Egypt and the Middle East Past and Present

A parallelism offered by American reporter Norbert Schiller between the Middle East of yesterday and today, with a focus on Egypt. |E' un parallelismo proposto dal reporter americano Norbert Schiller tra il Medio Oriente di ieri e di oggi, con una particolare attenzione all’Egitto, dove l'autore ha vissuto per quasi vent'anni.

EGYPT/Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s Last Pharaoh. Luxor Massacre (Part 6)

2 August 2012

by Norbert Schiller

Twenty nine world leaders gather at the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh to attend the Summit of the Peacemakers, March 1996. Ph. Norbert Schiller

As Egypt’s former President, Hosni Mubarak, languishes on a hospital bed, who would have ever believed, that the once all-powerful Pharaoh, who ruled for nearly 30 years, would wind up a broken man. Instead of being remembered as a hero, Mubarak last image will be him laying on a hospital gurney, inside the courtroom cage, sporting expensive sunglasses with his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, trying to shield their father from the television cameras.

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EGYPT/Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s Last Pharaoh. Fear of assasinations (part 5)

13 February 2012

by Norbert Schiller

PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat stands apart as (from L to R) Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Perez, Russian Foreign Minister Andre Kozyrev, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak try and persuade Arafat to sign the Cairo document after a dispute broke out over the map marking the boundaries of Jericho. 4th of May, 1994. Ph. Norbert Schiller

Ever since Egyptian President, Anwar Sadat, was gunned down while watching a military parade in Cairo, on 6th of October 1981, by Islamic militants, opposed to the Israeli Egyptian peace deal, there was this underlying fear that more assassinations, in Egypt, were eminent. Nobody was more aware of this, than Sadat’s Vice President, and successor, Hosni Mubarak, who happened to be by Sadat’s side when he was murdered.

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EGYPT/ Hosni Mubarak and Iraqi invasion (part 4)

23 November 2011

by Norbert Schiller

Egyptian President Hosni Mabarak and U.S. Secretary of State James Baker speaking at a joint press conference in Cairo shortly after the Iraqi military invades Kuwait in August 1990. Ph. Norbert Schiller

At 03:30 in the morning of 2nd of August 1990, while my wife and I were on vacation in England, I received a call from the London office of the news agency I was working for. “Did you get a Kuwaiti visa?”, I was asked by an editor. I was previously asked to get one just in case I was needed to go and cover possible talks between Kuwait and Iraq over their disputed oil fields. “Yes!” I answered, trying to wake up. “What time is it?”

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