Egypt: The Story of Egyptian Revolution Retold

By Sameh Naguib*

Courtesy IDN-InDepth NewsReport

LONDON (IDN) - As the Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin said, "There are decades when nothing happens; and there are weeks when decades happen."

For years, Egyptian activists would plan a day of protest — and on the planned day a few hundred of the usual suspects would show up. We would be surrounded by 3-4,000 riot police, and after chanting, speeches and a few confrontations with the police, the planned day would end.

Activists were more optimistic about January 25, 2011, because of the Tunisian spark. This time we might get several thousand people, at least in two or three of the main centres. Perhaps we could even reach 10,000! But none of the activists in our wildest dreams could have imagined what actually took place that day.

The demonstrations started with the usual slogans. But as soon as the now famous Tunisian chant was shouted – "The people demand the downfall of the regime" – something seemed to have changed.

More and more people came down from their houses and started shouting the slogan with overwhelming passion. Men and women, young and old, Christians and Muslims took part – the vast majority poor Egyptians.

The louder they shouted that magical slogan, the more it echoed in the poor alleyways, the more people joined. What started with a few hundred activists turned into mass demonstrations of tens of thousands. The fear and confusion of the police was palpable. They were ordered to retreat to the major junctions in an attempt to prevent the demonstrators from reaching the city centres.

It is there that the major battles on that historic day took place. Water cannons, rubber bullets and endless rounds of tear gas canisters were used to beat back the protesters.

OBSTACLE

By far the most difficult obstacle was the choking tear gas. But the more seasoned demonstrators started organising the distribution of clinical masks, cola cans and onions – provided freely by housewives, pharmacy workers and coffee shops – to help survive the white clouds.

Tens of thousands of demonstrators were able to break through many of the police barriers and reach the city centres, including, of course, Tahrir Square. But the battles continued. There were tens of martyrs and thousands of injured at the end of that day of liberation – the day that ignited the Egyptian Revolution.

Demonstrations and battles continued during the following two days, but the main focus was on organising the "Friday of Rage" – January 28. This time the Muslim Brotherhood decided to participate.

The organisers were no longer just the "usual suspects” but thousands of new leaders – mostly working class youth who were better educated by days of actual revolution than years of political education.

After Friday prayers, hundreds of thousands started their marches from all the major mosques and squares towards the city centres. Hundreds of thousands reached Tahrir Square and began their famous occupation of it that only ended with Mubarak’s fall on February 11.

Popular committees started springing up all over the country to defend their neighbourhoods, to organise traffic and even to clean the streets. The protesters called for million-strong marches on Tuesday, February 1, in all major cities.

The reaction of the army generals was one of the major turning points in the revolution. Military spokesman General Ismail Othman declared on national television that the army recognised the legitimate demands of the people and would not shoot at them.

SACRIFICE

The army generals understood that ordering a crackdown by the troops would split the forces and turn thousands of soldiers and young officers against them. The army leaders were prepared to sacrifice Mubarak to save the regime.

Millions participated in the protests of that day including two million in Tahrir Square in Cairo, one million in Martyrs’ Square in Alexandria, 750,000 in Mansoura, and a quarter of a million in Suez. It was an unprecedented show of strength.

Thousands of banners and placards with the people's demands expressed through poetry, jokes and personal stories filled Tahrir Square. Graffiti, murals and slogans covered every building’s wall.
People shared food, water, and cigarettes. Songs, music, poetry and chants filled the air. A new Egypt was being created. The next day, a number of prominent billionaires, leaders of the ruling NDP party, and secret police officers, led by Gamal Mubarak, devised a plan for a full-blown attack on the demonstrators.

Dozens of horse and camel-riding thugs came charging at the demonstrators. Confused and bewildered at first, protesters fought back with their bare hands. The demonstrators quickly organised themselves into thick defence lines and stones and bricks were gathered from all over the square for the fightback.

An elaborate division of labour was devised.

The young and strong, particularly the working class youth, would take the frontlines as stone throwers. Others would break pavements to provide a steady flow of stones. Yet other groups would carry the stones to the frontlines.

Young women brought water to the fighters throughout that terrible but heroic night.

Snipers started aiming their laser pointers at the demonstrators. Tens of young demonstrators would climb the barricades and let the pointers aim at their chests. These were fearless fighters, with a clear aim and a clear message – either victory or death!

Blood flowed everywhere. Over a dozen young fighters were martyred during that night, their bodies carried with pride and determination by their comrades to the makeshift hospitals. Hundreds of the injured would return to the fighting immediately.

BATTLE

By dawn the battle had been won. The thugs and police were fleeing. They ran for their lives as the revolutionaries had reached the bridge and intersections outside the square and ran after the thugs. The majority of our enemies held either police or NDP identity cards.

By daybreak, hundreds of thousands of Egyptians joined their fellow demonstrators in order to show support and solidarity. The leaders of the protests had already called for massive demonstrations across Egypt on Friday after prayers, calling the event "Departure Day".

In the last week of the uprising a wave of mass strikes and demonstrations by workers in key sectors of the economy spread like wildfire, with both economic demands and the main revolutionary demand of removing Mubarak.

Suez, scene of some of the fiercest battles against the police on the Friday of Rage, led the way. On February 8, 6,000 Suez Canal workers went on strike, joining textile and steel workers. By February 10, the wave had spread from Alexandria in the north to Aswan in the south. Even the generals' own factories, where workers live under harsh military discipline, were alight with strikes.

The demonstrations on Friday, February 11, were the largest ever. Over 15 million people were estimated to have taken part in demonstrations all over the country.

Workers came out this time in organised demonstrations from their workplaces, signalling that they would paralyse the country if Mubarak did not back down. The same evening, our demand was finally met.

The first stage of the Egyptian Revolution had triumphed. Nearly a thousand were martyred, tens of thousands injured – but Mubarak was history.

*Leading Egyptian revolutionary socialist Sameh Naguib has written a pamphlet about the revolution that overthrew Hosni Mubarak – and where the struggle could go next. This article is an abridged version of what was published first by Socialist Worker on http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=25245