Some Angry Arab Opinions

9 Comments

1. 

   Oui on February 3, 2011 at 7:04 am

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   ElBaradei 2011 – To the people of Egypt …

       Was not a surprise move the people of Egypt believed each of the greatness of this people .. After some tried to question the ability to revolt in the face of injustice and corruption .. However, it is known as the people of Egypt the right to knowledge is well aware that it might be a long patience, but it may decide to move will not stop force on earth .. The outrage yesterday a microcosm of what could be the next Gillat .. The wheel of change had taken place already, and will not stop before it achieved the desired objective.

       With our belief that revolutions do not happen overnight, and that victory is still a long way .. However, the sons and daughters of Egypt who came out yesterday, declaring impatience on the system of corruption and tyranny, they assert that a bright dawn is about to brighten the sky and in our country.

       Has proven to be attended by our treasures and went out in demonstrations of tens of thousands of popular areas in different provinces, but they could not paste it charge chaos or sabotage. Gillth came in the best picture of progress and civilization.

      God bless the martyrs of the nation in the cities of Egypt, the valiant, who Naahidhm that their blood will not go in vain, and our prayers go out to all the people of Egypt injured, persistence and resilience to all those who have fallen into the hands of cronies of the system. He was beaten all the finest images of struggle and courage

   And still we have to answer the call of home to us yesterday to stand firm and persevere and to continue to build on what has been achieved, it was the wrath of a loud, echoed echoed the entire world, and shiver apart the forces of global and regional know full well that the change in Egypt in particular, will be the locomotive of change in the region as a whole.

       We call upon all our brothers the Egyptians to continue the struggle and take to the streets without waiting for instructions from one, did not get out yesterday, led by alleged stream a particular political or leaders of certain, but it is a popular movement emerged in which the masses of their own express the pains and aspirations, Feltzl continuation of the movement of protector of their anyone who tries to ride the wave of the popular tide .. We did you go out alone you demand your rights .. And achieving your victory will Bndhalkm alone. Vltoasloa Shuar struggle even if the limited size of the protests until the next day of rage after Friday prayers the next.

       And everyone knows that .. That what happened yesterday was only the beginning of the wrath of Halim, and followed by Gillat to regain their right to free and dignified life under the umbrella of a democratic civil state, is blessed with people of social justice.

   Long live the struggle of the Egyptian people
   Egypt for all Egyptians lived  

   [Google translation – Oui]

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

2. 

   Oui on February 3, 2011 at 7:25 am

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   Jewish prayers for Egypt’s uprising

   Many Jews have warned Israel that it is a mistake to ally with these kinds of regimes, just as we’ve warned the US to learn the lesson from its failed alliance with the Shah of Iran. We’ve urged Israel to free the Palestinian people by ending the Occupation of the West Bank and the blockade of Gaza. Israel’s long-term security will not be secured through military or economic domination, but only by acting in a generous and caring way toward the Palestinian people first, and then toward all of  its Arab neighbours.

   Similarly, America’s homeland security will best be achieved through a strategy of generosity and caring, manifested through a new Global Marshall Plan such as has been introduced into the House of Representatives by Congressman Keith Ellison.

   In normal times, when the forces of repression seem to be winning, this kind of thinking is dismissed as “utopian” by the “realists” who shape public political discourse. But when events like the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt occur, for a moment the politicians and media are stunned enough to allow a different kind of thinking to emerge, the kind of thinking that acknowledged that underneath all the “business as usual” behaviour of the world’s peoples, the yearning for a world based on solidarity, caring for each other, freedom, self-determination, justice, non-violence and yes, even love and generosity, remains a potent and unquenchable thirst that may be temporarily repressed but never fully extinguished.

   It is this recognition that leads many Jews to join with the rest of the world’s peoples in celebrating the uprising, in praying that it does not become manipulated by the old regime into paths that too quickly divert the hopes for a brand new kind of order into politics and economics as usual, or into extremist attempts to switch the anger from domestic elites who have been the source of Egyptian oppression onto Jews or Israel which have not been responsible for the suffering of the Egyptian people.

   We hope that Egyptians will hear the news that they have strong support from many in the Jewish world. We are not waffling like Obama – we want the overthrow of Mubarak, the freeing of all political prisoners, the redistribution of wealth in a fair way, trials for those who perpetrated torture and other forms of injustice, and the democratisation of all aspects of Egyptian life.

    Rabbi Michael Lerner is editor of Tikkun, chair of the interfaith Network of Spiritual Progressives, and rabbi of Beyt Tikkun Synagogue in Berkeley, California. You can read more about  the Global Marshall Plan.  

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

3. 

   Oui on February 3, 2011 at 12:24 pm

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   Remember the heavy death toll of journalists at the hands of U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan … deja vu.

   Domestic and foreign journalists have come under siege

   (Al Jazeera) – Journalists in Egypt – domestic and foreign – are increasingly under siege, with Egyptian authorities detaining reporters and gangs of young men roaming the streets looking for anyone with camera equipment.

   Some of the pressure has come from the government: Six Al Jazeera journalists were detained for several hours earlier this week, and while they were eventually released, their equipment remains with the police.

   Two New York Times reporters were reportedly arrested – or “taken into protective custody”, as the government termed it.

   Spotters stand outside many hotels, watching balconies with high-powered binoculars. When they see balconies with camera equipment or photographers, they use radios to call in the details. Egyptian police sources say that information from those spotters has been used to conduct several raids on journalists’ hotel rooms in recent days. The government has reportedly pressured several hotels not to extend the reservations of foreign journalists.

   But most of the intimidation and violence has come from unofficial sources: Young men loiter outside the hotels where many reporters are staying, shouting at (and sometimes attacking) anyone with equipment. Hotel lobbies are filled with journalists and camera crews wearing bandages, and many have been restricted to watching the events in Tahrir Square from their hotel balconies.

   Egyptian state television has actively tried to foment the unrest by reporting that “Israeli spies” have infiltrated the city – which explains why many of the gangs who attack reporters shout “yehudi!” (“Jew!”).

   The area around Tahrir Square has become a virtual no-go zone for camera crews, which were assaulted  almost as soon as they entered the area controlled by supporters of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak. Several of them were mistaken for Al Jazeera crews, and were chased off by young men wielding sticks and chanting, “Jazeera! Jazeera!”.

   • Bush vs. Al-Jazeera: Fact or Fancy? by jpol

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

   • 

     Oui on February 3, 2011 at 12:32 pm

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     Arabic broadcaster Al-Jazeera banned in Egypt

     DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP/WaPo) — The pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera said Egyptian authorities ordered the closure of its Cairo news hub overseeing coverage of the country’s massive street protests.

     Al-Jazeera called the Egyptian ban “an act designed to stifle and repress the freedom of reporting by the network and its journalists.”

     “In this time of deep turmoil and unrest in Egyptian society, it is imperative that voices from all sides be heard,” said the statement from its headquarters in Qatar’s capital Doha. “The closing of our bureau by the Egyptian government is aimed at censoring and silencing the voices of the Egyptian people.”  

     HIS MASTER’S VOICE?
     • US bombed Al Jazeera office in Kabul
     • US artillery targeted Al Jazeera in Bagdad
     • Iraq a Deadly Place for the Media by sybil

     "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

4. 

   Oui on February 3, 2011 at 1:07 pm

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   Some excellent expressions about Mubarak and Egypt:

   • Obama: Careful please!
   • Mubarak: Need more time
   • Obama and Israel [Netanyahu] .. could also be reversed!

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

5. 

   shergald on February 3, 2011 at 3:20 pm

   Senator Patrick Leahy: We Will Cut Off Aid If Mubarak Does Not Step Down

   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

   Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs, the body that oversees American foreign aid, warned Egypt on Wednesday that unless President Mubarak steps down and the violence stops, Egypt will lose its financial assistance from the United States. In an interview on MSNBC, Leahy told Cenk Uygur:

   “Time has run out, and the options that might have been available to President Mubarak three or four years ago are not there now. It is unrealistic to think he can wait until elections in September. It also does not help his position to have people — actually thugs — in the street that appear to be government sponsored.”

   The senator said aid will be discontinued sooner rather than later. “We have a lot of aid in the pipeline now,” he explained. “That pipeline will be turned off. There is nobody — Republican or Democratic — in the Senate or I suspect in the House that is going to vote for an aid package for Egypt under these circumstances.”

6. 

   Oui on February 4, 2011 at 6:13 am

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   Israel isn’t the center of the Mideast, or of the world

   (Haaretz Opinion) – For years, our Orientalists saw a danger in ‏(secular‏) Arab nationalism. Both the right and the left examined Arab intellectuals with a fine-toothed comb in order to prove that they were “pan-Arabists.” What lay behind this, always, was a colonialist questioning of their right to self-determination on a par with our own standards.

   But today, when people no longer demonstrate in Lebanon’s squares on behalf of Lebanese Arabism, and when nobody is singing paeans to the Arab nation in the streets of Cairo, our examiners are rewriting the questionnaire: Instead of “nationalists,” they are looking for “religious people.”

   The problem with such discourse − which sees the world through the prism of the Shin Bet Security Service, with no inhibitions and no curiosity about what is unique to Egypt − is that it helps to seal off the ghetto into which we are gradually locking ourselves, a ghetto within the Middle East and within world history. We should recall Israel’s attitude to the nationalization of the Suez Canal, the “rotten business” we perpetrated in Egypt in the early 1950s, the 1956 Sinai Campaign, the affinity between these events and our alliance with the shah of Iran and his murderous security services, and the affinity between all these and the coronation of Bachir Gemayel as Lebanon’s ruler on the broken blades of Israel Defense Forces bayonets.

   Forget about the strategic dimension. The issue is that military interests have always trained intellectual integrity and analysis to provide them with justifications and the status of “the truth.” The adoption of the region’s oppressive elites was carried out with the help of Shimon Peres-style language laundering and constant conciliatory gestures toward the West: We’ll be a base for you in the heart of darkness − even now, when the West is turning its back on these politics. After all, that is the only historical significance these events have as far as we are concerned: The United States no longer needs this offer.

   [Links added are mine – Oui]

   CIA/Mossad training SAVAK  

   • The Egyptian Revolution: The Third Act

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

7. 

   Oui on February 4, 2011 at 1:32 pm

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   Israel’s intelligence units have been all over the Middle-East from Egypt, Lebanon, UAE, Syria, Kurdistan, Iraq and Shah’s Iran (even a bit with Khomeiny after demise of the SAVAK). The best conspiracy  theory was in the early 50’s, much later evidenced as an Israeli red flag operation and became known as the Lavon affair.

   While rank-and-file Republicans were overcoming the party regulars to nominate Eisenhower in July 1952, Egyptians were overthrowing their government in a nearly bloodless revolution. Egypt’s 1948 debacle against Israeli soldiers in Palestine was a catalyst for the coup by army officers humiliated at the high-level sloth and corruption it had revealed in the government of Egypt’s playboy King Farouk. Two years later, Col. Gamal Abdel Nasser, the driving force behind the original coup, deposed its figure-head leader, General Mohammad Naguib, and assumed power himself.

   Both Israeli and American Arabists who had picked the handsome, eloquent colonel as the officer to watch in the Egyptian revolutionary government now picked him as the leader to watch in the Arab world. In each country, secret chains of events were set in motion, but at least one of the Israeli plans was diametrically opposed to that of the United States.

   Eisenhower was uniquely qualified to understand the peacemaking potential of a charismatic military leader with a strong personal political base. Assured by his Middle East advisers that Nasser was such a leader, he set out to woo the Egyptian president through Kermit Roosevelt, grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt, an earlier charismatic U.S. president whose political career began with a military victory in the Spanish-American War and ended in a vain attempt to keep the United States out of World War I.

   To keep the American press, which already had developed strong pro-Israel leanings, off the track, Eisenhower used U.S. and Egyptian intelligence channels. The strategy was to assure Nasser that the United States was ready to adjust its Middle East policies to his politics of reform if the Egyptian leader was prepared to make peace with Israel and thus remove at one stroke the greatest strain on Egypt’s budget and the only serious irritant in U.S.-Arab relations.

   President Obama following the script of Dwight Eisenhower? Beware of the Ides of March!

   See also today’s comment – Orientalists Looking Through the Shin Bet Prism

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

8. 

   Oui on February 7, 2011 at 6:11 pm

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   US envoy’s business link to Egypt

   (The Independent) – Mr Wisner joined Patton Boggs almost two years ago – more than enough time for both the White House and the State Department to learn of his company’s intimate connections with the Mubarak regime. The New York Times ran a glowing profile of Mr Wisner in its pages two weeks ago – but mysteriously did not mention his ties to Egypt.
   Nicholas Noe, an American political researcher now based in Beirut, has spent weeks investigating Mr Wisner’s links to Patton Boggs. Mr Noe is also a former researcher for Hillary Clinton and questions the implications of his discoveries.

   “The key problem with Wisner being sent to Cairo at the behest of Hillary,” he says, “is the conflict-of-interest aspect… More than this, the idea that the US is now subcontracting or ‘privatising’ crisis management is another problem. Do the US lack diplomats?

   A spokesman for the State Department said he “presumed” Mrs Clinton knew of Mr Wisner’s employment by Patton Boggs and the firm’s links with the Mubarak government, but refused to comment on any conflict of interest for the envoy.

   Law firm denies Obama envoy worked for Egypt  

   Press reports indicate that Mubarak is an “old friend” of Wisner, and that Wisner has made comments supporting the regime in the face of criticism in the past. Gawker’s John Cook also points out that Patton Boggs has lobbied for an ally of the Mubarak regime as recently as 2007.

   [Ahmed Ezz is linked to Mubarak’s son Gamal and the NDP party – Oui ]  

   "But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."