New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

So, nearly 100,000 Egyptians pledged on Facebook to turn out for a "day of revolution" to mark a national holiday. And today hundreds of thousands have indeed come out into the streets for protest and it's getting dicey. The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK

There are also some twitter and facebook feeds to follow. You can find some feeds and more on the scene testimony in these Reddit threads here and here.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Rip »

Wikileaks has turned the world upside down.

:ninja:
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Holman »

So is this more like "Down with Ahmadinejad" or "Down with the Shah"?
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by El Guapo »

Holman wrote:So is this more like "Down with Ahmadinejad" or "Down with the Shah"?
It's not exactly like either. The Egyptian President (dictator) is a secular dictator mostly aligned with the U.S., so in that sense it's like down with the Shah (though he's not a monarchist).

Beyond that, if the uprising succeeds in bringing him down (and that's still a huge if at this point) whether it goes in an Islamist dictatorship or democratic governance remains to be seen. My understanding is that (although I don't know much about Tunisia at all) the Islamist opposition is much more organized and constitutes much more of the opposition in Egypt than it does in Tunisia (where, apparently, the main Islamist opposition group was exiled some time ago and is believed to be pretty weak). So I think the odds of Egypt going in an Islamist direction is higher than Tunisia's, though it's all pretty uncertain.

Egypt going to an Islamist dictatorship, incidentally, would be an epically bad thing, though at least we'd save on all the foreign aid we give them currently.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by LawBeefaroni »

Enough wrote:So, nearly 100,000 Egyptians pledged on Facebook
Have we annointed Mark Zuckerberg as King of All the World yet?
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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I noticed that a few couldn't help clapping when President Obama said facebook during The State of the Union address.

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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Enough wrote:The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK
That would seem to be a unconfirmed rumor. I've not seen a major new org reporting this yet.

In fact it seems to be a circular reference. The article you linked to says the Arab website reported an Italian new publication saying Mubarak's son fled, while if you go to the Italian website they say the Arab website reports he left. They seem to be citing each other :)
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Grifman »

Rip wrote:Wikileaks has turned the world upside down.

:ninja:
What's Wikileaks have to do with this?
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Rip »

Grifman wrote:
Rip wrote:Wikileaks has turned the world upside down.

:ninja:
What's Wikileaks have to do with this?
Well many claim they were responsible for the turmoil in Tunisia.
Publication of WikiLeaks sourced private US comments on the corruption and nepotism of a hated "sclerotic" regime is said to have helped create Tunisia's protest, and generated talk by US commentators of a "Wikileaks revolution".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/ja ... ghannouchi

So if the Tunisia unrest spawned the Egyptian unrest it stands to reason wikileaks will be credited with that as well.

Now I am not saying "I" believe that, but a number of people do. I would have to agree they have as much right to claim credit for these events as Al Gore does to claiming credit for the internet.

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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Rip »

Rip wrote:
Grifman wrote:
Rip wrote:Wikileaks has turned the world upside down.

:ninja:
What's Wikileaks have to do with this?
Well many claim they were responsible for the turmoil in Tunisia.
Publication of WikiLeaks sourced private US comments on the corruption and nepotism of a hated "sclerotic" regime is said to have helped create Tunisia's protest, and generated talk by US commentators of a "Wikileaks revolution".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/ja ... ghannouchi

So if the Tunisia unrest spawned the Egyptian unrest it stands to reason wikileaks will be credited with that as well.

Now I am not saying "I" believe that, but a number of people do. I would have to agree they have as much right to claim credit for these events as Al Gore does to claiming credit for the internet.
There were a substantial amount of released documents that did nothing to endure the Egyptian people to their government as well.
The Brotherhood now has a new trove of information to mine. For example, a February 2009 cable from Margaret Scobey, the U.S. ambassador in Cairo, to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton describing intelligence sharing between Egypt and Israel may add further credence to allegations that cooperation between the two states led to an Israeli hit on a Palestinian target in Gaza earlier this month — something Egypt vehemently denies. Potentially more damning is a June 2009 cable from the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, which reveals that Egypt had been consulted about Israel's air and land assaults on Gaza prior to the attack the previous winter.


http://www.time.com/time/world/article/ ... 93,00.html

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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK
That would seem to be a unconfirmed rumor. I've not seen a major new org reporting this yet.

In fact it seems to be a circular reference. The article you linked to says the Arab website reported an Italian new publication saying Mubarak's son fled, while if you go to the Italian website they say the Arab website reports he left. They seem to be citing each other :)
You can read the Reddit threads I posted, congrats. :wink:
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Grifman »

Enough wrote:
Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK
That would seem to be a unconfirmed rumor. I've not seen a major new org reporting this yet.

In fact it seems to be a circular reference. The article you linked to says the Arab website reported an Italian new publication saying Mubarak's son fled, while if you go to the Italian website they say the Arab website reports he left. They seem to be citing each other :)
You can read the Reddit threads I posted, congrats. :wink:
Yep, read them, still nothing confirmed so I'm not sure what your point is?
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

LawBeefaroni wrote:
Enough wrote:So, nearly 100,000 Egyptians pledged on Facebook
Have we annointed Mark Zuckerberg as King of All the World yet?
This is the evolution of Tiananmen, we now have Facebook, Twitter, flickr, meta sites like Reddit, etc... the word gets out easier than ever before. I think that's a good thing on balance, even if Zuckerberg gets his overly inflated ego stroked a bit.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:
Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK
That would seem to be a unconfirmed rumor. I've not seen a major new org reporting this yet.

In fact it seems to be a circular reference. The article you linked to says the Arab website reported an Italian new publication saying Mubarak's son fled, while if you go to the Italian website they say the Arab website reports he left. They seem to be citing each other :)
You can read the Reddit threads I posted, congrats. :wink:
Yep, read them, still nothing confirmed so I'm not sure what your point is?
I figured you picked up it was unconfirmed from one of the other links I posted and didn't mention that. It was a throwaway comment on my part, my apologies.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Holman »

Enough wrote: This is the evolution of Tiananmen, we now have Facebook, Twitter, flickr, meta sites like Reddit, etc... the word gets out easier than ever before. I think that's a good thing on balance, even if Zuckerberg gets his overly inflated ego stroked a bit.
I fully expect Zuckerberg to make a Dissent Management Package available to repressive governments in exchange for their whole economy's personal data.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

Holman wrote:
Enough wrote: This is the evolution of Tiananmen, we now have Facebook, Twitter, flickr, meta sites like Reddit, etc... the word gets out easier than ever before. I think that's a good thing on balance, even if Zuckerberg gets his overly inflated ego stroked a bit.
I fully expect Zuckerberg to make a Dissent Management Package available to repressive governments in exchange for their whole economy's personal data.
By then his site will likely be totally irrelevant for pro-democracy movements. Shelf-life for social media is very short it seems.

Meanwhile in Cario it continues.

And also, I don't mean to oversell the value of social media for encouraging freedom around the world. We all thought China would change just by being exposed to social media, but so far it seems to have little effect. And then there's this story on how,
Far from being a tool of revolution in Iran over the last year, the Internet, in many ways, just complicated the picture.
But it is fascinating to watch history being made regardless.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

The ever-amazing Big Picture has a feature up on the unrest.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Enough wrote:The ever-amazing Big Picture has a feature up on the unrest.
This one's my favorite...

Image
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Grifman »

Enough wrote:
Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:
Grifman wrote:
Enough wrote:The president's son and family have apparently fled to the UK
That would seem to be a unconfirmed rumor. I've not seen a major new org reporting this yet.

In fact it seems to be a circular reference. The article you linked to says the Arab website reported an Italian new publication saying Mubarak's son fled, while if you go to the Italian website they say the Arab website reports he left. They seem to be citing each other :)
You can read the Reddit threads I posted, congrats. :wink:
Yep, read them, still nothing confirmed so I'm not sure what your point is?
I figured you picked up it was unconfirmed from one of the other links I posted and didn't mention that. It was a throwaway comment on my part, my apologies.
No problem. I didn't read the Reddits until later, after I had posted.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Holman »

Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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And the Ripster's Wikileaks theory is getting traction in Foreign Policy.
In one fell swoop, the candor of the cables released by WikiLeaks did more for Arab democracy than decades of backstage U.S. diplomacy.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Just to be clear, this Wikileaks angle isn't some oddball theory that Rip came up with. It's been widely reported in, say, the New York Times and other major media outlets. In Tunisia, for example, the protests have mentioned leaked cables that implicated the ruling family in widespread corruption.

It's more or less beyond dispute that the Wikileaks releases have contributed to the unrest in the Arab world. What's unclear, and probably can't really be determined, is how significant that contribution is. It's certainly possible that events would have unfolded almost the same as they have even absent Wikileaks, but Wikileaks has had a role here.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Rip »

El Guapo wrote:Just to be clear, this Wikileaks angle isn't some oddball theory that Rip came up with. It's been widely reported in, say, the New York Times and other major media outlets. In Tunisia, for example, the protests have mentioned leaked cables that implicated the ruling family in widespread corruption.

It's more or less beyond dispute that the Wikileaks releases have contributed to the unrest in the Arab world. What's unclear, and probably can't really be determined, is how significant that contribution is. It's certainly possible that events would have unfolded almost the same as they have even absent Wikileaks, but Wikileaks has had a role here.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

El Guapo wrote:Just to be clear, this Wikileaks angle isn't some oddball theory that Rip came up with. It's been widely reported in, say, the New York Times and other major media outlets. In Tunisia, for example, the protests have mentioned leaked cables that implicated the ruling family in widespread corruption.
I guess a winking emoticon was called for in my previous post. Foreign Policy isn't some oddball source, that's for sure.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Enough »

Rip wrote:
El Guapo wrote:Just to be clear, this Wikileaks angle isn't some oddball theory that Rip came up with. It's been widely reported in, say, the New York Times and other major media outlets. In Tunisia, for example, the protests have mentioned leaked cables that implicated the ruling family in widespread corruption.

It's more or less beyond dispute that the Wikileaks releases have contributed to the unrest in the Arab world. What's unclear, and probably can't really be determined, is how significant that contribution is. It's certainly possible that events would have unfolded almost the same as they have even absent Wikileaks, but Wikileaks has had a role here.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Holman wrote:Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
The unrest in Yemen is a little unsettling insofar as I think the most likely outcome if the Yemeni government falls is a radical islamist dictatorship a la the Taliban regime.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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El Guapo wrote:
Holman wrote:Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
The unrest in Yemen is a little unsettling insofar as I think the most likely outcome if the Yemeni government falls is a radical islamist dictatorship a la the Taliban regime.
Yes, I think that would be bad news. Sometimes we need these lousy dictatorships.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Grifman »

ImLawBoy wrote:
El Guapo wrote:
Holman wrote:Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
The unrest in Yemen is a little unsettling insofar as I think the most likely outcome if the Yemeni government falls is a radical islamist dictatorship a la the Taliban regime.
Yes, I think that would be bad news. Sometimes we need these lousy dictatorships.
No good choices there for sure. Yemen isn't going to bloom into a Jeffersonian democracy overnight.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Kraken »

ImLawBoy wrote:
El Guapo wrote:
Holman wrote:Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
The unrest in Yemen is a little unsettling insofar as I think the most likely outcome if the Yemeni government falls is a radical islamist dictatorship a la the Taliban regime.
Yes, I think that would be bad news. Sometimes we need these lousy dictatorships.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by Rip »

Well some might be so delusional as to give credit to someone having their mouthpiece give a speech many years ago.
But the spark for this wave of revolutions may have started during the Bush administration when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave a seminal speech at the American University in Cairo:
"For 60 years, the United States pursued stability at the expense of democracy in the Middle East -- and we achieved neither," Rice argued during her 2005 speech which came across as a direct challenge to the Mubarak regime, a regime that receives billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid, the second highest after Israel.
"Now, we are taking a different course. We are supporting the democratic aspirations of all people."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01 ... ra-sparks/

:roll:
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Some liberal paper should counter it giving credit to Clinton or Carter.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Kraken wrote:
ImLawBoy wrote:
El Guapo wrote:
Holman wrote:Now unrest erupts in Yemen.
The unrest in Yemen is a little unsettling insofar as I think the most likely outcome if the Yemeni government falls is a radical islamist dictatorship a la the Taliban regime.
Yes, I think that would be bad news. Sometimes we need these lousy dictatorships.
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Maybe they'll just fight each other.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Rip wrote:Well some might be so delusional as to give credit to someone having their mouthpiece give a speech many years ago.
But the spark for this wave of revolutions may have started during the Bush administration when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave a seminal speech at the American University in Cairo:
"For 60 years, the United States pursued stability at the expense of democracy in the Middle East -- and we achieved neither," Rice argued during her 2005 speech which came across as a direct challenge to the Mubarak regime, a regime that receives billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid, the second highest after Israel.
"Now, we are taking a different course. We are supporting the democratic aspirations of all people."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01 ... ra-sparks/

:roll:
I thought the conservative talking point was that Obama might give a good speech (with the obligatory teleprompter remark) but that giving good speeches doesn't ultmately do anything - you need to be a man of deeds. I guess that's different now?

Anyhow, FWIW I do give the Bush administation credit for pushing freedom over stability more than previous administrations in foreign affairs. Though it's a little far-fetched to attribute all of this to one specific freedom-related speech over five years ago.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by hepcat »

Rip wrote:Some liberal paper should counter it giving credit to Clinton or Carter.
and then fox should counter that.

it's a vicious cycle....
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by msduncan »

El Guapo wrote:
Rip wrote:Well some might be so delusional as to give credit to someone having their mouthpiece give a speech many years ago.
But the spark for this wave of revolutions may have started during the Bush administration when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave a seminal speech at the American University in Cairo:
"For 60 years, the United States pursued stability at the expense of democracy in the Middle East -- and we achieved neither," Rice argued during her 2005 speech which came across as a direct challenge to the Mubarak regime, a regime that receives billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid, the second highest after Israel.
"Now, we are taking a different course. We are supporting the democratic aspirations of all people."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01 ... ra-sparks/

:roll:
I thought the conservative talking point was that Obama might give a good speech (with the obligatory teleprompter remark) but that giving good speeches doesn't ultmately do anything - you need to be a man of deeds. I guess that's different now?

Anyhow, FWIW I do give the Bush administation credit for pushing freedom over stability more than previous administrations in foreign affairs. Though it's a little far-fetched to attribute all of this to one specific freedom-related speech over five years ago.
Unless I missed something, I read it to say that the POLICIES she was speaking about was the spark, not the actual speech itself?
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by El Guapo »

msduncan wrote:
El Guapo wrote:
Rip wrote:Well some might be so delusional as to give credit to someone having their mouthpiece give a speech many years ago.
But the spark for this wave of revolutions may have started during the Bush administration when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave a seminal speech at the American University in Cairo:
"For 60 years, the United States pursued stability at the expense of democracy in the Middle East -- and we achieved neither," Rice argued during her 2005 speech which came across as a direct challenge to the Mubarak regime, a regime that receives billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid, the second highest after Israel.
"Now, we are taking a different course. We are supporting the democratic aspirations of all people."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/01 ... ra-sparks/

:roll:
I thought the conservative talking point was that Obama might give a good speech (with the obligatory teleprompter remark) but that giving good speeches doesn't ultmately do anything - you need to be a man of deeds. I guess that's different now?

Anyhow, FWIW I do give the Bush administation credit for pushing freedom over stability more than previous administrations in foreign affairs. Though it's a little far-fetched to attribute all of this to one specific freedom-related speech over five years ago.
Unless I missed something, I read it to say that the POLICIES she was speaking about was the spark, not the actual speech itself?
The article is a little vague on that point. I do give the Bush administration credit for pushing freedom as a more important factor in U.S. foreign policy (I think I just posted this in another thread, so apologies for the redundancy), so to the extent that its policies did so I do give it credit.

There's also the X factor in terms of what effect the Iraq War and consequent Iraqi democratization efforts have had on the unrest, which would be hard to pin down.
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by LawBeefaroni »

Egyptian government shut down their internets.
In response to increasing civil unrest, the Egyptian government appears to have disabled almost all Internet connectivity with the rest of the world. The Internet's global routing table, which is used by Internet routers to determine where to send traffic, has had virtually every Egypt-bound route withdrawn, giving the Internet traffic no path either into or out of the country.
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MYT
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hepcat
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by hepcat »

:shock:
Covfefe!
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AWS260
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

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Image
From Al Jazeera's excellent live blog.
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hepcat
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Re: New Egyptian Unrest: Tunisia Part II?

Post by hepcat »

Just an aside, but while perusing the pictures on Al Jazeera's site, I could not find any photos of protesters which included women in them. I wonder if they're being told explicitly to stay out of this by their peers.
Covfefe!
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