Ded el Hekomah …What does it mean?

Roots of the January 25 Revolution in Egypt


The powerful Egyptian rap Ded el Hekomah is the anthem of the Egyptian Revolution. News analysts, security experts, orientalists and all types of talking heads have for decades talked of the grim choice the USA and the West have in Egypt; corrupt dictatorships or Islamist western hating, war mongering instability like that of Iran. Pity they did not take some time to look beyond their prejudices and listen to “Ded el Hekomah”. Egyptian Rapper Ramy Donjewan song is a beautiful passionate cry against a brutal government, against injustice, thuggery and torture against the killing of innocents.

Ramy rages against dictatorship and even against the victims of oppression for their silence, for putting up with injustice and for thirty years of dictatorship. Ramy urges people to speak out against the oppressive government …”kefayeeh noam” enough sleep! … “kefayeeh moat” enough death! ... “kefayeeh sekoot” enough silence! ...“kefayeeh zolm” enough injustice … ”ana ded el hekomah” I’m against the government! …”ana ded illi ya’abel yetthan” I am against those who accept humiliation! “ana leya aeemah” my life has value!

The beautiful poetry of Ramy Donjewan speaks to universal values of freedom & justice; the American Founding Fathers would have strongly approved of every word and sentiment in “ded el hekomah”. What a surprise to the western talking heads and policy makers … Egyptian youth share the same basic universal values of other people, they do value their lives, they want freedom of expression, they want justice and opportunity; and guess what, they are not too keen on getting brutalized, tortured or killed. What a surprise! And, it is not just the youth we have seen Egyptians in their sixties and seventies take to the street to support the revolution.

The policy makers and their orientalists advisors failed to see the revolution coming as they projected prejudices against the people of Egypt through a process of generalization and stereotyping; lumping in different countries and cultures. The absurdity continues as “experts” talk of their concerns of Egypt splitting up confusing tribal societies in countries thousands of miles away with Egypt; perhaps the world first nation state with substantially same boundaries for millennia.

The reality, before all of us to see on CNN, BBC and Aljazeera, is that Egypt has a foot in the first world with millions of educated people; heavy users of internet and modern communication; they rap, they tweet, have lots of tweeps and Facebook friends, they work for Google, they demonstrate with iPhones, blackberry and even iPads and many are multilingual. This perhaps is the world’s first revolution led by what we Egyptians call “mistreheen” or the “comfortables”, those with education, jobs and some material wealth, the middle and upper classes of the society. Yet Egypt is a third world country with tens of millions of people living on below $2 a day. Daily tweets remind the pro democracy protestors to help the poor on their way to Tahrir Square.

The Egyptian Revolution is no bread riots; it is the “mistreheen” revolt for dignity, self respect and freedom on behalf of all of the people of Egypt. This is about an old nation waking up; finding its voice and showing the world values of social justice & cohesion, religious tolerance & unity. What may come of the Egyptian Revolution is still up in air, for now silence and wavering in supporting the brave people of Egypt is complicit support of thuggery, brutality, torture and criminal oppression of the will of the people. We should all be singing … ana ded el hekomah .. ded el hekomah … ded el hekomah.


AA
February 9, 2011

Informed and Perceptive View of Iraq - Book Review of Night Draws Near by Anthony Shadid

This is easily the best book I can recommend to anyone on the Iraq war. Anthony Shadid, a third generation Arab American, who speaks fluent Arabic was on the ground before the Iraq war and lived through its phases all the way to the full blown insurgency.

Shadid demonstrates an excellent understanding of the people and the culture, this understanding makes his analysis very valuable indeed. A very important point that Shadid makes is the desire of the people for justice over democracy.

Shadid's understanding of Iraqi society makes his analysis on the insurgency, its roots and its nature very convincing. The analysis of the power structure with the Shiite religious leadership and the diverging loyalties as well as the Iranian versus Arab orientation of the leadership is very well explained. It is remarkable how ill informed much of the media in the US referring to the Mahdi Army, the Sader militia, as Iranian influenced when Shadid explains clearly their roots being as populist & nationalist counter movement to the Iranian dominated Shiite religion leadership.

Through countless daily interactions with Iraqis from all classes, all sects and all political views Shedid offers tremendous insight on the factors that shaped the views of the Iraqis and how these changed over time as the country sunk deeper into a depressing war. Shedid equally well covered the American troops, their perception of their role and of the Iraqis around them.

Can't say enough about this book except I wish it becomes mandatory reading for political and military readers. Shadid's Pulitzer Prize for his reporting of the war is very well deserved!

Anti Essentialism & Controversial - Book Review of Edward Said's Orientalism

This book and Edward Said in general seem capable of generating such intense controversy. Many reviewers of this book seem to forget actually to review the work and focus on attacking Edward Said as a person, many others still forget to review the book and proceed to speak for Palestinian rights and the negative western attitudes of Islam. I will attempt to present an actual review of this book based on MY own reading of it.

In Orientalism, Said sets about dismantling the study of the "orient" in general with primary focus on the Islamic Near East. Said argues that concepts such as the Orient, Islam, the Arabs, etc. are too vast to be grouped together and presented as one coherent whole, encompassing all there is to know about the subject. Said bases his view on the shear width and breadth of the subject, the inherent bias of conflicting cultures and more recently the role of the Orientalism in colonialism. It is indeed difficult to attempt to represent a book that is so focused on anti essentialism.

Said's research of western / occidental discourse was very thorough indeed and he does illustrate through repeated examples how misinformation sufficiently repeated can become accepted academic work. Said also presents an analysis of the causes and motives and theorizes about his findings. A lengthy and a times tedious discussion of the origins of Orientalism is rather repetitive and hard to follow for a non specialist like me.

Edward Said however seem to have fallen in the same trap he attributes to Orientalism, he has not attempted to explore Arab writings of the periods he discussed nor has he attempted to present (possibly even read) work by Egyptian and Arab historians of the periods he was addressing save for work carried out in the west and within western universities. In doing so, Said fails to see how the modern and contemporary "orient" sees itself through primarily "oriental" eyes such as Ibn Khaldoun, Al Maqrizi and also through the writings of orientalists like Lane. Said also fails to address the work carried out by orientalists based on many manuscripts of Orientals.

I particularly enjoyed Said's analysis of the strong ties that Orientalism has with power and colonialism. Said analysis of the diverging development of the British and French practice based on the latter's limited success as a colonial power was very enjoyable and very well thought out. The Orientalism Today and indeed the Afterwards section are also very informative and as these were more familiar areas for Said his presentation of ideas and thoughts came across more clearly and the writing was far less tedious than the earlier parts of the book.

Orientalism is not an easy read, it will challenge many established views, indeed it has already with a fair degree of success led to changes in the way the Near East is studied. To me, most of all I see this as a book that offers in part a largely coherent explanation for the on-going misunderstanding between the West and the Near East and in Islam. And while Occidentalism does not exist as a field of study in a place like Egypt per se, Said fails to see that the west is viewed largely in terms of its wealth, promiscuous habits, hypocrisy and anti Islam and thus fails to see it as 2 way street, albeit with unequal power.

This is by no means a the definitive correction of the history of the Middle East or Near Orient, it is however a very legitimate and serious study of a field of study that no doubt has a lot to answer for!

AA Oct 26, 2001