The morning of 20 November came with a rude awakening for Mahmoud Fathy, a resident in the Houd al-Musullas neighbourhood in the rural Montazah area of Alexandria. Some neighbours called to him and told him two bulldozers had begun demolishing a building down the street and that his home would be next. As the vacant building not too far away was being demolished, about 350 residents in the area confronted the construction workers and the 20 security force members that accompanied them. The bulldozers and security forces were dispatched by the Endowments Authority, which it said was to demolish illegal construction. "The residents showed security forces their ownership papers, but the police said they are not responsible and ‘you can appeal it to the court'", Fathy said. People from the crowd immediately ran into the homes targeted for destruction. "They said ‘If you demolish the house you'll demolish it on us'," according to Fahty. As residents argued with the security forces, Mahmoud Al- Kabir, a lawyer who represents residents in the current land dispute demanded that security forces show documentation justifying their action. After about 30 minutes the security forces finally produced papers saying that only the walls around four homes were to be taken down. "If we didn't insist to see their written papers, they could have not only demolished one house but more houses in the neighbourhood and given this land to a developing company," said Al-Kabir. Al-Kabir added that none of the residents had been notified about the destruction. "Only 350 had come out this time to stop them, but next time there will be more, because now the people are ready." The attempted demolition comes after a 13 October appeal by the Endowment Authority, urging the Alexandria governorate to clear 300 Fedans in Houd al-Musullas, on which the residents live, many of whom are agricultural workers. The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), a non-governmental organisation that specialises in human rights and economic justice, released in a statement on 2 November saying title documents submitted by residents showed that the land was in the possession of current residents. The EIPR statement noted that approximately 5,000 families that live in the rural Montazah area face possible displacement as a result. Ahmed Shadley, the North West director of the EIPR says the dispute has its roots in the development of the housing cooperatives, which were developed in 2008 and are responsible for much of the construction projects underway near Houd al-Musullas. The EIPR statement said that in 2008 the Endowment Authority signed a protocol "on the condition that the governorate evacuate the land and install utilities to make way for real estate developments", though that protocol was rejected by former the governor of Alexandria Osama Al-Fouli. "The Endowment Authority concluded agreements for housing developments with several housing cooperatives, in addition to the protocol with the Alexandria governorate, without any legal basis for its claim to the land," the statement said. Ashraf Abed, a steel worker who lives in the area, pointed to several high rises in the neighbourhood adjacent to the farmers and said: "All these buildings belong to business men. The government will remove the people from their land and give the land to them." "The housing associations' role is to build cheap houses for people, but that's not true because these people sell the land and turn a profit," Abed added. A source in the Endowments Authority who asked not to be named said it was the residents of Houd al-Musullas and not the Authority who have begun to sell the land and started illegal construction. The source also said the illegal construction, which included high rises, began after the popular protests in 25 January led to the ouster of former president Hosni Mubarak. The protocol with the Alexandria government to evacuate the residents came because of the illegal construction, the source continued. "The real ownership of the land belongs to the Endowments Authority," and the residents rent the land from them, said the source. "The army has already started to remove some of the buildings. It's already not their land. [The residents] use the land in a bad way," the source said. Al-Kabir has exerted huge efforts to inform locals not to sign any papers or documents presented to them by the authorities, fearful of the residents being swindled. He said: "The Endowments Authority will give them contracts to pay for compensation, but you cannot take it." Shadley added: "Most of the people here can't read or write" and are ignorant of the laws and easy to be taken advantage of. Al-Kabir added: "The police do nothing and the judicial system is slow so the courts may reach a decision after they lose their house because the Endowments Authority is doing demolitions trying to get people off their land," as evidenced by the situation on 20 November. Many of the residents are distrustful of the authorities and say the behaviour of security forces ranges from harassment to indifference. One of the most prominent cases was that of Hassan Shandy. On 22 September 2009, Shandy, a farmer who had been organising against the eviction of residents in the area for eight months, disappeared one night and his dead body was found the next day with his hands and legs restrained. On his body was a note that said: "This is the punishment for the leader of the farmers." Though no one was ever arrested for his murder, his nephew Ibrahim Shandy believes it is probably moneyed interests who are agitating for his land. "Farmers are now scared to find the same destiny of Hassan Shandy," said Abed. Ibrahim himself has complained of harassment. "One morning at 4:00 am in November, security forces had entered my home accusing me of terrorism. The police said they came to search for weapons. On another evening someone lit a fire to my front porch while I was sleeping," he said. Al-Kabir noted that the Endowments Authority makes the appeal that the farmer is occupying the land illegally and the farmer is then arrested. "When people get arrested, they have to pay money to finish their paper work. The procedure takes a lot of money and they don't have a lot of money," he continued. Your average farmer is detained about three times a year, Ibrahim Shandy added. "[The arrests] come like our farming seasons," he joked. Abbas Hamed, another farmer who was detained, said that he stayed with criminals for three days with no food, and police beat him at the back of the head. Many of the families in rural Montazah complain that they are generally ignored by the government and suffer from lack of facilities. In many parts locals have installed their own electricity, water irrigation, and hired their own garbage pickup. Hasan Abdel Wahed is the father of two children. He graduated at the top of his class from Alexandria University in agriculture, and despite having other opportunities, he decided to sacrifice a "good job" in order to work the land his father and grandfather had worked. He doesn't count the hours in the day he spends farming, but says it is usually from sun-up until sun-down, sometimes longer. He is proud of the 15 feddans of eggplants, cabbages, guavas, and beans, his family farm harvests. Though he says he gets little support from the government, what he does get is plenty of sewage and pollution, which has reduced his seasonal harvest from a yield of about 230 to 300kgs to about 80kgs. "The businessmen, when they build these buildings, their sewage leaks into the irrigation of the farmers. We don't have clean water to farm the land because the sewage decreases production. This affects the taste of the food. My land is dying because I can't get clean water," Abdel Wahed said. He says the Ministry of Agriculture is supposed to give them fertiliser and networks of irrigation, but most of the water from the Nile is lost to the sea and irrigation water mixes with sewage. He pointed out one of his canals that has been turning white due to the chemicals in the water. "A long time ago this canal had fish. Now all the fish died. The trees in the middle don't grow. All the trees I planted are destroyed," he said. Abdel Wahed says he has tried to farm the land three times and the pollution has killed much of the arability. He doesn't have the resources to treat it. He does not know what to do next. "The government will take me to court and the authorities will say the farmers are destroying this land," he added. Asked what they will do if they lose their land, Ahmed Hadad, a resident said: "We're not going to lose this land. Otherwise we'll die here." "Some of the people have stopped appealing their case because they feel it is useless," Shadley added. Abed offered a more optimistic assessment, referring to 7 April, 2012, when protests prevented the Endowment Authority from demolishing twelve homes, forcing the government to make a deal with the residents. "They want to protest but they are scared their request will be refused," because of the authorities arbitrary and biased nature towards giving permits, Shadley noted. "If they plan on protesting without a permit, they may be arrested because of the protest law," he said. "We don't want to fight. We want the government to sit with us and have a negotiation," Al-Kabir said. He added: "We have the papers to solve the problem. The problem is that the government is with the people who want to take our land."
