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Dahab Spring Tears

Categories: Middle East & North Africa, Egypt, Breaking News, Governance

Another black day! Yesterday, Egypt was having a national holiday, Sham an Nessim, just few days after the Coptic Easter, which means that many Egyptians were in Dahab [1] as well as foreigners. At about 19:15 local time, three different explosions rocked the tourist town of Dahab. It was reported that at least 23 dead and up to 150 people were injured.

Condolences, sadness, condemnations and anger are floating all over the Egyptian blogsphere. Some blogger wonder what's keeping the Egyptian president [2] from firing the Interior minister.

Ibn ad Dunya from Fustat blog said [3]:

I would think that an imadiate result would be the sacking of the Minister of Interior, Habib al Adly. it’s unprecedented in recent history that a minister of Interior gets to keep his portfolio after three major terrorist attacks. Usually the president’s paticience is not that long.

Free Soul is depressed [4]:

It is enough to listen to the news everyday to get you into deep depression, I don’t know how to express my emotions but it seems like I am lost.

It seems the ethics I have has no real meaning, they are nonsense, they don’t have any meaning but in my fake world, but in the real outer world they mean nothing, they don’t exist.


Free Soul was not the only sad person. Zeinobia also was going to cry twice [5]:

First time when I saw the Judge Mohamed Hamza in the Prime Time “10 O'clock ” in an exclusive hit interview from the Cleopatra hospital, the Head of the North Cairo Court was attacked by the Police forces yesterday Morning in front of the Judges Club !!

Second Time when I saw the victims of Dahab ‘s photos on the Egyptian National TV among them, a young baby , just months , seems to me not Egyptian but Foreigner , I couldn't take it any more , it is just a little angel that did nothing wrong except being in the wrong place and wrong time

This is the saddest Spring day ever

and this is the saddest Sinai Liberation day, some one wants to kill our celebration deliberately.

Why during feasts? Why three times blasts happen in 6/10 (October war) and 23/7 (the revolution) and now 25/4 (Sinai liberation)? Free Soul said [4].

There is a fear in Egypt that Sinai [6] Bedouins [7] will be main suspects/victims as happened before. DNA is not ready to believe this happening again and calls all of this as lies [8]:

The bombings in Dahab didn’t happen. It’s all lies. The terrorists haven’t won again. Our tourism industry is doing great, and it’s well on it’s way to recovery from last year’s fiasco. The Bedouins have nothing to do with this. It isn’t a coincidence that this bogus piece of news came out at the same time it did last year. We shouldn’t expect anything to happen in July – another Red Sea high season. Nobody died, nobody got hurt. There’s nothing to see here. Move along.

Along the same concept, Ibn ad Dunya said that government denial of possible al-Qaida involvement is to save tourism industry [3]:

Another development will most probably be mass arests of suspects, and the government will do anything to say that this was not al Qaida, that it was homegrown, anything to save the tourism industry. In fact i already heard some official saying that this had no connection whatsoever with any of the recent attacks.

On the other hand, Maryanne thinks that if Sinai Bedouins has anything to do with these blasts, it is government to blame [9]. Sinai Bedouins lacks everything. Education, medication, development, etc.:

But has anyone considered sharing the benefits of development with the local families? Very few. With all of the money flowing through Sinai, very little has stayed there to benefit the Bedouin who barely manage to exist in their beautiful hell. No schools, no training, no hospitals. What are the children here expected to do in the future in this situation? How are children who have no material assets, no chance to learn the skills needed in the increasingly urban society that we have here, going to manage as adults who have no possibility of employment?

Why do we need to look abroad for the perpetrators? As the government has said, this is a local problem but it is a very serious one that needs attention.

The Egyptian Arabic language blogsphere equally critical on their government. The economical consequences are drastic. Mohammad Rabie describes the situation in his words [10]:

عبدالرحمن
عنده مكتب هندسي في دهب ، باقيله سنة تقريبا فاتح ، المكتب بيجيب دخل شهري كويس ، الى جانب الدخل من القاهرة ، عبد الرحمن كان بيفكر يجيب شقة و يدفع المقدم من التحويشة ، و باقي الأقساط هايسددها من مكتب دهب ، انهاردة صرف نظر عن موضوع الشقة

محمود
شريك الأولاني في المكتب ، عنده شغله في القاهرة بس شغل دهب فيه حركة أكتر ، و برضه بيساعد في المصاريف ، انهارده بيفكر يفض الشركة و يرجع للقاهر

Abdulrahman
He has an engineering office at Dahab, it's been a year since he started and the office is returning good monthly income beside his other business at Cairo. He was planning to pay a down payment to buy a flat from his savings and then pay the monthly installments from his Dahab office income. Today, he gave up his plans to buy the flat.

Mahmood
He is Abdulrahman partner. He also has another business at Cairo, but Dahab office returns more income for him. Today, he is thinking in dissolving the company with Abdulrahman and return back to Cairo.

Mohammad Rabie then closes his post with wonders. He said [10]:

الكثير يعتقد أن الاسرائيليين خلف الموضوع ، الكثيرون أيضا يقولون أن البدو هم المدبرون ، الكل يتجاهل أو ينسى الجماعات الارهابية ، ربما لأنه لم يعلن أحد عن مسؤوليته حتى الان ، الجميع يؤكد أن للبدو حق لو أنهم من فعلوا ذلك ، ما فعلته الحكومة بهم بعد شرم و طابا اكثر من أن يتحمله انسان ، فما بالك ببدوي يعشق الحرية و يرى أن كرامته فوق كل شيئ ، الجميع يؤكدون أن خلال الاحتلال الاسرائيلي لسيناء كانت الأمور أفضل كثيرا ، كان المنغص الوحيد عليهم هو أنهم يشعرون بأنهم محتلون ، بينما كانت معاملة الاسرائيليين لهم أفضل كثيرا من معاملة المصريين ، البناء و التعمير اتخذ طابعا سرطانيا أثناء وجود الاسرائيليين ، الخدمات مثل الماء العذب و الكهرباء كانت متوفرة و بكفاءة عالية بعكس ما هو حاصل الان ، و كانت الأعمال أكثر من ان يقوم بها سكان المنطقة وحدهم ، فكانوا يقومون بعمل عملين أو أكثر في وقت واحد ، كان الصيد حرفة أساسية ، و كان الصيادون يبيعون المحصول لليهود بأسعار مبالغ فيها ، لم يتم القاء القبض على أحد لم يتم ضرب أو تعذيب أحد ، مع أنهم كانوا محتلين و غرباء
Many think that Israelis are behind the whole thing. Many also say that Bedouins are behind it. But everybody ignores the terrorist groups. Maybe because no group has claimed the responsibility until now. Everybody confirms that if the Bedouins were behind it, then they have done the right thing. What the government did to them after Sharm alshaikh and Taba is beyond the tolerance of any human beings. Everyone confirm that under the Israeli occupation of Sinai, situation was much more better, putting aside the fact that they hated the feeling to be under occupation, but the Israeli treatment to them was much better compared to Egyptian. Construction was going in very fast and rapid theme during the occupation, water and electricity was available in high standards, just opposite to what the situation is alike now. There were a lot of work opportunities. In fact it was very common doing to jobs at the same time. And since fishing was one of their main skills, they used to sell their fishing harvest to Israelis at very high prices, and they were never arrested, or beaten or tortured, even they were under occupation.

Ahmad also thinks that all what is happening is due to governmnet's wrong priorities [11]:

و ها قد فشل النظام من جديد ، بكل المقاييس ، ووفقا لكل وجهات النظر، فشلت الداخلية في حماية مواطنيها ، و في توفير إجازة آمنة لهم ، لماذا؟ لأن للأمن اهتمامات أخرى أهم ، فالأمن لم و لن تكون في أولوياته حماية عامة الناس ، و إنما أولوياته هي حماية النظام ، و الحفاظ على استمراريته التي تشتق منها استمرارية جهاز الأمن كله.
The system fails again, by all standards, and according to all opinions, the ministry of interior failed to protect their citizens and to provide them with a safe vacation period. Why? Because their main concerns are different. Security was never and will never be a priority to protect the citizens, but to protect the ruling system and to make sure the system keeps running which in return will keep the security system in place.