EGYPT

New wave of the Egyptian Revolution

by Jesse McLaren

Five months after the overthrow of dictator Hosni Mubarak, the ongoing Egyptian Revolution is entering a new phase with mass demonstrations and sit-ins across the country.

Despite the departure of Mubarak on February 11, the most basic demands of the Egyptian Revolution have not been met: neither Mubarak nor the police officers responsible for killing 1,000 people during the uprising have been tried, and activists continue to face military trials. Meanwhile strikes across every sector continue to raise economic demands, like raising the monthly minimum wage to 1,200 LE ($200).

At the end of June, Suez police responsible for killing protesters were released without charge, and Cairo police attacked martyr families demanding justice. Street battles in Cairo fought off the police, and then mass protests were called.

On July 8, two million people demonstrated across Egypt, with chants now directed against field marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi—head of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces—and Prime Minister Essam Sharaf, whose reshuffle of the cabinet did nothing to quell the protests.

Indefinite sit-ins were set up in Suez and Cairo, which in Tahrir square includes a school, library, movie theatre, restaurants, security, emergency clinics, pharmacies, and radio for news and debates.

Recent protests on July 29 saw splits emerge as Salafis—ultraconservative Muslims—broke a unity agreement by chanting anti-secular, anti-left slogans. The military and then thugs have since cleared Tahrir Square, after many protesters suspended their sit-in for Ramadan.

Meanwhile, the Revolutionary Socialists and the new Democratic Workers’ Party are trying to generalize the lessons of the revolution’s first phase in order to push the second phase forward:

“The regime could not bear to keep Mubarak in power for more than two days after your strikes of 9, 10, 11 February… If you use the strike weapon to stop the railways and public transport system, close the airports and the big factories, the regime can crack within hours.”