Interviews with Nora Younis

What worries me most is energy because there´s so much happening. And sometimes I feel that we are chasing so many things at the same time. There is a cops issue on sectarianism. There is a police and the return to work versus respect to human rights. And there´s a financial situation in Egypt and the economy. And there is unemployment. And there are the elections. And there is SCAF, the Supreme Council of Armed Forces. It´s just too much. It´s too much. And I hope we have the energy to handle all of this.

I think that if someone tries to monopolize the Egyptian people and if someone tries to become a dictator, or another small dictator or a big dictator, he is going to have a very hard time. I mean, Egypt has never witnessed football fans politicized. Young students politicized, all the government sector employees are not politicized. The farmers, the workers. It´s just going to be difficult. He has to deal with a completely different situation. And I don´t think we have a smart enough person to do this. I think the military´s acting very stupid. And it shows that if they were smarter than this, there were smarter things they could do.

So I don´t think they are smart enough to face the Egyptian people now. And the Islamists are a bigger threat in my opinion. But again, the people are fed up with them. And I think the first government that’s going to come to Egypt, whatever it is, it is going to be unable to achieve a lot because of the situation and because of the state the country has reached. This means if it´s an Islamist government, it will even frustrate the people even more. What worries me is that if it´s a liberal government, it will also frustrate the people even more.

So we have to wait and see. But I don´t think Islam is scary and is untouchable. And I mean, if any political group is rallying behind Islam, people are now prepared to fight for democracy even if it means fighting against this specific group. And, of course, I´m not talking about intelligentsia and the downtown intellectuals.

I mean, the Egyptians at large. Because it´s true that the Salafi Sheikhs [A conservative Islamic school of thought that emphasizes a strict and literal interpretation of the Koran and Muslim teachings.] for example, are very popular. And they have the legacy and so on and so forth. But at the same time people are discussing this. And they see that these Salafis have nothing to offer them in terms of bread and butter, the real life.So, so far I´m optimist. And we´ll see what comes and the next year. It´s going to be a very decisive year, I think.

Nora Younis is a human rights activist, journalist and blogger who is now working as the website managing editor of Al-Masry Al-Youm Daily Independent, one of the best known newspapers in Egypt.

As a human rights activist, Ms. Younis won the Human Rights First (HRF) thirtieth anniversary award in 2008 for her work using new media tools to expose human rights violations and police brutality.

When she started blogging in 2005 she focused on addressing the information vacuum on protest movements in Egypt. Before Twitter came into being, she was continually sending mass text messages to human rights activists, political groups, and journalists, informing them of rallies, arrests, state violence and police brutality.

After Twitter became established among Egyptians, she moved into visual documentation. Most recognized is her video of the textile workers’ strike in Mahalla in September 2007 that soon grew into a nationwide movement known as the April 6th strike. One of her most famous blog posts includes her testimonial about the brutal police raid on a Sudanese refugee protest camp in Cairo in 2005 where at least 27 men, women and children were killed. Her testimonial was translated by fellow bloggers and activists across the world into more than seven languages. It was used in law suits and human rights reports condemning the Egyptian government.

During the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, Ms. Younis played a major role in documenting and reporting events. Using improvised communications methods, she filmed and disseminated to global audiences the demonstrations and crackdowns in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.

Before she took up her position as website managing editor of Al-Masry Al-Youm Daily Independent, Ms. Younis covered the Middle East for The Washington Post (2008) and for other international newspapers.

Twitter: @NoraYounis