Despite all the criticism I level against Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International regarding some of their stands towards the Palestinian cause, I’ve always respected their sincere solidarity campaigns launched with Egyptian activists. But one thing I cannot comprehend at the moment, is how these two rights watchdogs have paid so much attention to demos organized by (and the security crackdowns against) Kefaya activists, who managed at best to mobilize a thousand in downtown, yet I haven’t seen up till now a single statement from their MENA divisions regarding 27,000 Mahalla strikers and their families in the ME’s biggest textile mill, who are clearly under the threat of police assault as Hosni’s regime officials come out almost everyday in the press and on TV denouncing the “illegal” action by the workers.
I hope our friends in HRW and Amnesty do not forget about the Mahalla workers, and join in the calls to the Egyptian government not to use force against the strikers.
We do not welcome any intervention by any Western govt. These are the officials who have been pimping for Mubarak over the past 26 years of his martial rule. It’s them who broker the economic deals that impoverished Mahalla and the Egyptian provinces. It’s them who stay silent and at best “express concern” while pro-democracy activists as well as ordinary Egyptians get sodomized in Mubarak’s police stations. They are hypocrites, criminals and liars.
But we always welcome solidarity from the international civil society activists, labor unions and citizen groups…. and it has never been as much needed as it is the case today.