Was Saadeddin Ibrahim's conviction cause for shame or celebration? The jury is still out on this and many other questions, write Gamal Nkrumah and Mohamed El-Sayed The Palestinian question and especially the unfortunate infighting between supporters of Hamas and Fatah recently preoccupied the pundits, many of whom expressed anguish and alarm at the rapidly deteriorating security situation in Gaza. "The brutality of Hamas: Where is it heading to?" was the title of the Monday 4 August column of the Editor-in-Chief of the official daily Al-Ahram Osama Saraya. "There were some who imagined that Hamas has a secret agenda which is not restricted to Palestine, just like any other political organisation that espouses religious slogans," explained Saraya. "Still, we hoped that the project of Hamas, under its religious cover, would integrate with the Palestinian national project," he extrapolated. "However, after Hamas seized Gaza on 7 July 2007, and especially after the barbaric acts of the past few days, it has become abundantly evident that the agenda of Hamas is not compatible with that of the Palestinian national interest. There are forces in Hamas that insist on putting their interests above those of Palestine; creating a totalitarian Islamic emirate in Gaza," Saraya concluded. The front page headline of Al-Ahram expressed the anguish in Gaza in graphic terms. "Hamas detained tens of Fatah cadres, and this resulted in the killing and injury of at least 99," ran the headline. Education, too, once again hit the headlines. "Ramadan is innocent of delaying the return to school," pleaded Al-Ahram. The headline reflected the debate about when the academic year ought to begin. There are those who believe that the students should commence with their schooling after Ramadan and Eid Al-Fitr. Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif insisted, however, that school would start on 20 September, during the second half of the holy fasting month of Ramadan. The paper noted that some parents preferred that schooling be postponed to a later date. Others contend that students should resume school during Ramadan. Sociologist and rights activist Saadeddin Ibrahim was sentenced to two years imprisonment for defaming the country and instigating political unrest. Ibrahim's case made headlines in independent and opposition newspapers in particular, but received less coverage in the official press. The independent press, on the other hand, pointed out that the reverse is true: Ibrahim's conviction is the real defamer of the country's reputation. "The court ruling against Saadeddin Ibrahim tarnishes Egypt's image, and the regime uses the judiciary to settle accounts with the opposition," Al-Masry Al-Yom quoted many a human rights activist as saying. Be that as it may, as far as the independent press is concerned, Ibrahim was to blame and deserved being punished. Indeed, most commentators in official papers were especially hostile to Ibrahim openly accusing him of being a traitor. Writing in the daily official Al-Gomhuriya, Mohamed Ali harshly criticised Ibrahim. He accused him of being a sellout and an agent working in the service of the United States. "Ibrahim sold his soul to the devil and swore to the US dollar, having devoted his life to tarnishing Egypt's image in the international arena. He depicted Egypt as hell where human rights are being violated without holding anyone to account," he argued. The editor-in- chief of the state-owned newspaper argued that US President George W Bush's meeting with Ibrahim in Prague "bears testimony that he has a special place in Washington's heart, a place he earned not for being a significant academic or international figure, but because he is a mercenary working against his country," the paper's editor concluded. The ruling party came under intense fire for allegedly mixing religious matters with politics. Writing in the daily independent Al-Masry Al-Yom, Suleiman Gouda argued that, "it is not only the Muslim Brotherhood that should be ruled out from the political life as they mix politics with religion, but also the ruling National Democratic Party as long as it does not offer something that gives hope to people." He added that, "the NDP has been busy chasing the Muslim Brotherhood, while forgetting what it ought to do to keep the political scene vibrant and get it out from the current killing stagnation." While the NDP is preparing for its annual conference slued for September, Suleiman hopes that "the party is not busy thinking about the motto of the conference... the problem is that the ordinary citizen don't benefit from such a motto in his daily life, having discovered that they are meaningless." There was much debate over the prevailing sense of stoicism that stymies the national interest, according to several commentators. Writing in the same paper, Sahar El-Mougi tried to diagnose the public mood prevalent among Egyptians nowadays. "We Egyptians have lost the feeling that we belong to this country, and therefore we are not concerned about Egypt... and as a result of this sense of apathy, selfishness reigns supreme which aggravates crises like traffic jams, red tape procedures which always involve bribery -- be it in public or in secret -- and murders within families." On an entirely different note, Al-Ahram ran an interview with the president's son Gamal Mubarak which was originally published in the French magazine International Politics. "Egypt has not changed its policies aimed at combating the use of religion in politics since the [23rd July] Revolution," Gamal Mubarak, head of the ruling NDP's Policies Committee, was quoted as saying. He added that, "we agree with the Americans on many issues, but when we disagree with them we don't hesitate to oppose them." He also said that, "poverty was the catalyst for the flourishing of Islamist militants." Other domestic issues took precedence in the press. The fallout from the verdict issued by the Safaga Felonies Court last week, acquitting the owner of the Al-Salam 98 ferry Mamdouh Ismail from charges of causing the death of 1,034 passengers in 2006 preoccupied the pundits. The press reports reflected public outrage at the verdict. Indeed, some commentators drew parallels with the June 1967 Egyptian defeat at the hands of the Israelis. "Perhaps it was the saddest day in our contemporary history since the 1967 defeat," novelist and literary critic Gamal El-Ghitani argued in the daily official Al-Akhbar, commenting on the day the court ruling was issued. El-Ghitani expressed his sorrow in poetic terms. "The shock of the court ruling was more severe than that of the defeat," he added dramatically.
