19/5/2016, Al Bawaba Aly El Samman It was my great fortune, when I was in Paris in the 1980s, to join an organization for interfaith dialogue founded by a highly regarded Egyptian, the late Dr. Adel Amer, and the Catholic Father Michel Lelong. After the death of Dr. Adel, I was elected President of that organization, ADIC, and shortly after that I called an extraordinary meeting of the ADIC General Assembly meeting at which I proposed that the organization expand its original name to include ‘Intercultural Dialogue’ as well as ‘Interfaith Dialogue and the Peace Education’. The idea of adding cultural dialogue...
Articles
Dr. Maged Riad, American-Egyptian and Christian, confronts Obama
1/10/2013 Over the past thirty years, during my frequent travels to the capitals of the West, I always dreamt of the day in which we might successfully create an Egyptian or Arab lobby to defend our position, just as the Jews did in Europe and America. The Jewish lobby, the most powerful in the world, defends Israel, and we need one of our own to speak on our behalf. Finally, my dream has come true. Maged Riad, a Christian Egyptian-American lawyer based in New York, has set up just the kind of organization we need. Riad, who I met through...
Interview with Dr. Aly El-Samman
by Abd Elhady Abbas for Al Akhbar11/10/2013 “I support the presidential candidacy of Gen. Sisi because it is a popular demand. To those who reject the army I say, please read our history carefully!” Dr. Ali El-Samman Q. To what extent is security and stability necessary for economic growth in this coming period? A. This is a serious question because the economy at this critical stage is quite dependent on security. Therefore, I cannot emphasize enough that security and economic recovery are inseparable. When you take the tourism industry into account, there is no denying that security is crucial. Tourism, upon...
Egyptian expats promote our interests in America
10/4/2014, El Masry El Youm For more than two years I had not been to America. But recently I received a kind invitation from New York’s Stony Brook University to speak about the three monotheistic religions. The invitation was sent to me at the request of Sister Sanaa Nadim, chaplain of the Stony Brook Muslim Students Association, who has lived in America for 45 years and has gained the respect of her colleagues at the Interfaith Dialogue Center; Rabbi Joseph Topek, president of the Hillel Foundation for Jewish Life; Joanne Buonocore, religious advisor of the Roman Catholic Campus Ministry; and...
In words and numbers, a victory for al-Sisi, and tears of joy for Mahlab
28/3/2015, Al Masry Al Yom For all the swashbuckling and scheming of terrorists, it was only natural for our citizens to be vigilant as they watched this historic economic conference unfold in Sharm el Sheikh. From the bottom of their hearts, Egyptians wish for the will of this country to prevail, with our army and police forces providing every security precaution for this great achievement to go unimpeded. The attendance from the whole world was astounding; our Arab brethren came, driven by their chivalry and wisdom to support and stand by Egypt with great gallantry. In the lead were Saudi...
Security and Egyptian-American military cooperation
7/8/2015, Al Bawaba Speaking during an Egyptian-American Dialogue session Sunday morning, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said that military cooperation between Egypt and the US is a mainstay of cooperation and essential for the security for both countries. The Egyptian foreign minister explained that Egypt is examining US regional power, which is also what the US is doing towards Egypt. He stated that reinforcing economic relations would be possible through a new approach based on mutual interests, not on the imposition of conditions. Minister Shoukry added that the American-Egyptian Dialogue will address the Palestinian issue, terrorism, ISIS, and Iran’s nuclear...
Retaliation against the terrorists
14/11/2012 The time for empty slogans is over. It is time to ring an alarm to wake up the Egyptian people. Once this call is heard, Egyptians must take to the streets en masse to declare war against terrorism. We shall pay a high price if we do not destroy the international terrorist organizations acting on our land that have received international and/or regional financing. National security must regain its strength and its ability to gather information about terrorist cells. In particular, now that the police have undergone structural reforms. But we always must remember that police, without national security’s...
The minister is safe, and so is our national security
10/9/2013 There is something in the method the attackers used in the recent attempt to assassinate Interior Minister General M. Ibrahim, which caused widespread outrage among Egyptians of all walks of life, that reminded me of another attempt, one that claimed the life of Prime Minister Rafik el-Hariri of Lebanon. Many of the details are similar, although the explosive charge was larger in el-Hariri’s case. Ibrahim and the policemen who work for him are soldiers in our battle with terror. Being in the frontline, they are risking their lives to protect ours. Unlike their enemies they have rules to follow....
What is the truth of the assassination attempt on Egypt’s interior minister?
16/9/2013 The cowardly attempt on the life of Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim brings us face to face with tough questions about our police force. Were the measures taken to protect the minister adequate, for example? We also have to ask ourselves if the dismantling of the State Security (now renamed the National Security) service, in Morsi’s time, advisable? Other questions, far more important, also come to mind. I am trying not to be paranoid, but isn’t there a chance that our security services were infiltrated by Morsi’s people during the Muslim Brotherhood’s rule. To put it bluntly, did Morsi appoint...
Nabil Farrag: Martyr, Commander and Hero
24/9/2013 I would have never imagined that hostilities would rip this country apart, turning Egyptians against one another, and even Muslims against each other. Those who have chosen the path of violence and extremism are now pitted against those who refuse to let terror reign supreme in our land. I never thought that names like “Raba’a al- Adaweya”, “al-Nahda” and “Kerdasa” would forever be embedded in our memories as sites of bloodshed and venues of horror. In one battle after another, the Muslim Brotherhood dug in, often summoning its friends from Hamas for help, asking the Palestinians to do battle...
October victory… relishing the memory
8/10/2013 The banned Muslim Brotherhood now wants to liberate Tahrir Square. MB members, in their deranged fanaticism, see this square, with its immense symbolism, as an enemy-occupied territory that must be reclaimed. To make matters worse, MB members are now insulting the great army of Egypt, this the army that ended the myth of Israeli invincibility. The Egyptian army fought a successful war of attrition under Nasser. Then, under Sadat, it fought a great battle that paved the way to negotiations resulting in the restoration of Sinai, the very piece of land that the MB practically handed over to the...
No more obstruction to protest law… and our hearts go out to Camellia
29/10/2013 The opinions of those who clamor about protecting the “gains of the revolution” and who are thus dead set against any regulation of protests are clearly at odds with the terrible reality of our streets. Recently we saw maddening protests sweeping Al-Azhar University, in which the participants hurled insults at the army as well as at Grand Imam Ahmed el-Tayeb. Any insult to the army, which defends the country, and the grand imam, who is the face of tolerant Islam, is distasteful to the extreme. But what is even more distasteful is that some people, posing as champions of...