With bad memories of Rumsfeld’s dismissal of the looting of the Iraqi national museum lingering, I was probably not the only person heartened by this NYTimes note on Saturday (c3:45pm):
Defending the Egyptian Museum:A cross-section of Cairo residents formed a human chain on Saturday to help guard Egyptian antiquities at a national museum.
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Cairo residents helped soldiers guard the Egyptian Museum in central Cairo on Saturday, following reports on Egyptian television that looters had broken in the night before and damaged two mummies there…
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The museum is located close to the epicenter of the protests in central Cairo, between two bridges that were the site of clashes between protesters and riot police on Friday.
Somewhat less heartening, in the next update at the same site:
Speaking on CNN [Saturday afternoon], Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian blogger and journalist appealed to the media to not fall for what she described as a Mubarak regime plot to make the protests in Egypt seem like dangerous anarchy. “I urge you to use the words ‘revolt’ and ‘uprising’ and ‘revolution’ and not ‘chaos’ and not ‘unrest, we are talking about a historic moment,” she said.
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Moments later, as Ms. Eltahawy suggested that looting and damage to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo shown on Egyptian television was the work of “the police and the thugs of Hosni Mubarak,” the lower third of the screen displayed the banner headline: “EGYPT IN CHAOS.”… The network then displayed video from Egyptian state television of damage to the museum, which has been shown around the world on Saturday.
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Ms. Eltahawy told CNN: “The Mubarak regime has never cared about the museum. If the Mubarak regime cared about the museum it would take care of the pricelss items there. They don’t care about it. They care about the pyramids because they took the money from toursm and put it into their own pockets.”
As Tom Scocca added on his Slate blog today:
“There are thugs going around looting and wrecking shops,” an Egyptian army officer told a crowd of protesters in a video clip in heavy rotation on Al Jazeera on Saturday. So the protesters should please obey the curfew and get off the streets at night, he said, so that the city could be protected from rampant violence.
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The officer seemed sincere. But by some coincidence, what the authorities were asking people to do to thwart the looting was also what the authorities wanted people to do to thwart the protests. Obey the curfew, please. Let us get the situation under control.
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But what was the situation, and how was it to be controlled? The Los Angeles Times was willing to buy the claims of theft and anarchy, as Choire Sicha pointed out at the Awl. There is always someone who will pick up the story about the looters. The truth is, in times of unrest or disaster, the defining crime is not looting but murder—extrajudicial killing in the name of law and order. Theft, or the suspicion of theft, becomes a capital offense, and this somehow affirms civilization. It happened after Katrina, and it happened in Haiti. The idea of looting produces the fact of lynching.
(Emphasis mine.) I hope, most sincerely, that the Egyptian people are able to continue to protect their share of our precious global heritage. It would be nice if the idea of protecting this heritage doesn’t get turned into yet another casus belli (casus foederis) for the warmongers, but it would also be nice if the weather channel would stop predicting another snowfall tomorrow, and I’m not counting on either of those things as I plan for the morning.
Zam
Looters? I didn’t know there were that many black people in Egypt.
/Teabagger
freelancer
@Zam:
Contrary to what you may believe if you watch Fox News, but Egypt is in Africa. They’re Africans (technically, but aren’t we all Africans, technically?).
Little Boots
I love you people. you do not sleep.
Little Boots
or maybe, you do.
Little Boots
what is with this place? nobody likes the new thread?
GregB
The fact that the footage of the looting came from state TV is quite elucidating. It gives much credence to those that allege the state was sowing chaos so that the state could then come in and end the chaos.
In some regards it appears that Bush stole Mubarak’s shtick. Terror, terror, terror.
Bush had 9/11 to hearken back to and Mubarak had the Sadat assassination.
asiangrrlMN
I post this without much comment on my part. It’s an Egyptian’s advice on what not to say to Egyptians about the protests.
Little Boots
BJ’s? Come on. You are all awake, just post already.
M. Bouffant
@Little Boots: OK, already.
Little Boots
M Bouffant, you are legend. I love you.
Little Boots
get these goobers up here, por favor.
S. cerevisiae
I agree the stories about “looters” may be a ploy by the regime to paint the protesters as anarchists and that the Egyptian people can see through the bullshit. I just hope for their sakes this all turns out well.
S. cerevisiae
I’ve always wanted to see the National Museum in Cairo, and I still have hope of seeing it someday.
Little Boots
@S. cerevisiae:
me too, I hope it’s there, forever.
freelancer
Little Boots
Little Boots
Little Boots
Can’t be wrong…
Little Boots
@freelancer:
you are beyond sweet.
freelancer
@Little Boots:
You’re awfully sentimental this evening.
S. cerevisiae
I was lucky enough to see the treasures of Tutankamun when they were on tour here back in ’76. I was young, but seeing that gold mask stopped me in my tracks. The craftsmanship is so amazing you could swear you were looking into his face. I half expected him to start talking.
Little Boots
@freelancer:
it’s true, i am, and where the hell is everyone? you juicers are supposed to be up all night, dammit.
asiangrrlMN
@Little Boots: I’m not commenting much because I am WAY out of my depth when it comes to Egypt. And, I’m writing a blog post of my own. Teaser: It will include her. But, I am awake and still skulking.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: I do know one a href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP1O3liDQl8&feature=related”>Egyptian thing you enjoy. I’m still tipping my hat to you and Emily for introducing him to me.
BTW I’m half-amazed no one has gotten him on TV. He is Egyptian, and he has family there.
M. Bouffant
I saw the Tut Tour too, though it’d slipped my mind.
Speaking of Rummy: He’s getting the Defender of the Constitution Award at CPAC.
MattR
@Little Boots: I’m catching the reruns of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report that I could not pay attention to the first time because I was on the phone with Expedia. But I really should be going to sleep.
Little Boots
@asiangrrlMN:
Oh, don’t let that stop you. It doesn’t stop M. Bouffant, and he is legend. Really.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: ‘Tis true. He has a voice like an ahn-gel, and he’s pretty easy on the eyes. How you be?
@Little Boots: You’re funny. Snort.
Little Boots
but I’m not kidding, I really do love M Bouffant. He is awesome. No joke.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: It’s the Okie accent he has when he talks in interviews that gets me. That more than anything else should make a teabagger totally lose his shit. Plus he’s smart as hell, don’t forget that part of it.
I’m good, work was just meh though a guy thinks I’m a genius now for just doing my job. Big assist from my manager on his case, but still I more or less get the credit.
Villago Delenda Est
@GregB:
I used to help run a nonprofit community ISP back in the early days of the ‘net. We had a system administrator who seemed to create problems with the servers, then ride to the rescue to “fix” the problem his own ineptitude created. A member of the board would praise him for his actions in fixing the problem, thus proving his worth, ignoring that he created the problem in the first place, which drove the other administrators (who were not in this thing to boost their own egos, just to make sure it worked)crazy. They’d use industry approved and validated solutions, this guy would undo them, and the system would be in chaos.
Sounds pretty much like what Mubarak is trying to pull with this “museum looting” thing.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: Yeah, I don’t see ‘Baggers liking my man, Kareem, no matter how much he twangs. The fact that he’s smart as hell is a further turn-off.
Cool about work. You are a genius. Meet you up in the next thread.
Little Boots
just come up, you bastards, seriously, stop being oblivious.
Ruckus
@asiangrrlMN:
Sounds like good advice no matter who one is talking about.
Platonicspoof
Sec. Rumsfeld on Friday, April 11, 2003 on the looting in Baghdad (Joanne Mariner):
The images you are seeing on television you are seeing over, and over, and over, and it’s the same picture of some person walking out of some building with a vase, and you
see it 20 times, and you think, “My goodness, were there that many vases?” (Laughter.) “Is it possible that there were that many vases in the whole country?” (page 3, pdf, loaded quickly).
Stuff happens! on page four.
Maybe next year CPAC will give him a ‘Defender of International Law’ award.
Origuy
I posted this link from Zahi Hawass’ blog yesterday. Besides the damage to the two mummies, the gift shop was looted, and a few other antiquities were damaged. The Port Said museum was not so fortunate, as a number of items were stolen.
NobodySpecial
Don’t be silly, this is America. Property is more valuable than liberty.