a thread about the civil unrest in egypt (& elsewhere in 'the region' if necessary)

http://assets.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/Page%2012.jpg

"5. A new government composed of people outside the military who care about the people of Israel"

um what? is that a typo?

from here

heard the next young humma song touches on this

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/27/egypt-riot-security-force-action

pretty incredible audio taken by a british journalist picked up by security forces and beaten

"5. A new government composed of people outside the military who care about the people of Israel"

um what? is that a typo?

― ex-heroin addict tricycle (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, January 27, 2011 7:55 PM (30 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

haha yeah i didnt quite get that one either

good coverage from 'gordon reynolds' at the awl

http://www.theawl.com/tag/egypt

david shapiro should cover the egypt uprisings

an egyptian army officer shouted at me and told me to get out of the way and then he told me i should just go back to america instead of coming to egypt so i told him that i was in the press and he swung a club at me and hit me in the head. i fell down and saw stars not the kind of stars like the band stars or the ones in the sky at night but stars swirling around my head not quite like in a bugs bunny cartoon but not unlike them either which surprised me. i was dragged into a truck and i was thrown in the back where it smelled and the truck started moving and i heard people whispering all around me and i sat up and went into the corner and started crying thinking about going back to new york where it was safe and i would be safe.

i heard that audio of the british journalist, it sounds like the last report from a doomed man based on where they're headed and the uncertainty of it all, i feel like it's a miracle he was able to get that audio out.

damn good
xpost

For a second i thought it was the PRR guy lol

Dumb question, but what do these protestors want from a more democratic government that their current despots aren't giving them? It's interesting that these aren't Islamist outbursts - we know what they want. But what's setting this off? Simple long simmering frustration with restricted freedoms? Human rights violations? Trash not getting picked up on time? I've followed this a bit, but must have missed any demand beyond new leadership.

(Related: could this finally be the manifestation of the Arab "youth bomb" that people have been warning about for years, the huge in number under 25 demo becoming politically aware?)

What we're seeing is something that would have been a lot different had the past ten years not turned out the way they did.

What do you mean? That these governments are weaker for our interference, or that the protestors more emboldened?

Also, can we discount the earlier unrest in Iran as a catalyst?

Or do you mean that the people are finally sick of having their despots propped up by the American government, whose presence in the region has never been welcome, either directly or by proxy?

And if this is an extension of anti-American sentiment, does that mean these protestors want governments that are even more anti-American (and anti-Israel)? Because, boy.

Dumb question, but what do these protestors want from a more democratic government that their current despots aren't giving them? It's interesting that these aren't Islamist outbursts - we know what they want. But what's setting this off? Simple long simmering frustration with restricted freedoms? Human rights violations? Trash not getting picked up on time? I've followed this a bit, but must have missed any demand beyond new leadership.

(Related: could this finally be the manifestation of the Arab "youth bomb" that people have been warning about for years, the huge in number under 25 demo becoming politically aware?)

― Josh in Chicago, Thursday, January 27, 2011 9:57 PM (42 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i think there are probably plenty of people and groups w/in the protestors who have tons of specific demands or hopes but as a whole the thing that seems to unite them is a desire for an actually democratic government. one thing that you keep hearing in man-or-woman-on-the-street interviews is "no one should be president for more than 10 years"

the proximate cause seems to be the so-far successful mass uprising in tunisia, showing that "it can be done" i guess. but theres been 30 years of "state of emergency" martial law in egypt--plus many ppl seem to be rallying around this guy khaled said, who was beaten to death last year by police when he asked for a warrant after they tried to search. i think someone may have self-immolated in an imitation of the guy in tunisia, too.

apparently shit is popping off in yemen now too

good post about elbaradei:

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/01/nuke-watchdog-wants-to-lead-egypt-revolt-no-really/

Times implies that the addition of the Muslim Brotherhood in the mix may change the dynamic. If I were [insert despot here], I would love for the extremists to get into the mix.

I still want to know what they'd want from a potential democratically elected government. Better ties with the US? Fewer ties to the US? In the case of Egypt, worse ties with Israel? A desire for expanded personal freedoms, or just the freedom to choose their oppressor?

The times lead does begin "Demonstrators in Egypt have protested against rising prices and stagnant incomes, for greater freedom and against police brutality," so maybe it is just a general sense of powerlessness. But the solution to those particular problems seems to be a more liberal democracy, which I can't see happening without clashing with the hardliners.

The tinderbox seems to be Jobs and prices Tunisia and Egypt both have youth unemployment in the 30-40% range. That's just the spark, though, the fuel is many things and seems to be different things for different people; (suppression of religion, free speech, petty bureaucratic oppression, the price of bread etc. etc.)

They've shut off the internet throughout the whole of Egypt, with the exception of the one the Egyptian Stock Exchange is on.

I read the other day someone quite vehement that the Muslim Brotherhood aren't extremists. Wiki says the organization is committed to non-violent reform but their goals are absolute Islamist life and law. What are the odds on what they'll do if/when they get a say in what happens next?

The impression I get from my half egyptian colleague is the the MB are a pretty broad based organisation from hardline to very moderate. There strength to date has been drawn from the fact that they are the only focal point for opposition to the government. That said the secular opposition is starting from scratch and the MB have the organisation and structure to fill any power vacuum that emerges (unlike Tunisia where the Islamic opposition is much weaker).

And if this is an extension of anti-American sentiment, does that mean these protestors want governments that are even more anti-American (and anti-Israel)?

Mubarak is not anti-American. Neither was Ben-Ali in Tunisia. And whatever yap Mubarak might come out with in public, his government colluded with Israel in such things as maintaining the siege of Gaza.

But I think you are right, there is more to this than just anti-Americanism, and the Iranian protests are probably a bit of a catalyst. Back then there was talk about how quiescent Arabs were towards their own thuggish dictators, but now belatedly they are springing into action.

My sense at this stage is that the Arab world is enjoying a 1989 moment. It will be interesting to see whether this spreads to the monarchies, and indeed to Syria, the one definitively not pro-Western Arab state.

Naipaul's travelogue in the immediate aftermath of the Iranian revolution is fascinating - at that stage it wasn't clear what sort it was - socialist or Islamic, and what kind of islamists they were. That's why I'm very worried to see the mb turning up.

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/1/28/1296219004898/Locals-pray-in-the-street-009.jpg

I still want to know what they'd want from a potential democratically elected government. Better ties with the US? Fewer ties to the US? In the case of Egypt, worse ties with Israel? A desire for expanded personal freedoms, or just the freedom to choose their oppressor?

The times lead does begin "Demonstrators in Egypt have protested against rising prices and stagnant incomes, for greater freedom and against police brutality," so maybe it is just a general sense of powerlessness. But the solution to those particular problems seems to be a more liberal democracy, which I can't see happening without clashing with the hardliners.

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, January 28, 2011 7:45 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

my guess is that the protestors are coming from a wide enough swath of society that youd get "yes" answers to all of those things! its not exactly a politically organized uprising (at this point)

i mean this is what that protest pamphlet that the atlantic translated has, not that its necessarily more representative of the protestors than anyhting else:

http://assets.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/Page%202_rev.jpg

and my understanding of the muslim brotherhood is similar to what ed is saying. i think itd be possible (though i have no idea how likely) for a muslim brotherhood-majority gov't to be more democratic and free than a mubarak military state.

ive also read that the brotherhood wouldnt draw a wide-enough base of support from the population to BE the majority, and a kind of coalition with a secular organization is more likely to be regarded as a genuine alternative to mubarak in a practical sense.

but! ismael (and i guess naipaul) is right. iran could have gone in a lot of different directions--and it had a large cosmopolitan/secular population, not to mention a large and i believe fairly well-organized (?) communist party. (plus figures like ali shariati who threaded a needle somewhere between secular and hard-line)

re: Naipaul. Are you talking about 'Among the believers'?

Khomeini played the Communists very well but Iran could easily have gone a different direction.

i asume thats what ismael meant? i dont know i really dislike naipaul so

I still want to know what they'd want from a potential democratically elected government.

jobs

or what ed said

max where is your first image from? any info?

http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/f9a2m/a_picture_i_took_yesterday_in_tahrir_square_cairo/

The problem with all entrenched regimes is that they become not only corrupt but very visibly so, hence the revolt against Ben Ali and clan in Tunisia. Today would have been Khaled Said's 29th birthday. He was beaten to death last summer for distributing video of police officers splitting up drugs amongst themselves that they had just confiscated. A photo of his smashed head in the morgue then quickly made the rounds. Egyptians are mindful that anti-Muslim Brotherhood, anti-islamist efforts by the regime have ended up leaving us with people like al-Zawahiri.

I have no idea about their sincerity but the Muslim Brotherhood has officially eschewed violence with few exceptions and apart from not being the regime, they also have a certain status in Egypt from their benevolent works, notably after the 1992 Cairo earthquake.

It seems to be that lots of these Islamic groups eschew violence officially, but have no problem with it as a means to an end. It's hard to imagine a peaceful strict, hardline Muslim government, but hey, stranger things have happened.

Another question: how are these despots different than those de facto despots in Russia? The complaints these protestors have don't seem that different from what I imagine the average Russian would say, were they allowed to openly say it. And god knows, the Russian government is every bit as brazen as these middle eastern governments.

But more popular amongst Russians me thinks, at least for the moment.

Just on the Muslim Brothers and elections and so on - the feeling in the academic literature is that Arab world Islamists win pluralities but not majorities in elections. So if post-transition elections in Egypt are run by proportional representation then we are not going to be looking at their having total power.

gunfire & explosions on the al jazeera live feed - http://english.aljazeera.net/watch_now/

whats happening are the mummies attacking

But what's setting this off?

I heard the desire for a minimum wage is a big desire. Also 30 years under the same President is hardly a democratic regime, regardless of how much US officials kiss his ass.

these pictures are incredible - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2011/jan/28/egypt-protests-cairo

this is an interesting piece about how tunisia, egypt and yemen are not the same - http://www.chapatimystery.com/archives/homistan/days_of_anger.html - i'm not sure if i buy the denial of any link between them, but then i'm not the expert here...

When do the neocons swoop in and start taking credit for all this

Isn't there a strain of thinking that in these relatively diverse, relatively moderate countries, a Islamist government would spark a popular backlash when forced to actually govern? Turkey has managed a democratic coalition of hardliners and moderates, hasn't it?

Slightly tangential but moving:

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/parting-glance-lucas-mebrouk-dolega-32/

http://renesys.com/blog/

This whole thing has had me thinking about Algeria in 1991. I do hope it all ends better.

The court ruled that the system for electing a third of the MPs was unconstitutional

I thought they didn't even have a constitution! they're getting a new one on Friday...?

http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/06/14/cairo_s_judicial_coup

ah okay, this is the answer I was looking for

The parliamentary election law also ran against past SCC rulings requiring independents to have the same chances to get elected as party members. Of course, since the two-thirds of seats assigned to party lists were written into the constitutional declaration (as amended in September 2011), so that could not be challenged easily. But for the remaining one-third the case of unconstitutionality was easier to make. (Past rulings rested in part on constitutional rights in the 1971 constitution that had been removed from the March 2011 constitutional declaration, as Harvard's Tarek Masoud has pointed out. But there was still strong jurisprudence suggesting that the court regarded the system as discriminatory against Egyptians who were not members of any party.)

Mohamed ElBaradei, the Nobel-Prize winning diplomat who withdrew from the presidential election in January because of the military's continued hold on power, warned that electing a president with no Parliament and no constitution was a recipe for dictatorship.

As the state-owned Ahram Online reports, Mr. ElBaradei "proposed two solutions to the current crisis: the first would be the formation of a 'presidential council' tasked with choosing members of the Constituent Assembly tasked with drafting a new constitution, along with the appointment of a 'national salvation' government to preside over fresh parliamentary and presidential elections once a new constitution is written. The second solution proposed by ElBaradei would be to elect an interim president who would then appoint a national salvation government and preside over a consensual committee tasked with choosing Constituent Assembly members, with presidential and parliamentary polls to be held once a new constitution has been drafted."

Mr. ElBaradei's was been calling for such an arrangement for months, and warning that the conditions in Egypt are still not right for a presidential election.

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/14/latest-updates-on-electoral-turmoil-in-egypt/

alas, looks like the "cynics" were right.

There's a documentary film making the rounds in which the Tahrir demonstrators voice skepticism (in Feb 2011) about all this "support" from the army.

http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/tahrir-liberation-square/6336

What a mess.

Then there's this

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/06/egypt-muslim-brotherhood-islamic-banking-.html

the Brotherhood’s economic policies may run counter to demands for social justice and better living conditions for Egypt’s poor.

“Their economic doctrine is not really attentive to social justice; it is very right-wing capitalist,” Sherif said. “They aren’t interested in any social restructuring that can be disruptive to this, especially in Egypt, because there are liberals who are widely represented in the economy.”

from what i know it's hard to place the economics of the country or its parties' proposals. the generals/military/ruling party own everything worth owning. a "right wing capitalist" position could mean making them divest everything. or nationalizing it and then selling off, or whatever.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/15/egypt-mohamed-elbaradei-warning

At times ElBaradei has been viewed as an opposition figurehead who occupied the rare position of being able to command respect from revolutionaries, secular liberals and political Islamists. On Friday, though, he spoke out against a catalogue of revolutionary mismanagement on all sides, with his harshest words reserved for the Muslim Brotherhood – whose role in the past year's "transition process" has led many pro-change activists to blame political Islamists for empowering the military and being sucked into an electoral game designed to give the old regime a facade of democratic legitimacy.

I wish Nahguib Mahfouz had lived to see this and write about it

He also argued that revolutionary momentum had been stalled by the failure of young protesters to embrace institutional leadership – wading into a thorny debate over the relative merits of horizontal and "leaderless" political change about which many activists feel strongly.

"The mortal mistake was that from day one the youth never agreed on a unified demand and never agreed to delegate authority to a group of people to speak on their behalf," said ElBaradei.

heh

i miss mahfouz too.

ElBaradei drinking too much tea w/ US Democrats

How about that military

large and in charge

this is why countries shouldn't have large, standing, professional armies

http://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/media/photo-s/02/80/05/3b/dascoot-tours-malta.jpg

The concept behind “DaScoot Tours Malta” is to offer local commuters and tourists visiting our islands the opportunity of an alternative way of branded transport as well as leisure riding through our densely populated streets against a fairly fee.

In few words we are the first to introduce the concept of “Scooter Tourism” in Malta. We look forward to have you on one of our DaScoot Tours this Summer!

Our scooter Tours are designed to be fun, thrilling, safe, reliable, space & time consuming, and environmentally friendly.

Their expansion plans to Egypt are surely doomed.

http://www.npr.org/2012/06/18/155134677/and-now-for-the-lighter-side-of-egypts-revolution?ft=1&f=1004

The growing presence of religious conservatives has prompted the owners of this bar to nail boards over the windows so that devout passers-by won't have to see the beer.

...

Zohny recalls a journalist who recently wrote, "The political situation in Egypt has rendered parody news obsolete."

Zohny sees the truth in this. "It is getting really hard to come up with parody news because the news has become a parody," he says.

wrong thread :-(

CAIRO, June 19 (Reuters) - Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for 30 years until overthrown by a revolution in the "Arab Spring" last year, was declared clinically dead by his doctors on Tuesday, the state news agency MENA said in a report confirmed by a hospital source.

the body is dead but the legend lives on

http://lynch.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/08/13/lamborghini_morsi

After long weeks of political gridlock and stagnation, Egypt's elected President Mohammed el-Morsi suddenly hit the gas over the weekend. Over the span of a few days, Morsi removed the head of General Intelligence, the head of the Military Police, the top two senior leaders of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, and the heads of all the military services. In addition to this SCAF-Quake, Morsi also canceled the controversial Constitutional amendments promulgated by the SCAF just before he took office and issued a new, equally controversial amendment and roadmap of his own. What's more, this all came after he replaced the editors of major state-owned newspapers with people viewed as sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood and cracked down on several other critical papers. Zero to 180 in three days -- even Usain Bolt would be impressed by that acceleration. Swirv.

not really sure what 'swirv' means in that context tbh

oh ha i just figure it out. carry on...

The fundamental problem remains one of trust and the absence of legitimate institutions. The political polarization of the last year and a half, fueled by all too many political and rhetorical mistakes on all sides, has left profound scars. The Shafiq voters in the Presidential election have hardly reconciled themselves to Morsi, and most activists and revolutionaries remain as alienated as ever from a political struggle dominated by the military and the Brotherhood. On top of the polarization comes the legal Calvinball, where rules and legal institutions are fundamentally contested and no arbiter has uncontested judicial authority. And then there's the regrettable absence of a Parliament, another casualty of the pre-election institutional warfare. With so much in flux and so much distrust, every move, no matter how minor, becomes deeply laden with potential treachery and disaster. And this was no minor move.

In most cases, I would think that the removal of the SCAF's senior leadership and the assertion of civilian control by an elected government would be celebrated as a major triumph in the push for a transition to a civil, democratic state. But the deeply rooted fears of the Muslim Brotherhood, fueled by recognition of their popular strength and doubts about their democratic convictions, prevents any easy acceptance of that reading in many quarters. That's why the next few weeks will be crucial, as Morsi makes clear what kind of constitutional process he really intends and as the military and the anti-Islamist trends in Egyptian politics weigh their next moves.

go morsi!!!

sudan now?

http://lynch.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/06/28/sudans_protests

i thought sudan barely has govt as it is??

omar bashir is still around, that's all i know tbh

exactly how eager for war w/Syria is Turkey...? this whole thing seems to be spiralling into worst-case-scenario territory

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324399404578583932317286550.html wow at the WSJ :

"Egyptians would be lucky if their new ruling generals turn out to be in the mold of Chile's Augusto Pinochet, who took power amid chaos but hired free-market reformers and midwifed a transition to democracy."

rolling middle east 2013 thread

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/egypt-sentences-3-al-jazeera-reporters

US keeps giving Egypt military aid so that it can have an influence there, says the US gov. This latest "trial" again shows the lack of influence

Oops, already discussed over in this other thread:

Rolling MENA 2014

Why Obama and Clinton make no secrets of seeking out Kissinger for advice and photo ops. They're his children.

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/10/16/egypts-u-s-backed-military-regime-brutalizing-student-protestors/

I'm with you re this one.

we like giving lip service to democracy but what we really want more than anything else is stability and our economic interests secure. that trumps everything.

In the world of realpolitik those have always trumped everything. And an oligarchy is more likely to align with our interests than would a democracy atm, because current U.S. government functions as an oligarchy more than a democracy.

i think it's facile to say that an oligarchy will necessarily have the same or similar interests as another oligarchy. that would make geopolitics much simpler than it is.

also US foreign policy has never been subject to the sort of "democracy" that domestic politics have

but you'll get no argument from me re. our egypt policy being atrocious

Q: is "realpolitik" really just a 20th Century term for "the way empire has always functioned"?

we don't have an empire, i heard Bill Maher say so.

this is the thread where we self-congratulatorily affirm the fact of an american empire to one another

http://www.feelnumb.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/album-cover-rage-against-the-machine-evil-empire.jpg

woah lol huge soz

@sharifkouddous
State Dept official in 2010 email from Egypt to Hillary Clinton about Mubarak government: "They love you here"

https://twitter.com/sharifkouddous/status/711883543601942528

Ergodan below 50%

🔴#SONDAKİKA | Anadolu Ajansı'na göre Tayyip Erdoğan'ın oyu %50'nin altına düştü. (%49.99)

— ibrahim Haskoloğlu (@haskologlu) May 14, 2023

*Erdogan