war prince like Samir Gaegae is a frequent guest in Egyptian TV channels and newspapers.
Aside from Flynn and Phares , I can not keep thinking if MP Mostafa El-Gindy plays a role in connecting the Egyptian regime with the Trump came through Conservative News website Breitbart News.
According to Guardian US , Mostafa El-Gindy owns Breitbart News DC HQ. El-Gindy denied that Breitbart News directly rented from him the house. Ironically, journalists from Guardian and Politico found El-Gindy mentioned several times in the US Conservative news website. The website is also paying attention to what is happening in Egypt.
El-Gindy denied later that he rented his townhouse to Trump's campaign "It is not the campaign" the news reort blaming the Qataris, MB and tGuardiandan for spreading lies and rumors about him.
Politico and other US based websites searched more and confirmed what the Guardian found, it was more than interesting to find Breitbart news renting a USD 2.3 million townhouse HQ from a Muslim millionaire in DC. "He bought it in 2009"
I do not know exactly what kind of business El-Gindy is involved in but the veteran MP got relations and businesses in Sudan and other African countries since the time of Mubarak. I do not even how this man is okay of renting his house to that racist website !!
It is not a big secret either that El-Sisi and his administration wish that the things will change when Trump becomes a President and invites him to Washington.
The Egyptian Pro-Regime media is in love in Trump already ignoring all his racist talk against Muslims and Islam.
The Pro-regime supporters in Egypt support and celebrate the victory of Trump as if it is their own victory. Yes, some of them still believe genuinely that Hillary Clinton created ISIS and worked with the Muslim Brotherhood to destroy the 30-June revolution in the country.
You know it is like all the Nationalist right wing supporters are uniting !!
Anyhow , we will see what will happen now in Washington.
It is not Trump alone in Washington but we got also other Republicans who got a different perspective.
It is not one man show in the Oval already.
VP Mike Pence, already got a different view about Syria than Trump.
Time will tell if the Egyptian administration and its media were in a hurry welcoming Trump in the White House or not. Only matter of two months.
During the call according to the readout released by the Egyptian presidency , Sisi invited Trump to visit Egypt. "I do not know if he visited it before".
 |
| Trump and El-Sisi in NYC last September "Egyptian Presidency" |
In return , the new US president-elect told Sisi that he was looking forward to see him soon.
It is worth to mention that Trump met El-Sisi in New York during the United Nations General Assembly "UNGA" in September.
El-Sisi was quite impressed by the Republican nominee then that he did not care much about insulting and disturbing statements about Islam and Muslims.
It is not a secret that Trump expressed his admiration with El-Sisi and his war on 'Islamic terrorism' from his point of view.
I think this has to do with the fact that his national security ex-General Michael Flynn praises El-Sisi whether in his book or in is talks.
Also, his top expert on the Middle East and terrorism issues Walid Phares also praises El-Sisi.
Phares is too open to the Egyptian media as in the past months , he used to give statements in Pro-regime media.
On Wednesday , he told Egyptian media allegedly that Trump would issue a law designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization.
Yes , it is all about the Brotherhood. They do not mind having an alliance with the devil itself to get rid of the Brotherhood.
Interestingly , the Pro-regime Egyptian media ignores the fact deliberately that Phares is neocon with bloody radical history in the Lebanese civil war.
You know, I wonder if Phares was the one who told MP Abdel Rihm Ali that Trump's role model was El-Sisi !!
It does not matter for them as now a war prince like Samir Gaegae is a frequent guest in Egyptian TV channels and newspapers.
Aside from Flynn and Phares , I can not keep thinking if MP Mostafa El-Gindy plays a role in connecting the Egyptian regime with the Trump came through Conservative News website Breitbart News.
According to Guardian US , Mostafa El-Gindy owns Breitbart News DC HQ. El-Gindy denied that Breitbart News directly rented from him the house. Ironically, journalists from Guardian and Politico found El-Gindy mentioned several times in the US Conservative news website. The website is also paying attention to what is happening in Egypt.
El-Gindy denied later that he rented his townhouse to Trump's campaign "It is not the campaign" the news reort blaming the Qataris, MB and tGuardiandan for spreading lies and rumors about him.
Politico and other US based websites searched more and confirmed what the Guardian found, it was more than interesting to find Breitbart news renting a USD 2.3 million townhouse HQ from a Muslim millionaire in DC. "He bought it in 2009"
I do not know exactly what kind of business El-Gindy is involved in but the veteran MP got relations and businesses in Sudan and other African countries since the time of Mubarak. I do not even how this man is okay of renting his house to that racist website !!
It is not a big secret either that El-Sisi and his administration wish that the things will change when Trump becomes a President and invites him to Washington.
The Egyptian Pro-Regime media is in love in Trump already ignoring all his racist talk against Muslims and Islam.
The Pro-regime supporters in Egypt support and celebrate the victory of Trump as if it is their own victory. Yes, some of them still believe genuinely that Hillary Clinton created ISIS and worked with the Muslim Brotherhood to destroy the 30-June revolution in the country.
You know it is like all the Nationalist right wing supporters are uniting !!
Anyhow , we will see what will happen now in Washington.
It is not Trump alone in Washington but we got also other Republicans who got a different perspective.
It is not one man show in the Oval already.
VP Mike Pence, already got a different view about Syria than Trump.
Time will tell if the Egyptian administration and its media were in a hurry welcoming Trump in the White House or not. Only matter of two months.
↧
Once upon #Alexandria in spring without filters. #Egypt #Citizenjournalism #blogger #thisisegypt #thisisalexandria #africa #northafrica #mideast #touregypt #sea #beaches #mediterranean [Flickr]
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About that so-called 11/11 Revolution in Egypt on Friday
Supposedly after Friday's prayers which are a few hours away , a so-called revolution or protests or uprising of 11/11 will erupt against the current Egyptian regime because of its so-called economic policies.
As usual, Downtown Cairo is locked down and famous Sadat metro station in Downtown is closed as usual. The ambulance authorities
For months , the pro-regime media has been warning the Egyptian people of participating in the 11/11 protests or so-called revolution which seemed to be an orphaned call with no political powers claiming it.
Suddenly , those calls for protests appeared from nowhere whether online or offline.
All the opposition/Pro-January 25/Pro-Democratic political powers and parties stated that they won't participate or call the people to join those protests.
Independent revolutionary activists also denied any relation with those calls appearing online and offline. At the same time, people from the working class began to speak about.
Pro-Muslim Brotherhood supporters seemed to support the call for 11/11 protests , they always support any calls for protests against the regime jumping into the wagon without knowing who is behind.
Same thing when it comes to the Pro-Muslim Brotherhood media from websites , Facebook pages and TV channels.
Many activists actually suspected the 11/11 revolution or protests call was a trap by the security to crackdown protests and political powers.
The Muslim Brotherhood itself or rather the different wings of Muslim Brotherhood have not declared their or its official position from the protests except on Thursday.
The MB wing led by the so-called spokesperson Mohamed Montaser "some believe that it is an alias" issued a statement on Thursday that does not only show its support to the calls for protests but also its confession about who believed those calls.
" There is contradicting information about the arrangements of different parties for 11/11 and what is being said from scenarios about that day but the MB declares its full support to the public demands rejecting the catastrophic economic decisions." The statement said to the end of that talk.
But then Montaser says the following interestingly later in the statement
"The MB announces that it is not a part of any scenario that is being planned on that day away from the revolution and its goals" He added.
Needless to say , now the MB cannot mobilize its supporters in large numbers as the past. Most of their protests now are in rural areas and narrow streets in Cairo and Alexandria.
Anyhow back to that strange call that will lock up the country within hours.
A couple of journalists as well the very informative and highly recommended investigative journalism "Al-Mawkef Al-Masry" found very interesting information about the calls for 11/11 protests and when it appeared.
It turned out that the first call for 11/11 protests or so-called revolution appeared on Facebook on a Facebook page called "The Peasants movement" on 26 August.
That page was founded by a man called "Yasser Abdel Halim El-Omda" , who is not a renowned political activist. After the 25 January , he called himself "The Revolution poet".
He issued a statement with the goals of that so-called "Peasants revolution" on 28 October and I agree with Al-Mawkef Al-Masry , that he either does not have any knowledge of politics or economy or lies to fool the people while they are angry and frustrated.
He is currently living in Turkey and according to his FB account , he is a Pro-Morsi supporter and is working in one of the Pro-MB TV channels.
Nevertheless, official MB denies any relation with him. Economically , the goals of those protests according to El-Omda do not go along with the MB's capitalistic views.
I do not expect any major thing on Friday except may few small MB protests in their areas like Sharkia and rural parts of Alexandria and Giza as usual.
Other than there will be no revolution.
Revolutions do not need a Facebook event. 25 January and 28 January were a historical exception that does not happen frequently in the same country.
Either way, I have to admit since October and the Pro-regime media was freaking out about the 11/11
We will see what happen after a couple of hours inshallah.
 |
| The graffiti of the so-called revolution "Reuters" |
As usual, Downtown Cairo is locked down and famous Sadat metro station in Downtown is closed as usual. The ambulance authorities
For months , the pro-regime media has been warning the Egyptian people of participating in the 11/11 protests or so-called revolution which seemed to be an orphaned call with no political powers claiming it.
Suddenly , those calls for protests appeared from nowhere whether online or offline.
All the opposition/Pro-January 25/Pro-Democratic political powers and parties stated that they won't participate or call the people to join those protests.
Independent revolutionary activists also denied any relation with those calls appearing online and offline. At the same time, people from the working class began to speak about.
Pro-Muslim Brotherhood supporters seemed to support the call for 11/11 protests , they always support any calls for protests against the regime jumping into the wagon without knowing who is behind.
Same thing when it comes to the Pro-Muslim Brotherhood media from websites , Facebook pages and TV channels.
Many activists actually suspected the 11/11 revolution or protests call was a trap by the security to crackdown protests and political powers.
The Muslim Brotherhood itself or rather the different wings of Muslim Brotherhood have not declared their or its official position from the protests except on Thursday.
The MB wing led by the so-called spokesperson Mohamed Montaser "some believe that it is an alias" issued a statement on Thursday that does not only show its support to the calls for protests but also its confession about who believed those calls.
" There is contradicting information about the arrangements of different parties for 11/11 and what is being said from scenarios about that day but the MB declares its full support to the public demands rejecting the catastrophic economic decisions." The statement said to the end of that talk.
But then Montaser says the following interestingly later in the statement
"The MB announces that it is not a part of any scenario that is being planned on that day away from the revolution and its goals" He added.
Needless to say , now the MB cannot mobilize its supporters in large numbers as the past. Most of their protests now are in rural areas and narrow streets in Cairo and Alexandria.
Anyhow back to that strange call that will lock up the country within hours.
A couple of journalists as well the very informative and highly recommended investigative journalism "Al-Mawkef Al-Masry" found very interesting information about the calls for 11/11 protests and when it appeared.
It turned out that the first call for 11/11 protests or so-called revolution appeared on Facebook on a Facebook page called "The Peasants movement" on 26 August.
That page was founded by a man called "Yasser Abdel Halim El-Omda" , who is not a renowned political activist. After the 25 January , he called himself "The Revolution poet".
He issued a statement with the goals of that so-called "Peasants revolution" on 28 October and I agree with Al-Mawkef Al-Masry , that he either does not have any knowledge of politics or economy or lies to fool the people while they are angry and frustrated.
He is currently living in Turkey and according to his FB account , he is a Pro-Morsi supporter and is working in one of the Pro-MB TV channels.
Nevertheless, official MB denies any relation with him. Economically , the goals of those protests according to El-Omda do not go along with the MB's capitalistic views.
I do not expect any major thing on Friday except may few small MB protests in their areas like Sharkia and rural parts of Alexandria and Giza as usual.
Other than there will be no revolution.
Revolutions do not need a Facebook event. 25 January and 28 January were a historical exception that does not happen frequently in the same country.
Either way, I have to admit since October and the Pro-regime media was freaking out about the 11/11
We will see what happen after a couple of hours inshallah.
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Kodak Agfa presents Alexandria in late spring
In May , I went to Alexandria in a short a three-days visit with my family. It was a nice spring break before the start of summer as well before Ramadan.This is my second - somehow long trip to Alexandria from 8 years ago.
The last time I went there was a for quick one-day or rather a few hours visit in 2012.
I went by train from Cairo's Ramses railway station.
It was the first time to see Egypt's first and oldest as well main railway station after its controversial renovations.
I think you have seen of those photos I took quickly while I was running to catch the train on time.
We took the first-degree train , the newest one in the service. It was better for real than the one I had taken in 2008. It got Wi-Fi Service but it was not working.
A direct trip to Alexandria , I took a couple of snaps of the Nile Delta towns and villages we passed through.
Arrived Alexandria aka Alex by Afternoon , the weather was hot unlike springtime. I remember we had a terrible heat wave during then in Cairo.
I remember the taxi that took us from Sidi Gaber Railway station to the hotel where we stayed describing the Mediterranean sea as "Non-movable carpet" because of the heat.
We were staying in Middle-class area of Sidi Bishr.
As someone who has not been to the city for 8 years , I noticed that many of the public beaches were closed for maintenance by none other than The Egyptian armed forces' Engineering authority. The army's Engineering also renovated the famous historical casino Cote D' Azur but it is still closed. {Once upon time, King Farouk of Egypt used to gamble in that casino}
Also, more and more concrete ugly towers are everywhere.
And the sea was amazing in May for real. It was breathtaking and clear.
 |
| The sea in Alexandria in May |
For three days only , I had not to much time to take a true tour in that big vast city.
The weather was so hot in Sidi Bishr in that time in May as I hinted to the level that public beaches were active.
 |
| Beaches and ugly buildings in Sidi Bishr |
As you can see , ugly buildings are everywhere.
Nevertheless, I love those cafes and casinos on the sea like that. Unfortunately , I saw several places like that closed and some of them under maintenance.
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| A cafe/ casino by the sea in Alexandria |
The sunset was amazing.
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| A sea sunset in Alexandria |
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| Another shot for that golden sea sunset in Alexandria |
Just like Cairo , Alexandria does not sleep early.
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| A long exposure shot for the traffic in Alexandria |
The corniche lights are amazing.
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| Corniche lights at night |
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| Heading to work in the sea |
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| A fishing boat heading to fish in Alexandria |
By afternoon, the heat wave reached its peak and there was no escape except some good time on the beach. I went to a private beach in Sidi Bishr that is placed between two public beaches.
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| Separated by wooden fence, public and private beaches in Alexandria |
Private beaches are increasing in number in Alexandria as many companies including the army's tourism "TOLIP" began to manage those beaches turning them from public to private.
The prices were between LE 50 to LE 60 to LE 100 in Spring and Summer which provoked many people for real.
 |
| A Diseny princesses floatee on the sand |
I wonder how much the prices will go up next year.
Now , the private beach where I went in the coastal city of Alexandria was for Upper Middle class and women there were wearing all sorts of swimming suits.
In fact, there was a Niqabi woman who was having a good time with her conservative family in the sea.
There was also that nice veiled granny who was relaxing in an adult float while wearing a Burkini overseeing her grandchildren while her daughter was wearing a swimdress.
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| The beach and the sea |
It is not secret but in private Middle Upper-Class beaches in Egypt , women have got more freedom to wear what they want and feel comfortable in.
In the afternoon , I went with my family to have a good fish meal in Bahri, the true heart and soul of Alexandria.
We went to the famous Greek Club restaurant beside the Yacht club and Qaitbay citadel.
 |
| Qaitaby citadel |
Located at the old Greek community club , the Greek restaurant "White and Blue" earned huge fame in Alexandria and outside.
Its menu is a mix between Greek and Egyptian seafood cuisine. It is not cheap but it is worth it.
Actually, after second thought , it is cheaper than seafood restaurants in Cairo when I remember it.
Aside from the great food , the view from the restaurant is breathtaking.
 |
| The overview from the Greek Club's restaurant |
 |
| An overview for Bahri |
 |
| boats, yachts and ships |
Needless to say , most of those buildings are built illegally.
I was worried in this visit to see the famous Palace of Aisha Fahmy demolished and turned into an ugly hotel complex but Thank God it is still there.
This important beautiful palace should be turned into a museum and its garden into some sort of botanical garden for real.
Already , I am worried that it may not survive for too. Its location is a treasure for hotels.
Anyhow , that palace is luckier than the famous El-Salam theater which the army's Engineering authority demolished to build another hotel on its land.
I had at last a good opportunity to snap the famous Stanley Bridge at night. In fact , I had a good opportunity from afternoon till night.
 |
| Stanley Bridge in the afternoon |
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| Stanley Bridge after sunset |
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| The Stanley bridge tower |
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| Another shot for Stanley bridge |
I think the Alexandrians are right when they say that the best time to visit is away from the summer season.
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| Fishing against strong sea waves |
In my short visit, I think one of my best photos taken in Alex this time was that simple Egyptian family having fun at a public beach giving no damn to the sea's strong tides.
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| The family and the sea in Alexandria |
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| Care less for the strong waves 😀 |
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| Having fun despite the strong sea waves |
By the way , these are not the only things I took photos for in Alexandria.
Wait for other important posts from that visit in Alex.
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| The sea in Alexandria |
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The moon before the supermoon [Flickr]
Kodak Agfa posted a photo:
Taken on Sunday , this is how the moon look like before it reaches to its super status on Monday.
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The moon before the supermoon
After a few hours later today , the world will meet what is believed to be the biggest supermoon sine the 1940s the Earth would witness.
Those photos of the moon were taken in Giza , Egypt Sunday night showing a glowing moon that has not reached its super status yet.
![The moon before the supermoon]()
![The moon before the supermoon]()
![The moon before the supermoon]()
By the way , I feel that I have taken better shots for the full moon in the past. What do you think ? Are those new ones good ?
Wait for the Supermoon inshallah.
Those photos of the moon were taken in Giza , Egypt Sunday night showing a glowing moon that has not reached its super status yet.
By the way , I feel that I have taken better shots for the full moon in the past. What do you think ? Are those new ones good ?
Wait for the Supermoon inshallah.
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November 2016 Supermoon [Flickr]
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November 2016 Supermoon [Flickr]
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November 2016 Supermoon [Flickr]
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November 2016 Supermoon [Flickr]
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More Pages to Explore .....
