After Dahshur, the infernal scenario of attacks, plunder and expulsion is now taking place in a number of other villages in Egypt. The inhabitants of Talbiya, a village in the governorate of Alexandria are now victims of the unjustifiable absence of security forces that give the chance to thugs and criminals to threaten these citizens to extort money from them, mass-evict them from their houses, and rob their properties. The authorities are still turning a deaf ear to their cries for help.
These families have found no solution other than to rent a room or erect a tent to shelter themselves during their forced exile.
Mrs. Saniyat Abdallah and her two daughters tell with tears in their eyes what they went through for objecting to drug dealing just outside their door: the dealers and their leader Abu-Leila beat them up, vandalized their houses and kicked them out of it. The mother with her daughters cry themselves to sleep every night not knowing what the future holds for them, especially after the police took no action nor made any arrests after they filed a report, though the gang members are known to them by name and they have records for them.
When Magda Fathi reported to police that her microbus was stolen and asked the officer to accompany her and talk to the people who did it, he replied that he is not willing to die for a bus; instead he proposed that she accepts a “settlement” check by the name of Abdel Hamid Abu-Leila or the neighborhood Imam “Adel Abdel Alim,” who has always served both as a “mediator” between the victims and their aggressors, of course against generous sums of money paid by the gangsters, to convince the villagers to obey and shut up: “better safe than sorry.”
Youssef Ahmed lost his eye with a gunshot during one of their “raids,” expressing a state of deep exasperation that may lead the neighborhood’s youth to follow unorthodox paths, like illegally obtain arms to be heard by the media and authorities.
Numbers of reports of kidnap, robbery, extortion and murder have been submitted to the police and no action was ever taken. In fact the gangs went as far as to steal the precinct computers to make sure any information about them disappear forever.
Translated by Coptic Solidarity; published
Elfagr, 8/26/2012