Cairo: A strange tale of a truce

Violence does not always escalate. Sometimes it turns into a war of words, then a shouted argument, and then peace.

This is according to a University Post contact inside the contested Tahrir Square in Cairo.

A close friend of a University of Copenhagen student from Slovenia, Saleh Fekry Mohamed is a chemical engineer from the University of Cairo and has been updating us on events as they unfold.

See Saleh’s gallery of photos from the protests here.

»We are all Egyptians!«

»We were inside the square, with the sound of guns firing into the air from surrounding army units,« he tells the University Post.

»Suddenly we saw a group running over the bridge overpass outside our perimeter, throwing some stones at us. After awhile we had to respond, and we threw stones back at the group.«

»This continued, but suddenly, spontaneously, chants arose from the crowds: We are all Egyptians! We are all Egyptians! Slowly, both sides stopped hurling stones, but the shouts continued,« he retells.

Read about Saleh’s fear of Mubarak supporters here.

Trust not enough

»They said they were a group that wanted to enter the square. From our side it was shouted back that they could not enter this way, and not in these numbers.«

Pro-democracy protesters entering the square are normally searched individually for weapons.

»We do not trust you 100 per cent,« one of our group shouted. »You must try and enter the square from another direction, and in smaller numbers«.

Does not know who is who

»The confrontation had turned into a negotiation, and in the end, the people we had seen as the attackers, dispersed,« he recounts.

Saleh does not know who the attacking group was, and what they will do.

»I don’t know any more than this, that they were a group of local people, and that they came here in anger«.

miy@adm.ku.dk

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