Police destroy Alexandria street book market

Alexandria security services removed book kiosks from Al-Nabi Daniel Street in the early hours of Friday morning on orders from the newly-appointed governor, Mohamed Atta Abbas.

The street was in chaos as piles of books and destroyed kiosks accumulated.

The destruction was met with anger on social networking sites, as activists expressed their rejection of the campaign and called for demonstrations after Friday prayers.

Al-Nabi Daniel Street is an important cultural heritage site in Alexandria.

A number of writers and journalists denounced the demolition of the book market.

Columnist Bilal Fadl said on Twitter: “I call on the Alexandrian community to restore Al-Nabi Daniel’s kiosks, protect sellers and not destroy the heritage of Alexandria for a governor suffering from intellectual difficulties and flawed priorities.”

He went on to ask if the governor of Alexandria and his men would dare to remove “all the floors built against the law in buildings that belong to the rich in Alexandria instead of assaulting the kiosks of the poor?”

“All the people of Alexandria complain of the spread of thugs and poor services and building violations, but I have never heard a resident saying that the Al-Nabi Daniel book kiosks should be destroyed,” Fadl wrote.

He accused the officials of forcing the sellers into criminal activity by destroying their source of income.

Writer Fatma Naaot also criticized the campaign, saying that Al-Nabi Daniel Street is a very important cultural site in Egypt.

Naaot wrote on her Twitter account: “Oh my God! Every day we destroy part of Egypt?! Do our children not have the right to receive Egypt as we've received it from our ancestors, if not more beautiful? Stop the massacre of Alexandria libraries!”