Egypt Celebrates Eid Al-Fitr, Marking the End of Ramadan
As Muslims worldwide welcomed the Eid al-Fitr holiday, photojournalist Hamada Elrasam turned his lens to Cairo where communities sought relief in rituals, festivities, and causes, especially amid the country’s deepening economic crisis. Captions were written in collaboration with Elle Kurancid.
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Thousands of worshippers gather around Old Cairo’s Mosque of Sultan Hassan for the end of the fasting month of Ramadan and the start of Eid al-Fitr, which is determined by official sightings of the new moon and one’s geographic location.
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Ahead of Eid celebrations, young siblings visit their neighbors as part of a holiday custom in Egypt among children, who are also traditionally gifted a new set of clothes for the occasion.
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The Egyptian Clothing Bank, a zero-waste nonprofit, hopes to distribute Eid outfits to 50,000 children in need, including orphans and refugees. Egypt’s latest, pre-pandemic figures say about one in three people live in poverty.
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Inside the Egyptian Clothing Bank, which donated over two million pieces of clothing to low-income communities last year. According to the World Bank’s latest, pre-pandemic data, 60 percent of Egyptians are poor or vulnerable.