Egypt’s Wall
Ursula Lindsey
February 1, 2010
(Ursula Lindsey is a Cairo-based reporter and writer.)
For background on Egyptian pro-Palestinian activism, see Ursula Lindsey, “Normalization Politics on the Nile,” Middle East Report 253 (Winter 2009).
See also Elliott Colla, “Solidarity in the Time of Anti-Normalization,” Middle East Report 224 (Fall 2002). Order the issue here.
In late December 2009, Arab TV channels aired footage of throngs of demonstrators, surrounded by the usual rows of riot police, on the streets of downtown Cairo and in front of foreign embassies. Street protests in Egypt have been sharply curtailed in the last few years, but the scene was familiar to anyone who had been in the country in 2005, when protests against President Husni Mubarak’s regime and in favor of judicial independence were a semi-regular occurrence. Yet there was something unusual about these protesters: They were all foreigners.
via merip.org