Last week , a 22-year-old Dutch journalist was gang-raped in Tahrir Square and had to undergo surgery for severe injuries . The assault reminds us yet again of an often overlooked aspect of the Egyptian revolution . When Egyptians overthrew their dictator in 2011 , one of the first celebratory acts in Tahrir Square included the gang beating and sexual assault of American journalist Lara Logan , who , like the Dutch journalist , landed in the hospital . The Logan rape has always been portrayed as another unfortunate byproduct of mob violence . In fact , it was much more than that . It was a warning shot fired by men whose political beliefs are founded on a common pillar : Women must stay out of the public square . One of the hallmarks of revolutionary victory in Tahrir Square has always been rape and sexual harassment . Mobs of men routinely set upon women , isolating , stripping and groping . No one is ever arrested or held accountable , and elected officials shrug their shoulders and blame the victims . Vigilante groups have been organized to track the incidents . Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment , one of the groups , recorded 46 cases of sexual assaults and harassment against women on Sunday night alone -- and has added 17 more to its list that the group said happened Monday . Egyptian women are the primary victims of sexual violence , and ultimately they are the intended recipients of the message : Stay home , your input in government and politics is not wanted . Opinion : Why Egyptian protestors welcome the support of the army . Raping foreign journalists -- guaranteed to attract global attention -- is merely a more efficient way of getting that message across . When Egyptians overthrew the dictator , the Muslim Brotherhood took advantage of public hatred of the dictator to ally him with Western progressive ideals , including gender equality . Out went the nongovernmental organizations that worked to make divorce easier and inheritance laws fairer . In came the thugs who stripped and beat women in the streets . Granted , some of these crimes against women were committed by the military and the police themselves , as women like Mona Eltahawy ( a journalist whose arms were broken by soldiers ) and Samira Ibrahim ( a young protester who sued the government , accusing an army doctor of submitting her to a forced `` virginity test '' ) have reported . Dina Zakaria , an Egyptian journalist , reported that the men who raped the Dutch journalist last week called themselves `` revolutionists . '' That label should surprise no one . If one fervently believes women should stay inside their homes and out of the business of public life , what better way to accomplish that than rampant sexual harassment and sexual assault in a country in which women 's virginity and honor is the sine qua non of female participation in society ? Not long ago , Egyptian Salafist preacher Ahmad Mahmoud Abdullah said that women protesting in Tahrir Square `` have no shame and want to be raped . '' The public face of the Muslim Brotherhood would never espouse such a statement . But its founding intellectual lights never hid the fact that a pillar of their planned theocracy was keeping women powerless . And their record in office is one of sexist exclusion . Women held only eight seats out of 498 ( four of the eight women were from the Brotherhood party ) in the disbanded Parliament . Women made up 7 % of the constitutional assembly that drafted the Egyptian constitution . No wonder then that the document ( approved by referendum in December 2012 ) refers to women only as sisters and mothers , and only within the framework of family -- not employment or public life , even though a majority of Egyptian women work . Egypt has always been a place where life for women is nasty and brutish , if not short . Last year , a UNICEF survey showed 91 % of Egyptian women between the ages of 15-49 said they had to undergo female genital mutilation . The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality in May reported that 99.3 % of Egyptian women interviewed said they had been subjected to some form of sexual violence . Rape victims almost never go to the hospital and certainly not the police . There are no medical protocols for rape , and police treat female victims as prostitutes . Whether or not that violence is political is worthy of discussion . I believe it is . At the moment , no one even debates it . It is the elephant in the room . As the Egyptian revolution enters another chapter , and more women get stripped and sexually assaulted in the streets while being systematically excluded from the halls of power in Cairo , it is high time for American progressives and other Arab Spring commentators to stop separating anti-female violence from the politics of the Muslim Brotherhood 's revolutionaries . In the broadest sense , the West 's response to the treatment of women in post-Arab Spring countries , from Egypt to Syria , says a lot about the status of women here . We might not be able to do anything to stop violent , organized misogyny in far-off lands , but we can certainly stand up for our own principles and call it what it is .
Dutch ##man , 22 , was gang - raped in Tahrir Square and sent for surgery . Karen Burleigh : This is just one of scores of vicious rapes and beatings of female protesters . Egyptian women are primary victims , she says . The message is : Stay home . She says Muslim Brotherhood misogyny , attitude rapes are common , in society .