The 18-day war: "revolution of the youth of the internet ... of the youth of Egypt ... of Egypt itself"

The end of the "Pharaoh", other front pages of 13 February said.

"This is the revolution of the youth of the internet, which became the revolution of the youth of Egypt, then the revolution of Egypt itself." 

That's how the acknowledged hero of the Egyptian uprising, 30-year old Egyptian Google marketing executive Wael Ghonim, defined the leaderless revolution of eighteen days, waged from the command posts in the social networks and Tahrir Square and on the streets of Cairo and other major cities.  

People are already saying Ghonim started the revolution through his Facebook page "We are all Khaled Said", which he set up to protest police brutality in honor of Khaled Said, a businessman who died in the hands of the police in Alexandria last year.  This spark lit up the movement that raged into Tahrir Square on January 25 .  He had about 400,000 Facebook followers to fan the flames of war!

According to reports, Ghonim ran his popular Facebook account outside of his office hours in Dubai until he went home to Egypt purportedly for personal reasons. His Google bosses did not know about his activism until he disappeared, and they had to ran a campaign for his freedom.  He was kept in police custody for 12 days, most of the time blindfolded.  When he appeared on TV upon his release on 08 February, "hundreds of thousands of protesters returned to the streets of Cairo" (BBC, 09 Feb). 

"We won't give up," he urged the protesters in Tahrir Square.  They did not. Nothing would move them out from Tahrir until Mubarak bows out. They would not wait for his 30-year reign to end after his successor is elected in September.

 

Grab from CNN broadcast.

There were cyberworld [underground is now passe, we suppose] voices that summoned people's power to the streets.  Blogger Sandmonkey was one of them.  Until he came out through CNN after he was assaulted by pro-Mubarak elements on his way to the Square with food and medical supplies, nobody knew he was 29-year old Mahmoud Salem who grew up in Egypt and studied at Northwestern University in Boston.

Hosni Mubarak was reported to have flown out of Cairo with his family and trusted staff late February 11 to his seaside mansion in Sharm el-Sheikh, a resort town at the southern tip of the Sinai peninsula. Terrorists attacked this town in 2005, and 88 people got killed.

February 11 was the day in 1979 that the Shah of Iran was overthrown, and he went into exile.  Twenty five years ago this month, the United States flew out the dictator Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines from the presidential palace to Hawaii as a result of the peaceful EDSA or People Power revolution.  Those who were on EDSA could remember that it was a military mutiny that morphed into a people's revolution; the Church called on the people to go to EDSA to support the mutineers.

As soon as  Mubarak fell, the Sandmonkey, as expected went ranting in his blog of that name:

"Today [12 February], the people were more resolved than ever to get rid of Hosny Mubarak, especially after last night's provocative statement. I went to the presidential palaces alongside thousands of Egyptians and we surrounded it completely. Within a couple of hours we received the news: MUBARAK HAD ABDICATED!

"Now, mind you, he didn't really abdicate..the army overthrew him. That's why we only had Omar Suleiman letting us know this. But it doesn't matter. We will get all the money they stole and use it to rebuild the country.

"Tonight will be the first night where I go to bed and don't have to worry about state security hunting me down, or about government goons sent to kidnap me; or about government sponsored hackers attacking my website. Tonight, for the first time ever, I feel free…and it is awesome!  

"Save any and all disagreements with any of the groups that operate them. We will disagree with each other, and that will be sweet because no more dictatorship. Tomorrow we squabble, and…tonite?

"TONIGHT WE CELEBRATE! "  

Egypt is slowly going back to normalcy.  The Muslim Brotherhood banned through all the years has come back into the political discussions. Noble peace price winner ElBaradei tried to be a negotiator during the height of the storm, but he never emerged to be the leader. He said he's open to run in the September elections.

Children in the war.

Peace be with you.

The protest movement ousted Hosni Mubarak and the country is in the hands of the military. Whether there was a coup, as Sandmonkey views it, or not, the fact is the military and the protesters slept with each other during those cold nights in Tahrir Square.  The military protected them by fencing them off from the hostile pro-Mubarak elements with tanks and barbed steel wire barricades.

Egypt has always been in military hands; Mubarak who succeeded Anwar Sadat after his assassination were high military officials although they were elected by popular vote. It was a win-win scenario for the United States, Israel and the Arab world.  

It looks like Egypt's fate is now in the hands of Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi. Here's a view from Anthony Shadid of the New York Times:

"The Egyptian military consolidated its control on Sunday [13 February] over what it has called a democratic transition from nearly three decades of President Hosni Mubarak’s authoritarian rule, dissolving the feeble Parliament, suspending the Constitution and calling for elections in six months in sweeping steps that echoed protesters’ demands. .. Though enjoying popular support, the military must now cope with the formidable task of negotiating a post-revolutionary landscape still basking in the glow of Mr. Mubarak’s fall, but beset by demands to ease Egyptians’ many hardships....  The moves to suspend the Constitution and to dissolve Parliament, chosen in an election deemed a sham even by Mr. Mubarak’s standards, were expected. The statement declared that the supreme command would issue laws in the transitional period before elections and that Egypt’s defense minister, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, would represent the country, in a sign that the 75-year-old loyalist of Mr. Mubarak’s had emerged to the forefront. Protesters — and some classified American diplomatic cables — have dismissed him as a “poodle” of Mr. Mubarak’s. But some senior American officers say he is a shrewd operator who played a significant role in managing Mr. Mubarak’s nonviolent ouster. . "

Faces of the revolution.

Invoking the power of the Almighty God.

Ecumenical battle front.

    

References:

Profile: Egypt's Wael Ghonim. (2011, Feb 09). BBC News Middle East.  Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-1240052 

News Agencies. (2011, Feb 11). Report: Mubarak, family leave Cairo amid persisting unrest.  The Haaretz.com. Retrieved from http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/report-mubarak-family-leave-cairo-amid-persisting-unrest-1.342792

Kinzer, Stephen.  (2011, Feb 11).  Where Will Mubarak Go?  The Daily Beast. Yahoo News. 
Retrieved from http://news.yahoo.com/s/dailybeast/20110211/ts_dailybeast/12370_mubaraksteppingdownwherewillhego

Shadid, Anthony. (2011, Feb 13).  Egyptian Miltary Dissolves Parliament. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/14/world/middleeast/14egypt.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2
 

 Sandmonkey. (2011, Feb 12).  Mubarak's Egypt No More. Retrieved from blogsite Rantings of a Sandmonkey.