Cairo’s economic fog
Al-Sisi appears to lack fundamental understanding of the potential economic and political damage that a soaring US dollar can do to a mangled Egyptian economy
Amr Khalifa
15 Articles
Amr Khalifa is freelance journalist and commentator recently published by Ahram Online, Mada Masr, Muftah, the Tahrir Institute, and Arab Media Society.
Latest by Amr Khalifa
Dallas and Cairo: a police story
The divide separating police and citizenry in both societies, as well as the political cost of police violence, continue to expand. Why are citizens being killed rather being protected?
Cairo: mission impossible?
Opinion writers, more so than their hard news brethren, have a running conversation with the reader. Ideally, that monologue is, paradoxically, a dialogue in the writer’s mind, with the goal being to clarify a muddy picture for the reader. Objectivity, is not a goal per se for anyone. So you look, you feel, you analyse, …
A visit to a frightening, angry Cairo
“In Egypt, nothing is what it is supposed to be. Wrong numbers, wrong policies, and wrong leaders”
The Unholy Trinity: terrorism, state terrorism and human rights
To understand the Egyptian Rubik’s Cube, your eyes must turn to the unholy trinity of terrorism, state terrorism, and systematic human rights abuses. Close examination of each arena reveals an Egyptian Body Politic in desperate need of remedy but heading downhill with meteoric speed. Attacks on Egyptian non-governmental organisations are at an all-time crescendo, attacks …
Heat rises in Cairo
Egypt is set to explode. When and how is dependent on who pulls the trigger and why. Those who had the opportunity to peruse the previous article came to quickly understand that Egypt has galloped to a 3, on a danger scale of 1-5, in 2.5 years of de jure Al-Sisi rule. A combination of …
Threat Level Rising
Effective threats are often delivered in a voice not much above a murmur and with a smile. Fate drew me to this important conclusion when I tripped upon the Oscar nominated “The Imitation Game” for the second time just recently. In it, an MI6 agent who oversees the group of scientists and mathematicians says in …
Sisi and the Can’t Shoot Straight Gang
When Abdel Fatah Al-Sisi is just a blip on history’s radar, discerning eyes will look back on this week as revelatory of the current polemic. Both the soul crushing murder of Regeni and the explosive gathering of the Doctors’ Syndicate in protest of Ministry of Interior abuses come at a crucial juncture in Egypt’s rule. …
Citizen X speaks to Al-Sisi
Dear Mr Al-Sisi, This letter will do something you are not used to: it will force you to listen to a citizen rather than lecture or imprison him. I recognise this will be incredibly difficult for you, as you are accustomed to giving orders, rather than receiving advice. This letter is not about venting or …
Defining 25 January
I kneeled down to the floor, knees pressed hard to the floor, tears of rebirth rolling down my cheeks, forehead to the parquet, in prayer: Mubarak was leaving. The reaction was not unique. That day, throughout the country, while some of Hosni Mubarak’s supporters’ cried tears of sadness, millions let loose screams of freedom and …
Should prostitution be legalised in Egypt?
Within the Egyptian milieu the suggestion or mere questioning of the legalisation of prostitution is deemed thunderously scandalous. There are many reasons why prostitution, as a paradigm of economic survival and moral choice, is resoundingly viewed as a mammoth negative elephant in the room of a seemingly conservative redoubt such as Egypt. But issues that …
Egypt’s Virus C: Organised virus, disorganised state
Even with a revolution and multiple massacres the reported Egyptian death toll is, approximately, 5,000 dead. However, a far bigger killer, Hepatitis, aka Virus C, and related liver diseases decimate nearly 45,000 annually. But without creative solutions, prevention, and organisation the Egyptian government is falling behind in the one of its biggest battles: not the …
Where a crane falls, questions rise
107 are dead and 238 injured in the wake of a major collapse of a giant building crane near the holy site of the Kaaba in Mecca, Saudi Arabia in the evening hours of 11 September. Initial news reports put the blame on severe weather that swept through the Saudi kingdom, with amateur videos, shot …
The Egyptian Lie
In the personal realm a lie is but a simple three letter word that can be destructive. When interjected with bureaucracies, businesses and nation states the lie undercuts the ultimate necessity in the relationship between citizen and state: trust. If the past 10 days are any indication Cairo has a serious and growing trust issue. …
Fascism Incorporated: Our fault
When the blood of the other becomes a fathomable reality, fascism is born. I remember well standing among thousands in front of the UN, on 30 June 2013, as we screamed atop our lungs against one dictator, but little did we know we would help usher in a decidedly more bloodthirsty one. All it took …