Empire Builder - Cairo Eid Sexual Rampage

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

"During Eid, I had heard rumours and secondhand "friend of a friend" accounts of chaos in downtown Cairo on the first day of Eid - apparently a massive crowd of less-desirable characters were roaming the streets in a huge pack, finding women on the street and mass assaulting them. I was far away in Dahhab and didnt really want to think about it, and when I got a few minutes of internet access I couldn't find anything at all about it." (Tom Gara)

"The stories:

One eyewitness recounts a large crowd of youth (shabab) that run after a woman in her early twenties when she trips and falls. The men then start groping her and take off her clothes. The woman gets up, runs, and hides inside a restaurant. The men surround the restaurant until someone shouts, "there is another one at ....". The crowds then run to that location to find another woman completely surrounded by hundreds of men trying to feel her and take off her clothes. A taxi driver takes that woman in his car but the men surround the car and shout for the girl to come out. A Security Officer (appears to be non-government) tries to fend the people off by hitting them with his baton. The crowds do not easily disperse until they see two women wearing the overall Saudi/Gulf veil & abaya walking alone. The crowds then completely surround them, before touching them and taking off their veils. They attempt to take their clothes off while 10/11 year old boys get in their abayas.
A well known actress, Ola Ghanem, was seen surrounded by her bodyguards fending off the crowds but were unable to completely protect the actress.
A woman in a veil and abaya is harassed by men who take off her abaya before two building Security guys took her into the building and locked the door to protect her.
A woman in tighter pants and a normal shirt is harassed and men take off her shirt and bra. A security person takes her into a shop fending off people with a stick.
Much worse assaults are reported by the word of mouth but are not witnessed. One in which a woman was sexually assaulted against a wall after taking off all her clothes.
Men cheered this before attacking a victim, "yaay, we will f***, we will f***". (yaay is my rough translation for 'heyeh').
And when they find another victim, "another woman, another woman".
And when they see women in veil & abaya, "go Saudi, go Saudi". (go is my rough translation for 'beep beep').
And when surrounding a taxi and calling for a victim to get out of the car, "get out you sl*t, we will show you". The woman was later forced out like they wanted!
Some bloggers warned women against entering the troubled areas, and most listened. Some women sought protection with the bloggers as they had cameras. The men did not assault these women fearing that they might be journalists.
Some men were observed to use their belts to ward off the crowds and then take the victim in a taxi and flee.
Some shop owners sprayed water to disperse the crowds and hailed for the women to come inside." (Mechanical Crowds)

"I am one of the females who got sexually harassed on downtown streets, more specifically on Talaat Harb street starting from Metro Cinema until the beginning of Sabry Abu Alam street.

There were two other friends with me, a female and her male.

We felt like we were in a war--I had my self defense spray was emptied on the endless number of guys who surrounded us and yet still wasn't enough.

We, girls, had our butts, breasts, and every inch in our bodies grabbed. I end up slipping into a car that was parking on the road side when I tried to catch one of the guys who insisted and never gave up on grabbing my butt. I end up with a deep cut in my right hand palm and another one on my thumb of the same hand as I slipped into the cars head light that broke and cut my hand. 6 stitches on my hand palm cut and 3 on my thumb--still my anger is pretty fresh in the deep inside of me that wants me to put all Egyptian men on fire right now for what they have caused. What the fuck mother fuckers? Don't you have sisters who can also face the same thing as we did? How the fuck would you feel about this knowing your sister's butt and breasts got grabbed by the guys on the street?

I think you better act cold towards that since you might be one of the assholes who grab other girls asses. But let me tell you this: It's NOT and NEVER the girl to blame you sons of a bitches, it's NEVER the girl, NEVER! It's you to blame for doing such things to girls who you could consider them sisters and try to protect them not fucking grab them and show the world the worst picture of how Muslim men are who say and insist on how good people they are, but to tell you the truth, Muslim men are the worst human being on the entire planet and they just don't know it. Oh no, they don't even deserve to be called human beings, they are ANIMALS--DIRTY PIGS! Mother fuckers, You're putting Islam in the worst image ever in front of the world, so don't be so surprised when the westerners call you TERRORISTS which I simply agree with them! Think about it, assholes, think about it!" (an anonymous poster in manaala)

Mobs. Beware of mobs. People do things in a mob that they will never dare to do individually.

Like the one happening in Central Park, Manhattan six years ago

" On Saturday, June 9th, at 1 p.m., there will be a rally at Central Park South (59th Street) and Sixth Avenue to mark the first anniversary of last year's Central Park assaults on June 11, 2000, when over 56 women were assaulted, stripped and molested by a large group of men." (The Street Harrashment Project)

It might be useful to carry and know how to use them. I was involved in more school fight that I would have liked back in the Island. The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to avoid a crowd in the first place. The next best thing is to take the next man down and make him your hostage (you have to fuck him up pretty badly to be able to do it) - so instead of emptying your self defense spray to 7 guys in the mob, empty it to one or two guys only and make them wish they were dead.

When people are in the mob, they are in a bubble of denial of accountability and the one way to put the fear of God back into them is to make an example of one or two of them.

Then withdraw as soon as possible from the scene.

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posted on Wednesday, November 01, 2006 1:50:33 PM (Egypt Standard Time, UTC+02:00)