In 2008, Mohammed Mustafa Mahmoud, better known as Saffah Al Maadi (“the Al Maadi Ripper”), harassed, beat and attempted to rape seven girls in Maadi. He would wait for each girl and tear her clothes using a sharp object, after which he would beat up his victim until she was severely injured, assault her and escape. In 2009 the police hunted him down and he was charged with the assault and attempted rape of seven women, on his confession he was tried and sentenced to five years in prison. His lawyers appealed the case on the grounds that the victims described him differently and that he was not psychologically fit for interrogation when he made his confession, arguing that, as per article 32/2 of the Egyptian Criminal Law, he should be punished for one crime rather than seven. They added that that crime was beating the women in question, not sexually assaulting them. The Court of Appeal sentenced him to six months in prison. In 2011, a female news producer working for a satellite channel was harassed by a group of young men while trying to cover the events in Tahrir Square. A policeman, Mohamed Sami, who was on duty nearby saw her screaming for help, rescued her and stopped a taxi for her, but the bandits started to beat up the policeman, nearly killing him before he was eventually rescued by protesters and sent to Al-Kasr Al-Aini Hospital. In June 2012, protesters managed to rescue a girl from a group of young men who were about to gang-rape her in Mohamed Mahmoud street, near Tahrir Square. The rapists chased her all the way to Tahrir Square, where they pulled off all her clothes. The protesters managed to separate her from the gang and place her in the care of the policemen on duty. Again the rapists tried to snatch her away, and the policemen fired in the air to disperse them before escorting her to Kasr Al-Nile Police Station, where she filed a report. In September 2012, 18 young men tried to assault a girl outside her school in Qena governorate. The police chased them away, catching some of them and going after the rest with the help of clues from the school teachers. In January 2013, a group of female activists were protesting for women's rights when a mob of men, believed to be fundamentalists, began to harass the female activists. The problem started when women's slogans were being shouted down with anti women's rights slogans and what started with a discussion between the two sides ended with the harassment of the women by members of the male demonstration. The incident was described by many as “political terrorism”. In 2013, Mahmoud, a 20 year old worker, harassed women by using a venomous snake to threaten his victims in the neighbourhoood of Hadaeq Al-Qouba. He would threaten his victim using a snake and the victim would then freeze and he would start touching parts of the victim's body or kissing her by force. While he was harassing a woman and her mother using that same method, the police arrested him. In June 2014, while Egyptian citizens were celebrating the victory of President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi in the presidential elections, Captain Mustafa Thabet from the Bab Al-Shereya Police Department, who happened to be on duty, realised that a group of young men had stood in a circle around a few girls and were trying to pull off their clothes and touching parts of their bodies, injuring them in the process. The girls screamed but no one could hear them because of the noise of the celebrations. By firing bullets in the air, Thabet managed to break the circle and free the girls. In September 2014, two female British tourists, a mother and her daughter, were harassed inside a shop in the market area in Sharm Al-Sheikh by two Egyptian shopkeepers. The victims were going to buy perfume at the shop but as soon as they entered the two men locked the doors and tried to make the women kiss them while touching their bodies. The two victims managed to escape the trap and ran to the nearest police station; the shopkeepers were arrested and eventually sent to prison. In September 2014, a man slapped another in Darb Al-Barabera for placing his mouth uncomfortably close to the faces of two girls walking and verbally harassing them. In October 2014, while a female American news correspondent was heading back to Egypt from Nairobi she was harassed by an Egyptian engineer working for a petroleum company in Kenya. As soon as the aeroplane landed at Cairo International Airport she filed a complaint. The victim said that, while lying down trying to sleep, the man in the seat next to her started touching her. He was arrested by Tourism Police at the airport. Harassment in statistics Women's clothes or conduct might have had some bearing on their being subject to harassment in the past, when harassment consisted of verbal assaults, or perhaps the harasser would touch his victim's body furtively and run. Today any woman is subject to being systematically injured, both physically and psychologically, with the last three years seeing cases of gang harassment or rape, particularly during mass demonstrations and political gatherings. In most cases the women are trapped into the situation and subjected to terrible pain. According to National Council for Motherhood and Childhood hotline statistics, out of 87 girls harassed or raped, 38 were four-six years old, 29 10-18 and 20 one-three. According to “I Saw Harassment” organisation statistics on Eid Al Adha last year, some 20 cases of physical violation were reported, with 188 cases of verbal abuse. There were six cases of attempted “collective harassment”, mostly by teenage boys, with one case involving sharp weapons. According to the Egyptian Women's Status 2013 Report, issued by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, women were subjected to harassment that could turn into rape under the Muslim Brotherhood regime especially when they participated in political demonstrations such as on 2 and 25 January 2013. They were also used as human shields during MB protests, and they were sexually exploited by MB members in what they called jihad al-nikah or sexual jihad, in some cases by kidnapping girls off the street and presenting them to male protesters by force. In 2013 women suffered many forms of violence, both political and sexual. Human Rights Watch statistics indicate that there were 100 sexual harassment cases during anti-Morsi protests. According to a study by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women in collaboration with the National Planning Institute and Demographic Centre in Cairo, 99.3 percent of women in the survey said that they were exposed to some form of sexual harassment. 49.2 percent of Egyptian women have experienced sexual harassment, 19.2 percent of them experience sexual harassment on a weekly basis and 7.3 percent experience sexual harassment on a monthly basis, while 67.1 percent of women in the survey affirmed that all girls suffered sexual harassment regardless clothes, looks or conduct. 87.7 percent of the participants feel that women in all social classes are exposed to sexual harassment, 68.9 percent that sexual harassment happens all the time and 68.5 percent that males of all ages practise sexual harassment. 48.9 percent of women said that sexual harassment has increased after the 25 January revolution, 44 percent said harassment rates were the same before and after the revolution, and seven percent said the rates dropped after the revolution. Asked which parts of the body were most frequently targeted, 54.5 percent of the women surveyed said the chest, 13.5 percent the buttocks and 7.1 percent the whole body. The attacks targeting women in Tahrir Square were staged in a systematic way, where a group of men assault women who are alone or try to isolate them; they drag the victim into a circle, violating her with their hands or sometimes with weapons, which are also used to rip off their clothes. According to UN statistics, 35 percent of women have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence and up to 70 percent of them have experienced physical and/or sexual violence in their lifetime from an intimate partner. Almost half the women killed in 2012 were killed by intimate partners or family members. Around 120 million girls have experienced forced sexual intercourse or other forced sexual acts at some point in their lives. Women and girls represent 55 percent of the estimated 20.9 million victims of forced labour worldwide and 98 percent of the estimated 4.5 million are forced into sexual exploitation. Women in urban areas are twice as likely as men to experience violence, especially in developing countries. According to a baseline study conducted by the Social Research Centre (SRC) at the American University in Cairo (AUC) in three low-income urban neighbourhoods in Egypt (Al-Hagganna, Mansheyat Nasser and Embaba), at least 80 percent of the sample reported verbal harassment including inappropriate talk, winks or whistles. The majority did not report this because they believed that it was “Not worth it” or because “Women shouldn't tell strangers”. The sample included both males and females (married and unmarried) in more than 3,000 households. The study found that both sexes believe that unemployment and lack of religious awareness, morals and manners as well as the influence of satellite TV, the absence of police in some areas and the difficulties youth find in getting married were the main reasons behind harassment; a few blamed it on the victim's way of dressing, talking and walking. As for the roles of women, the sample believed that women were “either seen to have no role at all or a subordinate one”. Some 90 percent of men said that women should not be involved in neighbourhood committees that combat harassment because they “wouldn't be able to do anything” and some of them saw their participation as “shameful” while others felt that neighbourhood members would not accept the idea of a woman offering protection. Places to learn the art of self-defence Egmadi 5 (Pull yourself together for five minutes) Egmadi 5 is a centre based in Alexandria that teaches girls self-defence techniques to use in harassment situations one the street or elsewhere. Under the slogan “It's your body: strengthen it, protect it, be proud of it”, the centre works to prepare women both physically and psychologically to deal with harassment. The course takes one day and the trainers there work on increasing a girl's physical fitness and body awareness with Zumba fitness exercises and self-defence techniques. The only condition is that a girl should wear sports clothes when she comes in; relatives and friends are also welcome. There is also a chance to meet members of Egyptian initiatives working in the field of combating harassment and learning from them. The Egmadi 5 Facebook Page gives more details on the location of the training sessions. Life up This is another self-defence class centre, a personal initiative of Mariam Awni's based in Heliopolis. Window of Hope Another Facebook group that organises self-defence classes for young ladies is the Cairo-based Window of Hope. Instructors and trainers are women and classes are women-only. The aim is to prevent crime against women and to teach women personal safety skills. Dragon Den This is a place to learn many forms of self-defence: kickboxing, mixed martial arts, or Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. The club is based in Dokky. Knock Out Zone/Fibers Club Located in New Maadi, this specialises in the martial arts and boxing but provides instruction in many other sports. It teaches self-defence techniques focusing on how to train mind, body and soul.
