Morsi: Now it is getting interesting...

[4est_4est_Gump]

OOn Thursday, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi passed an extraordinary presidential decree. This unilaterally fired the country’s prosecutor-general, banned the judiciary from dissolving the country’s constituent assembly and, conveniently, also declared all the president’s decisions to be irrevocable and immune from any form of judicial challenge or overturn.

Morsi said this would allow him to achieve ‘political and economic stability’ in Egypt and to ‘defend the revolution’: an ominous phrase beloved by every revolutionary-turned-despot from Robespierre to Lenin and Mao.

This momentous step – which one Egyptian legal expert described as ’absolute fascism’ - was almost certainly given the nod by the Obama administration, either implicitly or explicitly. Only a few hours before his announcement, Hillary Clinton had told a press conference in Cairo that:

“Egypt's new government is assuming the responsibility and leadership that has long made this country a cornerstone of regional stability and peace.”

After Morsi’s announcement, the US State Department merely observed that Morsi’s moves “raise concerns for many Egyptians and for the international community”, hardly a resounding US denunciation.

The ‘stability and peace’ trade-off that was reached between Clinton and Morsi in Cairo is clear; in return for Morsi persuading Hamas to agree to a ceasefire with Israel, the US would allow him to seize new ‘temporary’ political powers under the guise of ensuring ‘stability’, both in Egypt and in the region.

This move – the latest instance of the Obama Whitehouse dressing up naivety for hard-nosed realism -- is short-sighted for two main reasons:

Firstly, it grants the Muslim Brotherhood the power to act with minimal checks and balances from Egypt’s judiciary. Now that Egypt’s non-ideological military has realised that it can prosper under an Islamist regime, the judiciary was the last branch of government still acting as a significant brake on Brotherhood ambitions.

For all its faults, this institution is now likely to be purged and silenced, with knock-on effects for Egyptian politics: opposition protesters will face tougher sentences, Brotherhood members – already widely accused of attacks on rival demonstrators and of using sexual assault to intimidate liberal female oppositionists - will be able to act with greater impunity.

Ongoing, politically motivated prosecutions of opposition leaders, on charges from blasphemy to corruption, will also likely increase. Weakening Egypt’s judges will also enable the Brotherhood to move against other sources of opposition formerly protected by the judiciary.

http://www.thecommentator.com/article/2132/us_chooses_stability_over_democracy_in_egypt

As will become clear, in the longer-term Clinton’s deal with Morsi has weakened Israel by linking its security to the Muslim Brotherhood’s political ambitions: if the US does not give a free hand to the Brotherhood in Egypt, the Egyptians will cease to rein in Hamas.

Clearly, this new dynamic works actively against Israel; the more Hamas threatens Israel, the more the US will have to concede to the Brotherhood in Cairo; a formula that only motivates the Brotherhood to allow Hamas’ military capabilities strengthen further, all while the Brotherhood uses its control of Egypt to advance towards its planned ‘last stage’, namely the eventual liquidation of Israel.

 

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[4est_4est_Gump]

Is it time to say "We told you so?"

 

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[RobDownSouth]

Is it time to say "We told you so?"

Tell us again how people were much better off under Mubarek.

Bonus points for verifiable facts that actually support your position.

 

[PutitinYOmouth]

Is it time to say "We told you so?"

lol...