I write my first blog from the Cairo-based Mahkum prison, where I have mixed feelings of injustice, imprisonment, and longing for freedom and friends and longing for the keyboard through which I have been reflecting a true picture of what’s happening in Egypt. I am blogging and look at the bars that deny me freedom, deny me my friends, my work and my weblog. These bars even deny me a pure sky and I only see clouds on these bars which prevent me from seeing the moon.
Moneim adds in his also jailed weblog:" In this gloomy place, I try to avoid recalling the good memories of people, places and jobs. When enter helplessly into these memories, the jailer comes to shut down the cell door violently to remind me that I can’t meet them and I can’t even enjoy their company in my imagination".
My Parents
In this hideous prison, I think all day and night about my father whom I can’t see and who can’t come to see me because he fell ill after he fell ill when he saw me unjustly detained for the third time. He is now bedridden in an Alexandrian hospital.
As for my mother whose hug has been easing any feeling of suffering, I can’t see her in my month long detention because she is busy attending to my ill father. I am sure that my god is all merciful and will protect them.
My Weblog ... Ana Ikhwan
This is my weblog that has scared this worn out regime. I am longing to it because it was my close partner about which I have been thinking day and night.
Islam Lotfi was always saying he feels as if he is in paradise when he is blogging. Ana Ikhwan is a message to myself, Muslim Brotherhood youth and the society as a whole. I was blogging about the Muslim Brotherhood whose members are human beings who eat drink, got to cinema, demonstrate and have common aspirations.
Ana Ikhwan... a message of an Egyptian human being affiliated to a reformist movement... a young man who loves Egypt and wants to free it from tyranny, dictatorship and corruption.
Ana Ikhwan... a message of an Egyptian who seeks coexistence with communists, Copts, secularists, and the Muslim Brotherhood who share their love to Egypt.
To my friends
I received many messages of solidarity from many people, mostly people who have never seen me before but they are enraged by the injustice that I am facing. Let me first send my greeting to my team work, specially Mohamed and Islam. I long for Mohamed Ghozaln’s chatting. We were working overnight and you give me a lift but we chat again with each other and you return home nearly at dawn.
Islam Lotfi was the one I was getting him tired, specially after Al Qassas was arrested. "let’s go to ….to do so", "let’s go out for lunch", "accompany me to a certain destination and we shall be back soon"…….I miss you so much Islam.
I must send my greetings and thank those many people who showed their solidarity with me and those who asked about may parents’ health.
Iman...my faithful colleague who is always fully shouldered with yalltalaba website when I get detained. She is also preparing the college diploma classes for me.
Khaled Hamzah…The great intellectual whose reformist attitude enraged our corrupt regime and made it arrest me. He kept on encouraging "blog and keep on blogging Moneim to expose this dictatorship". I kept blogging till the authoritarian regime came and blogged me (arrested me).
Special thanks to bloggers whose relations with me popped out of the World Wide Web:
Alaa Saif, Mohamed Adel, Asad, Ahmed Abdul Fattah, Hossam Al Hamalawi, Shrqawi, Nora Yunus, Wael Abbas, and Samy Gharbiya from Tunis and many other bloggers.
Many thanks to Marc Lynch, the first Western writer to observe and write about the Muslim Brotherhood’s weblogs. He wrote about Muslim Brotherhood blogging in The Guardian. Many thanks to my very dear colleague Nadia Abul Magd whose continuous greetings are showering me.
Downtown
I like downtown not as a place but because I recall many relations with people I love so much in this crowded area.
I love Talaat Harb, Bab El Louk, Abdin, Al-Sayyeda, Tahrir, Munira, and Al-Qasr Al-Aini. I missed so much the cup of tea prepared by Said in the Cultural Seminar café and sandwiches from Shalabi’s and Mo’men’s. I missed Krok Miso sandwiches and orange juice from Costa beside the American University in Cairo. I was drinking and eating there while I was busy blogging An Ikhwan because there was Wi-Fi in it.
Late at night, I go to newspaper seller at Al Mansour street to end my night with the news.
I missed so much my friend Qassas Mohamed Qassas, my closest friend. When he was thrown behind bars, I couldn’t imagine spending a night without seeing him. I was sometimes caling him on the mobile although I know that the its shut down because its owner is in prison. However, I was visiting him in prison but now both of us are separated and detained.
When I was arrested I though that I will be detained with him, but the state security separated between us to add injury to insult. I miss you so much Qassas.
Sara, Anas, solaiman and Habiba, children of Ayman Abdul Ghani who is currently referred to the military court. Engineer Ayman Abdul Ghani is an old cellmate. I was detained for the first time with him in 2003 and then in 2006. Engineer Ayman, an older and more honorable friend, has a heart of an innocent child so loving to the Muslim Brotherhood and its members. He was serving us during the period of prison. He was giving me his children during the prison visit to play with while he was speaking with his wife. I loved these children so much, starting from Sara and Anas and Solaiman and even the then two years old Habiba.
When I was seeing his children, Solaiman was asking me:" why are you not detained with dad" till I was sent to prison but not with his dad.
Muslim Brotherhood Bloggers
Blogging started in the Muslim Brotherhood arenas a bit late. However, Muslim Brotherhood bloggers managed in a very short period o time to prove themselves and show a well refined image of the Muslim Brotherhood. They expressed their affiliation to the Islamic group very freely and boldly.
I hope this experience will develop, specially Ensa blogspot which managed to compete with the traditional media in defending the MB leaders referred to the military justice. I appreciate the efforts of the young bloggers who administrate weblogs against military courts, Saad, Khadiga, Asmaa, Bilal and Shousha’s family and Moaaz.
I also appreciate efforts of Muslim Brotherhood bloggers:
http://ebn-akh.blogspot.com/
http://ba7ebelnoor.blogspot.com/
http://molotoofy.blogspot.com/
http://yallameshmohem.blogspot.com/
http://nojoomol7era.blogspot.com/
Your are a new a generation of the Muslim Brotherhood. You are shouldered with the responsibility of showing the true and civilized image of the group, a new bold generation who can maintain the mission of reform in the country.
We Love You … Egypt
Despite all suffering and torture in prison, and despite the corruption and poverty, I still love you, never though of leaving you my homeland Egypt.
I will continue blogging, writing demonstrating and reforming till I see you free of corruption and dictatrship.
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