The Journalists Syndicate Council has opened an investigation into a verbal altercation that escalated into a physical confrontation at the syndicate’s headquarters between several members of Al-Bawaba News’ editorial board and journalist Ahmed Qandil.
The incident coincided with an investigation session with the newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Dalia Abdelrahim, syndicate council member Eman Ouf told Al Manassa.
Ouf said the syndicate council had received a memorandum about the incident and began investigation procedures, adding that the council “opened an investigation into the incident and will review the camera footage,” and that “everyone will get their due, and whoever is at fault will be held accountable.”
Both sides exchanged accusations of assault. According to Qandil’s account, the incident began when he went up to the fourth floor despite warnings from several Al-Bawaba News journalists staging a sit-in at the syndicate. “They told me there were people upstairs from the editorial board insulting me and that I shouldn’t go up so they wouldn’t attack me.”
Qandil had ruled out the possibility of such an incident taking place inside the Journalists Syndicate, but according to his account to Al Manassa, “As soon as I stepped out of the elevator, I found them in my face. I had barely said, ‘Peace be upon you’ before they started insulting my mother, then assaulted me.”
He added, “One of them grabbed a fire extinguisher and wanted to hit me with it, and another tried to restrain me,” saying he “documented and filmed the incident with eyewitnesses.”
Qandil linked the latest incident to a previous complaint he had filed with the Journalists Syndicate Council against Abdelrahim Ali, the owner of Al-Bawaba News, over “receiving the syndicate allowance without legal basis” before he was expelled from the syndicate.
He described the incident as “an attempt at intimidation and punishment,” adding that “it is not unlikely that it was orchestrated by Abdelrahim Ali and his daughter.”
Dalia Abdelrahim, however, told Al Manassa that she attended the investigation session in response to a syndicate decision issued after she filed a complaint with the Public Prosecution against a number of Al-Bawaba News journalists.
“As soon as I entered the syndicate lobby, I found the atmosphere extremely tense, and some of those staging the sit-in started directing inappropriate remarks at me. I ignored that and went up to the investigation,” she said.
She continued, “During the session, we heard obscene insults and a major fight. Even the syndicate’s legal adviser was disturbed. As soon as we opened the door, we found Ahmed Qandil and someone with him assaulting my colleagues, members of the editorial board, with blows and insults. My colleagues, of course, tried to defend themselves, and it turned into a brawl.”
Abdelrahim accused Qandil of “provoking” the editorial board members, noting that days earlier he had published a Facebook post “mocking the colleagues and provoking them, calling them Al-Bawaba puppets,” according to her.
She added that the editorial board members had submitted a memorandum to the syndicate over Qandil’s “transgressions” before the brawl took place, and later submitted another memorandum regarding the alleged assault. “He is not even a party to the crisis in the first place. Why would he fabricate a problem?” she said.
In November 2025 Al-Bawaba News journalists announced the start of an open-ended sit-in to demand the implementation of the minimum wage, which management rejected on the grounds that it could not afford it.
Management later dispersed the sit-in by force and sued a number of the protesting journalists, who subsequently obtained compensation and acquittals on charges of “insulting and defaming” Abdelrahim Ali and his daughter.
In the same context, the Journalists Syndicate referred Dalia Abdelrahim for investigation in a session held on June 3, 2026, during which she defended her position because she had “previously expressed solidarity with the demands of the protesting journalists.”
But, she told Al Manassa, “No internal regulation or syndicate law has the right to obstruct constitutional rights, including the right to report any assault a person is subjected to.”
