The horrific incidents went unreported by the local media, except for Al-Masry Al-Youm which published an article about it yesterday based on the bloggers’ testimonies. MP Mustafa Bakri has submitted questions to the government today about the incidents, while the Interior Ministry is claiming nothing happened, as always.
Karam Gabr, the paper’s editor is claiming Wael is fabricating the incidents using his “sick fantasies”, and started the usual overdose of flag-waving with accusations of “defaming Egypt’s image” BS.
Gabr is the same guy who back in the summer was claiming that Mohamed Sharqawi was also fabricating stories about his torture and sexual abuse.
Shame on you Rosa! And as for you Gabr, your seat in President Gamal Mubarak’s Ministry of Truth is surely waiting…
maybe you should mention that we had 6 eyewitness accounts published on blogs (waels., malek, radwa, sharqawy, gemy hood, ma3t). some eyewitness accounts on comments.
then we had two sets of interviews with shopkeepers from the area, one conducted by a blogger who talked to 5 people and another by Dream TV who talked to 3 more.
between the bloggers the only discrepancies where in estimating the numbers involved (whether few hundreds or slightly more than 1000), the interviews with the shopkeepers 2 out of the 8 denied anything happened at all in typical defensive tone, the rest all gave accounts that matched what the bloggers said but this time the variation in numbers was higher (one guy said a tens and another said thousands).
I don’t know if it ever get’s better than this in journalism but that’s sure more fact checking and eyewitnesses than what one expects from Rosa.
as for the whole no one reported anything to the police, well at least sharqawy did try to report (to the very people who sexually harassed him) and they refused to take his statement.
Maybe foreign press will do the trick!
apparently Al Ahram did more interviews that confirmed the incident, and actress Ola Ghanem whome Malek reported was present at the scene talked about it all on Orbit TV.
I don’t think we need to confirm this more than that, it not only happened, IT HAPPENS.
It’s faintly pathetic that the regime thinks Rose al-Youssef still has any authority in an age of multiple private news outlets and the internet and blogs…I can’t believe they think all they need to do is write something in Rose al-Y and pouf, all the testimonies out there and pieces of reportage are going to vanish and people are obediently going to say “well Rose al-Youssef says nothing happened.”
Dear Alaa and everyone concerned, we don’t need to “confirm” anything, what we need is to sue Karam Gabr. He is a pimp.
Now the ones who are deemed “sick” and “destabilizing the country’s security” are the ones who dared expose the recurrent and persistent shame that stains us all and worsens our constant insecurity.
We need to take this fight to the court. It’s now or never.
Nobody will trust you, dear bloggers, if you come out of this even with a draw. You have to introduce to the public a cover-up scandal, a security inaction scandal, and seek a legal and public protection of citizen journalism.
These guys can recoginze only rape as sexual harrassment! Yet somebody else will have the nerves to justify it in the name of Allah, the most gracious, the most mercifull!
These guys won’t admit anything unless girls file compolaints at Qasr El Nil Police Station and sue the police for being such SOBs.
We really need to campaign. Banners, petitions, and all.
And girls, you are not safe, the rapists are. Muftis, state-owned press editors and the police protect those who will finger you, poke you, strip you, humilitate you, and FUCK you in the street.