When silence is deafening

Friends in Australia and the US have been asking me what has been going on in Egypt the last couple of weeks. Who is Khaled Said? What is this situation about? What happened to him? What’s going on?

Khaled Said is a 28-year-old Egyptian man who was brutally beaten to death by two plain clothes policemen in broad daylight in Alexandria on June 6, for no explicable reason. There have since been huge demonstrations – the most effective, powerful and heart-wrenching being the silent protest in Alexandria last Friday – and Khaled has become a martyr and an icon for change in Egypt, particularly for the movement against regime-sanctioned police brutality, which is routine. Of course there are countless others who have met the same fate, but this case has outraged the public and received widespread attention because it was in broad daylight and not behind the walls of a police station. There have been extremely graphic before-and-after photos of Khaled circulated that are impossible to ignore.

An Egyptian friend Shady explains the situation in more detail:
“The facts are that Khaled was brutally killed in the middle of the street by two plain clothes police informants (death/torture squads). They literally executed him by smashing his head into pieces (broken skull) in the middle of the street. They banged his head into the floor numerous times until his face became totally deformed. To make things worse, instead of bringing the killers to justice, the police have fabricated all sorts of absurd, illogical lies about Khaled (such as claiming that his smashed skull was a result of him falling off the bed while being transported to the ambulance!), which no one believes as the pictures and witnesses blatantly refute this. Furthermore, the corrupt system has utilized all state-controlled media to unleash a smear campaign against the poor victim, claiming he was a drug dealer. And finally, it's brutally cracking down on all demonstrations to try to silence any resistance.

“There are two stories about why he was killed: (1) He asked to be treated with respect; (2) He was about to expose cops who were dealing in drugs (there’s a video on the net showing this) and it’s claimed that the killers are in the video. The one sure thing is that there's a massive cover-up story.

“You might wonder why the police are doing this. The reason is to maintain their brutal image so as to terrorize people against showing any resistance to the regime. And they can never let any one of the police go to trial at any cost, even if they murder people.

“The regime is stealing taxes from people to fund the police, whose job is to protect the regime at any cost. Hence, those who are supposed to protect us are actually killing us, with support that reaches all the way to the Head of State. Hence, the police have ended up being the biggest mafia gang in the whole country.”

Last Friday 18 June – in a stroke of brilliantly conceived and implemented activism – Egyptian men, women, teenagers and children dressed in black and stood in silence for one hour along the corniche in Alexandria and Cairo demonstrating their fury at the government for the brutal killing of Khaled and countless others like him. They stood in silence, some praying with outstretched hands, some reading the Qur’an, some reading the Bible… and they stood a few feet apart so as to circumvent the law against public demonstrations and avoid the identification of any ringleaders or organisers.

As Shady said:
“This was a truly innovative technique as the previous demonstrations were brutally knocked down by the police mafia. The police have the 'dirty jobs' squad... plain clothes squads who kidnap and beat the demonstration leaders. This time the demonstration was spread out across kilometres, which made it very difficult for the police to stop them. This is a Ghandi-style type of demonstration!”

And another Egyptian friend Ramy said:
“I always thought this is the way to demonstrate, not with violence or hate slogans. This is the way it must be done, and this is the way you grab the world’s attention... not with violence and not by screaming and creating hate slogans. I’m sure the next one will be even more successful. The nation has started to have a PULSE after thirty long years of sleep.”

When my Australian friend Mandy read about and saw photos of the silent demonstration in Alexandria, she said:
“This is awesome – it's a pity more people in Australia and around the world aren't more aware of it and showing their support for such a huge moment in history! I had a dinner party last night and told them all.”

I hope everyone outside of Egypt is talking about this at dinner by the end of the week.

There is another silent demonstration planned for this Friday 25 June, apparently to be led by Mohammed ElBaradei. Let’s hope the international media gets behind it and the countries that finance the government stop looking the other way.

And, finally, a quote from Shady:
“A minuscule feat of resistance can trigger a ripple effect of epic proportions. The initial spark that unleashed the whole civil rights movement in the USA in the 1960s started when a black lady refused to give her seat to a white lady. In the end, this led to the freedom of the black people. Never underestimate your action, no matter how small... a single word can be as sharp as a sword.”

The domino effect, which starts with one gentle little push, is unstoppable.

God bless Egypt.