UPDATED!
On my own blog, Temple of Mut, I post news about discoveries related to ancient Egypt.
I also keep up with the news about modern Egypt, and today the country is being overrun with boobs. The first example is Egypt’s Prime Minister Hisham Qandil, who recently chatted about the dangers of “unclean” breasts during a cabinet meeting.
The PhD holding prime minister who studied water resources, somehow, related the lack of clean water to the lack of clean breasts in one speech. While meeting with his cabinet members he spoke in an emotional manner as he recounted the struggle of the villagers he witnessed on his trips as a minister…A couple of females in the cabinet meeting seemed uncomfortable during these remarks. The unpopular prime minister could create a huge controversy in the villages to which he refers, which will add to the unstable situation in Egypt that is currently hosting the Islamic Summit.
The next boob they had to import: Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in the country, and is receiving a mixed reception. While President Mohamed Mursi greeted him with red-carpets and open arms, other Egyptians were not so embracing:
But the Shi’ite Iranian leader received a stiff rebuke when he met Egypt’s leading Sunni Muslim scholar later at Cairo’s historic al-Azhar mosque and university.Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, head of the 1,000-year-old seat of religious learning, urged Iran to refrain from interfering in Gulf Arab states, to recognize Bahrain as a “sisterly Arab nation” and rejected the extension of Shi’ite Muslim influence in Sunni countries, a statement from al-Azhar said.
(UPDATE: During the Cairo conference, Ahmadinejad just claimed that Iran is now a nuclear state, but has no intentions of attacking Israel. One just has to recall his vision of a 12th Imam and the space monkey hoax to realize neither portion of that statement is likely to be true).
The regional tensions associated with Iran’s interference is causing much unrest in Egypt. However, Mursi’s pharaonic approach to governance is also creating major disturbances throughout the country. In fact, in response to rioting in Port Said and two nearby cities, the leading army officer indicated the state could collapse:
Residents of this Mediterranean coastal city burying their dead from Egypt’s wave of political violence vented their fury at Egypt’s Islamist president and the Muslim Brotherhood on Tuesday, demanding his ouster and virtually declaring a revolt against his rule, as the head of the military warned Egypt may collapse under the weight of its turmoil.Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi’ strongly worded comments, his first since the crisis began, appeared aimed at pushing both sides in Egypt’s political divide to reconcile and find a solution to the rapidly spreading protests and riots across much of the country the past six days.
And Egypt’s collapse is a valid concern. Tourism, essential to Egypt’s economy as it accounts for 12% of the jobs, has taken a serious hit over security concerns. For example, only 40 to 45 out of 270 to 280 cruises between Luxor and Aswan were operational during the recent peak travel season and there are reports of an increase in sexual harassment in places traditionally considered safe, such as hotels.
And with the likes of Mursi in charge of Egypt, it looks as if the news will remain dire into the foreseeable future.
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