During the first three days of the Six Day War, the Egyptian media claimed victory, and Egyptians did not know their army was crushed. Everyone was certain troops were at the doors of Tel Aviv. Rumors spread that thousands of Israeli prisoners were being shipped to Cairo by train to be paraded for all to see in Ramses Square, where the train station is located. The authorities had trouble satisfying this demand, as Egypt had caught no more than a handful of Israeli POWs. But a solution was found.

On the first day of the war, at a quarter to five sharp, we heard a knock at the door. We opened. Two policemen in civilian clothes wanted my brother Sami for 10 minutes at the station. He followed them...

...It took a month until we learned of my brother's whereabouts. The authorities arrested nearly all Jewish males between the ages of 17 and 60. Those who held foreign citizenship were taken to Alexandria and thrown on a boat, to be disgorged somewhere in southern Europe. They were the fortunate ones.

The others, Egyptians and stateless (Jews as a rule were denied citizenship), were taken to the notorious detention camps of Abu Zabaal, near Cairo. On the third day of the war, as a substitute for Israeli POWs, the authorities decided to parade instead the Jews from Alexandria, who were taken by train to Abu Zabaal by way of Cairo. The spectacle took place in Ramses Square in front of local mobs, who abused the Jews as they were thrown into open trucks.

A Christian friend of my mother, Ang le, lived near the station, and saw the spectacle. She only told me a year later how young and old were throwing stones at the men in the trucks, while shouting "Yahud."...