Egyptian Blood on Egytpian Hands: The Maspero Massacre

News from the Egyptian Street and Media Translated Without Comment from Arabic into English As a Public Service
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The email came to me, fast and furious.  It was from a young Coptic lawyer, one of my collaborators.  It was dated October 11 on a horrific disaster which befell all of Egypt on Sunday, October 9, at Maspero.  That is where the Egyptian Television is located, facing both the great Nile and also thousands of mainly Coptic demonstrators.

On that eventful day, perhaps the most eventful since Dictator Mubarak was chased out of office, 26 demonstrators were killed, 329 injured.  The cause of the Maspero uprising: an attack in upper Egypt on an Egyptian Coptic church in the most southern of Egyptian provinces, Aswan Province.  It was the spark that ignited the Copts who marched from their area of mostly Coptic concentrations in Cairo, called Shubra, on the symbol of Egypt's newly found freedom of expression, the state-run Egyptian Television at Maspero.

In his email of October 11, my Coptic lawyer friend said: "Egypt is crying blood and all the reason for that is the selfishness of some political parties and internal/external groups that want to see Egypt in this catastrophe.  I am really wondering why this is occurring for our dear country which really does not deserve all of that.  I also bring this tragedy to the lack of rule of law (for) which we all should work to strengthen (it.)"

Reflection of this extreme anxiety about the future of the Revolution of January 25 was through a cartoon in a government-controlled newspaper called "Rose Al-Youssef" which made the rounds throughout the Arab world.  The gifted cartoonist by the name of Anwar, had 2 persons wading into a pool of blood: one representing the military, the other, the civilian Prime Minister, Dr. Essam Sharaf.  On top of these two figures, the ominous words read: "Do you think we should open an investigation in where this blood came from, or is that not necessary?"

That bloody confrontation was between Coptic demonstrators on one side and security forces bolstered by military police on the other.  Muslims seem to have been split into two factions:  one group sided with the Copts, the other with the forces of the Government.  The first group was rewarding the Copts for their principled stand for national unity during the anti-Mubarak uprising; the second was rewarding the army for keeping its powder dry when Tahrir was aflame in quest of Mubarak's removal form power.

Who is to blame?  All parties.  Who are the winners?  Nobody.  Who are the losers: EGYPT.  In an email, my dearest niece told me from Cairo: "My heart is breaking for Egypt."

What are the consequences?  The honeymoon between the army and its people seems to have evaporated -at least for now.  There is suspicion that the military is angling for overstaying their welcome by extending the period of military rule, with a facade of a supine civilian government.

Yet actions by the Government were swift as were mutual recriminations.  Partial night curfew was declared for central Cairo; the Supreme Council of Armed Forces instructed the Government to conduct a thorough investigation and to bring to justice all those who were the cause of that mayhem; the Prime Minister called for national unity; the Copts called for the internationalization of sectarian strife, accusing the army of complicity.

In such complicated event, the conspiracy theory takes a front seat in the drama of the new Egypt taking its first baby steps towards democracy.  PM Sharaf declared: "There are criminal internal and external fingers which played their part in the violence in central Cairo to impede the establishment of a democratic system in Egypt."  Then he went on to tell the nation on TV: "The worst dangers confronting Egyptian security are the attempts to disrupt national unity; to sow disunity (between Muslims and Copts); to drive a wedge between the people and their army... It is difficult to characterize what happened as a sectarian conflict."

PM Sharaf seemed to have a boost for his theory from Pope Shenoudah, the head of the Coptic Church.  His Eminence, through the Holy Clerical Council which included 170 bishops, declared: "Christian faith rejects violence.  Outsiders penetrated Coptic demonstrators to commit those atrocities and then point the finger of blame at the Coptic community."

As for Al-Azhar (the Glorious) (Seat of Islamic learning for more than 1000 years), it declared through its Grand Imam, Sheikh Dr. Ahmed El-Tayeb:  "The Egyptian military was and shall always be the expression and manifestation of the principle of Egyptian citizenship."

The root cause of Coptic unrest was also tackled:  The Council of Ministers is slated to approve within two weeks a new law for standardizing the zoning rules of the construction of both mosques and churches.

If it does, then the flames at Maspero, which were ignited from a small church in Aswan Province, might have been converted into light guiding Egypt in the near future towards civilian and democratic rule.