This video is circulating via YouTube showing two kids being hurled from what looks like a 20-feet-high parapet to the roof of an apartment building and then being beaten. The people attacking them are hard line Muslim fundamentalists; one is carrying a black al-Qaeda flag. The youths who were attacked are alleged to have been anti-Morsi. At least one is said to be dead; I actually can’t see how either survived. The scene of the twisted, fallen body being beaten is especially hard to see. This happened in Sidi Jaber, Alexandria.
My advice to you is not to watch this video, since you can’t unsee it and it is very disturbing.
Here it is, for those with strong stomachs who are over 18. I am not embedding it, since I don’t want an unwary reader to click on it in error. You’ll have to actively seek to see it.
Both sides are commiting unspeakable acts of violence. I reflexively revile Salafis but coding the good guys as “youth” and the bad guys as “fundamentalists” obscures a reality. As in Syria and elsewhere, we could have duelling YouTube videos over which side is more rapaciously violent. The important and obvious reality is that democracy has been a catastrophic failure in Egypt; the civic society that enables the democratic process is utterly lacking with or without Mursi.
The original ‘uprising’ in Egypt and the ensuing ‘democratic’ election was a hopeful event. Egyptians must decide, with no interference from outside sources. America suffered through a ‘civil’ war, and it is hard to say whether democracy works here. As long as the ruling class allow only some folk to be actually free, we cannot say America is a democracy.
Thank you for the warning.