The Arabist

The Arabist

By Issandr El Amrani and friends.

Eyewitness to murder

I just got a call from an eyewitness to a situation near my neighborhood. The person is a member of one of the Popular Committees (the citizen's watch groups protecting streets) in Mounira, a middle class central Cairo area. This morning around 6:30am a car drove up the street leading from Qasr al-Aini St. to Saad Zaghloul metro station. The citizen watch didn't let them go through at first, but then they showed them their State Security IDs, so they were allowed to pass. At the end of the street they stopped, opened the rear of the vehicle and dumped a body out. The citizen watch people ran towards them, and the State Security fired a few shots before getting back into the car. Another car sped in the Citizen Watch's direction and hit two of them companions before fleeing. When the neighborhood people reached the body, they saw it was a dead man who had been shot in the stomach. He is unidentified and the body been taken to Mounira's hospital.

A note on this: there have been widespread reports of security forces being involved in the looting and violence that has taken place. This is one of the many incidents I have heard about. No doubt we'll hear of more.