Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Pyramids Have No Date With the Wrecking Ball


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/world/middleeast/in-egypt-rumor-of-pyramids-demise-proves-flimsy.html

New York Times
24 July 2012


By ROD NORDLAND and MAYY EL SHEIKH

CAIRO - What's this? Egypt's new Islamist leaders want to raze the Great Pyramids, scratch away the images on the death masks of the pharaohs, maybe even wipe the grin off what is left of the face of the Sphinx?

Someone who reads a lot of right-wing blogs in the United States these days might be forgiven for thinking so, though there is no sign here that any such Islamist clamor to destroy the monuments of ancient Egypt has actually arisen.

The fear that it has, though, is a textbook example of how a rumor, especially about a place as tumultuous as Egypt these days, can take on a life of its own - fed by a kernel of fact, a dash of Twitter, and a convenient coincidence or two. [...]