Sub-titles:
Dutch correspondent Hulsman: sorting out truth from exaggeration about Kosheh incidents
Dutch correspondent: "Relations between Muslims and Christians in Egypt are very good" [Hulsman: I stated ’are generally very good’].
Named Cornelis Hulsman, the Dutch journalist has been frequenting Egypt since 1976 when he was still a student. Over the past fifteen years, he has been working as a correspondent for a Dutch Christian newspaper.[Hulsman: incorrect. This is since 1994]
It was Hulsman who first went to Koshh village in the wake of the August, 1998 communal strife. His reports portraying the events have since then been the most trustworthy and sincere, as they have placed the events in their proper light without any exaggeration.
It was Hulsman, again, who blunted the purported persecution of Copts in Koshh, as falsely argued by some Western media. Only one week before the recent spate of violence in Koshh, Hulsman had reported on the situation in the village, pinpointing the trouble as being a social problem above all and urging that the truth be made fully known. He had also cited relations between Copts and Muslims as still being good, that some Western media have been inflating matters, and that fallacious reports have mostly been sent by reporters who do not live in Egypt.
The man’s (Hulsman’s) testimony is noteworthy for the following reasons:
Firstly, Hulsman, who has, since 1994, been a correspondent of a Dutch Christian newspaper, nurses a great deal of love for Egypt. He admits that he has fallen in love with Egypt since he first disembarked in Alexandria from a vessel which had carried him from Greece in 1976. He was then, he says further, a student at Leiden University in the Netherlands. He arrived in Egypt to conduct social research on developing farming as practiced by small peasants in the Delta governorate of Damietta. Dr. Ahmed Al-Guwaily, the former minister of supply, was even his professor at the time.[Hulsman: Dr. Ibrahim Soliman was my professor. Dr. Ahmed Al-Guweily was at that time the senior colleague of Dr. Soliman and supported my research].
In Alexandria, he came into contact with an Egyptian Copt by the name of Adel Suleiman, with whom he resided in the port city. When he went to Cairo, he got acquainted with a Muslim youth, identified as Medhat Isma’il, with whose family he lived in the western affluent Cairo suburb of Agouza.[ Hulsman: I met both young men on the boat from Athens to Alexandria. Already on the boat both invited me to stay with their families]
From then on, he has been deeply in love with Egypt and its people, into whom he married. [He married] an Orthodox Coptic lady who has given him four children, four sons [incorrect; this is three] and a daughter. Hulsman is an Orthodox [Christian] himself;
Secondly, it was he who first went to Koshh in the aftermath of the communal strife in August, 1998; his early account of the violent incidents showed the bare truth of the situation without either overestimating matters or concealing facts.
[Editor: What follows is an interview between Khaled Hamza of Akher Saa, and Drs. Cornelis Hulsman (the interviewee)]
Q: You have, since August 1998, submitted three reports on Kosheh so far, one of which had preceded the recent bout of violence by only one week. What did you say in those reports?
A: In my first report, dated September 3, 1998 [Hulsman: the correct date is September 30], I criticized two things: the first being the way the police had handled the situation, which I exposed as lacking proper discretion. The second having been the stance as assumed by some Christian and Muslim bodies whose accounts of the sectarian trouble were grossly exaggerated. Demanding, in my report, that such bodies should be sincere enough in reporting on the course of events, I sent the report to many Western media and to the Egyptian government’s State Information Service, whose chief Mr. Nabil Osman has been highly cooperative up to the moment, and to some other authorities within Egypt. [EOHR and others]
As for my second article, it was published in February 1999. It was in reaction to then-published exaggerated reports by the "Sunday Telegraph" of Britain on the course of events in Kosheh, as well as in response to reports carried by some Western and Egyptian media as well.
I said in the report, which also dealt with how the Egyptian government reacted to the incident, that some foreign media, not all of them, did not cite bare facts, but were rather emotional, even exaggerating and extremist on some occasions. I have noticed that it is the English-speaking media which have been striking this exaggerating and overestimating chord more than others, especially those published in, or broadcasting from the US or Britain. Newspapers have been more credible in France, Germany and the Netherlands.
I also said that Egypt’s government did not react adequately at the time, though this stance of government reluctance has never been deliberate [Hulsman: it is unfortunately typical for the government often to neglect sensitive Muslim-Christian issues instead of dealing with them] and that the government has not ever planned to inflict any harm whatsoever on Egyptian Christians. This statement of mine may, therefore, be provoking some angry sentiments.
My third report had been published only one week before the latest outbreak of violence at the village of Al-Koshh. It was compiled upon a request made by the US Council of Churches. The third report has obviously stated that foreign media [Hulsman: I spoke about my article about the Boston Globe. See RNSAW, 1999, week 52, art. 9] are willing to see information flowing out of Egypt about the Copts only in a particular light. I asserted that the full truth has to be laid open to the public when speaking of Copts in Egypt.
Q: Have you been monitoring the claims which Copts abroad have been spreading about the alleged persecution of Copts at Al-Koshh village after the last violent events?
A: I heard about what Copts abroad have been reporting on the Koshh incidents. I think they have been very emotionally reacting to what is going on in Egypt, but I do not think they are being manipulated for any evil purpose by anybody outside Egypt, though they are widely backed by the US media. [Hulsman: I said that I do not believe foreign Copts have evil intensions but that does not exclude the possibility that others could use their activities for their own purposes.]
Q: Have you been to Al-Koshh this time for first-hand knowledge of the events?
A: I have not been to Al-Koshh this time, but I met Bishop Morcos of Shubra Al-Kheima upon his immediate return from Al-Koshh, as he had been assigned by Pope Shenouda to get him first-hand knowledge about the situation there. Having come back from the two-day trip and having seen for himself the aftermath of the incidents there, Bishop Morcos told me that there has to be prompt action to resolve the problems of Al-Koshh. The bishop further urged that the entire situation has to be discussed against a background of an assigned role to each of education and media institutions, particularly television. Such institutions have to seek to enhance coherence between the two "elements of the nation" and to cultivate the value of coexistence as the case has always been throughout the years.
Q: Do you agree to what Bishop Morcos said?
A: Certainly... having thoroughly studied the history of Egypt, having for long time worked as a correspondent and having investigated a great deal of cases, I have come to acknowledge the general environment, particularly the social aspect, as having a major role to play.
Q: Do other correspondents have the same views as you about the Al-Koshh events?
A: Some correspondents exaggerate matters, with most fallaciously-reported stories about Copts in Egypt dispatched by foreign journalists who have been to Egypt only on specific, brief press missions and who have not lived long enough in Egypt. This was exactly the case with Christina Lamb, the correspondent of the "Sunday Telegraph", as well as with some US journalists. They have all failed to acknowledge the fact that Egypt accommodates divergent views and orientations. For any foreigner to handle Egyptians better, he has to fully recognize this fact in order to communicate with Egyptians in a better way.
Hulsman reaffirms that there have to be public figures to whom local people should turn for consultation in time of such crises [Hulsman: I spoke about the Dutch system of the ombudsman who assists people in finding their way to help solve problems or to obtain their rights]. Such public figures, he urges further, should be ones held in great esteem by the locals, be broadly empowered, flexible enough and capably consultant. I have seen for myself locals of the village stranded, at a loss for anyone to go to help them to put out the early burning signs of violence that are likely to spark off into a huge fire.
There is also a need, most candidly put, for conducting a just and genuine investigation about what happened in Al-Koshh and why it was repeated. As such, the investigation, has to be expanded to involve all parties which are known for not overestimating matters, regardless of any duration of time such an investigation will take. The important thing is to provide genuine solutions to the problems of Al-Koshh.
I said to Hulsman...
Q: "Having frequented, and resided in, Egypt throughout the past twenty-three years, how do testify to links between Copts and Muslims?"
Spontaneously he answered:
A: "In view of my deep interest in religious affairs and relations between Copts and Muslims, against a background of having compiled a great deal of reports for international media organizations and other bodies, and taking into account having a lot of Muslim neighbors whom I know very closely as I know Egyptian Copts, I hereby assert, most explicitly, I have many friends here in Egypt, Muslims and Christians. I can say that relations between the two elements [of the nation] are very good. [Hulsman: I have said these relations are generally very good. I explained that there are differences in relations between social classes and from area to area. Akher Saa has not mentioned this].
