Tahrir: Shock and awe Mubarak style

Tahrir: Shock and awe Mubarak style

Pro-Mubarak thugs weren't enough to deter the calls of democracy from the crowds gathering in Tahrir square. Al Jazeera writer in Cairo Pro-Mubarak activists clashed with pro-democracy supporters yesterday, with many in the pro-Mubarak camp accused of working for government ministries, including police forces [Getty] Between the Monday of January 31 until Hosni Mubarak's quaint speech late in the night night (1 February), the pro-democracy protest in Tahrir Square was the most diverse gathering that I have ever witnessed in Egypt. In normal times, Cairo is devoid of socially porous spaces where people of all classes can mix comfortably. The crowds in Tahrir Square, larger each night since the ministry of interior's security force was broken on January 28th, created a spontaneous Bohemia. As befits the label given to the uprising - thaurat al-shabab (revolt of the youth) - there were plenty of mid-teens to early 30s men and women in the pro-democracy camp. But with them were children, the elderly, the ultra-pious and the slickest cosmopolitans, workers, farmers, professionals, intellectuals, artists, long-time activists, complete neophytes to political protest, and representatives of all political persuasions outside the National Democratic Party, whose headquarters were sacked and burned last Friday, and still emitting a faint ashy smell by Monday.