About that Muslim Brotherhood...

[RobDownSouth]

Interesting article about how the Egyptian military and Egyptian liberals are totally overhauling the Egyptian government. It seems they are going out of their way to make their federal goverment "America friendly", i.e. installing female cabinet ministers and keeping religious conservatives from positions of power. Very much a "centrist" government, at first glance. I suspect the warmongers in Israel are pissed.

 

[pete]

do you think israel is looking to get into a scuffle with egypt? i don't understand why they'd bother

 

[RobDownSouth]

do you think israel is looking to get into a scuffle with egypt? i don't understand why they'd bother

War-mongering keeps the fascist Likkud party in power in Israel. They only thrive in a climate of fear, not unlike first-term Dubya.

 

[pete]

War-mongering keeps the fascist Likkud party in power in Israel. They only thrive in a climate of fear, not unlike first-term Dubya.

i figured the constant back-and-forth with palestine was enough.

and don't kid yourself, democrats heart the fear angle pretty hard

 

[KingOrfeo]

War-mongering keeps the fascist Likkud party in power in Israel. They only thrive in a climate of fear, not unlike first-term Dubya.

Are the other parties really any better?

 

[Beco]

do you think israel is looking to get into a scuffle with egypt? i don't understand why they'd bother

It would be nice to have the sinai back...

 

[RobDownSouth]

Are the other parties really any better?

probably not, but the likkud is the worst of the worst.

It was good to see them squeal like pigs this week when the European Union dropped a serious hammer on their jackbooted asses.

 

[Beco]

probably not, but the likkud is the worst of the worst.

It was good to see them squeal like pigs this week when the European Union dropped a serious hammer on their jackbooted asses.

The premise of this militant Palestinian rejectionism is rather simple: As the years pass, the international isolation of Israel will increase. Indeed, the campaign of delegitimizing the Jewish state — a campaign financed primarily by Arab oil — has gained momentum in recent years. The only thing that can stop it is the resumption of peace negotiations.

Each time Israel makes a gesture or undertakes a confidence-building measure, the automatic rifles in Ramallah are loaded and cocked. “If you agree to sit with the Israelis,” they warn Mr. Abbas, “you will be betraying us and betraying Allah.”

By YAIR LAPID
Published: July 19, 2013

 

[RobDownSouth]

The premise of this militant Palestinian rejectionism is rather simple: As the years pass, the international isolation of Israel will increase. Indeed, the campaign of delegitimizing the Jewish state — a campaign financed primarily by Arab oil — has gained momentum in recent years. The only thing that can stop it is the resumption of peace negotiations.

Each time Israel makes a gesture or undertakes a confidence-building measure, the automatic rifles in Ramallah are loaded and cocked. “If you agree to sit with the Israelis,” they warn Mr. Abbas, “you will be betraying us and betraying Allah.”

By YAIR LAPID
Published: July 19, 2013

You've got expect some international isolationism if you're going to thumb your nose repeatedly at international treaties. Likewise when you attempt to dictate behaviors that you exempt yourself from following.

"But....but...The HOLOCAUST!!"will only take you so far....

 

[Beco]

You've got expect some international isolationism if you're going to thumb your nose repeatedly at international treaties. Likewise when you attempt to dictate behaviors that you exempt yourself from following.

"But....but...The HOLOCAUST!!"will only take you so far....

international treaties got nothing to do with it....

 

[RobDownSouth]

international treaties got nothing to do with it....

4th Geneva Convention isn't a treaty?
How bout them Oslo Accords?

Does the phrase "illegally occupied territories" have any special resonance with you?

 

[unregistered]

 

[Beco]

4th Geneva Convention isn't a treaty?
How bout them Oslo Accords?

Does the phrase "illegally occupied territories" have any special resonance with you?

The Palestinian leadership has announced its intention to unilaterally declare statehood, thats not a violation of them Oslo A-cords!!

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Happy-go-lucky secular community organizers...

The Muslim Brotherhood reportedly is attempting to blame Egypt’s Coptic Christian community for the recent ousting of President Mohammed Morsi and even resorting to violent tactics in an effort to gain back power.

Reports have surfaced out of Egypt that sectarian attacks against Copts by Islamic extremists are on the rise since Morsi was ousted July 3. Copts, who make up about 9% of Egypt's population, have said they consistently have been targeted by Islamic radicals for campaigning against the Muslim Brotherhood-backed president.

“The Muslim Brotherhood’s regime caused a split in Egyptian unity on the basis of religious affiliations,” Nabil Abdel Fattah, political analyst and researcher for the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies said in a recent interview with Mid-East Christian news.

“The sectarian attacks against Copts are one of the controversial strategies pursued by Islamic extremist currents in their bid to intimidate Christians,” he added. “Whether it is out of revenge for participating in the political process or as a result of the radical ideologies these groups have, [they are] creating a state of anarchy and insecurity across the Egyptian streets, turning current issues into a sectarian conflict to mobilize neutral citizens against their fellow countrymen.”

Nine Christians have been killed throughout the country, including one priest in the Sinai Peninsula, according a report in the Financial Times. The fatal shooting of priest Mina Aboud Sharween has led many other Coptic clergy to go into hiding.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/0...egypt-christian-community-over/#ixzz2ZdAOzvKl

 

[RobDownSouth]

The Palestinian leadership has announced its intention to unilaterally declare statehood, thats not a violation of them Oslo A-cords!!

Right. Israelis always have an excuse. Always. Personally, "But Mom! The other side does it tooooooooooooo!" lost it's cachet around 2nd grade.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Oh look! Fat hate, twice a day...


Who knew that he had so little time in his real life?

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

"Since 2011, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had been working closely with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation [OIC] to implement UN Human Rights Council Resolution 16/18, one of the key vehicles aimed at legislating restrictions on Americans' .... right to free speech


Anything that causes offense to Muslims will be forbidden. Remember the "Islamophobia" scare campaign? We are already on the way there, or have you tried to say a critical word about Muslims to a liberal lately.


The world knows about Ms. Huma Abedan as Hillary's personal Muslim Brotherhood assistant. Huma no doubt helped to advise our Secretary of State about that war they keep making on us.

http://www.americanthinker.com/prin...er.com/articles/../2013/07/choosing_evil.html

 

[RobDownSouth]

Oh look! Fat hate, twice a day...


Who knew that he had so little time in his real life?

Once again, Chief, I wasn't talking to you. Go play your victim card someplace else.

 

[jeninflorida]

War-mongering keeps the fascist Likkud party in power in Israel. They only thrive in a climate of fear, not unlike first-term Dubya.

now, off with your head

 

[KingOrfeo]

From The Nation:

The Rise and Fall of the Muslim Brotherhood
It took twelve months for the Brotherhood to go from the highest peaks of power to protesting in the streets of Cairo. What next for the organization?

Sharif Abdel Kouddous July 19, 2013

It took the Muslim Brotherhood eighty-five years to reach the pinnacle of its power in Egypt—culminating in the inauguration last year of one its members, Mohamed Morsi, as the country’s first elected president—only for the group to lose it all twelve months later.

After a wave of popular anger led to an unprecedented mass mobilization on June 30, opening the door for Morsi’s sudden overthrow in a military coup, the Brotherhood went from controlling the presidency, the legislature and the cabinet to finding itself thrust out of office, its members protesting in the streets and hounded by security forces.

This was neither predicted nor preordained. Although the Brotherhood faced immediate political opposition upon winning at the ballot box, along with a declining economy and stiff resistance within the judiciary and state bureaucracy, critics largely blame the organization’s precipitous fall on its unilateral decision-making and an exclusionary style of governance—marked by hubris and a winner-take-all logic—that left it politically alienated, engendering open hostility from most sectors of Egyptian society.

“This happened because of the terrible mistakes that Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood made over the past year,” says Khalil al-Anani, a scholar of Middle East politics and Islamist movements at Durham University, and who was in touch with Brotherhood leaders in the days leading up to June 30. “They were disconnected from reality and underestimated what has happening in the street. They did not have a Plan B and gave no room for any political solution but for the military to intervene and end the deadlock.”

The Rise of a Conservative Wing

The Brotherhood’s decision-making authority is centralized and concentrated in the upper ranks of the organization, whose rigid hierarchy is marked by discipline and a strong tradition of deference to superiors. With its “listen and obey” credo, the upper echelons of the Brotherhood’s hierarchical pyramid came to be dominated over the last decade by a staunchly conservative wing of the organization, which asserted control over the group’s key decision making bodies, the sixteen-member Guidance Bureau and the 110-member Shura Council.

The ascendancy of the conservatives came in the wake of elections in 2005, which saw the Brotherhood win an unprecedented fifth of the country’s parliamentary seats—only to be rewarded with a crackdown by the Mubarak regime, including increased arrests, harassment and a constitutional amendment designed to prevent further electoral participation. This was successfully exploited by the groups’s conservative wing, which, Anani explains, “used to benefit from oppression in order to take control and dominate the movement.”

The growing hard-line trend within the movement was manifested in the political platform the Brotherhood produced in 2007 that sparked criticism for barring women and non-Muslim men from running for president. More controversially, it also called for a government structure that would include the establishment of a council of elected senior religious scholars—effectively giving governance power to an extra-constitutional entity.

The same conservative bloc would cement its control of the organization in 2009, when the Brotherhood held internal elections for seats in the Guidance Bureau. It edged out more reformist members, including such notable figures as Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh and Deputy General Guide Mohamed Habib, who publicly cast doubt on the legitimacy of the poll and eventually left the group.

After the 2011 overthrow of Mubarak, the Brotherhood went from being a banned and repressed movement to the most powerful political force in Egyptian politics, armed with a nationwide grassroots presence, a well-oiled electoral machine and established patronage networks. And it was the conservative wing that was in control to pave the group’s new path to power.

The Brotherhood initially vowed, as it had for years, “participation, not domination” in the political process after the revolution, signaling its limited political ambitions. It pledged, for example, to target only a third of seats in parliament. But during the military-led transitional period following Mubarak’s ouster, the Brotherhood came under heavy criticism for going back on these promises. When elections came in November 2011, the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (the group’s political arm) entered nearly all of the electoral races, winning a plurality of seats, with 46 percent of the People’s Assembly.

But it was the Brotherhood’s decision, in late March 2012, to field a presidential candidate that proved far more controversial. It put forth its top strategist and financier, Khairat al-Shater, a multimillionaire businessman known as “The Engineer” to his friends, who served as deputy to the General Guide. Imprisoned for twelve years under Mubarak, he had continued to run the Brotherhood from his jail cell. “Khairat Al-Shater is the most powerful person in the Guidance Council and he controls the political party,” says a prominent Brotherhood member.

Senior Brotherhood leaders, including Shater himself, had repeatedly pledged that the group would not seek the presidency, going so far as to expel another member, Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh (the reformist who failed to win a seat at the Guidance Bureau in 2009), when he declared his candidacy. The choice to nominate Shater was deeply contested within the Brotherhood itself. The group’s Shura Council met at least three times before coming to a decision on the matter, in a split vote of 56 to 52. “Khairat al-Shater and his trust network sort of dominated,” says Mona El-Ghobashy, a professor of political science at Barnard College who studies the Brotherhood. “They’re the ones who crucially steamrolled the organization into the decision to run for presidential election.”

Today, the Brotherhood defends its decision to field a candidate by pointing to the military’s refusal at the time to allow the newly elected parliament to name a prime minister and form a government.

“We realized the only way to get into executive power to maintain the democratic process was for us to field a candidate,” says Amr Darrag, a senior Brotherhood member and secretary general of the constituent assembly that drafted the 2012 Constitution who most recently served as minister of planning and international cooperation. “My personal opinion is that it was the right decision to take at that time.”

Shater would eventually be disqualified from running for office by the presidential election commission due to his prior criminal convictions, thrusting the group’s less charismatic backup candidate, Mohamed Morsi, into the limelight. On July 1, the day after the popular uprising against Morsi, the military issued a forty-eight-hour deadline for the political crisis to be resolved. According to state-run daily Al-Ahram, the Guidance Bureau met the same day and considered holding a national referendum on Morsi’s presidency. It was Shater who strongly opposed the idea, seeing it as a potential defeat from which the Brotherhood would not recover for fifty years.

“They are conservative in terms of their ideological views and religious understanding,” says Anani, the Durham University scholar, of the hardliners within the Brotherhood. “But also they don’t believe much in reaching out to the opposition genuinely and realistically.” He adds, “They were arrogant, they had a lot of misperceptions and a lot of miscalculation. I think this was one of the underlying factors behind the removal of Morsi.”

“We are ready to die”

In Cairo, the sit-in at the Rabaa el-Adeweya mosque in the eastern neighborhood of Nasr City has taken on the feel of a permanent encampment, complete with hundreds of tents, several field hospitals, a media center and a commandeered satellite broadcast truck. From the main stage, pro-Morsi speakers vow to stay until their demands are met. Tens of thousands of supporters of the ousted president endure the summer heat while fasting from sunrise to sunset to observe the holy month of Ramadan.

At night, the crowds swell and Morsi supporters have taken to marching through neighborhoods across the capital, at times blocking major thoroughfares and sparking fierce clashes with local residents and security forces.

“If you look at the people who are protesting right now in the streets—millions of people—it is getting larger and larger everyday,” Darrag says. “I believe this is going to be spreading and increasing until those who took over realize that it is impossible to run the country this way and the only way for stability is to restore democracy.”

The Brotherhood leadership has repeatedly insisted the military’s intervention be reversed and the ousted president reinstated as a precondition for negotiations or participation in the political process. Yet by most accounts, the reinstatement of Morsi, who has been held incommunicado without charge since July 3, is a long shot.

Analysts say the call for continued street protests and the president’s return maintain the group’s unity and cohesiveness, as well as potentially strengthening their hand at the negotiating table.

“The Brotherhood is caught between a rock and a hard place,” says Anani. “On the one hand, they know that Morsi cannot be reinstated. On the other hand they cannot stop calling for this because they might face a lot of discontent and dissent within the movement itself over who should be accountable for what happened and what led to the removal of Morsi after only one year.”

While the group has repeatedly denied it is involved in any talks with the military, Brotherhood sources say senior member Mohamed Ali Bishr—a former minister under Morsi—has had direct meetings.

Meanwhile, the country’s military-backed interim leaders have moved quickly to assert their legitimacy, naming an interim president, a thirty-four-member government that includes no Islamists, and announcing plans to amend the constitution followed by parliamentary and presidential elections.

The military has shown no signs of backing down. Instead, security forces have initiated a crackdown on the Brotherhood, arresting hundreds, including the top leadership, freezing their assets, shutting down sympathetic TV channels and killing dozens of their supporters in clashes outside the Republican Guard headquarters. The situation has been described as the most severe crisis for the Brotherhood since 1954, when Gamal Abdel Nasser’s military regime arrested thousands of members, sending them to desert internment camps, into exile or to execution.

“The military is really going out full force to give them a body blow,” El-Ghobashy says. “What has persistently happened in the Brotherhood’s history is that they rally around and dig in and increase their solidarity so that will forestall change within the organization if there’s heavy repression.”

The coming days may prove to be pivotal in shaping the future of the Muslim Brotherhood, both within the organization and the broader Egyptian body politic. For now, they are choosing to remain defiant and in the streets, as the army— their historical adversary—backs them into a corner.

“I feel like they aren’t treating Morsi and the Islamic current as citizens,” says Ihab El-Sayed, 36, who traveled from Mahalla, an industrial town on the Nile Delta, to take part in the Rabaa sit-in. His brother, 31 year-old Salah, was shot dead on July 8, one of at least fifty-three Morsi supporters killed outside the Republican Guard headquarters in one of the bloodiest days since the fall of Mubarak. “Whatever they do, kill us, imprison us, there is no president other than Morsi. We are ready to die.”

 

[jeninflorida]

Islam is about love! now off with your head, in the name of Allie

 

[eyer]

Looks like the power in Egypt is serious again about defanging the Bros quite a bit...

...starting with the poser who rose the highest:

Egypt's Morsi charged with espionage; tension mounts

CAIRO -- Egyptian prosecutors have charged deposed President Mohamed Morsi with espionage and colluding with the militant group Hamas in provocative accusations ahead of rival rallies planned Friday by Islamists and largely secular opposition forces.

The charges against Morsi, who has been in army custody since his overthrow on July 3, are certain to infuriate tens of thousands of his Islamist supporters who have been demonstrating in Cairo and other cities. The accusations come the day after the army warned Islamists to disband their sit-ins or face retaliation.

Gen. Abdel Fattah Sisi, commander of the armed forces, has called on millions of Egyptians who backed the coup against Morsi to rally Friday for a military crackdown against “terrorism and violence.” His comments further increased pressure on supporters of Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood party.

The political atmosphere is more volatile than it is has been in months, and many fear widespread clashes as the nation’s factional lines sharpen amid economic turmoil.

The Egyptian news agency reported a court has ordered Morsi to be held for 15 days while prosecutors investigate charges that in 2011 he conspired with Hamas, the Palestinian radical group that controls the Gaza Strip, to attack police stations and jails, "setting fire to one prison and enabling inmates to flee, including himself, as well as premeditated killing of officers, soldiers and prisoners."

The charges stem from a prison escape by Morsi and other political prisoners, including members of the Brotherhood, during the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak. The accusations have been discussed in judiciary circles for months and have recently gained traction as the army seeks to impose order, marginalize the Brotherhood and move beyond more than two years of unrest.

Morsi had said in an earlier television interview that unknown men freed him and other Brotherhood members from Wadi Natroun prison. The criminal accusations come amid growing international criticism that Morsi has been held incommunicado for nearly one month.

"At the end of the day we know all of these charges are nothing more than the fantasy of a few army generals and a military dictatorship," Brotherhood spokesman Gehad El-Haddad told reporters. "We are continuing our protests on the streets."

In an ominous statement suggesting possible violence, an army official told Reuters: "We will not initiate any move, but will definitely react harshly against any calls for violence or black terrorism from Brotherhood leaders or their supporters."

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-fg-wn-egypt-morsi-charged-20130726,0,4320835.story

The Egyptian military is very wise making such a public, forceful example of the Bros and their political terrorist wing, Hamas...

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Happy-go-lucky secular community organizers...


AND


The rightfully-elected government in exile.

 

[Beco]

CAIRO (AP) — Security forces and armed men clashed with supporters of Egypt's ousted president early Saturday, killing at least 65 people in mayhem that underscored an increasingly heavy hand against protests demanding Mohammed Morsi's return to office.

In chaotic scenes, pools of blood stained the floor and bodies were lined up under white sheets in a makeshift hospital near the site of the battles in eastern Cairo. Doctors struggled to cope with the flood of dozens of wounded, many with gunshots to the head or chest.

It was the deadliest single outbreak of violence since the military ousted Morsi on July 3 and one of the deadliest in 2 ½ years of turmoil in Egypt. It was not immediately clear if all the 65 killed were all protesters or if residents who joined the fight against the march were among the dead. The Brotherhood said that 66 Morsi supporters were killed in the Cairo violence.

 

[Beco]

BREAKING NEWS
Egyptian Health Ministry: Death toll rises to 525
Violence spreads across Egypt
Death toll rises to 525 amid calls for more protests
Abigail Hauslohner and Sharaf al-Hourani 7:27 AM ET
With more than 500 killed, it was the deadliest day in Egypt since the 2011 uprising that toppled Mubarak.