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Egyptian president Hosni
Mubarak is finding that it's difficult to give the people a "little bit
of democracy". Millions of protesters want reform now, not 8 months from
now.
Following six days of mostly peaceful protests, Mubarak made a decision to
counter protesters by unleashing the "baltageya" plainclothes
police armed with rocks, knives, and clubs.
With that, a peaceful ending that seemed possible two days ago took a sharp
turn for the worse. And after days of sitting on the fence, President Obama
finally took a decisive stand, calling for Mubarak to leave "Now".
Mubarak Supporters Strike Back With Clubs, Rocks, Knives
Violence took an unfortunate turn for the worse as Mubarak’s
Allies and Foes Clash in Egypt
President Hosni Mubarak
struck back at his opponents, unleashing waves of his supporters armed with
clubs, rocks, knives and firebombs in a concerted assault on thousands of
antigovernment protesters in Tahrir Square calling for an end to his
authoritarian rule.
The deadly clashes that started Wednesday carried into Thursday morning, when
shots were fired at the anti-Mubarak protesters, a number of witnesses said.
It was unclear whether the shots came from the pro-government demonstrators
or from the military forces stationed in the square.
The Egyptian military, with tanks and soldiers stationed around the square,
neither stopped the violence on Wednesday nor attacked the protesters.
Soldiers watched from behind the iron fence of the Egyptian Museum,
occasionally shooting their water cannons, but only to extinguish flames
ignited by the firebombs.
Only two days after the military pledged not to fire on protesters, it was
unclear where the army stood. Many protesters contended that Mr. Mubarak was
provoking a confrontation in order to prompt a military crackdown.
Mohamed ElBaradei, who was designated to negotiate with the government on
behalf of the opposition, demanded that the army move in and protect the
protesters. “The army has to take a stand,” he said in a
television interview. “I expect the Egyptian Army to interfere
today.”
The deployment of plainclothes forces paid by Mr. Mubarak’s ruling
party — men known here as baltageya — has been a hallmark of the
Mubarak government, and there were many signs that the violence was carefully
choreographed.
Please read the rest of that
story. Mubarak planned this violence. I suspect some will now want his head.
Arab World Faces Its Uncertain Future
The New York Times reports Arab World Faces
Its Uncertain Future
The future of the Arab
world, perched between revolt and the contempt of a crumbling order, was fought
for in the streets of downtown Cairo on Wednesday.
Tens of thousands of protesters who have reimagined the very notion of
citizenship in a tumultuous week of defiance proclaimed with sticks,
home-made bombs and a shower of rocks that they would not surrender their
revolution to the full brunt of an authoritarian government that answered
their calls for change with violence.
The Arab world watched a moment that suggested it would never be the same
again — and waited to see whether protest or crackdown would win the
day. Words like “uprising” and “revolution” only hint
at the scale of events in Egypt, which have already reverberated across
Yemen, Jordan, Syria and even Saudi Arabia, offering a new template for
change in a region that long reeled from its own sense of stagnation.
“Every Egyptian understands now,” said Magdi al-Sayyid, one of
the protesters.
Everyone seemed joined in the moment, fists, batons and rocks banging any
piece of metal to rally themselves. A man stood on a tank turret, urging protesters
forward. Another cried as he shouted at Mr. Mubarak’s men. “Come
here!” he said. “Here is where’s right.” Men and
women ferried rocks in bags, cartons and boxes to the barricades. Bassem
Yusuf, a heart surgeon, heard news of the clashes on television and headed to
the square at dusk, stitching wounds at a makeshift clinic run by volunteers.
“I’m fighting for my freedom,” Noha al-Ustaz said as she
broke bricks on the curb. “For my right to express myself. For an end
to oppression. For an end to injustice.”
“Go forward,” the cries rang out, and she did, disappearing into
a sea of men.
Protest Gallery
Stone Throwing
Cairo Protest
Those are 2 of 115 Photos From the
Protests
The count goes up every day, with new images added to the front.
Obama Abandons Mubarak
It took President Obama too long, but finally he got it right. Please
consider Sudden Split
Recasts U.S. Foreign Policy
After days of delicate
public and private diplomacy, the United States openly broke with its most
stalwart ally in the Arab world on Wednesday, as the Obama administration
strongly condemned violence by allies of President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt
against protesters and called on him to speed up his exit from power.
Egypt’s government hit back swiftly. The Foreign Ministry released a
defiant statement saying the calls from “foreign parties” had
been “rejected and aimed to incite the internal situation in
Egypt.” And Egyptian officials reached out to reporters to make clear
how angry they were at their onetime friend.
Separately, in an interview, a senior Egyptian government official took aim
at President Obama’s call on Tuesday night for a political transition
to begin “now” — a call that infuriated Cairo.
But the White House was not backing down. “I want to be clear,”
said Robert Gibbs, the press secretary. “ ‘Now’ started
yesterday.”
Officials at the Pentagon, the State Department, the Central Intelligence
Agency and the White House were running various scenarios across the region
in an effort to keep up with events.
What would the covert American war in Yemen look like if the supportive
Yemeni president were to be forced out? Will Mr. Mubarak’s successor
duplicate his support of the Middle East peace process? Will the shifts in
the region benefit Islamic extremists, who will try to capitalize on unrest,
or will it show the Arab street the power of a secular uprising?
“A full range of events are being discussed in many buildings
throughout Washington,” Mr. Gibbs said.
Hackers Shut Down Egyptian
Government Sites
The New York Times reports Hackers Shut Down
Government Sites
The online group Anonymous
said Wednesday that it had paralyzed the Egyptian government’s Web
sites in support of the antigovernment protests.
Anonymous, a loosely defined group of hackers from all over the world,
gathered about 500 supporters in online forums and used software tools to
bring down the sites of the Ministry of Information and President Hosni
Mubarak’s National Democratic Party, said Gregg Housh, a member of the
group who disavows any illegal activity himself. The sites were unavailable
Wednesday afternoon.
The attacks, Mr. Housh said, are part of a wider campaign that Anonymous has
mounted in support of the antigovernment protests that have roiled the Arab
world. Last month, the group shut down the Web sites of the Tunisian
government and stock exchange in support of the uprising that forced the
country’s dictator, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, to flee.
Mr. Housh said that the group had used its technical knowledge to help
protesters in Egypt defy a government shutdown of the Internet that began
last week. “We want freedom,” he said of the group’s
motivation. “It’s as simple as that. We’re sick of
oppressive governments encroaching on people.”
Yemen's President to Step
Down in 2013
In a possible ploy to buy time, Yemen's president
promises to step down in 2013.
In another reverberation of
the popular anger rocking the region, the longtime president of Yemen, Ali
Abdullah Saleh, announced concessions on Wednesday that included suspending
his campaign for constitutional changes that would allow him to remain
president for life and pledging that his son would not seek to be his
successor.
“No extension, no inheritance, no resetting the clock,” Mr. Saleh
said Wednesday during a legislative session that was boycotted by the
opposition. “I present these concessions in the interests of the
country. The interests of the country come before our personal
interests.”
But it remained to be seen whether Mr. Saleh, whose current term ends in
2013, was simply trying to siphon vigor from the antigovernment protests
planned for Thursday. Those demonstrations are intended to build on
gatherings last week that turned into the largest protests against Mr. Saleh,
who has ruled for 32 years. He promised in 2005 not to run again but changed
his mind the next year.
Jordan Prime Minister Seeks
to Contain Unrest
Please consider Premier of Jordan
Holds Talks With Rivals.
Jordan’s new prime
minister began consultations with key political groups, including the Muslim
opposition, on Wednesday. The talks came a day after King Abdullah II, caught
in a regional wave of discontent, sought to stave off growing public unrest
by firing his government and vowing reform.
Even before meeting with the prime minister, Marouf al-Bakhit, leaders of the
Muslim Brotherhood here condemned him as a poor choice because of his ties to
the military and because what they want is more democracy rather than a
change of personnel. But other vital constituents, including former military
officers and tribal leaders, were pleased by his selection, and that seems to
have been the king’s first concern in a country where tribal ties to the
monarchy are central. Many here said the king had calmed an important part of
public anger and won time for changes.
“This Friday will be the first in a month that we will not go out into
the streets to demonstrate,” Salem Daifallah, a colonel active in the
High National Council for Retired Military Men, representing some 160,000
people, said in an interview. “We will bide our time and see what the
new cabinet looks like.” The Muslim Brotherhood and leftists are
expected to demonstrate again this week, but most predictions are for smaller
turnouts than in recent weeks.
Analysts, diplomats and average Jordanians make the point repeatedly that
Jordan is not Tunisia or Egypt. It is a monarchy, and thus far the legitimacy
of Hashemite family rule here remains largely unchallenged. Moreover, the two
groups that make up the country’s six million people — the East
Bank tribes on one hand and Palestinians on the other — have distinctly
different interests, meaning the king is not expected to face a unified
movement for change.
“Jordan is not even close to being about to blow up,” a Western
diplomat here said. “It
remains a stable place.”
Superb Coverage from New York Times, Al
Jazeer
Coverage of these events by the New York Times has been superb. All of the
above links, stories, and images are from http://www.nytimes.com/.
Please also see excellent videos of Violence in Cairo
Square on
Al Jazeer. (click on the second image and it will open up a video to play). Also see the Al Jazeer Live Blog.
Mish
GlobalEconomicAnalysis.blogspot.com
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