Egypt resettles Bedouin tourist camps in Sinai

Reuters report: (Click here for full article on Infoseek)

Egypt is uprooting and moving Bedouin tourist camps in Sinai in a campaign which highlights conflicting ideas about state and nomadic land rights... The plan is to move them from land that Rady said the Bedouin were using, but did not officially own, to designated areas with folklore in museums and handicrafts in shops. ...

Bedouin say resettling them destroys rather than preserves the authenticity of their nomadic culture and is at odds with their concept of land rights based on custom and ancestry. "How can you preserve a culture when it was educating people in its own element, and put it in a 'zoo' created by Egyptians?'' said Julie Purcell, an American who lives in Sinai and witnessed the destruction of a tourist camp owned by a Bedouin named Amsalam Farrag... Last week, bulldozers and soldiers razed bamboo huts and a tile and cement restaurant in Farrag's Bedouin Dream camp north of the Sinai town of Nuweiba on the Gulf of Aqaba.

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