Al-Masry Al-Youm

History and profile

The newspaper was founded in late 2002 by Salah Diab, an Egyptian businessman whose grandfather (Tawfik Diab) was one of Egypt's most renowned publishers in the 1930s and 1940s. Hisham Kassem is also a founder of Al Masry Al Youm. and on 7 June 2004, it published its first edition. The publisher of the daily is Al-Masry Al-Youm for Journalism and Publication.{{cite web|title=The Coverage of Egypt's Revolution in the Egyptian, American and Israeli Newspapers

Magdi El Galad is one of the former editors-in-chief of the paper.{{cite news

The paper has a liberal leaning.{{cite web|author=Jonathan Brown|title=Salafis and Sufis in Egypt

It has successfully responded to the Egyptian media market as a whole and not a single political party, like many Egyptian opposition papers, and was unafraid to take on hard-hitting topics, like governmental news outlets. Further, it harnessed the energy of young journalists, giving them incentives to produce good work.

In 2012, the paper's online version was the 26th most-visited website in Egypt based on the Alexa data. The same year the paper sold 250,000 copies.

2011 Gaza Aid Flotilla Initiative

Main article: Freedom Flotilla II

In July, 2011, Al Masry Al Youm publicized its initiative to host the Freedom Flotilla II in Egypt and to have the flotilla's ships sail for Gaza from an Egyptian port. The flotilla's ships were stalled in Greece after Greek authorities refused to let them sail. The paper reported that flotilla activists welcomed the paper's initiative to sail from Egypt.{{cite news|url=http://www.almasryalyoum.com/node/474735|title=نشطاء "أسطول الحرية 2" يرحبون بمبادرة "المصرى اليوم" للإبحار من مصر المصري اليوم، أخبار اليوم من مصر|newspaper=Al Masry Al Youm|date=28 May 2010 |access-date=26 December 2012}} The French ship Dignité Al Karama was the only ship in the flotilla that managed to approach Gaza. It turned towards Gaza after publicly announcing that its destination was the port of Alexandria, before being intercepted by Israeli commandos and escorted to the Israeli port of Ashdod. Al Masry Al Youm reported at the time that a source among the flotilla's activists said to the paper that "the ship will reach the port of Alexandria to refuel, in response to the invitation of Al Masry Al Youm, and after that it will proceed to one of the Mediterranean ports, and from there directly to Gaza, challenging all of the threats that Israel has issued."

Accusations of self-censorship

On 1 December 2011, the chief editor of Al-Masry Al-Youm objected to and ultimately censored a print issue of Egypt Independent, Al-Masry's weekly English-language newspaper supplement that was launched in November 2011. The second issue of Egypt Independent was to carry an opinion piece by Robert Springborg, a political scientist and expert on Egyptian civil-military relations, that was critical of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces that had ruled Egypt since the February, 2011 departure of former president Husni Mubarak. Springborg and the Egypt Independent staff collaborated to alter the offending sections in the opinion piece, however the second issue of the supplement was nevertheless prevented from being published. Professor Springborg was himself accused of being a "conspirator against Egypt’s stability" on 7 December 2011 Arabic-language edition of Al-Masry al-Youm. The self-censorship episode prompted the staff of Egypt Independent to write that "even after 25 January, self-censorship still plagues Egyptian media. As an Egyptian newspaper, we, too, suffer from it. But if self-censorship becomes internalized and goes unquestioned, it becomes an irreversible practice. We refuse to let this happen."

''Egypt Independent'' closure

Egypt Independent was closed by the parent company in April 2013. Its final print issue which was due to be published on 25 April was withheld by the owners. It was eventually made available in an online digital edition.

In June 2013, former journalists of Egypt Independent founded an online newspaper entitled Mada Masr.

Editors

• Magdi Mehanna (2004)
• Anwar El Hawari (2004–2005)
• Magdi El Galad (2005–2012)
• Mohamad Samir (2012)
• Yasser Rizk (2012–2013)
• Mohamed Salmawy (2014)
• Ali Al Sayyed (2014–2015)
• Mahmoud Musallam (2015–2016)
• Mohamed El Sayed Saleh (2017–present)

References

References

1. Abdel Fattah, Alaa. (25 April 2013). "Championing The Cause of Narrative: An Obituary for A Newspaper that cannot Be Allowed to Live". Tahrir Squared.
2. "About Al-Masry Al-Yaum". Al-Masry Al-Yaum.
3. link
4. (27 March 2009). "Newcomer on Egyptian newspaper market making headlines". Arab Press Network.
5. Yasmin Moll. (16 March 2005). "How liberal are the nations two new liberal daily newspapers? And what does an Egyptian liberal believe in, anyway?". Egypt Today.
6. Sami Kamal Al Din. (2005). "600 publications in Egypt and not enough readers". Al Ahrām al 'Arabī.
7. (2014). "Media Situation in Egypt: Twelfth report for the period May and June 2014". Al Sawt Al Hurr.
8. "Time for an independent conversation". Egypt Independent.
9. [http://arabwestreport.info/node/19796 2008, week 19, art. 2] Arab-West Report
10. Omar Halawa. (28 September 2012). "Indebted and overstaffed, how can state-owned papers survive?". Egypt Independent.
11. Caryle Murphy. (18 December 2012). "The Future of Print". The Majalla.
12. (17 July 2011). "أسطول "الحرية 2" يبدأ تنفيذ مبادرة "المصرى اليوم" ويصل الإسكندرية "خلال يومين" المصري اليوم، أخبار اليوم من مصر". Al Masry Al Youm.
13. (25 April 2013). "Egypt Independent 2009-2013". Al Masry Al Youm.
14. (30 April 2013). "In the Egypt Independent's closure, an end of a beginning". Columbia Journalism Review.
15. (30 June 2013). "And we're back ...". Mada Masr.