Testing Time For Egypt's Media

With pro-Muslim Brotherhood media outlets now forcibly silenced, the Egyptian media landscape looks distinctly lopsided.

Pressured by a popular uprising and deserted by the army, President Mohamed Morsi’s downfall on July 3 was announced in live broadcasts via the state-run Maspero media network, the mouthpiece of various political masters for decades. Many of the private media outlets that celebrated Morsi’s ouster were once as critical of the army as they were of the elected president that Egypt’s generals have now ejected. And with pro-Muslim Brotherhood outlets now forcibly silenced, Egypt’s media landscape looks distinctly lopsided, albeit in lockstep with the country’s military-backed interim regime. Another outlet that faced the pressure from Tahrir Square protests was Al Jazeera Mubasher Misr. Once praised for echoing the aspirations of the Arab Spring, its offices were raided immediately following Morsi’s ouster. Twenty-three of its journalists have resigned in response to the network’s perceived pro-Brotherhood bias.