An Egyptian news site appears to have altered a major headline on Tuesday, and critics are alleging that it did so in order to avoid angering the Egyptian government.
"Two Islands And A PHD For Salman, And Billions For Egypt," read the original headline of a story on the website Al Masry Al Youm, a major newspaper in Egypt. The story was about Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz’s visit to Egypt this week. During King Salman’s visit, he negotiated a trade-off with Egyptian leaders, where Saudi Arabia would be given two Egyptian islands in the Gulf of Aqaba in return for continued Saudi aid to Egypt. Egyptians have been fiercely critical of their government’s decision to give away the two islands, Tiran and Sanafir.
Al Masry Al Youm later changed its headline to: “$25B For Egypt Is The Harvest Of Salman’s Visit To Egypt,” according to screenshots that soon surfaced on Twitter, and to a report in the Egyptian news site nmisr.com.
“This is indecent, what type of journalism is this?” a Saudi columnist posted to Twitter, according to nmisr.com.
Others posted side-by-side screenshots of the two headlines.
Al Masry Al Youm did not immediately respond to Al Bawaba’s request for comment, but according to nmisr.com, the paper’s editor-in-chief said the allegations that the paper had changed its headline were inaccurate.
Egypt’s record on freedom of the press has not been good lately. Reporters in Egypt face “acute dangers including arbitrary arrest, indefinite detention without charge, prosecution and intimidation,” Amnesty International said in July. The Egyptian government has arrested and detained journalists in recent months.
-Hunter Stuart
