Former employees of the closed Amonsito factory have ended their sit-in, following Wednesday's tentative agreement for overdue early retirement payment to the workers from Banque Misr, the factory's creditor.
The workers have been occupying the (...)
In the summer of 2008, the so-called “food price crisis” took Egypt by storm. Drastically rising food prices made headlines and left a population devastated by the burden of increased food costs. While the Egyptian media has now stopped covering the (...)
Many residents of Fayoum consider their governorate a microcosm of Egypt. With Bedouins, farmers and urban dwellers, the place offers glimpses of different Egyptian social groups.
Villages west of Fayoum experience a phenomenon that is (...)
In the heat of the day, about 30 workers from the Amonsito textile factory huddled under the shade of a tree.
“We are not workers, we are rejects,” the factory union leader Khaled el-Shishawy, who is known simply as sheikh Khaled told Al-Masry (...)
Kareem el-Beheiry was 20 years old when he first took part in a labor strike in December 2006.
"I didn't know what a strike was," said el-Beheiry, the Mahalla Textile Factory's first blogger.
The next day he saw a scene that changed his life. "I saw (...)
On 19 April, the streets of Cairo were once again lined with sit-ins. Within a 1km radius, six different groups--bereft of confidence in those appointed to represent them--staged protests in an effort to air their grievances.
TANTA FLAXS AND (...)
On 13 May 2008 the bulldozers came for the homes in the Tosson neighborhood on the northern tip of Alexandria.
The families could do little to resist the over fifty trucks filled with Central Security forces that arrived with bulldozers and trucks (...)
After a 21-day sit-in outside the gates of Egypt's parliament building, workers of the Amonsito textile factory finally reached a settlement with the government on 21 March. According to the agreement, compensation payments were to be made on 5 (...)
Alexandria--At 2 AM on 3 December, 2009 Abdallah Abdel Aziz opened the door in response to a loud knock on the family's front door. The six-year-old was completely unaware of the danger that was about to follow.
About a dozen members of the Muharram (...)
Thursday witnessed fresh clashes between employees of the Salemco spinning and weaving company and factory owner Mohamed Abdel Halim. The new round of confrontation comes after company union officials had reportedly clinched an agreement with their (...)
On Sunday at 4 PM the Salemco workers took down their banners and rolled up their blankets. By 5 PM they had disappeared from the sidewalk on Qasr el-Ainy Street in downtown Cairo where they had been sleeping for ten consecutive days.
The sit-in (...)
Workers of the Amonsito textile factory entered the tenth day of their sit-in outside the gates of the Shura Council, Egypt's consultative chamber of parliament.
Drivers stuck in traffic turned to listen, passers-by stopped to watch and tourists (...)
Egypt's actions in Gaza have been a source of confusion for some time. But confusing as it may seem, the Egyptian government's policy is part of a purposeful campaign by a two-faced regime.
Four factors shape the Egypt authorities' approach to the (...)
RAFAH: In the past weeks the families living in Egyptian Rafah have faced similar fears as their neighbors and relatives on the other side of the border. Although they have been out of the direct line of fire, many families fled the border areas due (...)
RAFAH: On Sunday night Dr Attalah Tarazi sat on his balcony looking at a view he had grown accustomed to over the years. Yet, that night something was different. For 10 days his neighborhood in Gaza City had been out of water and electricity. The (...)
CAIRO: At 11:30 am on Dec. 27 the Israeli air force bombed Palestinian government headquarters and civilian buildings all across the Gaza Strip. Six consecutive days of attacks resulted in over 400 dead and thousands injured. In the densely (...)
GAZA: Beit Hanoun in the Gaza Strip is anything but peaceful. And for the Salach family, living on the border between Israel and Gaza, ceasefire is a foreign concept only because it comes along in the rarest of times.
However, the current (...)
CAIRO: The last entry on Kareem Al-Beheiri's blog, egyworkers.blogspot.com, reads, "It is now 7 am on April 6 and I am on my way to the Mahalla textile factory to cover the events of the strikes. I wish success to all seeking to expose the failing (...)
CAIRO: With an announced strike, Sunday morning began as a somewhat slower day in Cairo. On Saturday government news sources warned citizens of participating in protests citing heavy penalties. Small squads of state security lined the streets near (...)
CAIRO: On Jan. 28, 2008 Gaza's Jabalya Refugee Camp was under siege once again. On the second morning, 14-year-old Mohamed Wadi and six of his friends roamed around the camp despite the announced curfew.Like typical teenagers, they were on the (...)
TANTA: On Oct. 1, 2005 Sami Al-Laithi turned 50. This was also the very day he arrived in Cairo after nearly four years of imprisonment and torture at Guantanamo Bay.
He was released after a US military tribunal deemed him innocent of charges of (...)
QALYUBEYA: Mohamed Al-Fiqi sat on the wooden couch in the unpainted and scantly-furnished living room. "Your father may come home with fruit, but I won't come home with fruit, he said.
The Al-Fiqis live in a small, unfinished two-story home. (...)
CAIRO: Lawrence Wright co-wrote the script to the 1998 Hollywood film "The Siege, which was a box office failure. Yet, after 9/11 the film became the most rented movie in the United States as the story unfolding on the screen almost re-told the (...)
CAIRO: Before an audience of Egyptian journalists Sir Alistair Horne, a renowned British historian, recounted the events of Egypt's 1973 war with Israel. A show of hands concerning Sadat's success in bringing peace to the region was evenly (...)