The bastion of religious reaction and bigotry in Egypt… The man who claimed fame by handing out fatwas left and right to support whatever Hosni and his gangsters say…

A7a!
One hundred years after it was founded, Cairo’s School of Fine Arts seeks to train Egypt’s artists but has to make do without nude “life” drawing classes so as not to offend Islam.
It is in this academic hive, sheltered inside a neo-classical villa on the chic island of Zamalek, that 2,500 students come from around [...]

Mabrouk for the Bahaai’s…  and fuck the bigots…

My friend Hannah Allam had asked me to contribute to a blog posting on her website, about the campaign agaisnt “Islamofascism Awareness Week” at US universities… Click on the pic below to check it out…

[A UC Berkeley student arguing against a Christian fundamentalist demonstrator who spent the whole day standing with a sign reading "Islam [...]

I received the following statement from HRW…
Egypt should immediately free two men active in promoting the rights of Egypt�s Shi`a minority and halt any criminal proceedings against them, Human Rights Watch said today. The two men were arrested after also criticizing the prevalence of torture in Egyptian prisons.
Click on the poster below to read [...]

Mubarak’s regime continues its bigotry…
A State Security prosecutor sentenced Mohamed El-Derini, prominent Egyptian Shia activist and writer, to 15 days in jail for publishing false information about being tortured in prison.
His son Ahmed El-Derini, a journalist at Al-Badil daily newspaper, told Daily News Egypt that the charges against him also included contempt for religion [...]

Youssef el-Badri, the fanatic cleric, is trying to push forward Judge Mourad’s lawsuit, where the latter is demanding 51 Egyptians websites and blogs (including mine) to be banned by the government… The latest developments in the case is included in the following statement by HRINFO… Click on Latuff’s cartoon below…

I’ve just received news from Cairo that Shiite rights activist Mohamed el-Derreini was arrested again by Mubarak’s Gestapo, who raided Derreini’s house around 2am, dragging him to Lazoughli (State Security Police’s main torture facility, located in downtown Cairo).
Derreini, the father of our blogojournalist friend Ahmad, was arrested and brutally tortured by Mubarak’s SS in 2003, [...]

From Reuters…
Young U.S. non-Orthodox Jews are becoming increasingly lukewarm if not alienated in their support for Israel in a trend that is not likely to be reversed, according to a study released on Thursday. ….
The study found only 48 percent of U.S. Jews under age 35 believe that Israel’s destruction would be a personal [...]

Here’s Al-Jazeera’s documentary on the assassination of Hassan el-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brothers…

After you watch it, make sure you click on the pic below to download Sameh Naguib’s booklet: The Muslim Brothers: A Socialist View…

I received the following statement from HRinfo…
The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (HRinfo) salutes Abdel Moati Hegazi, a prominent Egyptian poet, for his refusal to pay a L.E 20,000 fine imposed against him by an appeal court in Cairo, after he was charged with insulting Yusuf al Badri, an extremist infamous for his [...]

Click on the poster below…

From Al-Jazeera…
A Roman Catholic priest has gone on trial in Argentina charged with involvement in kidnappings, murder and torture while the country was under military rule from 1976 to 1983.
Heavy security surrounded the courthouse in La Plata as the trial got under way on Thursday, with defendant Christian Von Wernich wearing a bullet-proof vest.
The [...]