Worldcrunch
In an area the size of Singapore, Egypt is building its new capital. Constructed under the close control of the military and the head of state, the city embodies the grand ambitions of an increasingly autocratic president. But will it turn out to be a ghost city?
In an interconnected world, we are faced again with the negative implications of the so-called “butterfly effect” when a localized conflict can have far-reaching consequences and trigger lasting crises. For our world’s broken food systems, the war in Ukraine should be a wake-up call.
In Egypt, private schools are driven solely by profit. As the economic effects of COVID-19 forces families to choose cheaper schools, many parents are forced to confront the country’s endemic education problems. And they’re discovering that expensive private schools are better in outward appearance only.
Several notable political prisoners in Egypt have renounced their citizenship to gain freedom. The choice is a difficult one to make personally, and the practice is highly questionable politically.
Essam El-Haddad, a senior adviser to President Morsi, was jailed more than eight years ago. His son Abdullah continues to fight for his father’s liberation, which he says is a necessary path toward national union in post-Arab Spring Egypt.
Letters from inmates provide a crucial link with the outside world, and yet the process of sending and receiving them in Egyptian prisons is both arduous and arbitrary as an extra means of control.
ISMAILIA – Every year during the month of July, crowds gather in the mango farms of Ismailia, in northeastern Egypt, to pick the delectable summer fruit during its relatively short harvest season. But this year, as a result of erratic weather patterns throughout March and April, the usual bountiful mango harvest was severely affected with […]
? Wai!* Welcome to Thursday, where leaked documents show how some countries are lobbying to change a key report on climate change, Moscow announces new full lockdown and the world’s first robot artist is arrested over spying allegations. Meanwhile, German daily Die Welt looks at the rapprochement between two leaders currently at odds with Europe: […]
Due to climate change and pollution, entire neighborhoods and cities on the continent are destined to vanish. A new vision of African urbanism is needed to replace the illusion of the “city without limits.”
CAIRO — I’ve been thinking lately about my relationship with anonymity, and the way my understanding of it — which used to be somewhat one-sided — has been evolving, both in personal writing and in political work. In a polarized environment, we become trapped in a reactive position, especially as some of the approaches adopted […]
A new high-end food retailer, Gourmet, is helping reshape Egypt’s supermarket industry.
Women in Egypt have definitively broken the silence around sexual violence — but what comes next?
Only about 150,000 of the country’s 100 million people have been vaccinated so far against COVID-19, and in some crowded health centers, people wait hours only to be turned away.
This dearth of urban planning in the Egyptian capital dates back half a century. But it reached a new peak starting in 2019, when one of its last livable districts saw its old ways demolished.
With Joe Biden, Cairo’s relations with Washington are undergoing an uncomfortable reboot.
“I’m not against hijab in principle; I myself wear it,’ says one mother. ‘But I refuse to have my daughter wear it against her will.”
The editor of Mada Masr writes about what how to remember the revolution in Egypt.
Uber launched with an excited bang in Egypt in 2014, promising work and new income for a country struggling with unemployment. But the castle of sand has disintegrated, leaving a trail of debt and frustration.
Public denouncements have pressured some Egyptian institutions to establish anti-harassment policies. But without ‘collective responsibility,’ policies alone can only go so far.
When Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in December 2010, it first triggered a wave of revolts, then hopes of a historic liberalization in Arab countries. But the doors of democracy, barely half-opened, have been shut ever since.
Gasser Abdel Razek and his colleagues at a leading Egyptian NGO have been arrested as part of government crackdown. What it looks like to those who’ve been there before.
For rural communities in particular, serious water shortages were a big problem even before the COVID-19 outbreak made handwashing all the more imperative.
Movie houses, music venues and art galleries are showing signs of life after a long lockdown. They’re also having to be creative with how they reopen, as certain health restrictions still apply.
Families, neighborhoods and even the remains of loved ones are bulldozed over in order to build new highways and other works without the input of the people.
The pandemic is putting the squeeze on hospitals and clinics, and making things particularly difficult — and dangerous — for pregnant women.
An outright ban on wildlife trade may exacerbate the situation. Could carefully controlling these animal markets be the best answer?
Welcome to Thursday, where severe flooding in Germany and Belgium has left dozens dead, Brazil’s Bolsonaro is in the hospital and a gun that looks like a children’s toy sparks backlash. Independent Egyptian media Mada Masr also tells us about a high-end supermarket that’s transforming Egypt’s grocery lists. • Dozens feared dead in European floods: […]
From schedule changes and face shields to full operational shutdowns, the pandemic has directly impacted the country’s industrial sector.
Life was difficult enough for refugees even before the coronavirus outbreak. But with the lockdown depriving them of even meager earnings, the situation has beyond dire.
A reflection from Egypt, where a culture of warmth and feeling is suddenly shut down.
Egyptian students won’t attend in-person classes again until September. In the case of most private schools, there won’t be any refunds either to the mostly middle-class families.
CAIRO — Like many other laborers, delivery workers are not able to practice social distancing during the novel coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, the service they provide helps protect customers — largely middle and upper-class citizens — by keeping those people out of busy shops where they might come in contact wth the illness. […]
Egypt’s longest-serving president, ruling from 1981 until 2011, has died at the age of 91. From humble beginnings to iron-clad rule of the largest Middle East nation.
‘Where do we go to die, when we have lived thousands of lifetimes in a world that was not made for us?’
Nine years after the Jan. 25 popular revolution that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak, so much of the hopes failed to materialize. But not everything.
Throughout the country’s turbulent history, efforts to establish a government by and for the people have always come up short.
CAIRO — In Egypt, all imported meat must be certified as “halal,” meaning that it has been procured, stored and shipped in accordance with Islamic law. Obtaining this certificate is a crucial requirement for meat suppliers to be able to access the lucrative Egyptian market. The Egyptian government licenses a number of “certifiers’ around the […]
When reality transcends constitutional and legal provisions, you must be extra clever about social media use.
Changes are afoot, and yet writer Mohamed Naeem struggles to see light at the end of the dark tunnel into which Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has led the Egyptian people.
The editor of Mada Masr, a Worldcrunch partner publication based in Cairo, explains how they wound up making news itself last month.