Saturday, July 13, 2013

Mubarakism Without Mubarak The Struggle for Egypt

By Joseph Massad
CounterPunch

[Long Analysis Must read]


Ever since Muhammad Mursi was elected president of Egypt in democratic elections marred by his Mubarakist opponent Ahmad Shafiq’s electoral corruption and bribes, a coalition of Egyptian liberals, Nasserists, leftists — including socialists and communists of varying stripes –and even Salafist and repentant Muslim Brotherhood (MB) members began to form slowly but steadily, establishing an alliance with Mubarak’s ruling bourgeoisie and holdover politicians from his regime to oust him from power, fearing that he and his party were preparing a “Nazi-like” takeover of the country and destroying its fledgling democracy.
The liberals’ and the leftists’ fear was that the MB was Egypt’s Nazi party –they pretend to be democrats until they get elected and then they will refuse to leave power and will eliminate the democratic process and establish an Islamist dictatorship. That the Mubarak-appointed judges were the ones who dissolved the democratically elected parliament seemed not to bother the liberals and the leftists much, but they were horrified when Mursi issued his Constitutional Decree, which aimed to take away the power of Mubarak’s judges whom he had tried to depose unsuccessfully. Indeed the Constitutional Decree was seen as a sort of Reichstag Fire Decree, which it could very well have been. Mursi would soon reverse himself and would cancel the Decree in response to popular uproar. He would more recently express regret for having issued it.

Whether the leftists’ and the liberals’ calculations, that their alliance with the Mubarakist bourgeoisie and the army is tactical and temporary and that they will be able to overcome them and take power away from them as they did with the MB, are a case of naïve triumphalism or of studied optimism will become clear in the near future. What is clear for now, however, with the massive increase of police and army repression with the participation of the public, is that what this coalition has done is strengthen the Mubarakists and the army and weakened calls for a future Egyptian democracy, real or just procedural.
Gripped by popular fascist love fests for the army, Egypt is now ruled by an army whose top leadership was appointed and served under Mubarak, and is presided over by a judge appointed by Mubarak, and is policed by the same police used by Mubarak. People are free to call it a coup or not, but what Egypt has now is Mubarakism without Mubarak.

Cairo airport officials deport Syrians to Beirut


Authorities at Cairo International Airport have deported a number of Syrian citizens to Beirut, after they arrived in Suez without prior security approval.
Officials from Suez security directorate reportedly arrived at the airport to deport the unknown number of Syrians, putting them on an Egyptian aircraft bound for the Lebanese capital.
Since Monday Egyptian authorities have imposed stricter regulations on Syrians entering the country.
Syrians must now obtain visas and security approval in advance of a trip to Egypt. Syrian nationals were previously not required to undergo any pre-arrival procedures.
Fourteen Palestinians were meanwhile referred to a Palestinian embassy representative after they arrived at Cairo airport on board several different flights. They will be deported to the Rafah border crossing en route to Gaza.

Gaza Palestinians still stranded abroad by Egypt’s restrictions



Men and boys sleep on suitcases
Palestinians wait at the Gaza side of the crossing with Egypt on Wednesday.
(Eyad Al Baba / APA images)

“We spent about four days in a three-meter-wide and ten-meter-long corridor in Cairo international airport. On Monday, when I left back to Tunisia, there were dozens of stranded people like myself, including two families with children, wanting to cross on their way back to Gaza,” Salama Marouf told The Electronic Intifada by phone.

Marouf is now back to Tunisia, after being deported by Egypt and where he had already spent one week attending a media conference.

He is one of the thousands of people affected by Egypt’s ban on Palestinians entering the country in order to return to Gaza, the only route home for the vast majority of the strip’s residents.

The Rafah crossing on the border between Egypt and Gaza, about a six-hour drive from Cairo’s airport, is the main outlet to the outside world for Gaza’s nearly 1.7 million residents, due to Israel’s ongoing land, sea and air blockade of the territory.

Egypt closed the Rafah crossing after the army’s 3 July ouster of elected president Muhammad Morsi, stranding thousands of Palestinians abroad........"

تجارة الماس السرية بين دبي وإسرائيل: زيارات متبادلة.. وجهود المقاطعة تهددها

حلمي موسى 
في تحقيق موسع لصحيفة «معاريف» عن تجارة الماس الإسرائيلية في إمارة دبي، تحت عنوان «السلام الاقتصادي»، كشفت النقاب عن تراجع عائدات هذه التجارة بسبب جهود منظمة «مقاطعة، وسحب الاستثمارات وفرض العقوبات على إسرائيل» (BDS). وبينت الصحيفة أن العشرات من التجار الإسرائيليين أنشأوا لهم في الإمارة مراكز، وأقاموا علاقات طيبة هناك، لكنها لم تجد نفعاً أمام دعوات المقاطعة الدولية.
وأشار التحقيق إلى أن معرض الماس، الذي يملكه الملياردير الإسرائيلي ليف ليفاييف في دبي يحمل اسم «ليفانت». وليفاييف ليس تاجر الماس الإسرائيلي الوحيد الذي يعمل في دبي، فقد افتتح بني شتاينتس متجراً للمجوهرات هناك. وفضلاً عن ذلك، فإن تجار الماس الإسرائيليين ضيوف دائمون على بورصة الماس في دبي، وبعضهم يدخلها بجوازات سفر إسرائيلية.
وأوضح التحقيق أنه، في المقابل، يزور تجار ماس من دبي إسرائيل ويشاركون في مؤتمرات، بل أعلن هذا الأسبوع أن رئيس بورصة ماس دبي بيتر ماوس سيشارك على رأس وفد من التجار في أسبوع الماس العالمي، الذي سيعقد في إسرائيل في نهاية شهر آب المقبل. وأثار الإعلان عن مشاركة وفد التجار في أسبوع الماس في إسرائيل غضب منظمة «BDS»، التي سارعت للتنديد بالخطوة، الأمر الذي دعا دبي للإعلان أن أي وفد منها لن يزور إسرائيل.
ونقلت الصحيفة عن مؤرخ صناعة الماس حاييم إبن زوهر، الذي زار دبي مراراً وآخرها قبل شهرين، أنهم «في دبي لا يحبون العلانية. إنهم يعملون بصمت. وأخشى أنه بعد نشر التحقيق لن يأتوا إلى هنا». ويقول ابن زوهر إن «بورصة الماس في دبي تقدم خدمات لـ500 شركة، وهي تشكل مركز التجارة لدول الخليج والعالم العربي. فعبر بورصة دبي يمكننا أن نبيع الماس للعالم العربي ولدول الخليج. كما أن دبي مركز سياحي. وأغنياء الروس ونخبتهم يستجمون هناك. وهم ينفقون أموالا طائلة في التبضع. وصناعة الماس الإسرائيلية تبحث عن أسواق جديدة، إذ تراجعت السوق الأميركية جراء الوضع الاقتصادي، ودبي باتت إحدى الفرص الجديدة إلى جانب الصين وتركيا. وهناك آفاق للعمل بمصالح متبادلة. إذ عندنا الماسات الكبيرة، الأغلى والأندر التي يريدون».
ويقول تاجر الماس الإسرائيلي إيال بديحي، الذي يعمل مع تجار ماس في دبي، إن «هناك فنتازيا المال الطائل. صحيح أن بورصتهم صغيرة، لكنها تتلقى طلبيات من كل دول الخليج والدول العربية. والماسات الكبيرة والغالية يمكن أن تباع هناك. ودبي مثل نيويورك وهونغ كونغ، حيث يشتري أغنياء السعودية والبحرين الماس. وهم يبحثون عن البضائع الكبيرة والجميلة، أحجار بقيراطين وأكثر بألوان جيدة، أي بضاعة نوعية».
وقد زار بديحي دبي ثماني مرات حتى الآن. وهو يقول «إنهم بصمت ومن دون إعلان يسمحون لتجار ماس إسرائيليين بدخول دبي. وهم يريدون المتاجرة مع إسرائيل، لكنهم يخشون ردود فعل الإيرانيين والسوريين واللبنانيين الموجودين هناك بكثرة، لذلك يفضلون عدم الحديث عن علاقاتهم بإسرائيل».

Spare us your intellectual Disneylands

July 13, 2013 12:32 AM
By Rami G. Khouri

Iraq says can't stop Iran arms flights to Syria

Reuters

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, right, and his Syrian counterpart Walid al-Moallem, talk during a private meeting in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, May 26, 2013. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban, Pool)
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, right, and his Syrian counterpart Walid al-Moallem, talk during a private meeting in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, May 26, 2013. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban, Pool)
"RIYADH: Iraq is unable to stop its neighbour Iran transferring weapons to Syria through its airspace, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said in a newspaper interview published on Saturday.
"We reject and condemn the transfer of weapons through our airspace and we will inform the Iranian side of that formally. But we do not have the ability to stop it," he told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat.
Iran is the main ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is fighting mostly Sunni rebels in a civil war in which more the opposition say more than 100,000 people have been killed.
The United States, which wants Assad to relinquish power, has warned Iraq not to allow Iranian weapons flights to cross its airspace into Syria. But Zebari said he had told Western countries that if they wanted to stop such flights, they had to help do so themselves.
"If you imagine these flights breach United Nations Security Council resolutions banning weapons imports and exports from Iran... I invite you in the name of the government to help us stop these flights across Iraqi airspace," he said......"

CNN: إسرائيل قصفت اللاذقية الأسبوع الماضي

عــ48ـرب



"نقلت شبكة "CNN"، الليلة الفائتة، عن مصادر رسمية أمريكية قولها إن دوي الانفجارات التي سمعت في ميناء اللاذقية في سورية في الخامس من الشهر الجاري كانت نتيجة غارة جوية إسرائيلية.
وقال ثلاثة مسؤولين رسميين أمريكيين لمراسلة "CNN" في البنتاغون، باربارة ستار، إن هدف الهجوم كان صواريخ "ياخونت"  الروسية المضادة للسفن، والتي تعتقد إسرائيل أنها تشكل خطرا على قواتها البحرية.
يذكر أن المرصد السوري لحقوق الإنسان قال في حينه إن انفجارات هزت فجر الجمعة منطقة بالقرب من قرية السامية في شرق اللاذقية والتي تبعد عنها نحو 20 كيلومترا، تبين أنها ناتجة عن انفجار مستودعات للذخيرة قرب كتيبة للقوات النظامية.
ورجح مدير المرصد رامي عبد الرحمن، استنادا إلى سكان محليين، أن تكون الانفجارات ناتجة عن استهداف المستودعات بصواريخ من دون أن يكون في إمكانه تحديد المصدر. وقال إن تقارير وصلته أفادت أن طائرات قتالية لم يتم تشخصيها حلقت في سماء المنطقة.

وكانت قد أشارت تقارير إلى أن عددا من الجنود السوريين النظاميين قد قتلوا نتيجة الانفجارات، وأصيب آخرون. كما اندلعت حرائق في المكان.
وكتبت "هآرتس" أنه في حال تبينت صحة هذه التقارير فإن الغارة الإسرائيلية تعتبر الرابعة من نوعها خلال الشهور الستة الأخيرة، حيث استهدفت في كانون الثاني/ يناير الماضي إرسالية سلاح قرب دمشق كانت في طريقها من سورية إلى لبنان.
وأضافت أنه قبل شهرين هاجمت إسرائيل مرتين خلال أسبوع واحد إرسالية صواريخ "أرض أرض" متطورة من طراز "فاتح 110" في مطار دمشق الدولي.
إلى ذلك، قالت الشبكة الأخبارية "CNN"إن الولايات المتحدة تعتقد أن عدة إرساليات سلاح، وبضمنها ذخيرة ووسائل قتالية، قد وصلت في الأسابيع الأخيرة إلى سورية، بيد أنها أشارت إلى أنه لا يوجد أي دليل يشير إلى أن الحديث عن أسلحة ثقيلة أو مروحيات.
يذكر أن صاروخ "ياخونت" هو صاروخ مضاد للسفن، وهو قادر على ضرب أهداف بحرية على بعد 300 كيلومتر، ويحمل رأسا متفجرا يزن 250 كيلوغراما. وبحسب "هآرتس" فإن روسيا زودت سوريا، قبل سنة ونصف، ببطاريتي "ياخونت" مع 72 صاروخا، وتنوي تزويدها بأنظمة كاشوف (رادار) متطورة لرفع مستوى دقتها.
"

Friday, July 12, 2013

Sectarianism in Egypt Hits Home

I have just received a phone call that the brother of my brother-in-law was killed yesterday in El-'Arish, in north Sinai. His crime? He is a Copt!

My brother-in-law lives in Gaza with his family and has lived there for many, many years.

I read the news about a Copt who was killed in El-'Arish yesterday, but I did not realize at the time that he was a relative!

Please DO NOT TELL ME ANYMORE THAT "ISLAM IS THE ANSWER."

Tony Sayegh

Here is how his killing was reported:

Egypt: Coptic Christian priest shot dead
Father-Mina-Aboud-Sharween
"The priest, Mina Aboud Sharween, was attacked in the early afternoon while walking in the Masaeed area in El Arish.
The shooting in the coastal city was one of several attacks believed to be by Islamist insurgents that included firing at four military checkpoints in the region, the sources said.
Saturday's attacks on checkpoints took place in al-Mahajer and al-Safaa in Rafah, as well as Sheikh Zuwaid and al-Kharouba.
The violence follows attacks in which five police offers were killed in El Arish on Friday.
Mr Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood has fiercely criticised Coptic Pope Tawadros, spiritual leader of Egypt's eight million Christians, for giving his blessing to the removal of Mr Morsi and attending the announcement by armed forces commander General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi suspending the constitution." 

الرئيس محمد مرسى بين المبادرة والانقلاب العسكرى

Egypt in Turmoil, by Emad Hajjaj

Video Interview: Is the Egyptian Revolution Aborted? Interview with Hossam El-Hamalawi from Jadaliyya on Vimeo.

Egypt now needs truth, reconciliation and no rush to the ballot box

The Muslim Brotherhood thought that democracy was a winner-takes-all game – but Egypt needs politicians who build bridges


guardian.co.uk,
Worse still for the Muslim Brotherhood, the jihadi rhetoric and the violence have led to growing calls that the organisation be designated a terrorist outfit, outlawed and disbanded.
Given this language, it's hard to imagine how can Egypt re-integrate the MB into the political process – arguably one of the most difficult challenges facing the country right now.
The police have rounded up many of its leaders on charges of incitement to violence. Others are on the run. The MB has declined offers to be included in the new interim administration.
The ripples of Egypt's second upheaval are still being played out and their full impact may not be clear for some time. But one of its most important consequences has been throwing into sharp focus the question of the compatibility of Islamism and democratic values.
It has become pretty obvious to everyone that democracy for the MB means nothing more than the ballot box and winner-takes-all. That is primarily why they have failed to build bridges with the opposition and create consensus – the only way to run a divided society like Egypt.
Now, the MB has a choice to make: either do some soul-searching or continue to blame it all on foreign conspiracies and the "crusader west". The former could pave the way for compromise and power-sharing. The latter would consign it to a slow and painful death.
The MB has perfected the art of double-speak: the language of democracy and human rights to its western interlocutors, but that of jihad and xenophobia to fire up its poor masses. That too has to change if it wants people to believe its avowal to respect democratic values, and I don't see that happening any time soon.
No less important for the MB is the need to revise its founding myth (its core ideas have remained untouched since its founder Hassan Al Banna more than 80 years ago) that sharia is the panacea to the ills of society. This fallacy has been exposed and is why people quickly became disillusioned with Morsi. The poor and hungry cannot eat sharia, neither can holy books or piety alone create jobs or grow the economy. Egyptians revolted against Mubarak in January 2011 not because of a supposedly lost Muslim identity, but to demand freedom, dignity and social justice......"

Real News Video: Post-Coup Egypt Marked By Growing Rift Between Pro and Anti-Morsi Forces

Egyptian military moves against Al Jazeera media while nearly two dozen Al Jazeera journalists resign alleging network has pro-Morsi and Qatari agenda  


More at The Real News

Egypt's overthrow of Morsi creates uncertainty for Islamists everywhere

Experts warn coup could boost radicals, while some say Muslim Brotherhood's fall represents wider decline in Islamist politics

in Cairo
guardian.co.uk,

"It was a Ramadan gift with a difference: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates dipped into their oil revenues this week to stump up a cool $12bn (£8bn) to bail out cash-strapped Egypt – a swift reward for the army's removal of President Mohamed Morsi and the stunning blow to his Muslim Brotherhood.

Morsi's removal was a big moment in the unfinished story of the Egyptian revolution. But it is also posing troubling questions for Islamists elsewhere. Can they hold on to power where they have it or win it where they do not? And does the coup against the democratically elected leader of the Arab world's largest country – albeit an unpopular and incompetent one – mean that others will shun the ballot box and turn to violence?

Egypt's Brotherhood is calling it a "naksa" (setback in Arabic). "It is like 9/11 in its magnitude," argues the independent Saudi historian Madawi al-Rasheed. "The Muslim Brothers managed to repackage themselves as moderate Islamists. Hopes were raised after the 2011 uprisings and now they are back at square one."

Syria's president, Bashar al-Assad, keen to portray his enemies as jihadi fanatics, went so far as to hail the "fall of political Islam" when Morsi was deposed. That put Assad in rare agreement with Saudi Arabia, which is backing the rebels who are fighting to overthrow him. Turkey and Tunisia, where Islamist parties rule, both condemned the Cairo coup. So did Iran........."

New front opens in Syria as rebels say al Qaeda attack means war

COMMENT

Right on schedule, this phase is proceeding according to USraeli plans. The FSA is now expected to play the role of the US-created "Sahwa" forces in Iraq.

All of the USraeli objectives are being accomplished in Syria: Aggregation of "militant" Muslim fighters in one place for easy destruction; the conversion of the FSA to a "Sahwa" force; drawing in Hizbullah to scatter its forces and to weaken it; spread and intensification of sectarianism; Syrians killing each other and finally the destruction of the Syrian state.

Pity the Syrian people!
Free Syrian Army fighters carry their weapons as they prepare themselves prior to an offensive against forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Deir al-Zor July 11, 2013. REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
"(Reuters) - The assassination of a top Free Syrian Army commander by militants linked to al Qaeda is tantamount to a declaration of war, FSA rebels on Friday, opening a new front between Western-backed forces and Islamists in Syria's civil war.
The announcement is the latest sign of disarray in the armed opposition to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who has regained the upper hand more than two years into an insurgency that grew out of Arab Spring-inspired pro-democracy protests.
It follows growing rivalries between the FSA and the Islamists, who have sometimes joined forces on the battlefield, and coincides with attempts by the Western and Arab-backed FSA to allay fears any U.S.-supplied arms might reach al Qaeda.
Members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a hardline Islamist group, killed Kamal Hamami of the FSA Supreme Military Council on Thursday. Also known by his nom de guerre, Abu Bassir al-Ladkani, he is one of its top 30 figures.
Rebel commanders pledged to retaliate.
"We are going to wipe the floor with them. We will not let them get away with it because they want to target us," a senior rebel commander said on condition of anonymity......."

Demonising the opposition

Why the UAE needs foreign foes

By Brian Whitaker

"Delighted at the overthrow of President Morsi, several Gulf monarchies have been swift to offer aid to Egypt. Saudi Arabia has pledged $5 billion, Kuwait $4 billion and the United Arab Emirates $3 billion.
Clearly, there is more to this than a simple desire to help Egypt through its economic crisis, and the UAE's involvement is a particularly interesting example.

Last week, just a day before Morsi's ousting, verdicts were announced in the "UAE 94" case – a mass trial of Emirati activists which has been condemned by human rights organisations as fundamentally unfair. Of the 94 accused, 69 were given jail sentences of between seven and 15 years, while 25 others were acquitted. Many – but by no means all – of them are members of al-Islah, a local Islamic movement which the authorities have been eager to link to the Muslim Brotherhood.
The timing of these verdicts was probably no coincidence......

Davidson, author of After the Sheikhs: The Coming Collapse of the Gulf Monarchies, said the "UAE 94" trial provides a useful example of how these monarchies deal with opposition. He continued:
We have seen many different opposition groups over the years. These have been dealt with in different ways but one particularly effective strategy has been demonisation – essentially trying to make any opponents in your kingdom, sultanate or emirate part of a distinct "other" that the rest of your population will hopefully bandwagon against, to help the ruling elite and the regime ostracise them. 
When we look at the Gulf states they have tended to pick upon what's likely to be the most effective demon to get the bulk of their population on board and connect that opposition to some kind of external threat – the threat that's likely to alarm the west most at that time. 
It's why most opposition groups back in the 1960s and 1970s were described as Communist in the context of the Cold War. We also had the Arab nationalist threat – all these Arab schoolteachers and doctors working in the Gulf who were linked to the revolutionary movements elsewhere in the Arab world, and Gulf rulers were very uncomfortable about this. 
For example, after the Suez crisis, according to [British] Foreign Office archives, we even had Sheikh Zayed, the first president of the UAE, remarking to British political agents: "Why didn't you do to Nasser what the Russians have done to Budapest?" That was the level of antagonism they were hoping to generate. 
More recently, of course, we've seen political Islam and in particular militant political Islam, terror linked to al-Qaeda, becoming the obvious demon to create, connecting domestic opponents including human rights activists, intellectuals and academics to supposed terror organisations. We've seen this particularly in Saudi Arabia. We've also seen it in the UAE. For example, a number of people who were part of the UAE 94 were actually accused back in 2009 of being part of a terror cell to bring down the Burj Khalifa tower in Dubai.
We've also seen the Shia fifth columns, especially in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia being used very effectively to demonise opposition and generate links with Iran. 
Since the Arab Spring began these opposition containment strategies have had to be ratcheted up a few notches because the Gulf monarchies all face a range of increasing pressures. Of course their own populations are very much experiencing a demonstration effect from the rest of the Arab world, with people rising up against autocratic systems. This is coupled in something of a perfect storm with the declining ability of all six of the Gulf monarchies – or at least five of them – to keep up their wealth distribution strategies and the allocative state that has historically formed their social contract with the bulk of their citizens.
We've also seen the Gulf states being impacted very heavily by modernising forces such as communications, social media and so on, and other tools of protest that have proved effective in the Arab world. 
The other thing that has caused increasing discomfort and more alarm over opposition groups in the Gulf is the clear leadership deficit now – we have many aged rulers who seem to be disconnected with their youthful populations and seem over the last 18 months at least to have more or less chosen the wrong path at every turn.
As for the demonisation strategies they have been using right now, obviously in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain the Shia populations have borne the brunt of this – it is the most effective way of convincing the US that the ruling families of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain are very much on the west's side.
In the UAE it has been much trickier. The Shia population, although fairly substantial in the emirate of Dubai, has historically been very well integrated into the ruling establishment – in particular the merchant population in Dubai. As with Kuwait, we have seen the Shia form something of a loyalist backbone here, so the UAE has had to look a bit further, perhaps for something less plausible to link their opposition to. Al-Qaeda of course remains a good one. We still see people being arrested on security warrants, which is very effective. We have also seen this link to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. 
In fact the opposition in the UAE goes back quite far in time. I first became interested in it several years ago when the internet started to be used much more for debate by oppositionists. 
There was a website created – UAE Hiwar – a few years ago. Many Emiratis were using that to criticise the leadership, talk about the ruling family, talk about the lack of rule of law, and so on. It reached fever pitch early in 2010 when there was a very controversial trial of a member of the ruling family, Sheikh Issa, who ended up being acquitted. The website was shut down shortly after, probably as a result of that.
A lot of the discussion, as with al-Islah and the "UAE 94", was not about overthrow of the ruling family. It was about making the UAU honour sections of its constitution – that the UAE should be moving forward in an evolutionary manner towards a multi-party elected democracy. 
This is why the minister of state for foreign affairs is also breaking the UAE's constitution ... he has made it quite clear that he does not believe the UAE should be a democracy and that it's a different kind of political system rooted in various eastern ways connected to tribe, religion and tradition. But that's not what the UAE constitution says.
In 2011 we saw a cross-section being arrested. We saw the UAE Five (not members of al-Islah per se), we saw a noted economist, we saw a blogger, etc -- essentially a cross-section of the population which the leadership expected would be enough to create a sufficient red line to put off other UAE nationals from discussing these topics more. 
Then, in 2012, we had this massive crackdown. This was very much linked to the indigenous al-Islah organisation which has its origins all the way back in the early 1970s and was even sponsored by a member of the Dubai ruling family at that time and then also Ras al-Khaimah's ruling family. What we've seen with al-Islah is that the entire opposition in the UAE which actually has many shades and colours is being lumped together with al-Islah.
We are supposed to be making this explicit link with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt which is tenuous at best. 
This is very difficult to portray as just a single episode, as something the UAE can write a line under. Far from it, it seems to be just the beginning. Although conditions in the UAE are incomparable to the large chunks of poverty-stricken Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain, etc, nonetheless we have a significant wealth gap. If one were to do a good empirical study of the UAE's economy we'd find the five poorest emirates now contribute less to the UAE's GDP than they did in 1971.
Something's going badly wrong. There's a wealth gap, a corruption problem. We also have different strands of opposition emerging beyond political Islam, beyond the liberals in 2011. 
We even have senior members, including ruling family members, including members of the old Zayed administration who are now beginning to write letters to opinion-makers in the west (I have seen some of these myself). These are major figures often, who served in key roles in the Zayed administration up to 2004 and have very serious misgivings over the direction the UAE has been taking."

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Interview: The Arab world has harbored fantasies about the supernatural power of the United States

Mohammed Attar Interviews Noam Chomsky

July 11, 2013

"During his recent visit to Beirut, American thinker and philosopher Noam Chomsky met with a group of independent Syrian media activists, aid workers and individuals active in cultural and economic spheres. Chomsky had made it clear that he had come to listen to them; to lend an ear to their different views on the current situation in Syria.

Following the meeting I had the honour of holding an interview with him. At the outset of our discussion I stated that my motivation in talking with him was to encourage him to open up to Syrians, to address them directly with his evaluation of the situation in their country, following a series of interviews with Lebanese newspapers in which he had approached the subject through the filter of the papers’ own priorities and political biases. However Chomsky, now in his eighties, gently insisted that he was here to acquaint himself with the issue up close, rather than to offer fully formed conclusions of his own.

The discussion ranged over positions that Chomsky has subscribed to in previous interviews concerning his view of the complex situation in Syria, Hezbollah’s involvement, the American and Israeli stances towards revolutionary Syria and other related issues......
.....
In your view, what is Israel’s true position regarding the Syrian revolution?

Israel has done nothing to indicate that it is trying to bring down the Assad regime. There are growing claims that the West intends to supply the opposition with arms. I believe this is quite misleading. The fact of the matter is, that were the United States and Israel interested in bringing down the Syrian regime there is a whole package of measures they could take before they came to the arms-supply option. All these other options remain available, including, for example, America encouraging Israel to mobilize its forces along the northern border, a move that would not produce any objections from the international community and which would compel the regime to withdraw its forces from a number of front line positions and relieve the pressure on the opposition. But this has not happened, nor will it, so long as America and Israel remain unwilling to bring down Assad regime. They may not like the regime, but it is nevertheless a regime that is well practiced in accommodating their demands and any unknown alternative might prove worse in this respect. Much better, then, to watch the Syrians fight and destroy each other.
....
....."

Al-Jazeera Video: Israeli soldiers detain little boy


"New pictures have emerged in the Occupied West Bank of Israeli soldiers detaining a 5-year-old boy for throwing a stone. According to human rights groups, it is the latest in a number of similar detentions. Al Jazeera's Simon McGregor-Wood reports from occupied West Bank."

In Egypt, Barack Obama's approach is like that of a spread better

Forget human rights. F-14 jets and $1.5bn in military aid to Egypt show duplicity, not democracy, defines US policy


The Guardian,

".....Now Muslim Brotherhood supporters are being killed, arrested or muzzled; the former president is detained; and the army has issued an arrest warrant for the Brotherhood's spiritual leader. The US has cautioned the army about respecting the rights of Morsi supporters – but it won't side more strongly with them because it isn't clear, yet, if they are needed to maintain US concerns: the army and opposition may be able to forge ahead without the Brotherhood; they may not. For the US, it's best to stay vague. This is why, preposterously, America is able to confirm plans to send four shiny F-16 fighter jets to Egyptian military on Thursday, while still talking democracy and inclusion for Egypt's transitional process.

None of this will be of any great surprise to Egyptians who, as in other parts of the Arab and Muslim world, are used to this duplicity and double standards (Palestinians, for instance, know this script by heart). All that fine talk in Cairo in 2009 may have hit all our happy notes, but now in Cairo and across the Middle East, when the US administration reiterates its hopes for strong democracy in the region, it is beyond implausible – it is insulting."

Sudden Improvements in Egypt Suggest a Campaign to Undermine Morsi



CAIRO — The streets seethe with protests and government ministers are on the run or in jail, but since the military ousted President Mohamed Morsi, life has somehow gotten better for many people across Egypt: Gas lines have disappeared, power cuts have stopped and the police have returned to the street.

The apparently miraculous end to the crippling energy shortages, and the re-emergence of the police, seems to show that the legions of personnel left in place after former President Hosni Mubarak was ousted in 2011 played a significant role — intentionally or not — in undermining the overall quality of life under the Islamist administration of Mr. Morsi.
And as the interim government struggles to unite a divided nation, the Muslim Brotherhood and Mr. Morsi’s supporters say the sudden turnaround proves that their opponents conspired to make Mr. Morsi fail. Not only did police officers seem to disappear, but the state agencies responsible for providing electricity and ensuring gas supplies failed so fundamentally that gas lines and rolling blackouts fed widespread anger and frustration.
“This was preparing for the coup,” said Naser el-Farash, who served as the spokesman for the Ministry of Supply and Internal Trade under Mr. Morsi. “Different circles in the state, from the storage facilities to the cars that transport petrol products to the gas stations, all participated in creating the crisis.”
Working behind the scenes, members of the old establishment, some of them close to Mr. Mubarak and the country’s top generals, also helped finance, advise and organize those determined to topple the Islamist leadership, including Naguib Sawiris, a billionaire and an outspoken foe of the Brotherhood; Tahani el-Gebali, a former judge on the Supreme Constitutional Court who is close to the ruling generals; and Shawki al-Sayed, a legal adviser to Ahmed Shafik, Mr. Mubarak’s last prime minister, who lost the presidential race to Mr. Morsi.
But it is the police returning to the streets that offers the most blatant sign that the institutions once loyal to Mr. Mubarak held back while Mr. Morsi was in power. Throughout his one-year tenure, Mr. Morsi struggled to appease the police, even alienating his own supporters rather than trying to overhaul the Interior Ministry. But as crime increased and traffic clogged roads — undermining not only the quality of life, but the economy — the police refused to deploy fully.

Video: قائد شرطة دبي: إسرائيل ليست عدوة العرب،عدونا هم الإخوان المسلمون !

Al-Jazeera Video: Press freedom plummets in Egypt after coup

Scenes of Chaos in Egypt

Deadly clashes shock a nation fresh off the heels of a military coup


".......Regardless of how the incident started, it ended in a bloodbath. At least fifty-one Morsi supporters were killed, almost all hit by gunfire, and over 400 wounded, according to the Health Ministry, making it the single deadliest day of state violence since the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak. Dr. Kamal Nady, a doctor at a field hospital the morning of the attack, said most of the wounds were to the head and chest. “They were intending to kill,” he says.

The violence has damaged the political climate (which was already polarized) beyond repair—at least in the near term—and has alienated the Brotherhood even further, severely dimming the prospect of any kind of inclusive and consensual transitional process.
“I never expected the army could do this, but now my view of them has changed, there is blood between us,” says Zakaria. “I will bury my brother and return to the sit-in.”

Fifteen local human rights groups strongly condemned the “excessive use of force by army and security forces” in a joint statement. Security forces said one soldier and two policemen were also killed.

State television and anti-Brotherhood private channels faithfully parroted the army’s claims, repeatedly airing footage of Morsi’s supporters attacking the military, referring to them as terrorists, and neglecting to show scenes of the dozens of casualties......"

Who really decides in revolutionary Egypt?

Political forces and the media search for power brokers and behind-the-scenes manoeuvres, forgetting that the masses in the street are deciding their own history

Wael Gamal , Thursday 11 Jul 2013
Ahram Online

".....
No one has control over the millions who took to the streets on 30 June and who called for protest again on Sunday, 7July. While they welcomed intervention from above to support their demand of ousting Morsi, they will never allow another despotic regime to come to power. Their top demand is early elections, and more importantly their criteria are direct conciliation. On both issues, it appears the new ruling alliance, even after it settles its ranks, will not be able to meet the aspirations of the masses that are becoming increasingly vibrant and politicised.

The serious confusion about choosing the new prime minister indicates how chaotic the new alliance is, without any of its members having the upper hand in a fragile balance of power. Meanwhile, there is the omnipresent US requisite to adopt the IMF loan as a precondition for US political and Gulf economic support. This means continuing the same austerity policies, taxing the poor, and devaluation of the pound (which raises prices).

These are the same measures the Muslim Brotherhood tried to apply unsuccessfully, and that caused the masses to take to the streets to begin with. The new alliance, like its predecessor, relies on security institutions and is too weak to maintain a strong suppressive grip on unruly streets.

The revolutionary condition continues, and the final word remains with the street. Now do you know who really decides policies in Egypt?"

Al-Jazeera Cartoon

كاريكاتير: انقلاب عسكري

Learning How to Pray Early

A child is seen near members of the Muslim community attending midday prayers at Strasbourg Grand Mosque in Strasbourg on the first day of Ramadan July 9, 2013. The Grand Mosque of Paris has fixed the first day of Ramadan as Wednesday, splitting with the French Council of Muslim Religion (Conseil Francais du Culte Musulman or CFCM), which determined it would begin on Tuesday.  REUTERS/Vincent Kessler

(Reuters) From the Grand Mosque in Strasbourg.

It Looks Like Abdel-Bari Atwan Was Finally Bought Off!


لندن ـ ‘القدس العربي’: تتوجه اسرة ‘القدس العربي’ بجزيل الشكر الى قرائها الاعزاء على اهتمامهم البالغ ومشاعرهم النبيلة، ورسائلهم واتصالاتهم التي انهمرت على مقر الجريدة وموقعها في الانترنت منذ نشر خبر استقالة رئيس تحريرها السابق الاستاذ عبد الباري عطوان.
واذ تشعر اسرة الجريدة بالكثير من العرفان والتقدير امام هذا الموقف النبيل، واذ تتذكر الرحلة الصعبة التي خاضتها بقيادة الاستاذ عبد الباري طوال نحو ربع قرن فإنها لا تملك الا ان تؤكد بقاءها على العهد، وانها ستواصل كفاحها للحفاظ على الاستقلال والمهنية، والدفاع بأي ثمن عن حق القارئ في معرفة الحقيقة، والالتزام بحرية التعبير والاختلاف الموضوعي في زمن يتعمق فيه الاستقطاب.
وتنتهز الفرصة لنفي الشائعات والتكهنات والاسماء التي تم تداولها على الانترنت بشأن قيام حكومة بلد عربي بشراء الجريدة او مقاضاتها، وتسمية رئيس التحرير الجديد. كما تشير الى ان التقارير التي ربطت الاستقالة بـ’تهديدات بالقتل’ انما جاءت نتيجة سوء فهم، حيث ان الاستاذ عبد الباري كان يشير في مقاله الى تهديدات تلقاها قبل سنوات بعيدة لكن لم تثنه عن المضي في رحلته.
وتوضح ان الاستقالة جاءت نتيجة تقدم مستثمرين عرب لمساعدة الجريدة على تخطي تعثرها المالي والاستمرار في الصدور، وفضلوا ان تتولى ادارة تحرير جديدة مهمة الاشراف والتطوير في المرحلة المقبلة

"

Egypt condemns Iranian 'interference' after army ousts Mursi


"(Reuters) - Egypt accused Iran on Thursday of "unacceptable interference" in its domestic affairs for having criticized the Egyptian army's removal of elected president Mohamed Mursi last week.
The incident signaled a return to cooler relations between the two Middle Eastern powers after an attempt at rapprochement under Mursi, who hails from the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.
Iran on Monday called the ousting of Mursi after mass protests against him a "cause for concern" and suggested that "foreign hands" were at work in the Arab state.
Egypt shot back on Thursday, expressing "extreme discontent" with the Islamic Republic's comments and saying they reflected a "lack of precise knowledge of the nature of the democratic developments Egypt is witnessing".
"This represents unacceptable interference in Egypt's internal affairs," the foreign ministry said in a statement on its Facebook page. Egypt made similar remarks to Turkey after its Islamist-rooted government criticized Mursi's ouster.
Western states have been cautious so far in characterizing the military overthrow of Mursi. Washington has specifically avoided referring to it as a "coup", a word that would force it to halt aid including $1.3 billion per year for the army.
Relations between Egypt and Iran broke down after the 1979 Iranian revolution, when Egypt gave sanctuary to the deposed shah. Many Egyptians harbor strong feelings against Iran.
Mursi tried to improve ties after he was elected in 2012. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Cairo in February, the first visit by an Iranian leader in more than three decades.
But the two countries remained sharply divided on Syria. Shi'ite Muslim Iran is the main backer of President Bashar al-Assad while Mursi, often under pressure from hardline Sunni Muslim allies, backed Syria's largely Sunni rebels.
Egypt historically has much stronger ties to Gulf Arab states who have vied with Iran for regional influence. Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates provided Cairo's cash-strapped government $12 billion in aid this week."

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

The Egyptian army and Palestinian Authority join forces to punish Gaza

 link


Now that the Egyptian army and security services have seized power from the elected Muslim Brotherhood government, the punishment of Palestinians has begun in earnest. While Palestinians are detained or deported en masse at Cairo International Airport, hundreds have been stranded at the Rafah Crossing, which was recently closed by the Egyptian army, compounding a deepening fuel and food crisis.
Incitement against Palestinians peaked after the election of the Freedom and Justice Party’s Mohamed Morsi as President, with liberal politicians and media figures from the opposition exploiting the Morsi-led government’s perceived alliance with Hamas to hold him responsible for acts of terror committed in the Sinai Peninsula.
Since the army ousted Morsi, almost all Palestinians who have arrived at Cairo International Airport have been deported or detained. Among those sent home simply for possessing a Palestinian ID was Yousef Aljamal, a writer and activist who has contributed to Mondoweiss and The Electronic Intifada. According to Ali Abunimah, who first publicized Aljamal’s deportation, Aljamal was on his way home to Gaza from New Zealand, where he had participated in the Conference on Palestine in Auckland. When Aljamal arrived in Cairo with a visa he received from the Egyptian embassy in Kuala Lumpur, he was immediately sent back to Malaysia.
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights reported that since the Egyptian coup, “hundreds of Palestinians, including dozens of patients, Palestinian families living in other countries and university students who study abroad, have been stuck in Egypt waiting to be allowed to travel back to the Gaza Strip."
In recent days, Egyptian forces have destroyed at least 40 tunnels connecting Egypt and Gaza, intensifying operations that began under the watch of Morsi, whose government worked closely with US and Israeli military officials. With Gaza unable to import basic goods and gas from Egypt, its only alternative is to turn to Israel, whose suppliers rake in profits by charging exorbitant rates to a literally captive market.
Israeli officials have reacted to the scenario with undisguised glee, with Tzachi Hanegbi, a close Netanyahu ally, declaring, “the return to prominence of the [Egyptian] army and a secular authority capable of ensuring the stability of the country is good news for Israel.”

"New" Egypt: "Secular" Talk show host threatens Syrian refugees



COMMENT BY TONY SAYEGH

Disgusting and chauvinistic comment. It makes no distinction between Syrian Muslim Brothers who MIGHT stir trouble and the majority of Syrians fleeing to escape torture, imprisonment and death.

Both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have urged Egypt not to deport Syrians seeking political asylum.


On Tv should apologize for this terrible, terrible comment. It does not speak well of this channel or the Egyptian media in general at this critical stage when factual information, not hysterical comments, should be provided. 

Divine rights

The problem of democracy and Egypt's Islamists

By Brian Whitaker

"The overthrow of President Morsi has prompted new debate about the future of Islamist movements in Egypt and beyond. To some, it signals the beginning of the end for political Islam. Writing in the London Review of Books, for instance, Hazem Kandil suggeststhe country that invented Islamism may well be on its way to undoing the spell”.

In the long run such predictions may prove correct but we are not there yet. What can be safely said, though, is that at present the wind is not blowing the Islamists' way
Despite some electoral successes since the outbreak of the Arab Spring, Islamist movements are now clearly on the defensive – and not just because of their confrontation with the military in Egypt. Arab (and Muslim) opponents of Islamism, whose voices were often marginalised in the past, are speaking out as never before.
In Egypt, Kandil suggests, the Muslim Brotherhood deluded itself about its popularity and is probably continuing to do so.....

Whatever disappointment the Brothers felt over their parliamentary result was quickly overtaken by hubris when Mohamed Morsi passed the magical 50% mark in the run-off of last year’s presidential election. Unfortunately, they seem to have interpreted this as a sign of their own popularity rather than a sign of his opponent’s unpopularity among voters who would not normally support the Brotherhood....

Even so, there are fundamental questions about how far a reconciliation process can go unless the Brotherhood (and the Salafis too) change their approach towards working in a democracy. They are happy to accept electoral politics but still tend to view it as a tool for gaining power rather than a means for determining and implementing the will of the people......

Root of the problem

One of the basic requirements for freedom in politics is that sovereignty belongs to the people. Power may be delegated to representatives but the people should remain the ultimate arbiters. Islamists, no matter how they try to dress up their ideology, do not accept this key point. Islamism, by definition, seeks to apply “Islamic” principles to the state......

In practice, the Brotherhood has distanced itself from its famous slogans that “Islam is the solution” and “The Qur’an is our constitution” but the underlying problem is still the same: an anti-libertarian assumption that linking the state with religion is both legitimate and necessary. Not only that, but religion claims the right, at least in some circumstances, to over-ride the will of the people....."

Egypt: Do Not Return Asylum Seekers to Syria

Syrians Summarily Returned; Registered Asylum Seekers Denied Reentry

July 10, 2013

"(New York) – Egypt should allow those fleeing Syria full access to the UN refugee agency to have their asylum claims properly examined, and should also allow Syrians already registered with the UN body to reenter the country after periods abroad, Human Rights Watch said today.

Without prior warning, on July 8, the Egyptian government changed its entry policy for Syrians arriving in Egypt by requiring them to obtain a visa and security clearance before arriving in the country. According to media reports, on the same day Egypt denied entry to 276 people arriving from Syria, including a plane with Syrian nationals on board, who were then flown back to the Syrian town of Latakia. The new policy has also left several Syrians stranded in Alexandria’s international airport, including at least three people already registered as asylum seekers with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Egypt, who say the authorities plan to return them to the countries from which they arrived.

Egypt may be going through tumultuous times, but it must not return anyone, including Syrians, to somewhere threatening their life or freedom,” said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “While the Egyptian government can require foreign nationals to obtain visas before arriving in Egypt, it must properly protect them. Egypt should continue to allow those fleeing from Syria to lodge asylum claims with UNHCR and receive protection.”......"

Egypt turns away Syrians



10 July 2013

"The Egyptian authorities should not recklessly deny entry to Syrians and must provide anyone fleeing the conflict the opportunity to seek asylum, Amnesty International said today after reports that some 259 people were turned back at Cairo Airport on Monday.

“Given the scale of violence, bloodshed and human rights abuses currently taking place in Syria, it is unthinkable that Egypt should deny Syrians fleeing for their lives safety," said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui , Deputy Director of Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa programme.
Syrian nationals arriving on Monday were denied entry to Egypt on the grounds that the passengers had not obtained the newly required visas or security permits. Previously, Syrian nationals did not require visas to enter Egypt.

While the Egyptian authorities can regulate entry to and stay in Egypt, they must do so in full respect of their international human rights and refugee law obligations.

Those sent back include: 95 passengers on a Syrian Airlines flight to Latakia, in Syria; 55 flew MEA back to Beirut; some 25 to Jordan, and six to Abu Dhabi.

Amnesty International understands that UNHCR did not have access to any of them at Cairo airport and it is not known what has happened to those returned to Syria.
Three other Syrians are also being held in limbo at Alexandria Airport, after they were denied re-entrance to Egypt despite having registered in the country with the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR....."

Morsi

By Clay Bennett

Treatment of Palestinians is apartheid by any other name

By Jonathan Cook
The National

".........The Prawer plan, which passed its first reading in parliament last month, will force 40,000 Bedouin off their land - the largest expulsions inside Israel for decades. Unlike Jewish citizens, they will have no say over where they live; they will be forcibly assigned to a township.

For the first time, Israeli citizens - the Bedouin - are to be deprived of any recourse to the courts as they are harried from their homes. Instead Israel will resort to administrative procedures more familiar from the occupied territories.

The policy is clear: Palestinians on both sides of the Green Line are to be treated like sheep, fenced into ever-smaller areas, while Jews will have unrestrained access to a Greater Israel envisioned by Mr Netanyahu. The international community has long criticised Israel for the "discrimination" its Palestinian citizens face and for the "oppression" of Palestinians under occupation. This terminology needs overhauling too, say the human rights lawyers.

A system that treats one ethnic group as less human than another already has a legal name: it is called apartheid."

Arabs watch the grand stage in Egypt


".......I am awed by Egypt and the Egyptians, who persevere in achieving on their great public stage that which no Arab country has ever achieved: citizens who define their state, their national values, their rights, and their governance system, in a political process of national self-determination that also will see them ultimately as sovereign. They quarrel and negotiate, bluff and boycott, dare and jab, spend hours in meetings and negotiations, and only occasionally shoot to kill. They mostly move ahead, but sometimes also sideways and backward.

New actors regularly take the stage, and are either validated or repudiated by the only force that matters: the will of the citizenry. That will is now being negotiated and defined in multiple acts on that great Egyptian stage, in competing public squares in the street, in media outlets, in the constitutional revision process that will start again soon, and finally in new elections for the presidency and the parliament. They forge ahead, undeterred by their own turbulence and self-inflicted traumas, keeping their eye on the great prize of constitutionalism, citizenship and sovereignty.

I stand in awe of Egypt and the Egyptians, humbled and buoyed by their quest to create the first modern Arab country that makes sense, because it is the result of the handiwork of its own citizens."

With Deadly Crackdown, Is Egypt’s Military Repeating Same Mistakes of Post-Mubarak Transition?

Democracy Now!

EXCELLENT REPORT!


"The standoff between Egypt’s interim government and the Muslim Brotherhood party it replaced in power continues to widen. Egypt’s top prosecutor has ordered the arrest of Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie and other top officials on charges of inciting the violence that ended in the army’s fatal shootings of at least 51 supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi and the wounding of hundreds more. The charges come one day after the Muslim Brotherhood rejected a role in Egypt’s interim cabinet, which now includes former finance minister Hazem el-Beblawi as interim prime minister and Nobel Peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei as vice president. We’re joined from Cairo by Democracy Now! correspondent Sharif Abdel Kouddous. “Many critics say that this is repeating a lot of the same mistakes from the first army led transition following Mubarak’s ouster: It was drawn up by an anonymous committee without any input from the main opposition groups that were calling for Morsi’s ouster, including the national salvation front, including the youth led group Tamarod, who have voiced criticism for not being consulted in this process,” Kouddous says. “It’s a bare bones document that outlines the bare necessities but given that it makes very clear that it shields the military from civilian oversights.”......."

Real News Video: On Shifting Ground: Tensions High As Egypt Names New PM

TRNN Cairo correspondent Jihan Hafiz describes tense mood in Egypt after massacre, excessive force by military leaves many in denial of army's past human rights record

More at The Real News

Egypt's free-falling Muslim Brotherhood loses zero-sum game

The influential Muslim Brotherhood has lost its first genuine test after coming above ground. Now the group faces an uphill struggle to stay afloat after its rapid fall from grace

Hatem Maher, Wednesday 10 Jul 2013
Ahram Online
Muslim Brotherhood
An Egyptian protester looks at the damaged Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in the Muqatam district in eastern Cairo (Photo: AP)

"Hassan El-Banna, whose religious zeal and activism spurred him to establish the Muslim Brotherhood more than eight decades ago, is said to have regretted in the twilight of his rich life the group's deviation from its original course by mixing religion with politics.


However, the powerful, as-old-as-the-hills group still managed to come through a host of political struggles unscathed, leaving an indelible mark on the modern history of a country ruled by an iron fist for hundreds of years.
More than 80 years on, the shadow of El-Banna's regret might be hanging over one of his ideological descendants – Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie.
The Brotherhood's detractors believe the group got politics into a real mess when it finally reached the pinnacle of power, having been forced underground after being subject to oppressive tactics for decades, first by King Farouk – the last monarch of Mohamed Ali's dynasty – and then by three military autocrats.
The ouster of Mohamed Morsi – Egypt's first-ever freely-elected president, who hails from the Brotherhood – is a natural outcome of the group's disastrous performance in the first year of what should have been a four-year tenure in office, if not eight, critics argue.
"The Brotherhood's main problem was that they still played the victim role after assuming control of the country. When they took charge, they could not change that mindset," professor Khaled Fahmy, who chairs the history department at the American University in Cairo, told Ahram Online.
"They could not build any bridges of cooperation and co-existence with either fellow Islamist factions or non-Islamist ones. They had suspicions about whoever objected to their policies," Fahmy said.

Brotherhood hawks

The Brotherhood's rigidness, which saw them renege on a handful of promises made to the opposition when Morsi beat off former Mubarak-era minister Ahmed Shafiq to become Egypt's first freely-elected leader last year, is partly due to an old-school mindset embraced by the group's influential leaders.
The Brotherhood's big guns are followers of Sayed Qutb, the group's late leader who was executed in 1966 after being accused of plotting to overthrow the regime of former president Gamal Abdel-Nasser, who cracked down on Islamists during his tenure.
Qutb was accused by critics of endorsing hard-line views about the necessity of adopting Islamic Sharia Law and advocating resistance against "infidel governments."
More moderate figures in the current hierarchy were opposed by the conservatives, better known as the "Qutbis," a battle that led to the resignation of two leading figures before Morsi's election: former deputy supreme guide Mohamed Habib and Abdel-Moneim Abul-Fotouh, who had been a member of the powerful Guidance Bureau.
The duo's departure gave Badie and his mates free rein to implement their unyielding ideologies, which incurred the wrath of the opposition only a few months after Morsi was propelled to power.
"The Brotherhood sometimes underestimated the opposition and sometimes made light of it. They had the illusion of conspiracies being hatched against them," Fahmy added.
"The political landscape changed hugely after the 2011 January revolution, and the Brotherhood should have been aware of that. They should have cooperated with other factions; that was the only way for them to appease the growing anger against their rule," he said.
"Instead, Morsi acted as if he was the leader of the Brotherhood, not the leader of Egypt, only following the advices of the Guidance Bureau – the group's hawks who follow the Qutb school. Morsi himself was one of the hawks; he was the one who expelled Abul-Fotouh from the Guidance Bureau," Fahmy said.
Opponents of Morsi were enraged after the president declined to fulfil pledges made during what was widely known as the "Fairmont meeting" shortly after he was elected, including the formation of a national salvation government.
A decree Morsi issued in November last year, which shielded his decisions from judicial review, further stoked tensions and sparked unprecedented clashes between the president's supporters and opponents.
Political activists took to the streets on several occasions to object to what they perceived as Morsi's authoritarianism, and they were eventually joined by many ordinary Egyptians frustrated with ongoing economic hardship.
The Egyptian army subsequently intervened to overthrow Morsi, saying it had to bow to "the will of people." But that was not the only reason, argue critics.

No love lost

Some state institutions, mainly Egypt's notorious police, were the powerful tool that Hosni Mubarak used for three decades to keep the Brotherhood at bay, imprisoning most of their outspoken leaders and harassing their candidates on the eve of every parliamentary poll.
There was no apparent direct confrontation between the military establishment and the Brotherhood, but Islamists still complained they had no right to study in army faculties.
Morsi's bold move to dismiss former defence minister Hussein Tantawi, who was Egypt's de facto ruler during a tumultuous transition to democracy, and bring in Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi as a replacement less than two months after assuming office, was hailed by Brotherhood supporters as a giant stride towards asserting civilian control over a semi-autonomous army.
But that was not exactly the case.
A relative honeymoon came to a premature end last month when Morsi, a staunch supporter of the uprising against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, decided to sever Egypt's relations with Syria without first consulting El-Sisi, according to veteran Egyptian journalist Mohamed Hassanein Heikal.
"On the day of that Syrian conference [15 June], Morsi phoned El-Sisi to inform him that he had taken a decision to sever ties with Syria," Heikal, who had been in regular contact with El-Sisi in the run-up to Morsi's ouster, said in a televised interview.
"El-Sisi told him that such a decision would not make any difference in the complicated situation there [in Syria], stressing the importance of maintaining relations. But Morsi told him he had already made up his mind, and that he only wanted to inform El-Sisi," Heikal said.
With no love lost between the police and army on one hand and the Brotherhood on the other, calls for protests against Morsi – just as he was due to complete his first year in office – gave the security establishments a golden opportunity to become a thorn in the decaying Brotherhood.
"Rather than Morsi taking over the state, state institutions remained fairly autonomous and effectively ejected him," wrote Shadi Hamid, a director of research at the Brookings Doha Centre.
"Morsi was incompetent; stuck in a bubble, but strength of the 'state' poses questions regarding whether any government can pursue real institutional reform," said Hamid.

Existential challenge

Whether or not the Brotherhood can regroup and re-enter the political fray remains to be seen, but their relentlessness vis-à-vis an equally determined army could backfire at a time when it provoked an unprecedented outpouring of anger among millions of Egyptians.
An open-ended sit-in in a Cairo suburb combined with recurring street battles between Brotherhood supporters and opponents, which has left more than 100 dead since 30 June, suggest that the group is not willing to give in anytime soon.
A bloody confrontation between the army and pro-Morsi protesters near the Republican Guard compound in Cairo left at least 50 dead on Monday, raising the spectre of a wider conflict in a country struggling to restore order.

The authorities, for their part, have moved to arrest some influential Brotherhood leaders, including Deputy Supreme Guide Khairat El-Shater and Saad El-Katatni, head of the group's political arm.
"The Brotherhood is facing a serious existential challenge," Fahmy said. "They can either adopt a critical attitude and ask themselves what went wrong, or blame other political forces and the whole democratic system for their own shortcomings.""