International Consequences

Nov 21st, 2011

The first signs of real and lasting damage abroad as a result of recent police violence against the Occupy Movement here at home are now being seen.

Via ThinkProgress:

"As a part of renewed crackdowns on nonviolent activists in Egypt, the military-run government injured hundreds and killed several people over the weekend.Renowned Arab journalist Sultan Al Qassemi points out on a Twitter that an Egyptian television anchor on state television justified the crackdown by pointing to the crackdowns against Occupy Wall Street in the United States and similar crackdowns in Germany."

Much the way our own servicemen and women are now more likely to be subject to Geneva Convention violations in the wake of the last administration's use of torture, there are broad and lasting consequences here. The U.S. does, after all, still lead the world in many ways. It is time to ask more loudly, "where the Hell is it leading it?"

A Peaceful Sea

Feb 4th, 2011

Today's crowd in Tahrir Square from overhead.

"I Don't Understand What Has Happened"

Feb 4th, 2011

When Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq said these words yesterday, many were stunned. Personally, I don't think any of Mubarak's people could have put it better. They really, really don't get it.

Why, It's Revolutionary...

Feb 4th, 2011

©2011 Bennett Chattanooga Times Free Press

Worth 1,000 Words

Feb 4th, 2011

An Egyptian anti-government protester uses debris to protect himself from the continuing attacks of Mubarak and Suleiman's Thugs.

Worth 1,000 Words

Feb 3rd, 2011

نحن أبناء الله جميع

Hat tip to Jan.
UPDATE: THE DEEPLY MOVING PHOTO I CELEBRATE HERE WAS TAKEN BY NEVINE ZAKI

As we all watch the ongoing Egyptian struggle, which continues to provoke both hope and terrible fear here in The West, I proudly pass along this photo. Perhaps out of solidarity with the Muslims who formed human shields to protect Copts in December and very early January from continued extremist violence... perhaps out of simple decency... Egyptian Christians joined Muslims in Tahrir square earlier and made a barrier to protect afternoon prayers to Mecca from the violence and tyranny of the Mubarak Regime.

Amanpour Takes It To The Strongman

Feb 3rd, 2011

FULL VIDEO OF TONIGHT'S ABC NEWS REPORT FROM CHRITIANE AMANPOUR IS BELOW.

I have two observation about the reporting today by Christiane Amanpour from Cairo. First, she is to commended for her profound bravery in journeying through a terribly dangerous situation to get her story. Second, she really didn't get much out of Pres. Hosni Mubarak other than confirmation that he is a delusional, besieged thug. 

From ABC:

"We had to take a route that ran through a neighborhood where there were pro-Mubarak supporters in the streets were setting up their own check points.

When we got stuck in a crush of traffic, we were surrounded by an angry mob.

Vodafone - Official Tool Of Repressive Dictators

Feb 3rd, 2011

Things are just this ugly. So you want to operate a telecom network in some countries? Be prepared to actively assist in fomenting violence on behalf of those country's strong-men. An official statement from the international communications company Vodafone:

"Thursday 3 February 2011

Under the emergency powers provisions of the Telecoms Act, the Egyptian authorities can instruct the mobile networks of Mobinil, Etisalat and Vodafone to send messages to the people of Egypt. They have used this since the start of the protests. These messages are not scripted by any of the mobile network operators and we do not have the ability to respond to the authorities on their content.

Vodafone Group has protested to the authorities that the current situation regarding these messages is unacceptable. We have made clear that all messages should be transparent and clearly attributable to the originator.

Wednesday 2 February 2011

Vodafone is pleased to confirm that it has been able to reinstate data services in Egypt this morning, enabling our customers to access all internet sites.  We are actively lobbying to reactivate SMS services as quickly as possible for our customers."

The cost of doing business with the iron-fisted continues to mount... 

Mubarak's Heavies

Feb 3rd, 2011

A short time ago, Egypt's new Mubarak-appointed VP, Omar Suleiman, made a statement in which he apologized for the violence in Tahrir Sqaure while simultaneously blaming it on "outsiders" and "foreign" agitators. Suleiman's history as one of Mubarak's torturers is widely documented. 

The following is an account of yesterday's clashes.

David D. Kirkpatrick and Kareem Fahim report: 

"President Hosni Mubarak struck back at his opponents on Wednesday, unleashing waves of his supporters armed with clubs, rocks, knives and firebombs in a concerted assault on thousands of antigovernment protesters in Tahrir Square calling for an end to his authoritarian rule."

"The deployment of plainclothes forces paid by Mr. Mubarak’s ruling party — men known here as baltageya — has been a hallmark of the Mubarak government, and there were many signs that the violence was carefully choreographed.

The Mubarak supporters emerged from buses. They carried the same flags and the same printed signs, and they all escalated their actions, from shouting to violence, at exactly the same moment: 2:15 p.m. The protesters showed journalists police and ruling party identification cards that they said had been taken from Mubarak supporters who had been caught infiltrating Tahrir Square, also known as Liberation Square, and detained in a holding pen.

The preparations for a confrontation began Wednesday morning, a day after Mr. Mubarak pledged to step down in September while insisting that he would die on Egyptian soil. The president’s supporters waved flags as though they were headed to a protest, but armed themselves as though they were itching for a fight."

The End Of A Paradigm

Feb 2nd, 2011

Thomas Friedman is in Israel. From the NY Times:

"I'm meeting with a retired general at a Tel Aviv hotel. As I take my seat, he begins the conversation with: “Well, everything we thought for the last 30 years is no longer relevant."

That pretty much sums up the disorienting sense of shock and awe that the popular uprising in Egypt has inflicted on the psyche of Israel’s establishment. The peace treaty with a stable Egypt was the unspoken foundation for every geopolitical and economic policy in Israel for the last 35 years, and now it’s gone. It’s as if Americans suddenly woke up and found both Mexico and Canada plunged into turmoil on the same day.

"Everything that once anchored our world is now unmoored," remarked Mark Heller, a Tel Aviv University strategist. "And it is happening right at a moment when nuclearization of the region hangs in the air."

Clashes In Cairo

Feb 2nd, 2011 7:25am CST

Clashes have begun between pro-Mubarak and anti-government forces in Cairo's Tahrir Square. A short time ago, pro-government partisans charged into the square on horseback. So far, the army and police have continued to exercise restraint. It is possible that Mubarak is attempting to engineer violence to reassert authority. There is strong on the scene coverage here at The Times of India as well as Al-Jazeera.

The Right on Egypt - From Sane to Crazy

Feb 1st, 2011

The events unfolding throughout Egypt are provoking an interesting variety of responses from the right. First, there is this very sober and thoughtful essay in The National Review by Duncan Currie:

"The history of democratic Christendom," (Reuel Marc) Gerecht wrote in The Weekly Standard, suggests that "you don't get to arrive at Thomas Jefferson unless you first pass through Martin Luther."

Worth 1,000 Words

Jan 31st, 2011

It's Time To Ask

Jan 31st, 2011

How long can the nation of Israel maintain the position that it's very existence is dependent on preserving the oppressive regimes of it's neighbors? Yuval Ben Ami asks the question:






"According to Haaretz, the Israeli government sent a message to world governments urging them to enhance their support of Mubarak’s regime in Egypt. The message urged that the stability of Egypt’s regime is beneficial to the stability of the entire middle east and thus must be preserved.

What is the value of our so called democracy if it can only flourish by keeping millions and millions out of democracy’s reach? We have been told for years that such occupation techniques as the construction of the separation barrier are neccesary to ensure the survival of “the Middle East’s only democracy”. We learned to accept that our democracy is dependent on human rights infringements. Now we learn that the scale of these infringements must be fantastically greater.

For 30 years Israel enjoyed the status quo with Egypt, while Egyptians suffered from tyranny, lacked freedom of speech and could not effect their own destiny. What message is Israel sending now? Does it truly imply that only a dictatorial Middle East will permit it to survive as a Jewish state?

Is this Jewish state such a fragile fantasy, that an entire region of the world must be kept imprisoned in order for it to thrive?" 

"How many people must be deprived of liberty so we can have ours? Can we only have our liberty by maintaining absolute dictators as allies? Are we really that scared?"

Made In U.S.A., cont...

Jan 28th, 2011

Rich Engel reports from Cairo:
"In my hands, this is one of the tear gas canisters and very clearly written in English on it it says "Made in the U.S.A. by Combined Tactical Systems from Jamestown, Pa."

Worth 1,000 Words

Jan 28th, 2011

This just came across the interwebs. A protester in Cairo kisses a "bewildered" security officer.

Made In The U.S.A.

Jan 28th, 2011

This photo is causing quite the stir around the world. It should. It shows an Egyptian protester holding one of the hundreds of spent tear gas canisters that litter the streets of Cairo. As you look at it, remember that it was our tax dollars that payed for it's manufacture. It was our tax dollars that payed for it's shipment it to Mubarak's regime. It was our country that made it possible for a people crying out against their own tyrannical government to be abused with "low-intensity" chemical weapons.

When Cliché Is Essential

Jan 28th, 2011

Mother Jones posted this as the tweet of the day. A clear response to Mubarak's unnervingly detached statement regarding the current upheaval.

"They Didn't See This Coming"

Jan 28th, 2011

Egypt continues to spiral. The money quote from an "Egyptian official":
"We didn't see this coming."

More Amazing Good News... Too Inconvenient For American Media.

Jan 7th, 2011

A few days ago, I let loose (quite legitimately, I might add) on Marty Peretz for his recent essay in TNR regarding Muslim reaction to the violence against Egypt's Copts. 

The broader point I was trying to make had to do not just with the general omission from American media of information that reflects poorly on our own country, but also the exclusion of news which inconveniently demonstrates positive action in others. Here are some more current happenings you might not have heard about:

From Ahram Online:

"Egypt’s majority Muslim population stuck to its word Thursday night. What had been a promise of solidarity to the weary Coptic community, was honoured, when thousands of Muslims showed up at Coptic Christmas eve mass services in churches around the country and at candle light vigils held outside.

From the well-known to the unknown, Muslims had offered their bodies as “human shields” for last night’s mass, making a pledge to collectively fight the threat of Islamic militants and towards an Egypt free from sectarian strife.

“We either live together, or we die together,” was the sloganeering genius of Mohamed El-Sawy, a Muslim arts tycoon whose cultural centre distributed flyers at churches in Cairo Thursday night, and who has been credited with first floating the “human shield” idea."