Egyptian

CAIRO -- Egyptian riot police armed with clubs and water cannons stormed a downtown square packed with Sudanese war refugees before dawn yesterday in an attack that a human rights group said left 23 people dead. About 2,000 Sudanese had been living for months in a dilapidated tent city near the offices of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, demanding to be resettled abroad. Their protest was viewed by many Cairo residents as an eyesore in one of the city's upscale areas. Thousands of Egyptian riot police massed around the square early yesterday and tried to force the demonstrators onto buses.

Al Eisner, in his letter, "Egyptian election is tragic" (June 29), has substituted opinion for fact when he calls the Muslim Brotherhood "a virulent anti-Semitic organization. " Anti-Zionist, yes; but he provides no evidence whatsoever that it is anti-Semitic. Mr. Eisner shows no compassion for the Egyptian people who suffered for so many years under the brutal dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak. Instead, his concern is only for Israel and what Egypt's new government might mean for Egyptian/Israel relations and also for U.S./Israel relations.

When it comes to movie theaters, everything old really is new again. Arundel Mills' Muvico 24, a 125,000-square-feet Egyptian-style megaplex slated to open Dec. 8, harks back to the glory days of moviegoing, the art deco years of the 1920s and 1930s, when going to the theater was as much a part of the experience as watching the movie. Festooned with sphinxes, pharaohs and hieroglyphics, the 24-screen complex transports moviegoers to a time and place as distant and exotic as anything Steven Spielberg or George Lucas have dreamed up. "We're bringing back the glamour and excitement of going to the movies," Muvico president and CEO Hamid Hashemi said during a tour this week, where visitors navigated around workers busily carving the River Nile into the lobby floor.

Since it has been determined to be absolutely necessary to overthrow the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, even though Egypt and Israel had managed to co-exist for several decades, the results are now a tragedy ("Islamist wins Egypt presidency," June 25). President Barack Obama was instrumental in supporting this and used the might of theU.S. military to help achieve it. He had to know that the vacuum created would be eventually filled by the Muslim Brotherhood, a virulent anti-Semitic organization, whose stated chief goal is the eradication of Israel and the Jewish people.

CAIRO, Egypt -- Islamic militants exploded a powerful car bomb yesterday that narrowly missed Prime Minister Atef Sedki and blasted a nearby school, killing a young girl and injuring at least nine others.Mr. Sedki, whose armored car escaped the explosion by only seconds, was the third senior Egyptian official targeted in recent months in a wave of fundamentalist attacks.The incidents have crippled Egypt's tourism industry and left the nation stunned by the pervasive violence and the massive police crackdown that, so far, has failed to halt it.The Jihad (Holy War)

Scientists have uncovered what may be the largest underground tomb ever found in Egypt's fabled Valley of the Kings -- a mausoleum in which may lie buried 50 sons of Ramses II, the red-haired pharaoh of Exodus who ruled Egypt at the zenith of its power more than 3,000 years ago."We were the first people inside parts of the tomb in 3,000 years," said Dr. Kent R. Weeks, an Egyptologist at the American University in Cairo who made the find public yesterday.Archaeologists excavating the tomb so far have identified 67 chambers -- about five times more than is common in other tombs in the valley where so many of ancient Egypt's rulers were buried.

CAIRO - The two young women were breathless as they ran toward my cafe table outside the Nile Hilton hotel. Both were journalists for the opposition newspaper Al-Dustour. They were late for our meeting because they'd been dodging government security men. Abir al-Askiri and Shaimaa Abol Kheir were in trouble because they filed a lawsuit against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Egyptian Interior Minister Habib al-Adli and a group of government security police. Their complaint: Thugs from Mr. Mubarak's ruling party had beaten and groped them along with women who were peacefully demonstrating for democracy May 25. But that was not all. Ms. al-Askiri, who was panting under her yellow head scarf and red blouse, recalled how government intelligence agents visited her parents' apartment recently and told them they would be arrested if she didn't drop the lawsuit.

What's for dinner? Tiny tortoises Tortoises are plant eaters. Egyptian tortoises are one of the smallest species of tortoise in the world. Adult female tortoises grow to be only five and a half inches long. Egyptian tortoises have yellow shells with dark patterns that help them camouflage (hide) in the hot, dry deserts, and woodlands and scrublands of North Africa. They bury their eggs in the sand to hide them from predators.

YOU WON'T WANT TO miss the Youth Art Month exhibit by public and home-schooled students on exhibit through Sunday at Carrolltown mall in Eldersburg. Every school in Carroll County is represented.North Carroll High School students have a strong exhibit featuring their study of Egyptian and Greek art.The Egyptian cartouche, a series of hieroglyphics used to depict one's name, was the basis for key chains painted by Rachel Brown, Candice Simpson, Jessie Rhoten, Brandon Hirsch, Carissa Tierney, Pam Carr, Amanda Miller, Ryan Koch, Casey Buchman, Billy Maynard, Aaron Sahl, Kevin Martin, Chris Graham, Ashly Fox, Lisa Murphy, Becca Myers and Pam Click.

A Johns Hopkins University archaeological expedition in Egypt has unearthed a 3,400-year-old, life-sized statue of an Egyptian queen. The team found the statue Saturday in Luxor while excavating the site of what was a temple used about 1370 B.C., a period known as the Egyptian New Kingdom. Betsy Bryan, a Hopkins professor of Egyptian art and archaeology, and Fatma Talaat Ismail, a graduate student, found the statue while clearing a temple dedicated to the Egyptian goddess Mut, Bryan said in an e-mail from Egypt.

The high hopes of the Egyptian people for a peaceful transition to democracy are being thwarted by the brutal tactics of the country's military rulers, who in recent days have launched a bloody campaign of repression against protesters demanding an immediate turnover of power to an elected civilian government. The armed forces, once revered as guardians of the popular uprising that overthrew longtime dictator Hosni Mubarak in February, now appear desperate to cling to power at any cost.

The name alone, Egyptian Pizza , might conjure up any number of curious images, or shut down imagining altogether as you try to get a grip on the juxtaposition. Wait till you see the dining room. The Belvedere Square pizzeria-cum-Middle-Eastern-restaurant at 542 E. Belvedere Ave. presents diners with a striking interior that's part obvious to the point of parody and part mysteriously jarring. But don't let that get between you and Egyptian's Giza pie. The lighting's a few watts too low. The music track is limp easy listening: think Seals and Croft on Valium.

Unfortunately, with the limited experience that Egypt has with democracy, there is a very good chance that we shall see continuing chaos in that nation, spreading throughout the Middle East, a region not noted for listening to the voices of its own people. The results in Iran were devastating, with the initial acceptance of a purported democratic government, destroyed by the accession of Khomeini to power. Fortunately, the religious leaders of Egypt do not have the same following, but with the Muslim Brotherhood a strong factor we may be looking at a theocratic government with no possible conversion to what we consider a democracy.

It must have come as a surprise or shock for some Americans to learn that there are dictatorships in the Middle East beyond Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, and Iran. It must have been even more shocking to know that those countries (Tunisia and now Egypt) are U.S. allies. In the days and months to come we might add to the list more names like Algeria, another U.S. ally, and maybe even Jordan. It is true that not all allies are perfect. It is also true that the current crisis was ignited by the global recession, high food prices and lack of jobs, but the political system or lack thereof helped make what could have been a controlled fire seem poised to burn out of control.

Barbara Ann Griffith, who owned Imperial Egyptian Stud Farm in Parkton, died of heart disease Oct. 21 at Greater Baltimore Medical Center. She was 77 and lived on Mount Carmel Road. Born Barbara Ann Boone in Baltimore, she was raised in East Baltimore and was a 1951 Patterson Park High School graduate. She married Douglas Warner Griffith, an automobile dealership owner who went on to have Chrysler, Plymouth, Corvette, Honda and BMW agencies in Baltimore, Westminster and York, Pa. The couple purchased a Brooklandville farm and began raising purebred Arabian horses.

JERUSALEM - Israel and the Islamic group Hamas have agreed on a mutual cease-fire scheduled to take effect tomorrow after negotiations brokered by Egypt, Egyptian state news media announced yesterday. The official Egyptian state-owned news agency MENA and state-run television quoted an unidentified senior Egyptian official as saying that the truce would begin at 6 a.m. Israeli officials would not immediately confirm or deny that any agreement had been reached. Talks brokered by Egypt have been proceeding intensively between Israel and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip.

CAIRO, Egypt -- Egyptian security forces trying to eliminate an Islamic extremist cell fought street battles in a Muslim fundamentalist stronghold south of Cairo yesterday, leaving two policemen and at least 10 civilians dead, security sources said.The latest bloodshed was part of an intensifying succession of clashes between Egypt's secular leaders and Muslim militants who seek to topple President Hosni Mubarak's government and replace it with a purist Islamic state.It also is part of an increasing pattern of Islamic attacks that target Westerners for supporting the Middle East's non-Islamic governments.

EGYPTIAN DAY IS probably not indicated on your kitchen calendar, but it was celebrated yesterday by pupils at Sykesville Middle School.For seventh-graders, the event culminated a social studies unit on Africa and its cultures."

MUSTAFA KHALIL, 88 Egyptian peace negotiator Mustafa Khalil, a former Egyptian prime minister who was an architect of the 1979 Camp David peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, died late Saturday in a Cairo hospital where he was being treated for an unspecified illness, said the Egyptian state news agency, MENA. Mr. Khalil, as former secretary-general of the ruling Arab Socialist Union party, accompanied Egyptian President Anwar Sadat on his historic visit to Jerusalem in November 1977.