After weeks of violence culminating in a dictator’s resignation, peace in Egypt hangs by a thread about the neck of a military council.
Journalists, commentators and even locals in Egypt were proud to say the Jasmine Revolution followed through without the burning of a flag or church, bereft of the stereotyped and demonized radical Islam. Renewed political and sectarian violence, however, has brought with it a series of reality shocks for the hopeful Egyptian youth and global spectators like ourselves.
The first shock came March 4 after an imam in the Egyptian town of Soul ordered the murder of all Christians, leading to the burning of a Coptic Christian church. The arson was in response to the discovery of a love affair between a Christian man and Muslim woman.
The violence escalated when the Coptic Christians peacefully protested the burning and lack of legal protection, angering Muslims who reacted violently once more and left 13 dead and 140 injured in the clash.
A derivative of religious fundamentalism, sexism also remains problematic among the Egyptian populous. One of the most inspirational facets of the initial protests in Tahrir Square was the participation of women who felt empowered to be allowed to voice a political opinion — or an opinion at all, for that matter.
For Women’s Day on March 8, though, women protesting for equal rights in Tahrir Square were chased out by heckling, harassing and groping men telling them to return home where they “belong.”
The military eventually intervened and escorted women out of the square in an attempt to curtail further violence.
Such abominable acts give belated credence to former President Hosni Mubarak’s war against religious extremism in Egypt.
Underscoring the irony of a military council working for peace, another reality shock took place Wednesday as violence befell the lingering protesters’ encampment in Tahrir Square. The violence came by the hand of the military itself accompanied by more than 100 civilian supporters in an effort to clear the square once and for all.
There were no reported casualties in the skirmish, but the act is a clear indicator that the revolution is far from over.
President George W. Bush’s idea of cultural condemnation to violence and oppression re-emerges amidst Egypt’s newfound chaos, and cynicism is inevitable.
Bush was right in saying no one is culturally condemned to violence, and the revolutions have given all witnesses reason to believe this to be true. After all, the sweeping unrest across the entire region was almost unanimously secular and democratic.
The implications of these recent rash acts cast a large grain of salt into the equation.
As mere spectators an ocean away, the protests in Egypt looked deceivingly popular to us. The protests have been said to involve anywhere from a half million to 2 million protesters. We forget, however, that Egypt is a nation of 80 million, a large portion of which are not only poor but were subserviently loyal to Mubarak.
The demographic of the rallies makes a large difference, as well. The youth was the most active group involved, distorting outside viewers’ perceptions of the aims of the Egyptian people.
With the success of Mubarak’s resignation behind them, a sense of empowerment is certainly well founded, but the problem is that the predominantly secular youth is not the only group feeling empowered and seeking to stake claims in the new Egypt.
An air of instability in the rubble of the regime seems to be beckoning all groups to make their voices heard and their actions far-reaching, resulting in the aforementioned violence.
The root of the problem is made evident by the religious and intolerant violence taking place, and I await the day decades from now when the protesters who called for a secular Egypt are venerated for recognizing it.
Clayton Crockett is a 19-year-old international studies freshman from Lafayette. Follow him on Twitter @TDR_ccrockett.
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