Egypt’s Fear of Facebook
June 3rd, 2008 — idteamYesterday Sherif Mansour argued in an LA Times Op-Ed that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is considering shutting down Facebook. Mansour writes that Facebook activists have been targeted for mobilizing 80,000 activists to protest food prices and because they helped organize a textile workers strike, as we have discussed here.
Even without a potential shut off, the government is applying pressure. According to Mansour:
…Facebook activists are being targeted by government-based media campaigns defaming the website and the youth activists who use it. The government also warns media not to talk about the phenomenon. I saw the heavy-handed efforts of the government while recording a TV show with Maher. During the taping, Egyptian police broke into the studio, threatened the station manager and forced the guest outside the room.
Mansour notes that so far nearly 20 Egyptian human rights have shown their support, lead by Ahmad Samih, but that that the international community has been less quick to take up the cause. Mansour concludes that, “It would be shameful for the international community not to stand up on their behalf against a government that seeks to deny them even that small space to express themselves.”
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August 11th, 2008 at 1:38 am
what should be done then ?
a detonational destruction all along the country or just spreading chaos is just retarded solutions,
I think the media like TV programs will be the perfect solution like “el beet betak”
October 27th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
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January 27th, 2009 at 3:36 am
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