Repression and Some Good Reporting

Anthony Shadid writes of political freedom and repression in Egypt with words that sound depressingly like CheneyBush's America:

The state has launched its most serious crackdown in a decade on the Muslim Brotherhood, arresting hundreds, sending 40 of its members to military courts, with no right of appeal, and freezing the assets of wealthy patrons. In Alexandria, the government sentenced a blogger, Abdel-Karim Nabil Suleiman, to four years in prison for, among other things, defaming the president.

For my money, Anthony Shadid is the best correspondent and writer reporting on the Middle East. He has the knowledge and language skills to understand all levels of that culture. He describes the feel of people's lives, thier hopes and fears in what is for most Americans, an alien world. The article on Egyptian repression is filled with observations from the people involved.

Any relationship with any foreign power, but especially the Americans, is the kiss of death," he said. "We don't need this kiss."

[...]

"The Arab spring is happening because of Bush's policies," Alaa Seif, a young blogger, said at the time, a cup of coffee next to his computer. "But it's not the way they think about it. It's the other way around. They did mobilize people, and they still are."

[...]

"On first class, they're not looking for suspects."

Shadid's book, Night Draws Near: Iraq's People in the Shadow of America's War, is a highly informative, very readable account of Iraq in the first year of the occupation, a time when there was still hope but also much trepidation.