Previous demonstrations have led to violence, and these are intended to be the biggest since the January 25 revolution which overthrew President Hosni Mubarak. Three people, including an American student who stopped to take photographs of protests in Alexandria, were killed on Friday alone.
The American, Andrew Pochter, 21, was working in the city over the summer as part of a volunteer scheme.
“As we understand it, he was witnessing the protest as a bystander and was stabbed by a protester,” his family said in a statement on Saturday from their home in Ohio.
Read it all and please join us in praying for Egypt.
Update: There is more from Reuters there.
Our Ambassador in Egypt also spoke publicly, recommending people not to turn out for the protests. I have been following the Twitter feeds and have seen several signs negative to Obama and Amb. Patterson. “Obama supports terrorism!” is the line.
So far there has been less violence than feared, especially since estimates are that 17 million people or more were in the streets across Egypt today.
At least Egypt will be able to make good use of the tanks and Jets we gave them…