On Wed, May 21, 2008 at 11:28 PM, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote: I was thinking about donating some israeli works of literature to them. It would be interesting to see the Egyptian minister for culture to burn books from Sayed Kashua and others. Mathias

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 12:12 AM, Robert Stojnic <rainmansr(a)gmail.com> wrote: http://www.egynews.net/wps/portal/!ut/p/c0/04_SB8K8xLLM9MSSzPy8xBz9CP0os3hz… The article mentiones a parliamentary debate from May 10th in which the statement was made - apparently in response to some statement from the "Brotherhood".

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 12:32 AM, Pharos <pharosofalexandria(a)gmail.com> wrote: The original article can be found at http://www.asharqalawsat.com/details.asp?section=4&issueno=10765&ar… There is also a comment below the report on the situation.

On Wed, May 21, 2008 at 6:40 PM, Robert Stojnic <rainmansr(a)gmail.com> wrote: I don't read Arabic, but it appears the conversation went something like this (as he retells it): Brotherhood person: Egyptian libraries are full of Israeli books! Culture Minister: No they're not! Brotherhood person: Yes, they're full of them. Culture Minister: There isn't one Israeli book in an Egyptian library. If any are found, I'll burn them myself! Thanks, Pharos

On Wed, May 21, 2008 at 6:59 PM, Mathias Schindler <mathias.schindler(a)gmail.com> wrote: To be fair, again, I don't read Arabic, and this is just my best guess of the gist based on my reading comprehension of the google translation. He stresses that he was not actually proposing book-burning, but rather emphasizing that Israeli books are banned from the libraries. Also, he talks about restoring historic synagogues and the Cairo Geniza. I think they're also something about translating Egyptian books into Hebrew for the benefit of Arabs in Israel, but the translation isn't very good at that point. Thanks, Pharos

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 4:08 PM, Yaroslav M. Blanter <putevod(a)mccme.ru> wrote: Not sure if this link is stable: http://aleph518.huji.ac.il/F/VCHK7YPLRNI781PGD9IE3VLUYB8Y4AHRAILKJTVGJGTH16… The Jewish National and University Library has 11 records for books from him in hebrew (נגיב מחפוז), I did not check for doublicates. Mathias

Mathias Schindler wrote: It's also good to remember that Mahfouz was not universally admired in his own country. Ec

Mathias Schindler wrote: O'Casey, Steinbeck, Pasternak, Fo.... Looks like I'll be reading the Cairo Trilogy on the long flight to Wikimania. Ec

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 9:09 PM, dex2000 <sir48(a)lite.dk> wrote: Well... I wouldn't put it as strictly as that, but it is true that the literature discussion is slowly moving to off-topicness... While I believe that all of you have interesting things to say about John Coetzee and Elfriede Jelinek (both writers whom I recently read and thus I'm somewhat interested in this topic), we should maybe get back to the topic at hand - if anything more can be said about it, that is ;-) Michael -- Michael Bimmler mbimmler(a)gmail.com

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 11:51 AM, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote: I would *love* to talk about good Egyptian novels etc. to read beforehand... but maybe over on the Wikimania list? :) -- phoebe

Hello all, On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 1:59 AM, Mathias Schindler < mathias.schindler(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: Summing it up based upon on media sources that doesn't mention the whole thing and its follow-ups is really a bad thing to do (I don't think you can read Arabic from your words) Farouk Hosni is nominated to be the director of the UNESCO; the conference in the parliament was to give him support locally, while the news spreading around like this one is to what happened then according to your Arabic source and many other sources is largely what Pharos has interpreted "a member of the Muslim Brotherhood claimed that Israeli books is found in Egyptian libraries, Hosni replied with an overstatement (as he later said) that he would burn such books if existed, and that was not meant that he would actually burn Jewish books but it was just to confirm the non-existence of these books" no way the statement of him was meant to actually burn Jewish books in that general sense the media have been trying to impose on the issue. the guy is against cultural normalization until a just solution is done between the Palestinians and Israelis, that said doesn't mean that he will go for a search and destroy for Jewish literature or heritage, actually, quite the opposite is actually happening in Egypt. Jewish temples are being restored in Cairo and Alexandria under the supervision of the Culture Ministry. and he calls to translate books from Hebrew into Arabic as in Israel, Arabic books are being translated into Hebrew please don't over estimate such statements, we don't burn books nor people here in Egypt. Best regards, Mohamed Ibrahim [Mido] -- - Arabic Wikipedia: http://ar.wikipedia.org/ "Share your knowledge"

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 10:22 AM, Milos Rancic &lt;millosh(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: I think that it is not fair...

On Thu, May 22, 2008 at 11:54 AM, Mathias Schindler &lt;mathias.schindler(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: Internal political debate with fundamentalists which listens an audience with strong anti-X sentiment is a different thing than a real position of a politician. I think that this is an obvious fact, as well as it is not so hard to find much worst statements from German, US, Taiwanese or Argentinian politicians, not related to books, but to much more serious issues.