Cover girls and the fallout from the Goldstone fiasco had Doaa El-Bey making the rounds The death of a third Egyptian from swine flu and a WHO report stating that 417 people worldwide had died this week were further causes of concern that had led to a rise in the number of students absent from schools and universities. Moreover, there is still a lack of sanitisers and cleaning staff in many schools. Newspapers followed the developments. Al-Masry Al-Yom wrote, "Swine flu is attacking us: the death of a third victim, more cases in schools and the virus enters our universities". In Al-Ahram : "Giving students a sick leave because of a rise in temperature does not mean they have swine flu"; Al-Akhbar wrote, "Two classes closed in Cairo due to the appearance of two more cases". From Al-Wafd, "The prime minister denies the spread of swine flu among prisoners", while Rose El-Youssef noted the fall in the number of students attending schools as one measure taken by parents to protect their children. Mosaad Nawwar criticised the government's decision to start schools now because the cursed disease has already appeared in schools in Giza, Cairo, Minya, Sohag, Fayoum and Alexandria just one week after schools opened. The premature start of the academic year aimed to allow private and governmental schools to collect the full school fees in order to satisfy the owners of these schools at the expense of the lives of the students. "Strange enough, the minister of education declared on TV that all schools have their share of sanitisers and nursing staff whereas in fact, toilets in most of the government and private schools are in poor condition or worse," Nawwar wrote in the weekly Al-Arabi, the mouthpiece of the opposition Nasserist Democratic Party. However, what annoyed Nawwar most was that the government declared that it had distributed booklets about measures to combat the spread of the disease to all schools, though many schools still insist on morning lines which can spread the virus. In addition, some teachers insist on keeping windows in the classes closed -- when they should be open -- a sign that either schools have not shown these booklets to their teachers or the government has not distributed them to schools in the first place. The grand sheikh of Al-Azhar's decision to prevent students from wearing the niqab (face veil) in classrooms and dormitories in all of Al-Azhar University's schools and institutes created much controversy. The editorial of the official daily Al-Ahram said it was the right and duty of the sheikh of Al-Azhar to issue regulations that control his institution in a way that guarantees that it carries out its role. He is aiming to protect the students from people seeking to threaten their security. However, the edit stated, we have much more important issues that need our attention, like developing education, improving health service and infrastructure, and providing the citizen with basic needs like clean drinking water, electricity, sanitary drainage systems, and a modern road network. The edit added that in order to build up a modern rather than frightened society we need to allow every citizen to practise his own rights freely provided that they do not clash with the values of the society, namely moderation. Each society has its own regulations and laws, and imposing one's own personal rules should not be acceptable on that society or else it would turn into anarchy, the edit concluded. Refaat Fayyad was surprised at the uproar caused by the sheikh of Al-Azhar's decision and the subsequent controversy it caused over whether the niqab is obligatory in Islam or a custom. However, the writer found it annoying that the decision was seized by some as a chance to attack Sheikh Tantawi in person without any respect for his status as a respectable religious figure. "Sheikh of Al-Azhar was right in everything he said about the niqab. We should not have made it such a controversial issue. Instead, we should have respected his decision as the right one, coming as it does from the head of the most prestigious religious institution in Egypt and the world," Fayyad wrote in the official weekly Akhbar Al-Yom. Fayyad added that he knew of the case of 15 men wearing the niqab who managed to enter the university hostels for girls last year. As a result, he said, he has been one of the strongest supporters of Sheikh of Al-Azhar, as there is no point in wearing the niqab in hostels inhabited solely by female students and supervisors. No men are allowed in for any reason. Insistence on wearing the niqab in these places is parochial and contradicts with the teachings of our religion, Fayyad concluded. Granting the Nobel Prize for Peace to US President Barack Obama was a surprise to those who believe that he deserves it and to those who do not. Suleiman Gouda questioned whether Obama deserves the Nobel Prize. He found the matter amazing because Obama is still at the beginning of his presidency and he has not offered anything effective regarding peace. "Giving Obama the Nobel Prize at this stage is like giving an A to a student at the beginning of the school year. As a result, he will not need to exert any effort whatsoever throughout the rest of the year," Gouda wrote in the independent daily Al-Masry Al-Yom. In fact, his achievements on the ground, especially regarding the Palestinian issue, do not qualify him to win a Nobel though his thoughts and inclinations do. During his speech in Cairo, he not only offered new ways of thinking towards the Islamic world but underlined the importance of establishing an independent Palestinian state. Most probably, as the writer assumed, those who gave him the prize not only thought of what he said in Cairo but of what he intends to do in the future and the peace he is trying to spread in his country. Mohamed Hamdi wrote that Obama won the prize for his good intentions rather than his deeds. Granting Obama the Nobel was most controversial since it came as a shock to the world including Obama who said he did not deserve it. Obama promised during his presidential campaign to withdraw US troops from Iraq, close the notorious Guantanamo prison, open channels of dialogue with the Muslim world, resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and win the war against terrorism in Afghanistan. But he did not achieve anything yet. He may be serious in changing the picture of his country in front of the world and spreading unprecedented peace. But up till now he has presented only good intentions. "Thus we can call him the Nobel ambassador of goodwill," Hamdi wrote in the daily newspaper Rose El-Youssef.
