Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi* Open Democracy
A single incident that took place in the Egyptian city of city of Alexandria on 6 June 2010 anticipates the wave of protest in the country that was to explode in January-February 2011. It involved the arrest of 28-year-old Khaled Saeed, who was detained on his way to visit an internet café in the Sidi Gaber district.
Khaled Saeed was treated so brutally by the two state-security officials who seized him that he died of his injuries. The pretext for the murderous assault is that Khaled was believed to be carrying videotaped evidence that implicated members of the police in drug-dealing.
Those responsible compounded their crime by claiming that Khaled died from swallowing a cannabis joint; in face of a public outcry, they were sentenced to four days in prison.
Many Alexandrians staged a moving protest of mourning and defiance, wearing black and standing with dignity on the city’s famous corniche. The simple and brilliant idea, skilfully practised so that no five people would gather on exactly the same spot, circumvented the terms of Egypt’s restrictive state-of-emergency law.
It also led to further civic action; Wael Ghonim, a blogger and Google executive in the region, established a Facebook page called “We are all Khalid Saeed” during the January 2011 protests. He was detained on 27 January on account of his involvement in the protests, though on 7 February he was released and promised soon to rejoin the movement in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.
