The Oscar nominated documentary “The Square” chronicles the Egyptian protests that began in 2011 in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. In the span of three years, the repeated uprisings would lead to President Hosni Mubarak stepping down, the Muslim Brotherhood taking power and then being deposed, all under the authority of the Egyptian military.
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In one scene, in the midst of mass demonstrations against the military regime in the fall of 2011, a female protester says to another woman, “They’re gassing the hospital and people are dying. Even the doctors are dying. The patients have to be moved or they will die.”
“I was shaking and suffocating. Everyone was,” said the woman, adding, “I think its nerve gas. You collapse and convulse.”
In a follow-up scene, a woman holds up a silver canister, saying “These are being thrown at us. This is what is making us fall to the ground.”
Another person inspects the canister closely finding a “Made in USA” label.
“America?” she exclaims. “A gift,” a man chimes in.
In November 2011, The Huffington Post reported:
CAIRO — At the foot of Mohamed Mahmoud Street, just a few feet from the resounding crowds in Tahrir Square, a group of people gathered around a man holding four canisters above his head.
“Tear gas! Rubber bullets! Nerve gas!” he cried out, displaying the spent metal canisters.
“Where are they from, America?” people asked, already knowing the answer.
“Yes, America,” the man replied furiously. The crowd murmured with unsurprised disdain. Like many gas canisters in Tahrir, one of his was marked with blue letters that read “Made in USA” and bore the name of the company that produced it: Combined Tactical Systems, in Jamestown, PA.
For the Egyptian protesters, HuffPo added, “this added indignation of an American connection—on the street, protesters insist it is more like collusion…”
“You know where this is from,” another man, standing next to a field clinic across the street, said with a glare Wednesday, as he held up a thick metal canister shaped like a short bottle of spray paint.
“This is from America. America sent it to bomb Egypt.”
In a speech in November at The Citadel, South Carolina’s military college, Senator Rand Paul (R-Kent.) told the audience, “In a highly unstable situation, our government continued to send F-16s, Abrams tanks and American-made tear gas. My guess is that the protestors on the receiving end of tear gas made in Pennsylvania don’t harbor warm and fuzzy feelings for America.”
In 2011, Paul called for ending foreign aid to Egypt and other countries, particularly those with unstable governments. In August 2013, the Kentucky senator condemned President Obama for continuing to send aid to Egypt’s military regime.
By October 2013, the Obama administration would finally suspend its $1.5 billion in annual foreign aid to Egypt, including weapons.
The omnibus budget passed in January allows the president to resume giving Egypt aid.
The Square is nominated for the Academy Award for best documentary feature.
