WThe 2013 Middle East cold snap, also referred to as Alexa, refers to the winter storm that hit the Middle East region in December 2013, affecting Israel, Turkey, Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, and Egypt. The storm caused mayhem to millions of poor and displaced people across the region, especially afflicting refugees from the Syrian conflict.
WThe Abu Musallam incident was an event where a large group 3000 people, including Salafist Muslims, killed a small group of Shias in their home in a suburb of Cairo on June 23 2013. Among the dead was sheikh Hassan Shehata who was a prominent religious figure among the Egyptian Shia community. Some news sources described the mob as "takfiris", while others described it as being a result of anti-Shia rhetoric steaming from sermons at Friday prayers.
WThe Badrashin railway accident took place near Badrashin station in Giza, Egypt, on 15 January 2013. A train en route to Cairo from Sohag derailed, leaving at least 19 people dead and 120 injured.
WThe 2013 Egyptian coup d'état took place on 3 July 2013. Egyptian army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi led a coalition to remove the President of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, from power and suspended the Egyptian constitution of 2012. The move came after the military's ultimatum for the government to "resolve its differences" with protesters during widespread national protests. The military arrested Morsi and Muslim Brotherhood leaders, and declared Chief Justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court Adly Mansour as the interim president of Egypt. The announcement was followed by demonstrations and clashes between supporters and opponents of the move throughout Egypt.
WThe 2012–13 Egyptian protests were part of a large scale popular uprising in Egypt against then-President Mohamed Morsi. On 22 November 2012, millions of protesters began protesting against Morsi, after his government announced a temporary constitutional declaration that in effect granted the president unlimited powers. Morsi deemed the decree necessary to protect the elected constituent assembly from a planned dissolution by judges appointed during the Mubarak era.
WOn 14 August 2013, Egyptian security forces and army under the command of General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi raided two camps of protesters in Cairo: one at al-Nahda Square and a larger one at Rabaa al-Adawiya Square. The two sites had been occupied by supporters of President Mohamed Morsi, who had been removed from office by the military a month earlier in the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état. The camps were raided after initiatives to end the six-week sit-ins by peaceful means failed and as a result of the raids the camps were cleared out within hours. The raids were described by Human Rights Watch as crimes against humanity and "one of the world's largest killings of demonstrators in a single day in recent history". According to Human Rights Watch, a minimum of 904 people were killed with strong evidence to suggest more likely at least 1,000 died during the dispersal. However, according to the Egyptian Health Ministry, 595 civilians and 43 police officers were killed and at least 3,994 were injured. Later, the official Forensic Medical Authority stated only 8 police officers were killed and Egypt's National Council for Human Rights stated at least 624 civilians were killed. The Muslim Brotherhood and the National Coalition for Supporting Legitimacy stated the number of deaths from the Rabaa al-Adawiya Mosque sit-in alone was about 2,600. The total casualty count made 14 August the deadliest day in Egypt since the 2011 Egyptian revolution which had toppled former President Hosni Mubarak. Several world leaders denounced the violence during the sit-in dispersals.
WIn July 2013, at the same time as mass protests began against the 3 July coup d'état which deposed Mohamed Morsi, and in parallel with the escalation of the already ongoing jihadist insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula, pro-Muslim Brotherhood militants started violent attacks against policemen and soldiers in Central and Western Egypt. In the following months, new Islamist armed groups were created to reinstate Islamist rule in Egypt, like Soldiers of Egypt and the Popular Resistance Movement. Since 2013, violence in mainland Egypt has escalated and developed into a low-level Islamist insurgency against the Egyptian government.
WThe 30 June protests occurred in Egypt on 30 June 2013, marking the one-year anniversary of Mohamed Morsi's inauguration as president. The events ended with the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état after mass protests across Egypt demanding the immediate resignation of the president. The rallies were partly a response to Tamarod, an ostensibly grassroots movement that launched a petition in April earlier that year calling for the government to step down claiming to have collected 22 million signatures, a figure not verified by independent sources with skepticism over the rise in number by millions in a matter of days, with the Freedom and Justice Party putting the figure at 170,000 signatures. A counter campaign was launched in support of Morsi's presidency which claimed to have collected 11 million signatures. According to the Egyptian military, which calculated figured via helicopter scans of demonstration perimeters across the country, this was "the biggest protest in Egypt's history", with 32 million protesters. However, independent observers have raised concerns about wild exaggeration of the number of actual anti-Morsi protestors with one crowd statistical expert study indicating that a total of a little more than 1 million people protested against Morsi across the whole country.
WOn 26 February 2013, a hot air balloon crashed near Luxor, Egypt, killing 19 out of the 21 people on board. A fire developed in the basket due to a leak in the balloon's gas fuel system, causing the balloon to deflate mid-air and crash to the ground.
WProtests against the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état erupted in July 2013. Immediately following the removal of President Mohamed Morsi by the Egyptian Armed Forces on 3 July 2013 amid demonstrations against Morsi's rule, many protesters amassed near the Rabia Al-Adawiya Mosque to call for Morsi's return to power and condemn the military, while others demonstrated in support of the military and interim government. Deadly clashes such as Rabaa massacre continued for several days, with three particularly bloody incidents being described by Muslim Brotherhood officials as "massacres" perpetrated by security forces. During the month of Ramadan, prime minister Hazem al-Beblawy threatened to disperse the ongoing Pro-Morsi sit-ins in Rabaa al-Adaweya square and al-Nahda square. The government crackdown of these protests occurred in a violent dispersal on 14 August 2013. In mid-August, the violence directed by the army towards the protesters escalated, with hundreds killed, and the government declaring a month-long nighttime curfew.
WMohamed Soltan, an Egyptian-American human rights advocate who was a political prisoner in Egypt from August 2013 to May 2015. Soltan was shot, imprisoned, tortured, and sentenced to life in prison after protesting against the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.