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Diaries of a Surveilled Citizen after a Failed Revolution in Egypt
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 March 2021
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Under a pseudonym in December 2011, I published an article titled “al-Jaysh wa-l-Iqtisad fi Barr Misr” (The Army and the Economy in Egypt) in Jadaliyya. I wrote it after months of participating in numerous protests in Cairo against the government of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF), which took power upon President Hosni Mubarak's abdication in February 2011, and of searching fervidly for the political sources that had allowed the military to prevail over civilian forces. In addition to the tanks and fighter jets, I found some of these sources hidden in a gigantic business empire that the military had clandestinely developed for years. In early 2012 the editor of an online edition of a widely read Egyptian newspaper, a revolutionary female journalist who would later be arrested and detained, invited me to write a series of articles on this business empire, this time using my real name. The first work in decades to be published on this taboo topic, this became the foundation for my later book-length study. As a scholar, this was my humble contribution to an ongoing revolution.
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References
1 Mohamed al-Khalsan, “al-Jaysh wa-l-Iqtisad fi Barr Misr,” Jadaliyya, 21 December 2011.
2 Nora Younis was detained in 2020 for editing an independent news website.
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8 Foucault, Michel, Security, Territory, and Population, trans. Burchell, Graham (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 489Google Scholar. See also Foucault, Michel, Society Must Be Defended, trans. Macey, David (New York: Picador, 2003), 15–16Google Scholar.
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12 For example, Stephen Mayhew, “STC Partners with Falcon to Increase Security in Egypt,” Biometric Update, 13 December, 2016, https://www.biometricupdate.com/201612/stc-partners-with-falcon-to-increase-security-in-egypt.
13 Muhammad Salah, “al-Kahraba’ Tata‘aqad ma‘a Falcon Group li-Qira'at al-‘Addad,” al-Shuruq, 22 August 2017; Hanan al-Sawi, “al-Sura ma Btikdibsh . . . Hall Yunhi Barnamig ‘Shu‘a‘’ Mashakil Fawatir al-Kahraba’?” Akhbar al-Yawm, 23 October 2020.
14 Muhamamd Zayn, “Hiwar Ra'is ‘Ma‘lumat al-Intaj al-Harbi’ Yakshif Aliyyat Hadhf Ghayr al-Mustahiqqin min al-Tamwin,” Akhbar al-Yawm, 12 September 2019.
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20 Sayyid al-Khalafawi, “Muhafiz al-Qahira: al-‘Asima Khaliya min al-‘Ashwa'iyya Nihayat 2020,” al-Yawm al-Sabi‘, 7 July 2020.
21 For a full list of the country's governors from the 1980s to 2015, see Abul-Magd, Militarizing the Nation, ch. 4.
22 That is Simaf company, owned by the Arab Organization for Industrialization (a military-owned conglomerate of seventeen factories and companies). See website, accessed 30 December 2020, https://www.aoi.org.eg/en/semaf.
23 Muhammad Mustafa, “Hal Yanjah Kamil al-Wazir fi Tajdid al-Sikka al-Hadid 30 Yuniyu 2020?” al-Borsaa News, 27 November 2019.
24 Nivin Yusuf, “Hal Bat al-Intaj al-Dirami fi Misr Taht Saytarat al-Dawla,” BBC Arabic, 6 May 2019, https://www.bbc.com/arabic/middleeast-48178108; Sara Ramadan, “Li-Man al-Ghalaba . . . Intaj al-Drama Bayna Ajhizat al-Mukhabart wa-l-Qita‘ al-Khass,” Mu'sassat Huriyyat al-Fikr wa-l-Ta‘bir (AFTE), Cairo, 23 December 2020, https://afteegypt.org/publications_org/2020/09/23/20020-afteegypt.html.
25 Khalid Ibrahim, “Sura Nadira li-l-Shahid Ahmad Mansi Tajma‘uhu bi-Abtal Firaqt “SEAL Team,” al-Youm al-Sabi‘, 28 April 2020.
26 See, for example, from El-Watan News, accessed 30 January 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZnH2rTu5_g; and, from Sada Elbalad, accessed 30 January 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqehD4hdt8Q.
27 For propaganda videos, see Facebook page of the Ministry of Defense, accessed 30 December 2020, https://www.facebook.com/EgyArmySpox; and YouTube channel, accessed 30 December 2020, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5AvwPA0ewLnAcNvCF8ZEhg.