Second Blast Hits Cairo

[cal04]

A second bomb is reported to have hit the Egyptian capital of Cairo killing two people, according to police sources. At least one person was killed in a blast just two hours earlier near a museum popular with tourists in the capital.
Police said the latest explosion was in a working class area of the city.

Security sources said the first blast was by a suicide attacker and near the popular tourist destination the Egyptian Museum in the capital, Cairo. Other witnesses, though, said the bomb had been thrown from a nearby bridge and that an Arab man was killed. The site is also near two hotels used by visitors and sits on a busy square.

Two Israelis, an Italian and one Russian are believed to have been among the seven injured. Scores of heavily-armed police cordoned off the explosion area and kept onlookers at bay.

Earlier this month, a man killed himself and three tourists when the bomb he was carrying exploded among a group of tourists in a Cairo bazaar.

http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1180251,00.html

[allemand]

1. Two gunmen fire at tourist bus in south Cairo(Reuters)

17:24 Two gunmen fire at tourist bus in south Cairo(Reuters)
17:21 Casualties reported in second explosion in Cairo`s old city (AP)
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/ShTickers.html

Last update - 17:38 30/04/2005

One dead, seven tourists, including 2 Israelis, hurt in Cairo bombing
By News Agencies

Seven foreigners -- two Israelis, a Russian and an Italian woman -- were injured when a bomb was thrown from a bridge to the street below not far from a 5-star hotel and the Egyptian Museum in central Cairo. One man of Arab descent was killed in the attack.

Less than two hours later, police reported another explosion, this time in the Sayeda Aisha area of old Cairo, an area rich with historic mosques and cemeteries.

Senior police officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they had initial reports coming from the later explosion that two female suicide bombers had tried to blow themselves up at a bus stop near the Sayida Aisha mosque. Further details were not immediately available.

An Egyptian security director told Reuters that two veiled females armed with guns opened fire on a tourist bus near Cairo's old city.

More:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/570569.html

[DoYouEverWonder]

2. Not good

I hope there isn't more.

[tjdee]

3. But I thought George Bush made the world safer??

??

This isn't good. I mean, Cairo?
We're seriously going to have no historical things left if these people don't stop this nonsense.

Of course, we'll have no people either.


Great. /sarcasm

[Igel]

6. The Muslim Brotherhood, if that's what this is,

is a historical thing at this point.

And damned difficult to root out.

[bush_is_wacko]

4. How do they manage to keep the numbers of wounded and killed so LOW?

Crowded bazaars and tourists buses and museums? Seems to me the numbers should be higher. Insanity rules the world at the moment. Americans aren't paying attention to what is going on their own society because THIS is happening in everyone else's society. Whatever happened to shared human experience?

I know there a lot of atheist and agnostics here but I consider myself a believer and all of heaven must be crying on an hourly basis anymore.

Very sad, very sad!

[classof56]

8. I'm reminded of the Eric Clapton song, "Tears in Heaven"

I, too, am a believer, and if God is the loving, compassionate, just being I think him to be, you are right--he and all of those in heaven must be crying incessantly. The sadness of all this is simply overwhelming and I can only wonder when it will stop. As long as Bush and crowd are in charge, I'm guessing no time soon. Sad indeed!

Tired Old Cynic

[bush_is_wacko]

9. Heavens theme song at the moment! n/t

[chookie]

5. In dying, they protect Americans

George said, at the press conference this week, in response to a question about terrorist events being WAY up this year, that it is a good thing that terrorists are being engaged overseas, and not in the USA, keeping Americans safe.

Unfuckingbelievable.

[bush_is_wacko]

11. Yeah, what a humble set of values that is, huh?

It isn't Americans so it's JUST fine with HIS God! My God disagrees with that assessment!

[lonestarnot]

13. So does mine.

[allemand]

7. Two Women Open Fire on Cairo Tourist Bus

CAIRO (Reuters) - Two veiled women opened fire on a tourist bus in southern Cairo on Saturday but missed, Cairo Security Director Nabil el-Azabi said.

Security officers at the scene said one of the attackers then shot dead the other, before shooting and wounding herself.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050430/ts_nm/egypt_shooting_dc_1

CAIRO, April 30 (Reuters) - Two veiled women opened fire on a tourist bus in southern Cairo on Saturday but missed, Cairo Security Director Nabil el-Azabi said.
Security officers at the scene said one of the attackers then shot dead the other, before shooting and wounding herself.

Azabi said one of the women could have been the wife of a man on the run and wanted in connection with an April 7 attack on tourists in Cairo.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L30138943.htm

[soleft]

10. My son's school was thinking of a class trip to Egypt

And this is the week they would have gone. By the science teacher decided, quite wisely i think, that the state of things in Bush World made it too risky. And it appears she was right. If there had been a trip I would not have let my son go, how freaking sad is that.

[bush_is_wacko]

12. I had to deny my daughter a chance to travel abroad too.

Paris for Spring Break just didn't sit well with me this year. You never know where they are going to show up next and I just couldn't deal with the "possibilities." It is a sad state of affairs when something so "once in a lifetime-ish" has to be considered dangerous enough to forgo!

[cire4]

16. Personally, I think you should have let her gone...

Cairo is one thing, but Paris is completely different. It's one of the safest big cities in the world. Much much safer than NY, San Francisco, or any other major American city. You can walk through the middle of the city at 2 AM and feel completely comfortable and at ease.

And I wouldn't worry about terrorism either. While there are extremists in every country, I think the the French government is more competent and likely to do a better job at keeping its citizens safe than the American or Egyptian governments.

IMHO, Terrorism should never be an excuse not to travel abroad except in cases where the country in question is plagued by regular terrorist or violent activity (i.e. Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel, Somalia, Sudan, parts of Columbia etc.)

Anyway, that's just my personal opinion....

[bush_is_wacko]

20. I really wasn't worried about Paris in general. More the FLIGHT to Paris

I agree Paris is fairly safe. Really though, no place is safe, evne my own backyard. She still has time to do this, but I think the world needs to settle down a little first.

[Menshevik]

14. whoa

I was just there, at that exact location a week and a half ago

[onager]

15. I was there in January and may be going back...

It's hard to believe they bombed the Egyptian Museum. It's certainly a tourist magnet, but also an object of pride for Egyptians. Sort of like bombing the Giza pyramids or Saqqura...which they'll probably do next.

This is strictly my opinion, but there seems to be a swing to religious fundamentalism in the educated Egyptian upper classes.

Or not. I'm basing that on a couple of conversations with Egyptian men. They tried to convince me that women dressing in the traditional Muslim garb...with only the eyes showing...was the idea of the women.

"Aw shucks, no, us men aren't telling them to do that. They WANT to be covered head-to-foot in 110-degree weather."

I conducted my own unscientifc survey after hearing this BS. In our hotel, I asked the Egyptian women working there if they wanted to go back to a more Fundamentalist society.

The response was unanimous. Some version of: Over my dead body.

Unfortunately, that's exactly what will happen if fundamentalism gets in the saddle.

[DearAbby]

17. >

Just speechless, it is all too horible. :cry:

[norml]

18. Women open fire on tour bus in Cairo after suspected militant dies

Women open fire on tour bus in Cairo after suspected militant dies in blast
03:21 PM EDT Apr 30





Egyptian policemen check a body of one of the victims at the site where a bomb was thrown from a bridge to the street below not far from a 5-star hotel and the Egyptian Museum, killing an Arab man and injuring four foreigners, Saturday. (AP/Nasser Nouri)
PAUL GARWOOD



CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - Two veiled women opened fire on a tour bus in a historic part of the Egyptian capital Saturday and one of them was killed in a gunbattle with security guards, authorities said.

Hours earlier, a suspect in an April 7 bomb attack died in a police chase when an explosive he was carrying blew up as he jumped off a bridge.

Seven people, including four foreigners, were injured in the explosion, which occurred by a bus station near an exclusive hotel frequented by foreigners and behind the downtown Egyptian Museum.

The Interior Ministry said Ehab Yousri Yassin, an Egyptian suspected in the April 7 bombing at a tourist bazaar, was killed after he jumped from the bridge during a pursuit, setting off the device he was carrying.



snip



http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/050430/w043042.html

[AgadorSparticus]

19. I was never a believer in recreational drug use. But the craziness

has gotten so out of hand, I am beginning to see the wisdom for mass marijauna use. I've never seen a violent stoner, have you? If we could bottle pot in a bottle, I'd be for adding it to the water.

(I'm halfway joking, of course. But it sure is sounding more attractive...)

[derby378]

21. Two Veiled Women Shoot Cairo Tour Bus

Two veiled women shot at a tour bus, and a man the brother of one shooter and the fiance of the second blew himself up as he leapt off a bridge during a police chase Saturday. All three attackers died and seven people, four of them foreigners, were wounded in an apparent revival of violence against Egypt's vital tourism industry.

The attacks occurred within two hours and at locations just 2 1/2 miles distant.

Those wounded by the explosion in the center of Cairo included an Israeli couple, a Swedish man and an Italian woman, along with three Egyptians. Two Egyptians were wounded in the shooting, which targeted a bus headed toward one of Cairo's most prominent historic Islamic sites.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=717772

[KlatooBNikto]

22. Here begins the end of another U.S. stooge, Mubarak.

[Lefta Dissenter]

23. I'm being totally selfish here,

but all I can think of is my son, who is enrolled in school in Cairo beginning this August, for 9 months. :(