On the Arab Street, Rage Is Contagious

摘要

Such Is The Extent Of Politi-cal repression in Egypt that when tens of thousands of people took to the streets to decry the 29-year rule of President Hosni Mubarak, nobody was more surprised than the protesters themselves. "I didn't expect this many people," said businessman Ahmed Osa-ma as he took in the crowds bearing antigovernment posters and chanting anti-Mubarak slogans in Cairo's central Midan Tahrir, or Liberation Square. Even Zeinab Khalifa, an artist who has spent much of her adult life campaigning for political reform, was astonished by the turnout. "This is the biggest protest I've seen in this era," she said.