Using women as a way to hurt men....

CAIRO, June 9 - Government opponents say one way Egyptian authorities pursue suspects has been to pressure their female relatives. Over the years, if the police could not find a wanted man, for example, they sometimes took his wife or daughter into custody.

But the recent groping and beating of women as part of an attack on political protesters by a crowd of men chanting support for the ruling party, all while the police stood by and watched, has done anything but intimidate and silence, helping instead to unify and motivate a range of groups calling for more open and democratic government.

The images of women being hit and sexually abused - particularly offensive in this conservative Islamic society - have helped bring together groups as diverse as the Muslim Brotherhood and the Center for Socialist Studies in their calls for change. For a country whose political life has atrophied in more than two decades under emergency laws, the attacks on May 25 have also inspired many political novices to become active, creating a backlash that has taken the government by surprise.

The assaults have also jump-started the women's movement here, not a Western-style feminist force, but one where women have moved to take a leading role in trying to motivate and expand opposition to the ruling National Democratic Party and its leader, President Hosni Mubarak. The opposition groups are still small in number and national reach, but their very existence represents an unprecedented challenge for the president.

"We are opening a real popular female movement," said Jihan El Halafawy, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, speaking Thursday night at a forum called "The Street Is Ours," organized by some of the women who were attacked.

On May 25, the day voters were asked to approve a change to the Constitution to permit multiple candidates, a small group of protesters met in downtown Cairo, insisting that the referendum was a fig leaf.

They were greeted by an army of riot police officers and undercover security agents. Witnesses said that groups of men arrived in buses and were allowed, with the police standing by, to attack and beat the protesters. Witnesses said that in some instances the police kept protesters trapped and unable to flee while the men from the buses beat them.

While the violence against the protesters, women and men, made for national news here, it was the images and stories of women being attacked that have caused the greatest backlash against the government. The events were reported in the opposition and independent press but largely ignored by government-controlled newspapers and television.

"I feel like the assaults on women are a disgrace - a disgrace to every person in Egypt," said Ali Tayeb, 20, an engineering student in Cairo University. "I think we've been silent for too long now. The silent majority, which I am a part of because I was never politically active, has to start speaking out for their rights."

While I have a hard time believing those who follow the traditional practice of Islam really gives women more rights, addressing this issue is a very positive step forward. The practice of arresting or harming wives or children to get a man to surrender is not just an Egyptian issue, it is one that is still prevalent in to many countries. It needs to stop......