Egypt: Some Readings for Your Weekend

I know I talk about Egypt a lot, mostly because so much is happening there, but I still don't manage to touch on everything. Here are a few readings for your weekend, covering some ground that I haven't:

• Ahram Online has a gallery of today's efforts to bring down the concrete walls blocking streets around Tahrir.

•  Ahmad Shokr, "This is Not 1954." How the current SCAF/Muslim Brotherhood quarrels differ frm the Free Officers' crackdown of 1954.

• Mostafa al-Nagat, "Why We Withdrew from the Constituent Assembly." Defending the liberal/secularist (but now including al-Azhar) withdrawals from the constitution-drafting body.

• Mahmoud Salem (Sandmonkey), "For the Light to Come Back." On the problems of reforming the Egyptian police.

• Zeinab Abu al-Magd, "Stalin's Moustache and the Military Wheel of Production." On the military's involvement in every aspect of the economy, from building refrigerators to running the Suez Canal.

• Ali Abdel Mohsen, "Is Adil Imam's Prison Sentence the Start of a Worrying Trend?" The title's misleading since the actor/comedian hasn't been sentenced, just charged, with making "blasphemous" films — some 20 years ago. But it does raise questions about the new flexing of Islamist strength in the culture wars.

• Khaled Fahmy, "The Essence of Alexandria." For the fans, literary and otherwise, of Egypt's second city.

• Bikya Masr, "AUC's Digital Library Preserves Egypt's Cultural Treasures." The title explains it.