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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 May 2000 Issue No. 482 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 May 2000 Issue No. 482
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Features Heritage Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Yes minister, no minister
By Sarah El-Deeb"First of all, the book is no longer available on the market, so it no longer presents a threat to anybody. In Egypt there is no such thing as pre-publication censorship, only post-publication censorship. If Al-Azhar, the Ministry of Interior or any such authority decides that a book contains what might constitute a breach of the law, the procedure is to complain to the prosecutor general.
Salah Eissa
"That is why there was no order of confiscation. One can't pull a novel out of the market if it is not available in the first place. No doubt there was some misunderstanding, due to [Culture Minister Farouk Hosni's] use of several imprecise terms -- one of these being the phrase "withdrawn from the market" -- but as far as the minister's own stance goes, he thinks that his position was nonetheless consistent. If anyone's position adamantly defends freedom of expression, it is in fact the minister's.
"In a crisis that involves the national security apparatus and the religious establishment, as well as the Ministry of Culture, it is only natural to expect some difference of positions. I think that the concerned authorities initially underestimated the response to the campaign. What made the crisis even worse was that a sizable number of mosque preachers carried the campaign from the newspapers to the mosques. It was actually the security authorities that caused the ministry to back down at first. Other authorities were even less flexible.
"This is a novel aimed at intellectuals, the public should not necessarily be expected to understand it. If the issue only stayed within intellectual circles, it would not have taken on such proportions. You saw how it was all orchestrated: not simply an article, but the controversial quotes taken out of context and turned into headlines. One must also realise that the minister has been subject to blackmailing from both sides, which makes it very hard to maintain his consistently democratic stance. Hopefuly referring the issue to the judicial system will get everyone's hands off, including the parliament and Al-Azhar.
"The issue is political; it has nothing to do with religion. The Labour Party is practically blackmailing the government: either you release the editor of Al-Shaab, or we will wage a campaign against you. If they were really angry because a book on the market insulted Islam, they would have followed the legal procedures. But they did not do that, despite the simplicity of the issue, because it would not have been loud enough. And the evidence for this is that while the issue is in court, the campaign against the minister continues.
"Administratively, it is not logical to expect that the minister will read all the books published by the ministry. Not even the leader of the Labour Party reads every word published in his party's paper. But if censorship, based on the same criteria [used against Haydar's novel], were imposed on books published by the ministry, hundreds of novels -- those of Ihsan Abdel-Qoddous, Youssef El-Siba'i and Naguib Mahfouz not excluded would end up being banned.
"[In refusing to host the press conference arranged by intellectuals], the Press Syndicate likewise succumbed to the Labour Party's terrorising agenda. When Al-Shaab threatened to publish a headline that would read: "Come to the Press Syndicate Meeting to Defend God's Religion", the syndicate feared possible clashes. But of course [the Labour Party] is using terrorising methods; that is why it is necessary to form a unified front to defend freedom and democracy. But even within that front, there are countless contradictions. There are differences over the minister's policy's among intellectuals, which prevents many from adopting a firm position.
"I think intellectuals have to call for reorganising newspapers in the light of this battle. We need more organisation, independence from the official cultural authority and increased participation in public discussions. We must learn how to express differences of opinion in a civilised way, because some intellectuals oppose the Ministry of Culture and the minister in the Labour Party's manner. Their information is also often incomplete and imprecise. Now intellectuals have a chance to set up bodies independent of the cultural authority. But meanwhile, and regardless, the hell of the government is better than the heaven of Adel Hussein.
"The general picture is not bad. Now we have the Tagammu Party and its newspaper against Al-Shaab; we also have the Nasserite party and its paper; and the Wafd Party's position -- their attempt to be unbiased notwithstanding -- is not bad. The Labour Party is increasingly losing all political backing. Intellectuals are against it, which means that the party's cheap triumphs in the street will lead to nothing in the end.
"[The compulsion to defend Arabic literature, too,] has forced Arab intellectuals into this Egyptian battle, which is a great benefit, I think, particularly because other Arab intellectuals appeared more enlightened and even the official authorities elsewhere seemed more open-minded in dealing with the issue. I think that the Labour Party, despite the temporary benefits it reaped, has undergone a serious loss. For one thing, the government will not respond to blackmailing, refusing to release Labour prisoners. There is more of a chance that these pawns will increase due to involvement in this crisis. Secondly, the party has lost its last remaining supporters, who defended its right to exist based on an eagerness to see democratic principles implemented. [Labour] also lost a large number of moderate Islamists, who have serious reservations about the campaign.
"Such writers might be against the novel, or advocate censuring the parts of it that might offend them, but Egypt's enlightened Islamists increasingly feel that the Labour Party is leading them toward a confrontation with the government at a time when they do not want one. The Muslim Brotherhood has been subjected to enough problems in recent years with regard to elections and the military trials of some of its members. Consequently it is currently seeking more reconciliatory relations with the state. So they also feel that the Labour Party is leading them into an unnecessary confrontation with the state that only serves the party's interests.
"According to my own political analysis of the situation, when Adel Hussein became editor-in-chief of Al-Shaab in 1989, the Labour Party was a socialist democratic party, so the shift he brought about was to rally the support of political orientations that have no legal parties to represent them, including both the Nasserites, who did not have a party then, and the Muslim Brotherhood. Both were supposed to be combined into one integrated political force, but once this was under way, the Nasserites insisted on staying out and having their own independent party.
"The Muslim Brotherhood imposed conditions; it wanted to have a share in the party's leadership and space within its newspaper as an independent structure. So when Hussein found out that his original idea did not take shape, nor achieve the desired gains in popularity, he started trying to gain the support of extremist political groups; those who were leading the terrorists operations, such as the Jihad and the Jama'a. He is thus seeking to establish a legal cover for such groups, so that they become his party's supporters. This is the reason behind the Labour Party's extremist position on religion. I think this is a very dangerous game, particularly now that the national press is calling for the disbanding of the party and for referring it to the parties committee.
"There have always been problems between intellectuals and the cultural authority, represented by Farouk Hosni -- primarily due to a lack of dialogue. This campaign has resulted in a sort of realignment of positions, though, which is a positive consequence. The fanatics are now alone, while the cultural authority and the intellectuals are together on the other side, even though a fully-fledged thaw between the two has yet to occur. In my view, in the heat of battle, some unification between the cultural authority and intellectuals is likely to take place in the face of a common danger -- that is, extremism.
"The cultural authority in Egypt is, in my view, an enlightened authority, whether it is the minister or his principal aides we are assessing. I might differ with them on some issues, but the ministry's general tendency to effect the link between Egyptian culture and world culture -- to modernise, to reconstruct the infrastructure of cultural bodies destroyed during the Sadat era -- are all essential points of reference. This is why the most forceful attacks are perpetrated by fanatics. This realignment is actually very beneficial, and will reactivate society."
"The demonstrations against Haydar Haydar's novel are the result of the campaign of incitement and provocation undertaken by Al-Shaab newspaper. The situation is for the worse with the government's retreat in the face of Al-Shaab's campaign, represented by its decree to refer the novel to a committee to investigate its content and, as I've recently found out, in turn referring that committee to Dar Al-Ifta'. Personally, I am against this committee and against referring the novel to it. There is another authority, which I am not aware of, that in turn referred the committee directly to the grand mufti.
Gamal El-Ghitani
"I consider literature's only judge to be literary criticism itself. The clamour that erupted around A Banquet for Seaweed is the latest in a long series of attacks on literature. Prior to this, literary works have raised problems -- Naguib Mahfouz's Sons of Al-Gabalawi being the most famous case. A few months ago, though, there were problems at the American University in Cairo because of the books of Jibran Khalil Jibran and Mohamed Shukri. Every now and then a book, a poem or a story comes under fire, and regrettably, it is often for reasons other than literature.
"Our position as intellectuals and Akhbar Al-Adab staff is clear: we are against viewing literature from any perspective other than a literary one. In the meantime we are against offending religious feelings. I hardly welcome a literary work that offends the feelings of Muslims, but who decides that? Is it the Friday preachers and the newspapers practising incitement to murder, or specialised literary critics?
"Al-Shaab is carrying out a systematic campaign. After Haydar Haydar, in every issue of the newspaper, they have pointed to a new book. I view the whole thing as a long-term issue: the long-term threat to creativity and creative writers posed by this campaign. This kind of atmosphere can generate self-censorship, which is the most serious danger we could be facing.
"Regrettably, there is no organisation in Egypt that speaks from the intellectuals' viewpoint. In the past, if a famous writer like Taha Hussein or [Abbas Mahmoud] El-Aqqad was attacked, strong parties stood up to defend them. Now intellectuals are alone in the battle; they can do nothing but defend cultural values and stand up against extremism -- uncover it for what it is. I think this is very feasible, providing that we have the courage to do it. Otherwise there will come a time, not very far off, when no writer will be able to write a word.
"I think we are facing a very conniving adversary, our Shaab brothers. Silence or pacifying measures would only worsen the situation, as they will invariably continue with their attack. What are we to do? All we can do is write articles. They, on the other hand, carry guns. Al-Shaab is a legal newspaper with illegal organisations behind it.
"I am against referring any novel to a committee, especially if it is a well-known novel. Suppose in Germany someone objected about the poetry of Goethe, or the work of Thomas Mann. Are these works to be referred to a committee in response? Some works have just become part of the established literary canon; it is not logical that every few years you reconsider them. To form a committee to examine the work in question is simply an attempt by the government to contain public anger and resentment -- or this is what they think. But this will only serve to encourage more extremism. "while our campaign against the minister concentrated on cultural performance, Al-Shaab's campaign is essentially a campaign against culture. In the end it is a campaign against a novel. When we differed with the minister, it was over measures and procedures concerning the Islamic Museum, the millennium celebrations, etc. But now, I am defending culture. I am defending a novel, a book. There is no coordination between me and the minister or the ministry. I am acting out of my moral obligation as writer.
"The current climate can lead to assassinations, yes. There is a real threat to writers. Some simple people, believers, hear these words and do not read the novel. The novel was not well read, not very well known in the public at large. Now those students who are demonstrating, they are demonstrating because there is a blasphemous novel, written by an atheist, published by an atheist. This sets the scene for the assassination of writers. With Haydar Haydar's novel, the issue is really over a single sentence, uttered by a character, which was extracted from its context in the novel. Yet when we read novels by the very writer who waged the campaign, we found them full of blasphemy. One can only conclude that this person is fame crazed.
"These youths were incited; they were systematically manipulated. They are Muslims and believers, so when they are told that Islam is being insulted, they are not to blame, they are misled. When headlines call for Jihad (holy battle) in a country where the written word carries a lot of weight, one can only expect people to react in this way. There is also a general mood of disappointment, despair and economic crisis, which all find an outlet in issues like this one. This is where the danger lies. These students take to the streets, and immediately people join in, though they have nothing to do with what is going on. All the problems are thus reduced to one thing. This is the danger of this campaign."
