Egypt

Ministry of Agriculture fights encroachment onto agricultural lands

Daily News Egypt, by Sara Aggour

405 agriculture engineers are given the right to judicially seize lands which violate agriculture land regulations

Apartment blocks line the edge of a field in the fertile Egyptian Delta region of Al-Menofeya. (AFP Photo)

Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation Ayman Farid Abu Hadid announced that 405 agriculture engineers working at the ministry have been given the right to judicially seize encroached agricultural lands during an interview on the Egyptian satellite channel CBC.

The agriculture minister said that regular training sessions will be held for the agriculture engineers to educate them on their roles, the boundaries of their authorities and the punishment they will receive if they misuse this authority.

“In 2011, we requested that the Land Protection Agency have that right but it did not happen,” Abu Hadid said.

“In this government, as soon as we requested a judicial seizure right, the Minister of Justice approved,” he added.

Abu Hadid pointed out that those given that right will be allowed to file a complaint and submit it to the prosecution, which will make the process more effective and time efficient.

The minister said: “The danger is not just in the agriculture lands that have been violated by building over them, but in the fact that it has become a direction and a culture of the people.”

“Even if we continued with the reclamation of new agricultural lands, the problem will persist and [investments will be lost],” he added.

The minister admitted that, in terms of authorities’ efforts to prevent the spread of this “encroachment culture”, the government has been absent to “a large extent”.

Abu-Hadid added that such monitoring is not the role of the government alone, and it should be assisted by the public, which he said “must understand that the effects on them of the exploitation of Egypt’s limited agricultural resources.”

On the new constitution, the minister said that “it includes articles that promise to protect agriculture lands and the rights of farmers.” 

via www.dailynewsegypt.com

On the Ropes, But No Obit for Muslim Brotherhood

CBN News by Erick Stackelbeck

WASHINGTON -- In Egypt, the so called Arab Spring has given way to a violent winter.

Dozens of Christian churches have been burned to the ground. Deadly attacks against Egyptian troops and police continue, as do calls for jihad against the so-called "enemies of Allah."

After Egypt officially banned the Muslim Brotherhood earlier this year, many people started dismissing the group as if it were no longer a powerful arm of radical Islam.

But Islamist groups don't give up so easily. The Muslim Brotherhood and its allies have been busy since the Egyptian military forced President Mohammed Morsi from office.

As it fights for survival, the Brotherhood is clearly on the ropes in Egypt. It has once again been outlawed, and most of its leaders now sit in prison awaiting trial.

Polls show that a large majority of Egyptians are pleased with the change. Millions of Egyptians consistently took part in massive protests last June calling for Morsi's ouster.

Raymond Ibrahim, Middle East expert and CBN News contributor, says Egyptian outrage is rooted in Morsi's and the Brotherhood's decision to put the advancement of radical Islamist ideology over the good of the Egyptian people.

"A lot of the people in Egypt on the ground are sick of them," Ibrahim told CBN News. "They're being accused of being disloyal, of working with foreign entities -- and just to get themselves in power and do their bidding."
 
The Brotherhood also faced backlash in Tunisia, where it rose to power in 2011. Its Palestinian branch, Hamas, has been weakened as well.

And a recent leadership change in the tiny, oil-rich nation of Qatar -- one of the global Brotherhood's biggest financiers -- may affect the group's efforts around the world.

But don't begin writing an obituary for the Muslim Brotherhood because it remains active in some 70 countries -- and it's resilient.

Middle East analyst Avi Melamed is a former Israeli intelligence official. He says as the Brotherhood struggles to regain its footing, even more radical forces, like al Qaeda, are seeking to take advantage in places like Syria.

"We have to remember that the Muslim Brotherhood is a very substantial factor in the Arab world. This is the biggest mass movement in the Arab Muslim Sunni world," Melamed told CBN News.

"Syria has also become a stage for the struggle between practical, political Syrian elements, like the Free Syrian Army on the one hand and radical Islam-affiliated groups, who basically see Syria as a great opportunity to establish an al Qaeda-style base in the heart of the Arab world," Melamed explained.

The growing strength of al Qaeda and its allies became clear most recently in Kenya, where the terror group al-Shabaab killed at least 67 people at a Nairobi shopping mall.

At the same time, Shiite Iran continues its march toward a nuclear bomb, and its Lebanese-based proxy, Hezbollah, has stockpiled tens of thousands of rockets and missiles.
 
Another ally, Turkey, continues to be a power player in the Middle East and beyond.
 
As for the Brotherhood, CBN News has reported how its followers hold influential advisory positions in the Obama administration even as these Muslim Brothers continue to lead violent protests against the interim Egyptian government.

"If anything, usually before a death blow, things get very chaotic, and hectic and violent. So, if anything, you can expect to see more of an outlash from the Brotherhood," Ibrahim said.

via www.cbn.com

Egyptian women fare the worst amongst Arab women, or do they?

According to the Thomson Reuters Foundation survey, conducted and distributed in November 2013, Egyptian women fare the worst amongst the women of the 22 Arab states. “Sexual harassment, high rates of female genital cutting and a surge in violence and Islamist feeling after the Arab Spring uprisings have made Egypt the worst country in the Arab world to be a woman.” 

The vision the reader perceives from this survey is of fairly docile and submissive women, veiled and secluded unable to protect themselves or their bodies. They don’t venture outside without permission as did Amina in Mahfouz’s Palace Walk; modest and passive, they obediently accept their overseer’s escort and rules.

Wrong! Egyptian women have proven that they not only have a voice but also a talent for exhibiting their dissatisfaction. By comparison to Saudi women who are unable to drive, Yemeni child brides who die at the age of eight, Egyptian women fare quite impressively. 

I’m not denying that many Egyptian women suffer even today: some are battered, others are married under age; many more are harassed and violated. Female genital mutilation is still rampant, verbal and physical abuse common. However, Egyptian women are proving that they are not in any way hindered by these attitudes; they have a presence on the street and in demonstrations. They call for change and demand attention.

Tahrir reflected this presence; tweeters replicated it even further. Nesreen Salem writes:

When history books reflect on modern Egypt, we will read the “official” version of the story but we will never read the stories that matter: her stories. We will not hear the voices of millions of women who stood shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand, on 25 January, 2011. Yet the revolution diary is filled with pages upon pages of the tribulations of Egyptian women. http://bit.ly/1hVayuP 

Women were indeed dealt a hard blow during the earlier days of the revolution and even later: virginity tests and the if-she-had-remained-at-home-nothing-would’ve-happened-to-her attitude. But, to these women's credit, the video of the seemingly unconscious and non-threatening abaya-clad woman dragged and hurled to the ground, beaten by batons, and stomped on the chest, her top ripped apart exposing her  blue bra exhibits how far Egyptian women were willing to go. Salem also says: “We will gain our emancipation with our very own hands. We are no longer waiting to be given our rights; we are snatching them from those who claim to be our protectors.” 

Today, women tweeters and activists are a voice to reckon with. A small token of these outspoken women is exemplified in @m7roussa, @Zenobia, @nervana_1, @monasosh, and @emannabih. They represent a new caliber of Egyptian women ready to voice their views and stand for their rights. I doubt if I can name the thousands of women willing to speak loudly and emphatically.

However, some Egyptian women may have taken it a precarious step further. This is the photo of Muslim Sisterhood members wearing similar attire and yellow bandanas. The image they exemplify is of warriors. 

 Here is another photo of women collecting rocks and stones to throw at soldiers or others.

Better yet this is a video of female students denouncing the police force and the Ministry of Interior. They promise to give both a beating that would leave its mark on the faces of these soldiers and officers.  

When they tell you that women have no say in Egypt, watch these women to realize that the events of the last three years created another caliber of women: defiant and disobedient. It’s a good thing that these women have gained confidence and will; it’s a bad thing that they’ve opted to fight Egyptians while at the same time wailing terror and disgust when they are charged.

Women should speak out, play an equal role as men in creating a new Egypt, and call for their own emancipation, but they shouldn’t feign docility if they opt to go that route. Equality entails having these women punished, if they must be, in an equal fashion to men.

The picture of the young MB female students in white robes behind bars was quite disconcerting.

However, if men are caged, then the women should be caged equally. Why should men be punished for disobedience and women not? If women demand equality, then they should be treated as men.  

As much as I want women to have the same rights as men, as much as I don’t want these women to be treated in any ill manner. This is quite the dilemma. I guess these young women must choose the course they wish to pursue: to become equal citizens to men or remain privileged women? 

Winston Churchill’s Egyptian Getaway: The Old Cataract Hotel

Read on. The Daily Beast, by Lauren Bohen

Photo by Bertrand Rieger/Hemis via Corbis

The Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan has played grand host to the likes of Churchill, Mitterrand and Agatha Christie—but in the wake of Egypt’s revolution, it’s facing a slow death on the Nile.

Khaled Ali Abdullah says he has the keys to the most beautiful room in all of Egypt.

The 40-year-old flows through the meticulously majestic halls of the Old Cataract Hotel with a self-possessed brand of pride and swagger that’s hard to come by in a country drooping with expired dreams.

“This is my hotel, my Egypt,” he beams in his perfectly tailored gray suit as he walks into the “Winston Churchill” suite, named after the statesman who used to stay there. The room goes for several thousand dollars a night.

The Old Cataract Hotel, built in 1899, is owned by the Egyptian government but managed by Sofitel, a French luxury hotel group. It’s a beacon of luxury and charm perched on the Nile in Egypt’s southern city of Aswan, not far from breathtaking antiquities. It’s where the famed mystery writer Agatha Christie was inspired to write Death on the Nile (she, too, has her own namesake room). French president François Mitterrand rested his head here multiple times, as did Princess Diana of Wales and the Agha Khan. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt reportedly travelled there on a private jet.

Khaled, the tall, robust “VIP extraordinaire,” who hails from a tiny village outside Aswan, is in charge of making sure the needs of high-profile guests are met. He giggles like a schoolboy when he recalls how Mitterrand routinely requested for Khaled to assist him to the hotel’s sprawling terrace for afternoon tea.

“His own team of people used to brush me away, but the President always wanted me to stay and help,” Khaled recounts, his deep onyx eyes smiling. “This hotel is about making people feel special.” Khaled included.

But not many tourists have stayed at the swank hotel since its Fall 2011 re-opening following a three-year $100-million renovation, orchestrated by French designer Sybille de Margerie. Announcing “The Rebirth of a Myth,” the hotel reopened just before the popular uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak. Since then, it has rarely broken an occupancy rate of 10 percent amidst protracted political chaos. Right now, occupancy hovers around two percent.

“The uprising has been a big challenge for us…really, the situation is awful,” said Lamia Assem, director of marketing. “All of Upper Egypt is struggling. We’re trying to promote local tourism, but that’s even difficult. Before all of this, it was a marvelous, successful hotel.”

via www.thedailybeast.com

Cairo today—resembling Montreal

‘Disaster’: The Brother of Egypt’s Deposed Muslim Brotherhood President Isn’t Heaping Praise on His Sibling’s Leadership

The Blaze.ccom

A supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood and of ousted president Mohammed Morsi holds a poster of Morsi during a rally outside the police academy where his trial was taking place, Nov. 4, 2013, in Cairo. Egypt’s deposed president went on trial over protester deaths, raising fears of new bloodshed four months after the army ousted him. (AFP/Getty Images)

In an interview published in the New Republic this week, Hussein Morsi, the younger brother of deposed Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated President Mohammed Morsi described his brother’s tenure as Egypt’s leader as disastrous.

The younger Morsi, who is himself active in his local Muslim Brotherhood cell, or “usra,” said of his brother’s presidency, “I think it was a disaster.”

In the interview with Egypt scholar Eric Trager of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Hussein Morsi acknowledged his brother “made some mistakes” and described the presidency as a “huge responsibility.”

Despite the fact that his brother had ascended to Egypt’s highest political office, Hussein Morsi, a high school math teacher, suggested the honor may have negatively impacted his own family.

“We lost many of our rights,” he said. “For example, when someone fought with my son, before I would fight about it. But [after Morsi became president] I couldn’t, because people would say that I’m doing it because my brother is president.”

Morsi served as president for a year, but his brother Hussein never visited the presidential palace. The brothers did meet at Mohammed Morsi’s other Cairo home and spoke by telephone regularly.

Hussein said he is committed to fighting for the reinstatement of his brother – to whom he referred as “Dr. Morsi” – as president.

“Everything will go back to its place,” Hussein Morsi said.

Trager described the Morsi family’s humble roots, having come from the impoverished village of Al-Adwa, a Brotherhood stronghold.

Morsi was removed from power in July and since then, he and top Muslim Brotherhood leaders have been on trial on charges of inciting to murder during protests last year. He could face the death penalty if convicted. During the first day of his trial, Morsi insisted he was still the legitimate president of Egypt.

“One Giza-based leader told me that phone communication is no longer safe for those Brotherhood officials who haven’t been arrested, so they now send messages to each other via their daughters,” Trager wrote.

Despite the challenges, Trager explained, the Muslim Brotherhood is far from being history.

While the government has cracked down on the organization in the cities, in smaller areas, the group continues its activities.

As to the future prognosis for the Islamist group, Trager wrote:

The fact that the Brotherhood is still functioning even somewhat normally in Egypt’s rural areas, despite a nationwide crackdown that has ensnared most of its top leaders, is good reason to question the widespread analysis that the organization cannot reemerge politically anytime soon. Much depends on what the Brotherhood’s leadership, perhaps even at the local level, decides to do: If the Brotherhood decides to run its own candidates as independents or support candidates from other parties in the next parliamentary elections, which are slated for next year, it could regain at least a small share of the influence that it lost during the past five months.

“Of course, the Brotherhood is hardly on the cusp of a dramatic comeback, but the fact that it is far from dead means that the struggle for Egypt’s future isn’t over,” Trager wrote.

–

via www.theblaze.com

Egypt, December 2013

It’s almost three years since Bouazizi turned on the tap of change in the Middle East. After a torrent of events, the Middle East, with Egypt in the centre, is truly in a predicament, its leaders unable to figure out the next moves or the due paths, its peoples disgruntled and dissatisfied.

Having arrived in Egypt for the winter, I observe the change.  The seething unrest is not apparent. People are going about their businesses oblivious of the underlying turbulences or simply ignoring them.  

From the political perspective, Cairo verges on the birth of a new constitution. The Committee of 50 came up with a constitution that seems quite rational if compared to Morsi’s 2012 version.  Will this new constitution please everyone? Definitely not. Will it be the all and end all one? Guaranteed, it won’t. It is only a step in the right direction. And yet, the hum and the buzz around the 2013 Constitution is deafening.

The government itself is in qualms with many of the leading factions. It is trying to stabilize the rocking vessel amidst unrest and calamities, be they intentional or unintentional—train disasters, suicide bombers, distrust, impatience, and lack of obedience and control. 

In defiance, protests at universities across Egypt have escalated after the death of one engineering student, Mohamed Reda. Al Azhar University and Cairo University saw the brunt of these protests. Since then, the dean and deputies of the faculty of Engineering at Cairo University have resigned, and the Faculty of Engineering has suspended classes indefinitely. The situation facing Cairo University mirrors the mess elsewhere.  

These students don’t fall under one umbrella but actually represent various offshoots: activists who have a bone to pick with everything the new, or any, government initiates; MB members who are relentless in their call for the return of Morsi’s rule, a student body seeking retribution for its fallen; infiltrators who represent even wider retaliatory organizations; thugs hired to aggravate the unrest even further; and onlookers, those there for the fun of it unable to fathom that people die in such circumstances.

More importantly is the change that has occurred in some Egyptian women. This is quite the phenomenon. This photo shows Muslim Sisterhood members, ready to die for their cause.

It’s a good thing that these women have gained confidence and will; it’s a bad thing that they’ve opted to fight Egypt in general while wailing terror and disgust when they are captured or charged.

Simultaneously, the Muslim Brotherhood itself is far from done. Its members changed tactics somewhat. Now they congregate in smaller groups and venture into cramped, congested streets and alleys, creating a far more reaching effect than before. Their aim: to disturb the peace, so they harass passersby, feign car trouble to block roads, and make lots of noise just to inflate their presence.  

The streets of Cairo are more or less under siege, not only by protestors and MB demonstrators who flaunt their defiance but also by traffic snarls that border chaos. However, Cairenes have accepted this dilapidated state as the norm. They know that an errand across Cairo may take 90 minutes instead of 19, and they’ve accepted this as the norm and organized their lives accordingly. They've actually wizened up regarding how to deal with traffic snarls and demonstrations. Resorting to side streets, maneuvering amongst double parked cars, pedestrians, and an influx of traffic, they do reach their final destination even if in a delayed but acceptable fashion.

But the most troubling is the sense that things have gone from worse to worst: Egyptians don’t see eye to eye, are unable to forgive or forget, and believe in their own cause and no one else’s. A myriad of backfiring views and clashing causes leave other Egyptians spent, their strength usurped.

But it has suddenly dawned on most Egyptians, the remaining 90 million that is, that change will not come as speedily as they had expected, that, if it comes at all, it will take years to implement. And yet life must continue in spite of everything. They accepted that they have to go about the business of feeding children and protecting dependents. They’ve suddenly realized that though the bigger picture may not be forthcoming in change, the nuclear one will go on, and it is by far the most important to one’s sanity. The horror of earlier events left them tarnished but stronger, determined to live—as they should.

I’m with those who have decided to go off politics and distance themselves from the mess and the disgruntlement.  Though I personally have been unable to do so, I give them credit.

It’s high time Egyptians find a way to enjoy life. They deserve it.

Egyptian urban inflation soars, adds to risk of unrest

Associated Press, Via The Daily Star

CAIRO: Egyptian urban consumer inflation soared in November to its highest annual rate in nearly four years, increasing the risk of social unrest and potentially serving up a policy dilemma for the central bank.

Crippled by political turmoil since a popular uprising toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011, Egypt’s economy expanded just 2.1 percent in the year to June 30.

The central bank has cut interest rates three times by a total of 150 basis points since the army deposed Islamist President Mohammad Morsi in July, most recently – and unexpectedly – by 50 basis points at a meeting last week.

The bank said then it was more concerned about boosting growth than taming inflation.

But urban consumer prices rose 13 percent in November year on year, state statistics agency CAPMAS said Tuesday, their highest rate of increase since January 2010 and well up on October’s 10.4 percent.

Food costs, some of which are already heavily subsidized by the state, were a major factor in the increase.

“At the moment, the central bank is stuck, because it’s trying to cut the yield on government debt and at the same time help stimulate the economy and keep inflation in check,” said Angus Blair, chairman of business and economic forecasting think tank Signet.

“You’ve got an economic dilemma which they have to try and tackle.”

Spokespeople at the central bank could not immediately be reached for comment on the data, which also showed monthly inflation at 0.9 percent.

But in a statement accompanying Thursday’s rate cut decision it had acknowledged the possibility of higher inflation.

“While upside risks to the inflation outlook continue to moderate as the possibility of a rebound in international food prices is unlikely in light of recent global developments, annual inflation could increase above ... current levels in November and December,” it said.

The price index for urban food and nonalcoholic beverages rose by almost 20 percent while that for hotels, cafes and restaurants gained more than 22 percent, CAPMAS data showed.

“Clearly in a period where there is a restive population people expect a better standard of living and it’s likely that there will be social repercussions if inflation continues to run at these levels,” Blair said.

More than 26 percent of Egyptians live below the poverty line, according to the latest CAPMAS data, and the government is hooked on a subsidy regime under which it spends a fifth of its budget keeping energy and some food prices, including bread, well below market cost.

It has also launched a 29.6 billion Egyptian pound ($4.3 billion) stimulus package, aided by over $12 billion in aid pledged by Arab Gulf countries, since the army ousted Morsi in July following mass protests against his rule.

Egypt’s Investment Minister Osama Saleh said the government planned to launch a second 24 billion pound package in January.

The budget reached a deficit of 14 percent of GDP in the year to June 30, though Thursday’s rate cut promises to ease pressure on government finances, with debt yields having fallen at two auctions since then.

via www.dailystar.com.lb

MB women on a mission

If they plan on turning it into a war, then they should expect to be treated as soldiers. Soldiers often end up in prison; no preferential treatment.  

Omar Samra is Going to Space!

Cairo Scene, by Amy Mowafy 

After months of physically-gruelling training and competition, Egyptian mountain-climber, entrepreneur and all-round inspiration, Omar Samra has landed himself one of Axe's coveted tickets to space. Amy Mowafi applauds the unstoppable shooting star.

Here is what I have always found to be the strangest thing about Omar Samra. He is the most unassuming man you will ever meet.

Yes, there is a strength and presence in his physicality, honed and hewed by the years of mountain climbing and physically-grueling thrill seeking.  But unless he’s taking to a stage, a school, a conference room, tasked with motivating and inspiring – something that he clearly relishes – he will keep his charisma firmly tucked away.  He will not regale you with tales of his adventures (unless pushed and prodded and only then in the most sincerely humble and self-depreciating of vernaculars).  He will not draw everyone in the room towards him with the power of his presence or any of that special-person cliché nonsense. His voice is not big or booming, really quite the opposite. Sometimes you have to lean in a little to even catch what he’s saying. Whenever you see a picture of him atop a mountain or on some far-flung corner of the earth, he always seems a little surprised to be there.

Because Omar Samra doesn’t talk about doing, he doesn’t ‘do’ for the praise or the accolades or the awards (although they have been plenty coming).  He does because he is seemingly driven by a desire to truly test what is possible, for his mind, his soul, his body. For you and for me. For everyone who has an outlandish dream but thinks it is unattainable, hampered only by a lack of belief.  

When I first met him and would joke about climbing a mountain, and tagging along on one his big adventures, he would shrug and say, “Sounds good, we’re going in a couple months, want to sign up?” As if climbing a mountain were as easy as doing my makeup.

He lacks that voice in his head that says it can’t be done, or perhaps he’s learned to smother it beneath the force of his passion, perseverance and desire.

And so he has become the first Egyptian to climb Mount Everest and then to summit all seven of the highest peaks in the world.  He has traversed the iciest stretches of landmass in the world and while he was at it, founded Wild Guanabana, an award winning travel business - one that gives thousands the opportunity to grab life by the balls and just have an adventure.

And now after years of reaching for the stars (and begging all of us to do the same) Omar Samra is heading for the stars. Not proverbially, or metaphorically, but quite literally getting in a spaceship and heading for the bloody stars.

After winning an AXE competition ticket, which qualified him for the final round of the Space Competition in Orlando, USA, it was officially announced, late last night, that he had landed one of the 13 coveted spots on the spaceship, with each person selected based on physically and mentally grueling competitive space-simulation challenges. “Tonight was one of those epic moments in a man’s life,” he wrote on his Instagram when the results were announced, clutching, of course, the Egyptian flag. “We do this to inspire a future brighter and better generation.” 

In an era when Egypt seems only to be famous, or infamous, for its never-ending revolutions and revolutionaries, Omar Samra flies the flag (literally – trucking around that red, white and black, wherever he goes) for the best type of Egyptian and best type of human. One who is defiant and dazzling in the face of life’s

via www.cairoscene.com