http://madamasr.com/content/activists-seeking-enter-gaza-face-deportation-cairo-airport
Medea Benjamin the leader of the group has condemned the US Embassy for not helping after she spent 17 hours on Twitter etc asking for their help.
She is now back in DC after being deported via Turkey.
She reported that she was put in a filthy prison and fed dirty bread and dirty water and police broke her arm and amazingly an Egyptian doctor on a flight to Turkey reset her broken arm :dubious:
OK, so the embassy is - out of the blue - supposed to help someone because they asked via Twitter? Someone who refused to display a passport at immigration control?
These are people begging to be arrested. The US has little to do with it and the embassy is doing the right thing by ignoring it.
As for the filthy prison stuff? Protip: don’t get arrested if you don’t want to see a jail. Especially in the developing world. Though she’d likely be equally horrified at conditions in most county jails in the US.
I think **Marmite Lover **is coming out in *favor *of the US Embassy’s actions.
Reported - there’s a link here but no debate.
You just noticed? He’s been doing this for weeks.
Yeah. He makes my ass tired and it just reached critical mass. I’m hoping if we start reporting the threads en masse we can spread the pain around and maybe inspire someone to take official action.
Marmite Lover, while I support your desire to discuss and debate issues throughout the middle east, I have to question your behavior.
Just this morning you’ve posted three issues without much in the way of backing material nor real debate. Such accomplishes nothing and doesn’t contribute to the mission of Great Debates. In future threads, please maintain proper form and have a topic you wish to debate.
I’m going to cross-post this to the threads you started this morning and encourage you to do better in the future. More threads like this - vague statements to others writing without an attempt at debate - will be closed or moved at moderator discretion.
I have to say, Tyler Perry goes to amazing lengths to get into character.
Perhaps Medea Benjamin has had some sense smacked into her. As for the embassy, their job is to represent the citizen of the nation in another nation, no matter how obnoxious those citizens might be.
I don’t think it’s their job to take her word for it when she says she’s a citizen but refused to produce her passport.
yes you would think that wouldn’t you
she’s well known and the American Embassy in Cairo would have her on a list of persona non grata anyway but the embassy refused to attend her when she said they broke her arm so what is this?
So…the Egyptians have declared her persona non grata, and deported her? And the US embassy was supposed to…do what? Investigate whether Egyptian security forces broke her arm?
If the US embassy is supposed to help her, the best way they can help her is to get her out of the country. Which she is.
So what if she’s well known? Do you think every consular official knows who she is?
Plus, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Twitter a terrible way to try to get in touch with one specific entity? If the embassy wasn’t following her, would they have even known that she was asking for help at all?
Maybe she thought they would send her a coupon, like when you complain to a business about its customer service via Twitter.
What is this? It’s what happens to you when you refuse to show your passport. Lesson to be learned: if you want help, show your passport.
You can send Direct Messages to people who don’t follow you now, unless they’ve blocked you. But honestly, I can’t imagine the person in charge of the US Embassy in Cairo’s Twitter feed is all that responsive, or was even aware of the situation. Maybe instead of spending those 17 hours you just suck it up and show a passport?
Meanwhile, others went to McDonalds in protest, others visited the restroom in protest, and others got a drink of water in protest.
I can’t figure it out - who did the protesters think was going to be outraged by this?
Regards,
Shodan