Ugly Stuff. Pass It On...

This just came up in John's Twitter feed...

I hate it.
She's one of the good ones.
Second generation reformer.
Poster child for democratic reform.
Here's a tweet she set in motion several hours ago.

Her twitter feed is like a sparkling string of lights.
This should not be happening.

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Update:

I posted this as I went to bed a few hours ago. When I woke up a larger picture became clear.
This narrative at FDL covers what happened.

THEY JUST CAME! They took my dad, my dads blood is still on the stairs! They hit my dad so much! They beat him and he cudnt breath

they broke the doors, all wearing masks. They took my father and husband and brother in law. they beat up my other brother in law mohammed almaskati, and then threw him in a room and told him not to come out
we knew they were coming, they had gone to my fathers apartment first and taken my cousin who lives in the same building
we all changed and my father told us to stay calm when they come, he told us not to interfere if they take him so they dont hurt us
we heard door of the building being broken, then the door of the apartment.
my father went straight to the door, they started shouting
the one shouting didnt speak arabic, he kept telling my father to get on the floor, my father didn�t get a chance to say anything
they held my father from his neck & started dragging him down the steps.
they lay him on the floor between the steps & started beating him

He was covering his face while more than 5 men were beating him at the same time, I heard him say he cant breath
I ran after them & told them to stop beating him, I tried to get to my father.
they held me &a kept shouting at me to shutup
I said �he will go with you, you dont need to beat him�
that when I saw my husband & brothers in law being dragged down I started shouting �God will show you on Judgement day�

I kept shouting �intooon 7a66ab jahanam� One of them grabbed me form my shirt and started dragging me up the stairs, my mum was begging him to let me go another was shouting, if she doesnt shutup bring her down too.
they pushed me, my mum & sisters in a room, n they shouted at us.
one of them closed the door and then opened it real quick in my face. then they locked the doors on us, and took the men to the lower apartment, lay them on the ground and started beating them
they kept referring to my father as �the target� and my husband �the son in law of the target�
my brother in law Mohd Almasqati who they left here saw that my father was unconscious. When they unlocked the door, I ran down & saw drops of blood on stairs.
My fathers blood, my brave heroic fathers blood

I knelt on the stairs and kissed the spot where I saw them beat him as he said he cudnt breath.
I am sitting in the mess, the door is broken and we cant close it.
My youngest sister is trying to clean and weeping. I will go sit with my mum, she keeps saying be prepared for the worse.

If any1 can do anything for my dad, husband & brother in law, plz do Alkhalifa, YOU CANT BREAK US, U CANT BREAK US. WE WILL ALWAYS STAND STRONG AGAINST YOU

My father is Human Rights activist Abdulhadi Alkhawaja, my husband is Wafi Almajed, and my brother in law is Hussain Ahmed Hussain.

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And as those events were unfolding in Bahrain,an overnight assault in Egypt on protesters in Tahrir Square by the army reads like a recapitulation of the Mubarak-era crackdowns. A rash of tweets from a variety of sources describe what happened, which also became a story in the NY Times.

Soldiers beat hundreds of protesters with clubs and fired into the air in a pre-dawn raid that wounded 15 people on Saturday to disperse an overnight demonstration in Cairo's central Tahrir Square. The clashes were the latest sign of tension between Egypt's ruling military and protesters.

The troops eventually withdrew, however, enabling demonstrators to reoccupy the square and block the streets leading into it. Armed with sticks and other makeshift weapons, they vowed not to leave until the defense minister, the titular head of state, has resigned.

A force of around 300 soldiers swept into the square around 3 a.m. and waded into a tent camp in the center where protesters had formed a human cordon to protect several army officers who had joined their demonstration in defiance of their superiors.

The troops dragged an unknown number of protesters away, throwing them into police trucks, eyewitnesses said.

More at the link.
See, too, the Sandmonkey account which includes two videos.

This tweet from him underscores the seriousness of what is happening.

And please ignore my neutral tone in the tweet into implying that this was
a regular attack. The attack was brutal. Many injured & arrested!

Although there is no official connection, it's hard not the think these events in Cairo and Bahrain are unrelated.
If nothing more, US policies overlooking KSA intervention (that's what it is) in Bahrain might well be interpreted by some segments of the Egyptian military command as permission to proceed with a "law-and-order" gesture aimed at whipping into line some of their officers participating in the Tahrir overnight protests.