An interview with Muslim of the PBS flagship Frontline program conducted on July 18, 2013, and published on September 17, 2013, to coincide with the broadcast of the documentary “Egypt in Crisis”. Khaled Fahmy is professor and chair of the American University in Cairo’s Department of History. A liberal supporter of the revolution, Fahmy worried about human-rights abuses under President Mohammed Morsi, and now a return to the military state under Gen. Sisi. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on July 18, 2013 in New York. Help me understand the context of the Muslim Brotherhood and how they…
Leave a CommentTag: SCAF
Published in Ahram Online on September 3, 2013 Western media misunderstood the Brotherhood and underestimated Egyptians’ desire for democracy and social justice One of the signs of the crisis that Egypt is currently going through is the gap between the vision of a large portion of Egyptians that revolted against Mohamed Morsi on 30 June and that of Western media coverage of Egyptian events. Despite the fact that this dissonance initially revolved around the term “coup,” I believe the core of the problem is not related to how the army’s move was characterised, as much as to how the Muslim…
1 Comment
Published in Ahram Online on July 21, 2013 In focusing on the Muslim Brotherhood’s fascist tendencies do we not risk losing sight of the largest elephant in the room — the perils of army intervention in the name of protecting liberty? In March, I wrote an article here in response to an article written by Wael Abbas, author of the blog Misr Digital, in which he had warned of the threat of a spread of armed militias belonging to different groups, from the Brotherhood to the Ultras to thugs, expressing apprehension at what he viewed was the rise of militarism…
Leave a Comment
Posted on Facebook on April 11, 2013 Yesterday’s Guardian article is big news. The first question of course is whether or not Morsy, and behind him the MB, will do anything about it and summon the courage to hold Egypt’s high brass accountable. There are those who say that time has not come yet for the revolution to take on the army. They point out that other countries, e.g. South Africa, many countries in eastern Europe and South America, took decades before they could be able to dismantle the former regime. We have to crawl before we are able to…
Leave a Comment
Posted on Facebook on March 21, 2012 The reasons for my call for a boycott of the German University in Cairo and declining to attend the conference on “Downtown Cairo” due to be held at GUC on 24 and March 25, 2012: I believe that the university, any university, must be an open place where everyone has the right to express their opinion without threat or intimidation; this right, furthermore, should not be limited on campus to a certain place or time. Providing a climate that is conducive of intellectual and academic debate at the university is conditional upon the…
1 Comment
Published in Egypt Independent on February 26, 2012 The trial of 43 pro-democracy activists, including almost 20 US citizens, on the charges of working illegally in Egypt, has left many puzzled and bewildered. Over the past two weeks, US diplomats, congressmen and military generals have been shuttling between Cairo and Washington in a frantic attempt to figure out what lays behind this sudden move and to secure the release of the charged US citizens. And while many Egyptians seem to have bought the official line that this was a long-overdue move aimed at subjecting foreign NGOs to local legislation and…
Leave a Comment
Aired on Jazeera English on December 8, 2011. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbPibuTu_m0
Leave a Comment