almasryalyoum.com
Mon, 04/07/2011 - 13:41
Many of today’s papers have the same story on the front page. Privately owned Al-Shorouk and Al-Wafd both run stories on the report Interior Minister Mansour al-Essawy submitted to the interim cabinet about the events in Tahrir on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Both run the same headline about the report, with Essawy contending that not a single round of either live or rubber bullets was aimed at protesters. Essawy also said police used maximum restraint throughout the clashes. Media reports say this resulted in more than a thousand injuries in less than 24 hours.
The state-owned paper Al-Ahram publishes a headline on the same story, dealing with Essawy's statement that an armed group was arrested during the clashes, and this armed group was responsible for the injuries of many of the protesters. Essawy also stated that two tear gas launchers were confiscated from protesters, who took them from police during the events.
Working for years as the propaganda mouthpieces of the previous regime, it seems state-run media outlets have been unable to shake their pro-government bias.
On page seven, state-owned Al-Akhba r publishes the headline: "3000 tourist trips to Dahab canceled because of the Tahrir protests." The accompanying story, filed from Sharm el-Sheikh, appears to use a store owner who previously spoke to the paper, saying one tourist told him people abroad were concerned about the events in Egypt. He had no mention of Tahrir.
Al-Akhbar also sports an ominous headline, “Youth coalitions warn of a conspiracy to abort the revolution.” According to the story, many revolutionary coalitions have “confirmed the existence of an internal and external conspiracy to abort the revolution by creating a confrontation with the police and exploiting the blood of the martyrs to gather people in Tahrir. But the great Egyptian people by not responding to the calls for an open protest have proven that those who called for said protest have split from the people and the real revolutionaries.”
It's worth noting that this statement was signed by about a dozen groups, many of them Islamist. Under Mubarak's regime, state-owned papers often depicted Islamist groups as the biggest threat to stability in Egypt, and you'd be hard pressed to find statements from them on the pages of Al-Akhbar.
Speaking of forgotten Islamists, Mohamed Habib writes an op-ed for the privately owned Al-Dostour. The former deputy supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood was unceremoniously pushed out of the group’s Guidance Bureau in its last elections, which saw current Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie replace Mohamed Mahdi Akef.
Habib seems to be in a better mood these days, and that’s because Mubarak and his regime are gone. Habib starts off his column by praising God for the blessing of freedom and accusing Mubarak of high treason. His reasons include what he calls unwavering support from Mubarak for the "Zionist entity," meaning Israel. Besides selling gas to Israel at cut-rate prices, as well as Mubarak's role in the Israeli war on Gaza, Habib also accuses the former president of being a US foreign policy stooge and, above all, he accuses him of involvement in the killing of protesters during the uprising.
However, Habib attempts to extricate the military from responsibility for any of this, saying its position is the complete opposite of Mubarak. Habib insists that the “Zionist entity” is still the Egyptian military’s No. 1 enemy, so someone might need to refer him to the most recent Camp David peace treaty.
He goes on say that “undoubtedly” Mubarak’s policies in appeasing the Zionist entity at the expense of Egypt and its security must have placed a lot of pressure on the military and put it in an unenviable position.
Egypt's papers:
Al-Ahram: Daily, state-run, largest distribution in Egypt
Al-Akhbar: Daily, state-run, second to Al-Ahram in institutional size
Al-Gomhurriya: Daily, state-run
Rose al-Youssef: Daily, state-run
Al-Dostour: Daily, privately owned
Al-Shorouk: Daily, privately owned
Al-Wafd: Daily, published by the liberal Wafd Party
Al-Arabi: Weekly, published by the Arab Nasserist party
Youm7: Weekly, privately owned
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