RADIUS

A firsthand account of an influential feminist activist group established during the Arab Spring.

El-Rifae is a founding member of Opantish (Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment), which helped protect women from mob attacks in the wake of the 2011 uprisings. “From physically intervening on the ground to overseeing the complicated logistics of the operation, women led,” writes the author. “Opantish positioned itself as a necessary part of the revolution even as it struggled against sexism within revolutionary circles.” El-Rifae, who co-produces the Palestine Festival of Literature, and her friends were at the center of demonstrations in Egypt, when young revolutionaries were experiencing “all of the transcendence and promise of unstoppable, fear-breaking collective action against decades of police brutality, dictatorship, and corruption.” Despite the encouraging progress, online reports soon revealed that women were being surrounded by mobs of men and sexually assaulted. As a result, El-Rifae and a motivated group of both women and men took the initiative to create Opantish. Well organized and employing protective gear and safety kits, they confronted the mobs in order to save the women, often at great personal risk. The author also discusses how the Egyptian military had been using attacks against women in public spaces since the early 2000s. In addition, the Muslim Brotherhood, the deeply conservative religious sect that briefly prevailed in its overthrow of the government, had also sanctioned assaults against “liberal,” Westernized women. Throughout the book, the author presents the results of her interviews conducted over several years after the events, many wrenching in detail. Her colleagues reveal that many perpetrators of sexual violence espoused the ideals of the revolution but took the opportunity to assault women whenever they were trapped in a crowd. El-Rifae’s text is both deeply troubling and inspiring.

Powerful testimony of the Egyptian revolution destroying itself and the courageous people who hoped to save it.