In yet another sexual harassment incident in Egypt, a male snorkeling instructor reportedly assaulted a female Russian tourist underwater.
The incident was brought to light by another professional diver, Mohamed Hany, who took to Facebook to recall what he witnessed and share photos of the incident.
According to Hany, the incident took place in the middle of the Red Sea in Sharm El-Sheikh, where he allegedly saw the suspected harasser inappropriately touching the tourist and decided to take photos documenting the crime.
Hany explained that he was aboard a tourist boat when he witnessed the woman, who later turned out to be Russian, expressing discomfort with the instructor's sexual advances.
The photos shared by Hany capture the woman, whose face does not appear, apparently resisting as the instructor puts his arms around her body and forces her closer to him.
According to Al Arabiya, Hany followed the duo and took photos of them without being noticed.
Hany stated that when the tourist and the instructor got out of the water, she called for help and asked to be protected from him. As a result, Hany confronted the harasser, told him about the photos, and threatened to report the incident to authorities.
In response to social media users who criticized Hany for not directly intervening underwater, he wrote:
"I didn't have the authority to do anything about it and I was not capable of doing anything else. If I had been a pessimist, I would have not taken the photos, nor defended her, like many people do."
In another post, he wrote that he would have gotten into trouble at work had he left the boat.
Hany went on to criticize Egyptians for their attitude towards foreigners, writing:
"The problem lies in the Egyptian culture that considers such incidents as normal for a foreign woman. Guys, foreigners are humans just like us, they are not sex-obsessed individuals."
Unsurprisingly, last year, Trip.com ranked Egypt as the world's least safe country for solo female travelers.
Not the only incident of its kind in recent weeks
Last week, a video capturing tens of men sexually harassing three Egyptian women in one of the country's streets went viral on Twitter.
In the footage, the women, who were wearing the hijab at the time, could be heard screaming for help while the men cornered, pushed, and shoved them around. No passersby were seen approaching the scene or trying to help the women out of the horrific situation.
In another incident this week, an Egyptian bus driver who allegedly sexually harassed one of his female passengers was publicly shamed by people who caught him in the act.
Photos capturing the incident show the abuser standing on top of his bus with only his underwear on. The images were uploaded to Twitter and have since gone viral.
Several tweeps, some of whom claimed they were at the scene, wrote that the man had harassed the passenger after she was left alone on his bus. When passersby heard her pleas for help, they attacked and cornered the man, publicly shamed him, and didn't let him go until police came and arrested him.
Sexual harassment is a major issue in Egypt
According to a 2013 report, released by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, 99.3 percent of Egyptian women have experienced some form of sexual harassment.
A recent study conducted by UN Women in collaboration with Promundo, a Brazilian organization campaigning for gender equality, also revealed that around 43 percent of men in Egypt actually believe that women enjoy getting attention and have no problem with being harassed.
In addition, according to the same study, three-quarters of men and 84 percent of women polled said that "women who dress provocatively deserve to be harassed".
Egypt considers sexual harassment a crime punishable by law
If a woman takes her harasser to court and he is convicted, he can face a minimum of six months in prison. If a harasser is found to be a repeat offender, he could potentially face up to five years in prison.