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Bin Laden And The Hookah

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By WADE STEPHENS III Special to the Tribune

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 19, 2008

ISLAMIC CAIRO - Ambivalence and rhetoric mix then drift here like the peach-tinted smoke from the hookah at our table. The words that rise from Abdel are like the smoke; the 30-year-old man is from the United Arab Emirates, and came to Egypt to study and be with his remaining family. He is drinking coffee in an alley cafe steps from the Mosque of Sayyidna al-Hussein, grandson of the Prophet Mohammed, thus so sacred that non-Muslims are not admitted, except when they are admitted through the side door for women, accompanied by someone with the guide skills of Abdel, shoes folded sole-to-sole under an elbow, head covered with a pashmina. Americans are welcomed at all other mosques as long as they abide by certain traditions in this nasty, noisy, niggardly and noisome city of 15 million.

At one mosque, the student is off looking at religious rock paintings while the old man sits on a bench watching hundreds in prayer. Absently, he crosses his legs for a while. Far across the interior that has one side fully open to an acre-size courtyard a cleric spots the crossed legs, stops, raises a hand and wags an index finger at the man on the bench. "What?" thinks the America. The cleric, seeing the confused face, points to the floor, The old man looks at others on the benches and sees that all of them have both feet on the carpet. Oh! he thinks and does just that. The cleric smiles, nods his head and bows slightly at the waist. Third-world communication with first class manners.

"The Koran says that an enemy in your home should be protected and bin Laden does not honor this." Abdel said. "Jihad should come from the heart because it is stronger than guns."

The Islamic quarter of Cairo is a rectangular slice of vivid chaos in the southeast of the city. Founded in 641 A.D. by invading Muslims, to be in this oasis of Islam is to feel welcomed, calm, safe and respected. It is spectacular in its beauty and hospitable in its manner.

"Osama bin Laden has a valid point about Western hegemony. Does the U.S. get to serve exclusively its interests without consequence because it is a dominant world power?" he asks. "Arabs love Americans but just do not like their government because it believes it can do whatever it likes to do."

It is easy to move about guided by Abdel. The sights are of children twirling and swinging and kicking soccer balls as the 5:15 p.m. prayer starts at the al-Hussein Mosque. The smells are of the spices from the stalls at the Khan al-Khalili market. The sounds are of muttered prayers by men on grand carpets and small pieces of worn woolen rug, and the prayers blasted by loud speakers so that when you walk through three-foot alleys with speakers hanging from arches and boarded abandoned windows you are surrounded by sound you've heard and that you're coming to.

Abdel will take the college student up the spiral steps in the dark interior of the minarets of the Mosque of al-Azhar. He is doing this so they can see and hear Islamic Cairo as he explains the cadence of the prayers as they come from a speaker just across from the circular walkway at the top of the slender minaret. The broadcast prayers are a song, a striking coincidence that the sun sets as a crescent moon rises from the east above the four-story roofs of apartments, shops, houses, businesses, schools and markets built in a maze of antiquity. The old man has acrophobia; he sees most of this because he has stopped and waited below to peep through a slit in the 1,100-year-old rock wall of the tower.

Now, the words at the cafe become harsher to a Western ear. The rich people - the Jewish people - who control the world from behind a curtain are responsible for most of the suicide bombings, Abdel asserts. "They wish certain things to happen, and they use the religious beliefs of others to make these violent things happen.

"If you are poor ... and are offered money and prosperity for your family in exchange for what you think will bring you to Paradise, it is a good choice for you. You will do what these jihadists ask, but it is manipulating."

"Do Arabs respect any American leaders?" the college student asks, wondering if she should drink from the nearby water fountain. Abdel notices this, and briskly orders bottled water, which he pays for.

"The people of Egypt have an enormous respect for Jimmy Carter," Abdel said of the president who crafted the 1979 Camp David Accords with Israeli politicians and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. It leads to a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt; and the Islamic Brotherhood assassinates Sadat "... because they have a closed mind about what Islam is for."

The Egyptian president is Hosni Mubarak. "He has survived to age 79," Abdel said, "because he says 'yes' to the people around him. They are these powerful people who tell him what to do. Sadat wouldn't listen to their demands and that is why he was killed."

Two weeks after Abdel uttered those words the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip had all food, medicine and fuel supplies shut off by Israeli roadblocks. More Hamas rockets had killed more Israelis. Palestinians exploded a powerful bomb at the base of a metal wall that is the Egyptian border in this upper part of the Sinai Peninsula. Palestinians flooded into Egypt clamoring for food, water and supplies necessary for daily life. Mubarak welcomed them as his "Islamic brothers," sent troops to assist, and then commanded the same troops to push the Palestinians back into Gaza.

Exodus 34 blows a reeling message from the cloud on Mount Sinai. "Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you."

From every point of the compass the African wind carried the whooshing sound of conflicts and shouts. It was not a sound of resolution and calm. That was as fleeting as the pink smoke from a hookah.

- Wade Stephens III is a former editorial writer with The Tampa Tribune.

For more photos from the Stephens' odyssey through Africa, go to TBO.com and click on "Opinion" on the drop-down menu under the News header in the navigation bar.

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