The Daily Blog

Ayman al-Zawahri, Al Qaeda’s No. 2, Issues Eulogy For Bin Laden.

CAIRO — Osama bin Laden’s deputy said the slain al-Qaida chief “terrified America” when he was alive and would continue to do so in death, according to a eulogy that appeared on militant websites Wednesday.

The message by Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaida’s longtime No. 2 and considered the network’s operational head, heaped praise on bin Laden, who was killed in the May 2 raid by U.S. Navy SEALs in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad.

Al-Zawahri also blasted the United States for burying bin Laden at sea after the raid and urged the people of Pakistan to rise against the country’s rulers, describing them as “traitors.”

Within days of the bin Laden raid, al-Qaida had issued a statement vowing to keep fighting the United States, a message that was likely designed to convince followers that the organization would remain vigorous and intact even after its founder’s demise.

But al-Zawahri’s eulogy was the first comment on bin Laden’s slaying by his potential successor.

In the 28-minute video, al-Zawahri, who is believed to be operating from somewhere near the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier, appeared in a white Arab robe and turban, a Kalashnikov at his side.

“The man has terrified America when he was alive and is terrifying it even when he is dead, to the extent that they denied him a tomb,” al-Zawahri said.

He also said U.S. officials withheld the release of photographs of bin Laden’s body, fearing the “Islamic peoples’ anger and hate” for America. He claimed bin Laden had “achieved what he wanted to do, which is to incite the Islamic nation to holy war and his message had reached all.”

Al-Zawahri, who is Egyptian, is a less charismatic and unifying figure, and he is believed to lack bin Laden’s ability to bring together the many nationalities and ethnic groups that make up al-Qaida. His appointment as the next al-Qaida leader could further fracture an organization that is thought to be increasingly decentralized.

The euology included five poems of praise for bin Laden, describing him alternately as modest, noble and shrewd commander and “the vanguard of jihad (holy war) against the Communists and then the Crusaders,” a reference to bin Laden’s campaign in the Afghan war against the Soviets in the 1980s and the Sept. 11, 2011 attacks against the United States.

Al-Zawahri also vented his anger at the Pakistani military leaders and politicians, implying they had a role in bin Laden’s death.

“I call on the Pakistani nation to rise up against the mercenary military traitors and the corrupt politicians who turned Pakistan into an American colony, allowing it (America) to kill or capture whoever it wants,” al-Zawahri said.

He concluded by saying bin Laden will remain a “source of horror and a nightmare chasing America, Israel and their allies.”

Journalists Attacked, Arrested in Cairo Chaos.

Foreign journalists covering the political tumult in Cairo have been roughed up by unruly mobs and detained by security forces, according to multiple reports Thursday.

The attacks near Tahrir Square, the center of the protests, came from supporters of President Hosni Mubarak, foreign journalists told the Associated Press. Demonstrators backing Mubarak have clashed with anti-government protesters as a peaceful uprising turned violent over the past 48 hours.

The New York Times said security forces and pro-government gangs were even hunting down journalists at their offices and in hotels where many had taken refuge. The Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya television networks said they couldn’t cover the scene at Tahrir Square live because their crews had been harassed on the streets and at vantage above the square where cameras had been set up.

Earlier, the Times said two reporters working for the newspaper were released Thursday after being detained overnight in Cairo. Washington Post Foreign Editor Douglas Jehl said witnesses on the street in Cairo reported that his paper’s bureau chief, Leila Fadel, and photographer Linda Davidson were among two dozen journalists arrested by the Egyptian Interior Ministry.The Greek newspaper Kathimerini said its correspondent was briefly hospitalized after being stabbed in the leg by supporters of Mubarak. A Greek newspaper photographer was also reportedly beaten.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, traveling with President Obama in Pennsylvania, told reporters that the actions are “completely and totally unacceptable” and “any journalist that has been detained should be released immediately,” the Times reported.In Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley condemned the violence. “There is a concerted campaign to intimidate international journalists in Cairo and interfere with their reporting,” Crowley said.

On Wednesday, ABC correspondent Christiane Amanpour had to make a quick getaway when demonstrators yelling that they “hate America” banged on her car and smashed part of its windshield.

Mubarak, who has held power for 30 years, agreed earlier this week not to seek reelection in six months, but the street demonstrations continued as his foes demanded that he step down immediately.

Exodus From Egypt Speeds Up, but Thousands Still Stranded.

CAIRO — EgyptAir’s staff scuffled with frantic passengers, food supplies were dwindling, flight information was nonexistent - and some policemen even demanded substantial bribes before allowing foreigners to board their planes.

Cairo Airport was in complete disarray, overwhelmed with more than 18,000 passengers who flocked to the facility before 3 p.m. curfew, airport officials said Tuesday. Tourists detailed of a litany of woes, as dozens of planes arrived from all over the world to handle the surging exodus of foreigners and Egyptians amid growing anti-government protests in Cairo. As many as 3,500 travelers remained stranded at the airport Tuesday evening.

The United States ordered nonessential U.S. government personnel and their families to leave Egypt and Germany expanded its travel warning to the entire country, including the Red Sea resort towns.Airport officials said the family of former Tourism Minister Zohair Garanah left Cairo on a private jet bound for Greece. The departure was the latest by a member of Egypt’s business, political or entertainment elite. Protesters have complained that Mubarak’s regime favored the rich at their expense, and several wealthy businessmen are members of the parliament.

Even having a ticket was no guarantee that tourists could get on a flight.

Five or six EgyptAir employees scuffled with passengers who were frantically trying to get seats on the few outbound flights it had available, airport officials said. There were no reports of injuries, but the incident spotlighted how days of political uncertainty, as well as massive crowds at the airport and little guarantee of securing a flight, had worn down peoples’ nerves.

“People holding tickets had difficulties getting on the plane, because the airport in Cairo is pure chaos,” Canadian tourist Tristin Hutton said after his plane landed at Germany’s Frankfurt airport.

“The terminals are full of panicking people. The ground staff is disappearing, and at the gate, just before entering, we all together had to collect $2,000 for a policeman at the door. … He would not let us pass without paying,” added the 44-year-old.

“We did not see the protests coming. All of us have been surprised,” said Brian Johnson, the deputy head of the Canadian International School in the Cairo, who left Egypt along with 34 of his colleagues.

New York-based Pamela Huyser, who had traveled to Egypt for a conference, arrived in Larnaca late Monday unnerved by the violence she witnessed from her ninth-floor hotel balcony in Cairo.

“You cannot even believe what we saw,” she said. “We saw people looting, we saw gunfire, people shooting other people. A lot of people working in our hotel, they came out with sticks and knives and bats and they protected us from getting looted.”

Greek oil worker Markos Loukogiannakis, who arrived in Athens on a flight carrying 181 passengers including 65 U.S. citizens, said travelers had to negotiate 19 checkpoints Monday just to get to the Cairo airport.

Madeline Murphy Rabb, a Chicago-based curator, said that a Nile cruise for her 66th birthday was interrupted by the protests, with passengers confined to the ship at Luxor for two days.

“The manager of the tour ship restricted us from leaving the boat because he feared for our safety,” Rabb said in a telephone interview from London on Tuesday.

Tens of thousands of European tourists flock to Egypt for winter holidays, and the big question tour operators and governments faced was what to do with tourists in other parts of Egypt. Tour operators say they will fly home all their customers this week when their holidays end, or on extra flights, stressing there has not been any unrest in Red Sea resort cities like Hurghada or Sharm el-Sheik.Britain said Tuesday it was not ordering staff to leave Egypt, but confirmed most diplomats’ family had left. The U.K. is advising against travel to Cairo, Alexandria, Luxor and Suez.

However, about 15,000 British tourists staying in Red Sea coastal resorts have been told they are safe to continue their vacations.

Germany said Tuesday it was expanding its travel warning to include Red Sea resorts but not ordering evacuations. Some 1.2 million Germans visit Egypt each year.

The Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported that the vast majority of Russian tourists in Egypt - some 45,000 right now - had no plans to interrupt their vacations. Konstantin Shvartser of the tour agency Pegas Touristik said only 18 of about 18,000 vacationers who had bought a package tour had asked to leave early.

In a twist, even Iraq decided it would evacuate its citizens, sending three planes to Egypt - including the prime minister’s plane - to bring home for free those who wish to return. Thousands of Iraqis had once fled to Egypt to escape the violence in their own country.

Top Egyptian Official Says Mubarak in Control.

CAIRO — Egypt’s parliament speaker says President Hosni Mubarak remains in control of the country despite chaos engulfing the capital and other cities.

Speaker Fathy Surour says: “Matters are in the safe hands of Hosni Mubarak and he will act and you will see these actions.”

Protesters have seized the streets of Cairo, battling police with stones and firebombs, burning down the ruling party headquarters, and defying a night curfew enforced by a military deployment. It was the peak of unrest posing the most dire threat to Mubarak in his three decades of authoritarian rule.The government’s attempts to suppress demonstrations appeared to be swiftly eroding support from the U.S. - suddenly forced to choose between its most important Arab ally and a democratic uprising demanding his ouster. Washington threatened to reduce a $1.5 billion program of foreign aid if Mubarak escalated the use of force.

The protesters were sure to be emboldened by their success in bringing tens of thousands to the streets in defiance of a ban, a large police force, countless canisters of tear gas, and even a nighttime curfew enforced by the first military deployment of the crisis.

Flames rose in cities across Egypt as police cars burned and protesters set the ruling party headquarters in Cairo ablaze. Hundreds of young men tore televisions, fans and stereo equipment from other buildings of the National Democratic Party neighboring the Egyptian Museum, home of King Tutankhamun’s treasures and one of the country’s most popular tourist attractions.Egypt’s national airline halted flights for at least 12 hours and a Cairo Airport official said a number of international airlines had canceled flights to the capital, at least overnight. There were long lines at many supermarkets and employees limited bread sales to 10 rolls per person.

Options appeared to be dwindling for Mubarak, a 82-year-old former air force commander who until this week maintained what looked like rock-solid control of the most populous Arab nation and the cultural heart of the region.

With looting and arson fires rocking the capital, Mubarak seemed faced with the choice between a deadly crack and major concessions to protesters demanding he step down this year and not hand power to his son, Gamal.

The once-unimaginable scenes of anarchy along the Nile played out on television and computer screens from Algiers to Riyadh, two weeks to the day after protesters in Tunisia drove out their autocratic president. Images of the protests in the smaller North African country emboldened Egyptians to launch four straight days of increasingly fearless demonstrations organized over mobile phone, Facebook and Twitter.

The government cut off the Internet and mobile-phone services in Cairo, called the army into the streets and imposed a nationwide night-time curfew. The extreme measures were ignored by tens of thousands of rich, poor and middle-class protesters who united in rage against a regime seen as corrupt, abusive and neglectful of the nearly half of Egypt’s 80 million people who live below the poverty line of $2 a day.

“All these people want to bring down the government. That’s our basic desire,” said protester Wagdy Syed, 30. “They have no morals, no respect, and no good economic sense.”

Mubarak made no public appearance or statement and other senior figures in the regime were also notably absent.