The case of Hala Mustafa

I have followed this case. I met Hala Mustafa briefly once in Berkeley and I know of her politics. Here, Aly sent me a useful summary of the case. I want to say that I am surprised at the storm that this has caused which only proves that the public and even intellectual elite of Egypt is still vehemently opposed to normalization with the Zionist entity (or entitity, as `Abdus-Salam Turayki, former Libyan foreign minister, used to pronounce it). I cite Aly's message with his permission: " hope you shed some light on the ironic case of Hala Mostafa, editor-in-chief of the democracy magazine in Egypt who has recently met the Zionist Ambassador in her office. To put the story in context, Hala Mostafa is a member of the notorious "لجنة السياسات" in the NDP, but during the Bush middle east democracy days (الله لا يرجعها), she was vocal about democracy in Egypt and resigned from the NDP. When the Greater Middle East went to the back burner, she made amends and went back to the NDP again, as all reformers do. The reaction to her meeting with the Zionist Ambassador was fierce from the public, but also from the Journalist Syndicate, which bans any normalization attempts. Here is when things become hilarious (or very sad). Almasry Alyoum started an implicit campaign defending Hala Mostafa, as seen in this interview with Magdy Elgalad,, editor-in-chief. Almasry Alyoum is owned by Salah Diab, who also owns Pico Agriculture, and has been a pioneer of collaborating with Zionists. To keep part of its populist appeal, that has never been discussed in on Almasry Alyoum's "independent", "fair and balanced" pages. In the interview, Hala Mostafa argues that others have had similar visits
(the oldest argument for doing morally-despicable actions: everyone is doing it), and does not even have the intellectual integrity to publicly declare that she is pro-normalization (and pro-Zionism, because Egypt comes first). Hala Mostafa then says that her actions are under "مظلة القيادة السياسية" and that Gamal Mubarak supports, thereby asserting that Egyptian liberals are the most reactionary, pro-feudalism, pro-Zionism breed that has ever roamed the sad halls of Egyptian politics. The importance of this case is that it is a major public event for the pro-normalization camp in Egypt, and I believe they hope to break the normalization stigma, once and for all."