It appears that Egypt has lost and is still losing the international media war. They are short of video and stories of violence because to a greater extent the situation has stabilized here. Yet they continue with the insinuations of civil war, chaos and mayhem – Obama even linked in Egypt with Syria! Syria is now where they are focusing their hype – Please!  As with Iraq – any excuse for US to jump into another ME war will do.

My first viewing on BBC World this morning was just one segment on Egypt – under the heading EGYPT IN TURMOIL. The interviewer started by saying the situation in Egypt is getting worse. Then went on to interview some guy from Hamas (Brotherhood connection in Gaza) who went on to say that Egypt is trying to destroy Gaza (quietly added on “destroy Hamas”)and the Palastinians.  Followed by some video footage of the hardship caused in Gaza by the destruction of the smuggling tunnels into Gaza.  End of Egypt segment.

I actually haven’t seen anything on CNN or Euronews this morning concerning Egypt.  They covered the violence and even if lack of coverage is now due to lack of violence – could they not cover the stabilization of Egypt?

The infamous Qatar owned Al Jazeera coverage consisted of a tear jerking introduction to a video by Brotherhood leader, Baltagy – about the death of his daughter at Rabaa Al Adaweya.  Beltagy asks “Are we terrorists because we oppose the coup?” Then they showed two hazy, bad quality videos of what they claimed were large protests in Imbaba and Alexandria this week – no dates for the protests and the videos were impossible to identify and verify as to whether they are old or current.  End of Egypt segment.  No, Mr. Beltagy you are not terrorist because you oppose the coup – you are terrorists because of the murder, burning, intimidation and chaos you demanded after the breakup of the sit-in. You are terrorists because you, yourself said in the following video interview that the minute Morsi is restored to power the terrorist attacks in the Sinai will cease in the following minute.

It is difficult for anyone outside of Egypt to understand any of this or see where it is going as the news coming out of Egypt through the mainstream media is painfully and obviously biased in favour of the Brotherhood – for whatever reasons.  On the other hand Egypt at the moment seems incapable of putting enough information on the airwaves to counteract the media machine of the Brotherhood which is working at full capacity in spinning a confusing tale of lies.

2 Comments

  1. Hi Ray, yes, Egypt is turning the corner and implementing an excellent roadmap. There are still attacks from the Brotherhood here and there. I would not say there are concessions from both sides. Brotherhood did not concede anything voluntarily – only when most of the leaders were caught and imprisoned waiting trial for inciting violence, murder, colluding with foreign powers to destabilise Egypt etc. No, they have not called off protests, just that last week not many turned out – money to fund them dried up. Tomorrow Friday 30th they have called for full turnout across the country and to instigate new sit-ins. The government MIGHT not be banning them in that sense but there is a big momentum here not to allow or legalise political parties flying under any religious flag. Again media attention might be diverted – but it is all connected and when they only show Baltagy and Hamas on a news piece about Egypt – that says a lot. The gas lines changed after Morsi was removed because 38 tunnels being used to flow it into Gaza were demolished by Egyptian Army 🙂 We are still having power cuts once a day for an hour. You would really have to be here now to feel the air of hope across the country. The greater majority trust the government and are behind the army in everything they are doing to bring stability. Even the curfew is respect by all except MB who are pushing it here and there in Cairo away from security areas with flash demos. We are not under curfew in Luxor. Life is going on as normal. The new travel bans are incomprehensible in the face of only the odd incident here and there – same as in any country in the world – The travel bans which are now including Luxor and the subsequent cancelling of the charter flights due to not being covered by insurance is especially difficult to bear and difficult to understand – you know yourself we have had nothing of note happen here even since 2011. Indeed Egypt is now quieter than most countries, but tomorrow will tell a lot. Thanks for your good wishes and compliments on the web site 🙂

  2. I wonder if Egypt is now turning the corner to recovery from the Morsi regime disaster?

    Media here in the US has is reporting concessions from both sides – the Brotherhood accepting reality and calling off street protests (that few were attending anyway), and the Government backing down from talk of outlawing the organization. Possibly with international attention now focused on response to the atrocities in Syria, Egypt can make progress out of the limelight.

    The situation has been hard for the US government to handle. On the one had, there was a (more or less) democratically elected leader removed by the military, but on the other hand he had confused religion with government and the country was falling apart. We knew from the gas lines during our March stay with you that his days were numbered. (But it is rather interesting that the gas lines disappeared so quickly after the regime change ……….).

    Let’s hope and pray that your confidence in the current leadership is well placed and that Egypt does not return to being oppressed and looted by another Mubarak. Perhaps the cash from your Arab supporters can be well used with investment in security, tourism recovery and weaning the people off the long ruin debilitating government hand outs.

    Then your marvelous hotel and support network can return to the prosperity you deserve!

    PS: Your web site is terrific!

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