Egypt: Bedouins of Sinai Crisis, 11-year-old Mother and Blogger Say the Unsayable

This week’s round-up from Egypt highlights bloggers’ involvement in domestic issues like the rape of an 11-year-old girl and the Egyptian Bedouins of Sinai’s dilemma in Egypt and covers bloggers’ news.

Egyptian Bedouins of Sinai Facing Discrimination: Centralization and the one identity issue for an entire nation are among challenges facing so many developing countries in the world. If not heeded to, minorities are jeopardized and diversity is not respected. Despite the fact that Egypt is not a huge country, it enjoys quite good amount of diversity that makes it a rich nation in a way. Bedouins of Sinai have been living in this peninsula for ages, maintaining certain authentic culture and traditions that make them unique in every respect and add to Egypt’s cultural richness. They have been patient and silent over unfair discriminatory security treatment to them since the 90’s. A new blogger from the Bedouins of Sinai has started blogging about their problems.

“Wedna ne3ish” or we want to live is a new blog that discusses problems facing the Bedouins of Sinai in Egypt. The government and different security departments in Egypt have been intimidating the Bedouins of Sinai since the 90’s. The blog posts are loud cries protesting the discrimination treatment they receive at the hands of the security apparatus, which is ignorant of the Egyptian Bedouins’ culture, habits and style of life. The conflict between the Bedouins and all departments of security reached a climax that led some Bedouins resorting to Israel on the borders for help.

Manal and Alaa Blog has also been following and reporting on the problems of Bedouins of Sinai for quite some time now. You can read their blog posts in Arabic here!

Eleven year old Mother in Egypt: Egyptian Chronicles is reporting and commenting on a horrific incident from Qalyubia Governorate about an 11-year-old mother, who is now considered the youngest mother in Egypt. The poor girl was raped by 21-year-old man who threatened to kill her in front of her school if she opened her mouth. It is a very moving story. You can read the details in English by Zeinobia from Egyptian Chronicles here.

Ahmed Ghareeb is leading a campaign on his blog to ensure this child gets her rights. He described what happened to Hend as “… a heinous crime!”

Egyptian blogger in London this week!

Amr Gharbeia Beyond Censorship: Arabawy is reporting that Egyptian blogger Amr Gharbeia is in London this week to talk about the legal case filed by an Egyptian judge to block his website along with other blogs and human rights sites in Egypt.

Will be crossing fingers for Gharbeia today in London and until I see you next week, all the best from Cairo!

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