It is now the opportunity for all media outlets over the next few days to chew over the debate between Egyptian authorities and the Palestinian Army of Islam, from accusations of being responsible for the bombing of the Two Saints Church to denial of these accusations. Indeed, talk of the Coptic issue and of the anger of the Copts is now behind us: it has done its job and we now need to look for a new topic for the media to keep people busy with. Yet the question remains: what do we call the analyses that relied on fabricated and false information, which filled the pages of newspapers and the sets of every television show ever since the bombing of the Two Saints Church in Alexandria on the first night of the new year? Regardless of the details of the investigations, the results of which Egypt's Interior Minister Habib Al-Adly revealed yesterday in his speech at the celebration of Egypt's Police Day in the presence of President Hosni Mubarak. These results turned out to be the complete opposite of everything that had been said through the media in the words of security, well-informed or trusted sources over the past three weeks. Indeed, it is an established fact that a great deal of false information has been distributed among people, and that journalistic “fabrications”, television allegations and illogical analyses have been recklessly promoted, knowing that security officials and MPs have asked media outlets to put a stop to their “fabrications” and to give the investigating services a chance to do their job in peace and away from interference. In light of what was announced yesterday, the media has been making fools of people, sometimes deluding some of them into thinking that the crime was a result of the sectarian tension between Muslims and Copts, or that it had been the work of an Afghan who had landed in Egypt and entered from its airport or land borders, headed to Alexandria, planned it, carried it out, bombed the church and terrorized people! Yes, Egyptian newspapers published information (false of course) they ascribed to eyewitnesses (false of course) who claimed to have seen a person of Afghan features in the neighborhood of the church shortly before the bombing! They also weaved stories about the vendor of prayer beads and Qurans who used to sit in front of the mosque facing the church and disappeared after the bombing. There were numerous segments of television shows that included reports about the missing man and analyses of the art of disappearing after bombings, as well as answers (not questions) about the suicide-bombing carried out by this man, until it was revealed that the man in question had run away terrified by the explosion and that he had nothing to do with it! Newspapers and television shows will not fail to weave new stories and to “fabricate” further information, which will of course require analysis and commentary. And the same people will return with a discourse that is the opposite of what they had been saying before. And of course, the Egyptian authorities will not reveal all of the information they hold about the case until it is referred to a tribunal, and there too secrets will be kept that will be revealed through the prosecution before the tribunal's judges. And with a heavyweight name like the Palestinian Army of Islam, media outlets will do their best to deal with it, look into its history and dig out past operations it might have carried out as well as its relationship to other organizations. Certainly, this brings the opportunity to link the Hamas movement with this organization, despite the fact that specialists and seasoned observers realize the extent of the contradiction between the two. Thus, to human rights experts and specialists on the issues of the Cops and of sectarian strife will be added experts on terrorism and on Islamic and radical groups, so that they may say their piece in talks about the operations carried out by these organizations and how to confront them, as well as about terrorism and the ways to confront it, expose it and hunt down its members. And those same people will return to enlighten us, as they believe, on the methods employed by Egyptian security services to track down the perpetrators of the church bombing, even if when the time comes for tribunals, it appears that what they had talked about were mere “ramblings”, “dreams” or “delusions”, it will not be a problem, and there will always be something to talk about. What matters is for people to be kept busy with talk, which has become a profession regardless of the credibility of the person engaging in it. In times past, the governments of some countries would use the media to keep people distracted by fabricating problems or issues the media would then promote or weave stories around. Times have changed, and governments no longer need to use the media. Indeed, the profession has become rife with those who would use themselves, not to achieve any interests or in defense of a party, but in order for people to think that they know – while they themselves in reality do not know what mistakes they are making.
