Following yet another huge group of men sexually assaulting a woman at Tahrir Square in Egypt this week, yesterday a group of about 50 women and their male allies took to the Square in protest. Unfortunately, soon after they arrived, they were harassed and attacked, some women were cornered and groped, and they had to flee for their safety.
Thanks for proving the point, harassers. Tahrir Square, like so many public places, is not safe for women. That makes me so angry.
“After Friday’s attack, many were already calling for another, much larger stand in the square against such assaults.
Another participant in Friday’s march, Ahmed Hawary, said a close female friend of his was attacked by a mob of men in Tahrir Square in January. She was rushed off in an ambulance, which was the only way to get her out, he said. After suffering from a nervous breakdown, she left Cairo altogether to work elsewhere in Egypt.
“Women activists are at the core of the revolution,” Hawary said. “They are the courage of this movement. If you break them, you break the spirit of the revolution.”
There’s a lot of media coverage of the protest, and I’ll have a better post up here about it tomorrow. I’m interviewing a few women who were there for a Ms. magazine blog post and will cross-post it here.
In the meantime, you can also see the conversation about what happened and the issue overall on the event Facebook page and on twitter, follow the #EndSH stream.
