Via the great Egyptian blogger
Zeinobia, we are reminded in these days when the Egyptian Army has seemed to behave like a sectarian militia, of
General Fouad Aziz Ghali, who fought in every one of Egypt's wars from 1948 to 1973, took his division across the Canal in that war, and was named Commander of the Second Field Army just after the war. He later held many other posts and in 1980 was named Governor of Southern Sinai. In the
linked obit from Al-Ahram Weekly, he is quoted as saying, "There is no discrimination between Copts and Muslims. The proof of this is that I was chosen, during the October 1973 War, as commander of the Second Army, which is certainly a Muslim army. Had there been discrimination on religious grounds, there were many others who could have taken the post."
That's right, he was a Copt. I'm glad he did not see the Army's actions on Sunday. That was then; this is now. From his retirement in 1983 until 2006, he was the last Coptic governor of a province.
In the same post, Zeinobia also refers
to Captain Maged Boules, who was photographed during the "Battle the Camel on February 2, crying because he could not stop the attacks on protestors:
The name Boules ("Paul") shows he, too, is a Copt.
No comments:
Post a Comment