Students with ties to Egypt concerned, proud of country

When photographs of the Egyptian protests dominated the front pages, the average student looked… When photographs of the Egyptian protests dominated the front pages, the average student looked at a revolution-in-progress. Others looked for family members who were part of the protests.

These students who call Egypt home or have family members in the country only grew more invested in Egypt’s affairs after the start of the revolution.

With all her relatives in Egypt, senior Sarah Moawad, president of Students for Justice in Palestine, began to pay closer attention to Egypt even before the protests began in late January.

“Interestingly, the week before Jan. 25, we were talking about the rallies in Tunisia and wondering when it would be Egypt’s turn,” she said.

Some of Moawad’s family members took part in the protests, she said, including one of her cousins who was shot with a rubber bullet and another who was beaten by the police.

“I was more worried and scared when they later sent me photos of the injured,” Moawad said.

But soon her concern gave way to pride.

“I’m so proud to be an Egyptian. I’m proud of Egypt and the people there. They proved to the world that they could implement change through peace, and they all did so by themselves, with no outside intervention whatsoever,” she said.

While Moawad speculated on the possibility of a protest in early January, the events took senior Ahmed Gharib by surprise.

Gharib, who visits Egypt every year to see family, said he thought Egyptian people in the past seemed to support Mubarak and his administration.

“That’s why I wasn’t expecting it at all. Nobody saw it coming. No one knew the Egyptian people had it in them,” Gharib said

Gharib tried to contribute to the protests as much as he could by organizing rallies in front of the Cathedral of Learning to raise awareness of Egypt’s happenings.

His actions weren’t the only contributions coming from the United States.

Moawad said the U.S. media and social media sites helped mobilize the Egyptians. She said that websites like Facebook and Twitter did a good job of covering the protests and putting the situation at the forefront of global news.

But Moawad, who also visits Egypt every summer, attributed most of the revolution’s success to Egyptians. She said that young people had been angry for so long they were ready for an anti-government movement.

Youssef Ragheb, an Arabic professor at Pitt, said there was more to the revolution than just the protesters. He said the Egyptian government’s ignorance, the country’s lack of enemies, Egyptians’ craving for democracy and modern technologies all played a role in ousting Mubarak from his position.

Although the protests did much for democracy in the country, they also presented a situation where people were destroying Egyptian landmarks and harming foreign journalists.

Moawad said “the people who did the destruction” were paid by the government to distort the country’s image.

“True protesters helped protect the museums and foreign journalists,” Moawad said.

Ragheb said that the government instructed most anarchists to attack foreign reporters and damage the country in order to strike fear into the mass population.

“Some anarchists could have been acting all by themselves out of dire needs,” Ragheb said.

Regardless of the damage incurred during the protests, these students predict a bright future for Egypt and the Middle East.

Gharib said that events in Egypt could be the beginning of more revolutions throughout the area.

The fact that a ruthless government like Egypt’s could be toppled will empower other Arab countries to stand up for themselves and demand democracy, he said, adding that the protests in Egypt helped break the barrier of fear that has been stifling the Arab world and made it possible for further peaceful uprisings to follow.

Sophomore Hussein Mohamedagreed.

“Egypt is the leader of the region, so when we do something, everyone follows,” he wrote in an e-mail.

These students said the unrest won’t stop them from visiting over the summer. All three said they planned on making trips.

Mohamed, though, had planned his return since he bought a plane ticket last August. He said that before the protests began, he wondered how he was going to find a job in Egypt post-graduation. Although Egypt has a high rate of unemployment, he said he now has a good reason to return home.

“After I saw hope in our youth, the ones that decided that enough is enough and now is the time for true change, home has got dearer to my heart,” he said.