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February 07, 2006
Salafist Entrepreneurial Behavior: A Previous Incident Noted
Reading through the responses to the idiocy that has stormed across the Muslim world over Danish cartoons, I was struck by the similarities between these events and the riots in Alexandria late last year:
For Ali Abdel Fattah, a spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood and one of the organization’s leaders in the Mediterranean port city, the violence was the result of political maneuvers ahead of the parliamentary elections. According to Abdel Fattah, the CD containing a filmed version of the play I Was Blind but Now I Can See, which was performed only once (over two years ago), was distributed in the neighborhood to sabotage the candidacy of National Democratic Party Candidate Maher Khilla (one of only two Copts running for the party). Khilla announced that he would step down last week in protest at the violence, but was later told by the ruling party leadership not to run anyway. In a common variant of the story, one of his rivals in the race (which will be held on 20 November) distributed the CD to incite Muslims against Copts.
Let's see: violence, directed against Christians (in one case, Europeans, in the other locals), prompted by the widespread distribution long after the fact of work that is genuinely offensive. Right.
Posted by tomscud at February 7, 2006 12:06 PM
Filed Under: MENA Region General
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