Egyptian soldiers block a street during an anti-government protest in Tahrir square in Cairo on January 31, 2011
Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/162945.html
Dirty tactics are beginning to be used to strike fear into the hearts of Egyptian protesters.
Police out of uniform are employing militia tactics, thugs are hired to loot, and state media are portraying a calm society by distorting reports and images as an attempt to tarnish the reputation of peaceful protesters as looters and thugs.
The following is the transcript of Press TV's interview with Jihan Hafez, a journalist currently in Egypt, who tells us what is really happening on the streets in Cairo despite efforts by the government media to distort the image of protesters.
Press TV: Can you tell us the latest in exactly what's taking place in Cairo?
Hafez: Well the latest update, as far as the media is concerned, is the Egyptian government has officially banned Al-Jazeera Arabic and Al-Jazeera English. We're actually in the building that shares offices with the network and we've just watched them flee. In fact, the requests came in for us to do this interview in front of Tahrir [Square], but the security forces came in and said they cannot show the outside world of what's happening. So it seems as though, despite cutting the internet, which is the largest internet cut in internet history, it's also now being accompanied by a media blackout - which we're experiencing. We don't often go down with our cameras at this point.
Some updates on the government's cabinet here in the country. President Hosni Mubarak has announced two new governors to north Sinai and the Good Valley, both are areas which have experienced intense violence, especially north Sinai. In fact, clashes between the Bedouin and the police forces resulted in a number of deaths. And, so what's happening here in the country, and what everyone sees happening, is as you saw in your reports.
The US government has a stake to lose in this uprising. Egypt is geostrategic to the United States; it has been for the past 30 years. The tear gas bombs, the canisters that were being blown/blasted through the crowds in to the Egyptian civilians, all said "Made in the United States" - Jamestown, Pennsylvania, to be specific. And when people came up to us with these weapons, they were infuriated. And coming from the United States, [the people] said, "Why, why is America doing this to us? What did we do to the American people?"
Now the Egyptian people know that the Egyptian government receives USD 1.3 billion, and they know exactly where that money is going. It is not going to what the US government says is economic health and development, although there is some money to that. The people here, now, know that there is a strict contradiction to what's coming out of Washington, and what's happening here on the streets of Cairo and all throughout the country.
What Hillary Clinton says, "We support protests, we support reform in Egypt", the weapons being used [were] against the people, and used against the journalists - we were tear gassed badly, we couldn't film for a while. These are all weapons manufactured in the United States. People here associate Omar Suleiman, now the Vice President who was sworn in today, with a new puppet of the US government - someone to maintain hegemony here in this region because, as I mentioned, without Egypt you have no control over the Palestinian territory, especially Gaza; and, of course, the Israeli connection is something to note.
Aside from that, there are buildings on fire here in Egypt, still. A number of different government buildings, including police stations, court houses, government cars, [and] police vans that have been abandoned by the police, are still being set ablaze. There are tanks, as we speak, rolling through Tahrir [Square] where I can see this happening, but, unfortunately, we can't show you because of this possible media blackout that's about to happen. So, Egypt is still in chaos, and there's still an impasse between the Egyptian people and the government. They know that this is a farce. They know that Omar Suleiman and the new Prime Minister are simply reshuffling NDP/Hosni Mubarak's people back into the governments - very similar to what was happening in Tunisia.
And the Egyptian people know this. They say this is our uprising; we do not want this to go the way Tunisia went - meaning we don't want our government to be reshuffled with the same people. And on top of that, Egypt has been a military country since the 1952 revolution which ousted foreign forces. The military now is in full-force here all over the country. Tanks have replaced cars in Cairo, literally. And the worry here is the [Egyptian] army and the military still have weapons. And the people do not want this country to be run like a military country anymore.
On top of that, President Hosni Mubarak just went to the headquarters of the defense ministry to show his support and to indicate, according to a lot of people who have witnessed this, that he's still in charge. So, that's the latest development into what's happening and the reflections of the Egyptian people who are still tens of thousands in Tahrir Square right now.
Press TV: Jihan, there have been reports of looting, and some of our political experts were saying that perhaps a lot of the looting has been done by security forces themselves. What's your perspective on this and the situation overall?
Hafez: That's the only thing that people are seeing here. We have not been experiencing any violence here from protestors. This, for example, is actually very important…we're staying in an apartment, and as we're walking through with our cameras down we saw, with our own eyes, that we weren't able to shoot, police officers taking off their black uniforms and putting on civilian clothing. And they came and they guarded our apartment building. And they wouldn't let anyone leave. And they had clubs. We've seen, with our own eyes, them transforming out of police uniform into civilian gear. They've been using, as we've witnessed, ambulances to push into these residential neighborhoods. And then as soon as they get out, they create this havoc.
Nearly every neighborhood in Cairo has a militia to protect. In fact, in New Cairo, Muskebedya, and all the upper scale neighborhoods, they're making weapons. They're creating weapons out of sticks and knives, and out of anything they can find to defend themselves from these prisoners. Everyone here in this country is aware that prisoners are being let out.
In fact, I covered the Egyptian election here. And the same thing happened when the people were voting for the Muslim Brotherhood, which has lots of support in this country with Christians and Muslims. They released these prisoners and they were beating people profusely, preventing them from getting to the ballots. That's happening right now. They're trying to detour people from coming into the circle, and to confuse them with protecting their homes as opposed to hitting the streets. But despite that, there are still tens of thousands on the streets only in Cairo.
In Suez, in Alexandria, they've initiated a curfew. That curfew: no one's respected it whatsoever. In fact, they've been calling consecutive curfews since [January] 28th, the day of violence. No one has respected them. And the police now have been out of sight but not out of mind because on top of this we've been getting reports, unconfirmed at this point, that the Valley of Kings, one of the "Pharaohnic" sites of this country, has been looted. Along with the Egyptian museum, things were smashed, things were stolen….the pyramids themselves. These are "national prides" of the Egyptian people.
None of them say, at least the protestors we spoke to, they would ever do this. They were all pointing this to the thugs. On top of this, we've filmed yesterday morning as the military was moving in, people running all over the museum taking things out. And these weren't protestors. Protestors were very outraged at the fact that this was happening. So I've seen, I've witnessed with my eyes, along with the other journalists I've been working with, that these are thugs, that these are police/government-hired people to coop what's been happening, and to create a diversion away from what these people have been trying to do.
And what they're trying to do is to overthrow a government that's been here for 30 years - regardless of [whether] it's a new Vice President, or if it's a new Prime Minister.
Press TV: Jihan, in general, what was the situation in the country today? Today was the first day of the work week. Did most people go to work, or, in general, was there a strike? Give us a feel on the state of the country today, especially Cairo.
Hafez: Well the fascinating thing about what's happening in this country is that there's no leader of this movement. There's no name to this uprising. There's nothing. And, so the way the Egyptian people communicate with each other is they disseminate these leaflets to tell these people to "Go on strike! Go on strike!" No one's working today. There are cars moving but half of them are stuck on the bridge and they're joining the protestors.
It's impossible to find food within the surrounding area…to find water, to find anything. Everything is shut. The people are afraid to open their stores because of the looting and the possible riots, and/or they're obeying the strike and no one's working. And on top of that … the main government administration building has been taken over by the people. This is one of the main arteries for the government to function. And it's right in the middle of Tahrir Square, the square which we keep talking about. This leads all into the downtown area.
On top of that, the government has issued a warning to deport, literally deport all tourists of this country, because of the violence that's been happening in all of the different sites. So, we're still witnessing a state of chaos. We don't know if we can get on the streets and film anymore because the situation with the army included is very sensitive. No one's filming. And, as I mentioned, they just kicked Al-Jazeera out. So you can only imagine other journalists on the street right now simply covering what's happening inside of Tahrir, none-the-less the entire country.
Press TV: Jihan, we have reports coming in that protesters have been shot in the head by snipers - Do you have any more information on that?
Hafez: Yes in fact we had that this morning. Some 10,000 people spent last night in Tahrir Square and from on top of the old building of the American University overlooking Tahrir Square there were snipers. People have shown us bullets, we have no photos to confirm this, but there were plenty of people that came up to us screaming at our cameras and saying that there had been snipers shooting at them all night.
This is the only way the people can communicate - through a camera - so as soon as they see a camera they swarm it and say listen there were snipers shooting, there are dead people. There was a man shot dead at the mosque. People here were outraged that they shot this man - his friend was right next to him as he was dying and they brought us to the mosque to film that.
The only way to know what is happening here in Cairo is to be on the streets; to talk to the people and find out their sentiments; they are the stars of this movie playing out right now.
Press TV: What is state TV showing in general right now?
Hafez: Nothing. I'm telling you - at all. In fact they are saying that everyone's going to work today; everyone they have to come on TV and comment on what's been happening is, for example, a crying woman talking about how her daughter could be raped or her kids could be kidnapped or things could be stolen. So they're trying to show that the people out here, the protesters, are violent and that they're only unemployed men.
But there are children down there with their mothers and they're showing a completely different scene so instead of showing the masses of people that have taken over, they are showing signs of looting, they're showing one of the major cinemas here in downtown destroyed - completely destroyed. They don't show any government buildings being burnt however, this is the difference. The deception of imagery of the Egyptian news is propagating a lot of what they want the people to see and shows the side that everything is calm here; that you can go outside and catch a cab here or go down the shop to buy food - it's not true; it's not what has been happening.
There is graffiti from where I'm standing saying "Mubarak out", "Mubarak the dog" - all kinds of derogatory things unheard of in Cairo in the thirty years that he's been in power.
So the people here do have a sense of liberation and regarding the media stations, people watch them, from what I have been observing, and they laugh; they say how can these people betray their own country in a time of historic proportions as we're seeing right now.
That's what we've been getting from state run media, which has been heavily guarded and protected by the military.
Press TV: What about today's images coming from Hosni Mubarak going to the central army military operations and meeting with the top military officials. What do you think the goal of that was as far as showing that also on local media?
Hafez: The military is all over this country. Everywhere you go you see a tank shutting down a street and the common belief here even from analysts that we've spoken to is that President Mubarak is trying to re-secure himself and say that the military is in line with him, they are not about to revolt, and that I am very much in charge of the military.
And this is part of the deception of imagery I mentioned playing out very hard here and I assume elsewhere too though I haven't been able to see anything outside the country because of the internet blackout. Mubarak needs to show that he's still in charge - he can't give the sense that everything's falling apart despite the fact that some of his closest allies have fled the country; they've taken their private jets and all of their money out of the banks here - they're fleeing the country.
These are signs of a possible coup based on studies of what has happened with previous historic uprisings, the ruling elite that are in charge flee the country with their money yet they always try to maintain charge until things fall apart. And the Egyptian people here are hoping that things will fall apart and that he'll have to resign, but in order to do this, the military has to be in line with the people and we have spoken to officers in the military who have been protesting with people. When we talk to them they say they are here to keep order we take no sides. So it's hard to understand the military's role in this. But I know President Mubarak's cameo with the defense ministry and armed forces is all to show that he is still in charge here and it's also to indicate to America that he has things under control.
America plays a tremendous role in the outcome of what happens here. I think that's very important for the people in the outside world to understand because this country has taken on neo-liberal policies, economic policies that resulted in abject poverty - 50 percent of the people here live on $2 a day. This isn't something unusual; this is a policy that's been in place for more than 30 years even before Sadat was assassinated.
Press TV: And what about from the protesters perspective, we have reports of 150 people killed in these last few days. There are two different paths usually that uprisings can take as more people are killed - either it is taken as a warning to those people and they feel they should back off, or it can motivate more and more Egyptians to join the movement to change this regime. What is the feeling you have? Are the people more motivated? Do you see this desire expanding or growing to remove Mubarak?
Hafez: The more people who are killed on the streets the more angry the crowd becomes and the more dedicated they become. People have been sleeping on the roads and in burnt out police cars for the past couple of days; they're not going anywhere.
There is also an incredible amount of unity among the Egyptian people - there are no taxis and no way to get around anywhere so they're actually helping each other, bringing each other food etc.
For example, when I covered the Gaza freedom march in January and the police were beating us, we fled to a neighborhood and no one would open doors for us out of fear of the police. But now, when we flee from the police shooting at us, people grab us into their apartments and the take care of us and try to sneak us out later. So there is no stopping this now, people are not going back. There are even mothers who've taken their children out of school to be in Tahrir Square. And Tahrir Square is a historically important position for the Egyptians because it was the way they liberated. The military liberated the country from foreign forces; from British occupation.
And now Egyptians feel as though they are still being occupied by their own people who are being controlled by the very foreign forces they ousted half a century ago. And so it seems as though they are only becoming more passionate about what they want. In fact, they were asking me, because I have come here from the US, things about people power and democracy and government and having rights and human rights. Egyptians haven't had this for generations.
Now they have the free ability to think for themselves and to dream of a future. From my understanding they feel very excited and very blessed. In fact as they were shooting tear gas at people, and this a predominantly Islamic country, people were praying as the call to prayer was going on and so this only gave them more passion and power to take on the police.
Collectively, Christians, Muslims, everyone in this country are joining forces regardless of their differences. There is a saying, which translated means "Egypt is the mother of the world", and this is a sentiment that people feel here tremendously.
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