Make way for Palestine
The crisis in the occupied territories, the Egyptian economy and Iraq made headlines in the Egyptian press this week, writes Amira Howeidy
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October's Mahmoud El-Saadi features a man who has just read that the minister of manpower cancelled work permits for foreign belly-dancers. The man says to his wife, "Thank God! The problem of unemployment has been solved.";
Mustafa Hussein in Akhbar Al-Yom on the "phenomenon of conjoined twins";
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Israel's attempt on the life of Hamas founder and spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and the resignation of Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen, brought the Palestinian question back to the headlines after Iraq had taken priority the previous week.
"Israel to deport Arafat in response to Abu Mazen's resignation" read the Wafd Party's mouthpiece, Al-Wafd on 8 September. "Security concerns [if Arafat] is sent into exile" and "[Israel] threatens to liquidate all Hamas leaders."
Al-Ahram's 7 September front page gave prominence to the attempt to assassinate Yassin with a headline reading, "Sheikh Ahmed Yassin survives an Israeli assassination attempt. [Hamas leader Abdel-Aziz] Al-Rantissi: Israel opens the gates of hell. Hamas vows 'earth shattering' retaliation."
Following the European Union's decision to add the political wing of Hamas to its list of terrorist organisations, virtually banning the group and freezing its assets, a report from The Hague in Al- Wafd's 8 September issue emphasised the role of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in this latest development. "European sources," read the article, "stressed that the PA had helped the EU reach this decision because it had taken earlier steps to freeze the organisation's assets, among other groups. This was interpreted as an indirect declaration of Hamas's illegitimacy, thus declaring it a terrorist organisation."
The independent weekly Al-Osbou's 8 September issue summed up the developments in a telling headline, "Code word: Abu Mazen's resignation." Al-Osbou''s editor Mustafa Bakri devoted an entire inside page on this reading of events under the headline, "A US-Zionist agreement to deport Arafat and open the road to a civil war". According to Bakri, two Israeli security and political delegations visited the US recently to "put the final touches to a plan to invade Palestinian territories in one of the largest Israeli military operations, backed politically and technologically by the US administration." The plan, which the article says was discussed with some senators and the US National Security Council (NSC), proposed deporting Arafat from the occupied territories and if that proves difficult, to have Palestinian agents assassinate him and start a civil war. The Israeli delegation, wrote Bakri, argued in favour of a civil war as it will help prevent the Palestinians from carrying out "terrorist operations" against Israel, will be an opportunity for Israel to liquidate the Palestinians on its most wanted list and will help towards the collapse of Palestinian civil society.
The article blamed the internal Palestinian crisis that caused Abu Mazen's resignation on Washington and Tel Aviv, arguing that "they fed the Palestinian- Palestinian rift in order to divide the Palestinian front." Bakri went further into interpreting Abu Mazen's resignation as an attempt to "place more pressure on Arafat" and pave the way for Israel and the US to dispose of the Palestinian president.
Focus on the economic crisis in Egypt continued this week as government efforts to improve its image were emphasised by the national press and predictably ridiculed by the opposition. Al- Ahram's 7 September banner headline read, "$1.1 billion increase in exports and $546 million surplus in the balance of payments." Quoting Central Bank Governor Mahmoud Abul-Oyoun, the story said there was "clear and positive progress" and "an increase in our foreign currency resources". Citing figures, the governor argued that the value of the Egyptian pound had "improved when compared to foreign currencies in the bank" and predicted a "decline in the exchange rate".
A complementary story on the same page quoted Prime Minister Atef Ebeid as saying that the government will finish preparing work regulations for the "Interbank" payment system for foreign currency within this week. The same issue published three analyses on the economic crisis and the exchange rate.
The left-wing Tagammu Party's organ, Al-Ahali, pursued its campaign on the issue that has stretched over several months. "Ebeid decides to collect revenues of the state's main resources on daily basis" the paper's 3 September headline read. "The people have lost confidence in the government and dangerous repercussions from inflation anticipated," read a second headline. Al-Osbou's 8 September issue chose a red coloured heading reading, "the price monster is wolfing down the bread of the deprived."
"Put Atef Ebeid on trial before he is sacked," cried the independent weekly Sawt Al-Umma's 8 September banner while Abdallah El-Senawi, editor of the opposition Nasserist Party mouthpiece Al-Arabi, asked in his 7 September column, "what is President Hosni Mubarak really waiting for before dismissing Ebeid's government?"
A week after the assassination of Iraqi Shi'ite leader Mohamed Baqir Al-Hakim, reports and analyses this week adopted a critical approach towards America's responsibilities in Iraq, especially following the US proposal to the UN demanding a more active role for the international organisation in the occupied Arab country. "When will America admit to failing in Iraq?" asked the national weekly magazine October in its 7 September cover story.
Senior Al-Akhbar writer and chairman of the Press Syndicate Galal Aref published a column in Akhbar Al-Yom on 6 September titled "Who pays the price of foolishness?" "So only now does the US administration realise the huge price it has to pay for its occupation of Iraq, be it the death of its soldiers, US tax money or Bush's [slim] chances of winning re-election next year," Aref wrote. "Only now is the US reversing its position. It is accepting what it refused months ago, now wants to give the UN a bigger role in Iraq and is calling for a multinational peacekeeping force to control the deteriorating security situation in Iraq. But even as it reverses its position, it refuses to end its plan to build the American empire, controlling oil resources and [still wants to] rule the world on its own. And herein lies the problem." Aref argued that "the US administration does not want a UN that would put an end to the American role in Iraq but one that would affirm it." The "only" solution to the Iraqi crisis, he concluded, is to place and implement a programme that shifts power and decision-making to the Iraqis themselves through an "elected and legitimate government" in addition to ending the Anglo-American occupation.
An interview with the young Shi'ite Iraqi leader Muqtada Al-Sadr in Al- Ahram's 4 September issue quoted him as saying, "the occupation forces spread acts of terror... and the US prevents Iraq's stability in order to sustain the occupation." Egypt and other Islamic countries, Al-Sadr said, "should not send peacekeeping forces to Iraq because they will be supporting the occupation."
The weekly Al-Mussawar magazine's 5 September cover appeared in dramatic red set against the background of a scene from Al-Hakim's funeral. "Shi'ite anger burns bridges with the occupation forces" read the headline.
In a follow-up to last week's controversy caused by a scholar in Al-Azhar who issued a religious edict banning recognition of the Iraqi Interim Governing Council, Al-Ahram's 7 September issue published a front page news item saying Al-Azhar's Grand Imam Mohamed Sayed Tantawi sent a telegram on behalf of the institution's scholars expressing his condolences over the death of Al- Hakim.
The scholar in question, Mohamed El- Esh, was interviewed in Al-Mussawar which quoted him as saying, "had I known my fatwa was going to cause all this, I wouldn't have issued it."
Al-Mussawar's Editor Makram Mohamed Ahmed conducted an interview with Interior Minister Habib El-Adli who announced the release of 1,000 members of Islamist militant groups from prison. The minister was quoted saying that the release took place only after the ministry was sure that they had "sincerely changed their way of thinking, abandoned violence and realised that their previous stand was wrong."
El-Adli also told Ahmed that the problem with the ministry's search for missing Al- Ahram journalist Reda Helal was the "ambiguity of his life, his secrets and vast social network". He ruled out "any political connotations" to Helal's disappearance. Helal was last seen early last month.
As his 80th birthday draws near -- 23 September -- news of the Arab world's leading journalist Mohamed Hassanein Heikal's much talked about retirement took up extensive space in the press. "Don't do it Ustaz Heikal" wrote Farida El-Shoubashi in Al-Arabi's 7 September issue. Al-Osbou followed up on its anti- retirement campaign with a full page this issue, while Sawt Al-Umma took the subject a step further, opting for a 35-page supplement in its 8 September issue called, "Heikal: stories and secrets".
In the same issue, Sawt Al-Umma published two articles on the unusual popularity of an emblem in the shape of a fish that is appearing on the cars of many Egyptian Copts. The first article, headlined, "The fish, a special sign on cars whose drivers are Copts," explains that the symbol goes back to the Christian persecution under the Romans when Christians sketched the sign to identify one another. According to the report, an Egyptian company called Maria Group produces the symbol which is sold to Christians "exclusively". Sawt Al- Umma's Wael Abdel-Fatah's accompanying article entitled, "The fish bomb under the bed of national unity," sought to analyse the phenomenon and how it relates to Muslim and Christian forms of religiosity in today's society. "Why do Christians need to recognise each other through a religious symbol that is largely unknown to most people?" Abdel-Fatah asked. "The fish opens a very explosive file."
Al-Ahram: www.ahram.org.eg
Al-Wafd: www.alwafd.org
Al-Arabi: www.al-araby.com
Al-Osboa: www.elosboa.com
Al-Ahali: www.alahali.com
