VOA常速英语2007-Last Year's Violence Hangs Over Eid Celebrations

By Challiss McDonough
Cairo
12 October 2007

The Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr has already begun in many countries. Egypt will mark the holiday on Saturday, but the celebrations connected to the Eid will continue for several days. This year, there is apprehension¹ in Cairo after the events of last year's Eid al-Fitr, when a mob of young men rampaged through the crowds of downtown revelers, assaulting women and trying to tear off their clothes. VOA's Challiss McDonough has more from the Egyptian capital.

Colorful fabric² banners and other trappings of the holiday have appeared all around town as Cairo prepares for the Eid al-Fitr holiday. Celebrations typically go on for several days, and in past years the streets of downtown Cairo have been thronged³ with families enjoying a night out to mark the end of a month of dawn-to-dusk fasting.

But last year, on the second night of the Eid, something happened that deeply shocked and horrified⁴ much of the nation. According to eyewitnesses⁵, a mob of young men stormed through the downtown crowds for several hours, assaulting every woman they came across. They chased them, groped them, and tried to tear off their clothes.

Taxi drivers and shopowners tried to shelter the women, but witnesses said the police did little to stop the rampage.

The events became public only after several eyewitnesses posted photos, videos and their own accounts of the violence on the Internet. The disclosures were met at first with disbelief, then with outrage⁷. The government initially⁸ denied anything had happened, and accused one of the bloggers of lying. But the sheer number of eyewitness⁶, some of whom shared their stories with a local television station, supported the blogger's account. Nobody denies it anymore.

Against that backdrop, some women say they are nervous about going out during the holiday this year. But Elham Mohammed, 45, predicts the Eid crowds downtown will be as big as ever. She calls the events of last year "exceptional" and compares the assaults to being hit by a car. She asks, "Does that mean you never walk on the street again, or ride in cars?"

"Egypt is safe," she adds. But not everyone agrees.

Security guard Osama Saleh says the fear persists, and his wife will not go downtown without being accompanied by himself or her brother.

Being with male family members did not help the women who were attacked last year. The mob attacked them regardless of who they were with or what they were wearing. Some commentators⁹ see the assaults as an extreme version of what happens every day in Cairo, the harassment¹⁰ of women in public places.

When Egyptians speak about the events of last year's Eid, or about year-round harassment of women on the streets of Cairo, it is not unusual to hear people transfer some of the blame for the assailants' actions onto the victim. Saleh says some of the victims were wearing tight clothes.

That attitude, a common one here, frustrates¹¹ women's rights activists¹², who say it is never acceptable to blame a victim for the actions of her attacker. Stigma¹³ attached to sexual assault keeps most victims in Egypt from reporting the crimes.

At any rate, the argument that the Eid assault victims were behaving improperly¹⁴ holds little weight. Some of the women were wearing the Muslim headscarf, and most were out with male relatives.

After the assaults, the publisher of a local newspaper, Mirette Mabrouk, wrote an editorial slamming not just the assailants, but the society that let the attacks happen and also looks the other way when women are harassed¹⁵ on the streets all year round.

She wrote that the fact that they can get away with it is an unmitigated shame to Egypt and its culture.

The Eid assaults did push the issue of sexual harassment into the public eye. A controversial advertising¹⁶ campaign recently challenged Cairenes to think of their own female relatives when they see strangers being harassed.

1 apprehension   

n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑

参考例句：

• There were still areas of doubt and her apprehension grew.有些地方仍然存疑，于是她越来越担心。
• She is a girl of weak apprehension.她是一个理解力很差的女孩。

2 fabric   

n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织

参考例句：

• The fabric will spot easily.这种织品很容易玷污。
• I don't like the pattern on the fabric.我不喜欢那块布料上的图案。

3 thronged   

v.成群，挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Mourners thronged to the funeral. 吊唁者蜂拥着前来参加葬礼。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The department store was thronged with people. 百货商店挤满了人。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

4 horrified   

a.(表现出)恐惧的

参考例句：

• The whole country was horrified by the killings. 全国都对这些凶杀案感到大为震惊。
• We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. 地方监狱的普遍状况让我们震惊。

5 eyewitnesses   

目击者( eyewitness的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The examination of all the eyewitnesses took a week. 对所有证人的质询用了一周的时间。
• Several eyewitnesses testified that they saw the officers hit Miller in the face. 几位目击证人证明他们看见那几个警官打了米勒的脸。

6 eyewitness   

n.目击者，见证人

参考例句：

• The police questioned several eyewitness to the murder.警察询问了谋杀案的几位目击者。
• He was the only eyewitness of the robbery.他是那起抢劫案的唯一目击者。

7 outrage   

n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒

参考例句：

• When he heard the news he reacted with a sense of outrage.他得悉此事时义愤填膺。
• We should never forget the outrage committed by the Japanese invaders.我们永远都不应该忘记日本侵略者犯下的暴行。

8 initially   

adv.最初，开始

参考例句：

• The ban was initially opposed by the US.这一禁令首先遭到美国的反对。
• Feathers initially developed from insect scales.羽毛最初由昆虫的翅瓣演化而来。

9 commentators   

n.评论员( commentator的名词复数 )；时事评论员；注释者；实况广播员

参考例句：

• Sports commentators repeat the same phrases ad nauseam. 体育解说员翻来覆去说着同样的词语，真叫人腻烦。
• Television sports commentators repeat the same phrases ad nauseam. 电视体育解说员说来说去就是那么几句话，令人厌烦。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 harassment   

n.骚扰，扰乱，烦恼，烦乱

参考例句：

• She often got telephone harassment at night these days.这些天她经常在夜晚受到电话骚扰。
• The company prohibits any form of harassment.公司禁止任何形式的骚扰行为。

11 frustrates   

v.使不成功( frustrate的第三人称单数 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• What frustrates him is that there's too little money to spend on the project. 使他懊恼的是，可用于这个项目的资金太少。
• His trouble is that he frustrates much easily. 他的毛病是很容易泄气。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

12 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 stigma   

n.耻辱，污名；(花的)柱头

参考例句：

• Being an unmarried mother used to carry a social stigma.做未婚母亲在社会上曾是不光彩的事。
• The stigma of losing weighed heavily on the team.失败的耻辱让整个队伍压力沉重。

14 improperly   

不正确地，不适当地

参考例句：

• Of course it was acting improperly. 这样做就是不对嘛！
• He is trying to improperly influence a witness. 他在试图误导证人。

15 harassed   

adj. 疲倦的，厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He has complained of being harassed by the police. 他投诉受到警方侵扰。
• harassed mothers with their children 带着孩子的疲惫不堪的母亲们

16 advertising   

n.广告业；广告活动 a.广告的；广告业务的

参考例句：

• Can you give me any advice on getting into advertising? 你能指点我如何涉足广告业吗?
• The advertising campaign is aimed primarily at young people. 这个广告宣传运动主要是针对年轻人的。