Middle East
Security forces fire on Cairo 'Nakba' rally
Dozens injured as army and police use live ammunition, witnesses say, to
disperse demonstration at Israeli embassy.
Evan Hill Last Modified: 16 May 2011 07:55
At least 120 people were injured, one of them critically, when Egyptian
security forces attacked a pro-Palestine demonstration outside the Israeli
embassy in Cairo on Sunday night, according to witnesses.
Activists told Al Jazeera that army and internal security troops used tear gas,
rubber-coated bullets and live ammunition to disperse thousands of protesters
who had gathered to mark the 63rd anniversary of the "Nakba" or "catastrophe" -
the day in 1948 that Israel declared its independence and thousands of
Palestinians fled or were expelled form their homes.
At least two protesters were shot by live ammunition, while others were
hospitalised after inhaling tear gas or being hit by rubber-coated steel
bullets, some of which penetrated the skin, witnesses said.
The AP news agency, quoting witnesses, said three people had been killed by
gunfire and one shot in the leg, but that report could not be corroborated.
One protester, Atef Yehya, was shot in the head and remained in critical
condition on Monday morning, while another, Ali Khalaf, was shot in the abdomen
and believed to be stable, witnesses said. As many as 60 people were arrested.
Military and security forces near the embassy briefly stopped and questioned an
Al Jazeera television crew and confiscated the team's camera, according to
Rawya Rageh, our correspondent in Cairo. The officers destroyed a videotape and
took some of the crew's personal items, including notebooks and a camera, she
said.
Surge toward building prompts shooting
The violence began at around 11pm after a group of protesters surged toward the
front of the multi-story office building that contains the Israeli embassy and
managed to push aside some of the barriers that had been erected in front of
the ground-floor entrance, witnesses said.
Members of the Central Security Forces responded with a heavy volley of tear
gas, driving the protesters back with support from military troops on the
scene. Witnesses said the army forces - a mix of regular soldiers and military
police - first fired in the air to disperse the protesters but then aimed at
the crowd.
Protesters responded by burning tires in the street and throwing stones.
"The army was running after us, shooting rubber bullets," said Sanaa Seif, an
activist who attended the protest. "I kept on hearing gunfire from everywhere,
and someone told me that there was gunfire from the Central Security Forces ...
I wasn't sure if it was rubber or live, people were saying rubber."
Activist Sanaa Seif shot this video of protester Ali Khalaf, who was reportedly
shot in the abdomen
In the chaos, a friend of Seif's, Youssef Bagato, was shot by a rubber-coated
bullet that lodged in his back.
Another protester had fainted nearby, and Seif and her friends helped him into
the entrance of a building to recover. There they found Khalaf, suffering from
a bullet wound below his stomach.
The group moved Khalaf inside a nearby shop to hide him from security forces
but were forced to leave by the owner, who feared they would be found. They
moved to a main street and put Khalaf into a cab with his friends to be taken
to a hospital.
Yehya, the protester who was shot in the head, was taken to Kasr al-Aini
Hospital in central Cairo for treatment, according to Mona Seif, another
activist and Sanaa's sister. He too had been hit during the initial retreat
from the security forces.
The bullet penetrated Yehya's frontal lobe, said Seif, who was in contact with
two of Yehya's friends.
Unclear fate for detainees
Street clashes continued for several hours after security forces first
dispersed the crowd. At around 4am, Central Security Force and army troops
closed in on the remaining protesters and arrested dozens.
Mohamed Effat, a freelance journalist who was chronicling the protest on
Twitter, wrote that the security forces approached from one side and fired tear
gas, driving the demonstrators into army troops coming from the other side.
"They pointed their guns at us, forced us to lie on our stomachs, fired heavily
into air, cussing at and hitting us. An officer told me whoever looked up would
be smacked on the neck," he wrote. "Last thing was that they took our phones
and IDs, queuing us to put in [Central Security] cars while yelling 'Have fun
in military prison rev[olutionary] youth'."
A protester tells activist Gigi Ibrahim how Atef Yehya was shot in the head
Effat was the only one among those arrested to be released, he said. Others
were reportedly taken to an internal security facility in Giza. They included
Tarek Shalaby and Mosaab Elshamy, two activists who became well known on
Twitter during the revolution.
Shalaby apparently had been using the mobile phone livestreaming service
Bambuser during his arrest and left some video and audio of the incident posted
online.
He had returned to Cairo at around 3am on Monday morning after an unsuccessful
attempt to join a "Nakba Day" protest at the Rafah border crossing between
Egypt and the Gaza Strip.
The army managed to shut down that demonstration, erecting several checkpoints
along the road toward Rafah and preventing bus companies from ferrying
protesters from Cairo.
There were conflicting reports about whether the embassy protesters would face
military or civil justice. In the wake of the revolution that unseated
President Hosni Mubarak and replaced him with the Supreme Council of the Armed
Forces, thousands of Egyptians - including at least hundreds of demonstrators -
have been forced into military trials that activists describe as lacking due
process.
Army troops at the scene told protesters that those arrested would be taken to
a military prosecutor's office, Effat wrote.
But Seif, who has organised a campaign against military justice in the wake of
the revolution, said protesters had been taken to the internal security
directorate in Giza and that it appeared they would not be referred to a
military court.
Elshamy was being held inside a Central Security Force truck at the security
directorate, his brother Abdullah wrote on Twitter after receiving a phone call
from him.
Source:
Al Jazeera and agencies
------------------------------------
Post message: [email protected]
Subscribe : [email protected]
Unsubscribe : [email protected]
List owner : [email protected]
Homepage : http://proletar.8m.com/Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
[email protected]
[email protected]
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
[email protected]
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
