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Tomorrow’s Tunisia and Egypt: Reform or Revolution?
Arab uprisings are taking place with the historical speed of light. I began writing this piece following the downfall of Tunisian dictator Ben Ali and closed with the imminent downfall of the Egyptian one Hosni Mubarak. The Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings are not, as some armchair pundits called the Tunisian one, Jasmine Revolutions. They […]
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Germany: Yet Another Vote for War in Afghanistan, Amidst Guttenberg Scandals
“Guttenberg trotz Ansehensverlust beliebtester Politiker” [Guttenberg, Germany’s Most Popular Politician, Despite Scandals] (AFP, 28 January 2011). The German man of the hour is Baron Karl-Theodor von und zu Guttenberg. Actually he has eight other given names, which modestly prohibits him from using, but the title shows that his family traces back to 1158. He is […]
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On the Arab Revolt: Interview with Vijay Prashad
Vijay Prashad is a prominent Marxist scholar from South Asia. He is George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College, Connecticut. He has written extensively on international affairs for both academic and popular journals. His most recent book The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the […]
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The Showdown in Cairo!
Tomorrow the Egyptian people will go to the streets en masse to give the final blow to the regime. The people are talking of a rally of millions, and people have been pouring into Midan Atahrir, Tahrir Square, today and heading towards Cairo from the provinces. The regime closed all the roads and stopped the […]
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Can the Obama Administration Learn Lessons from the Egyptian Uprising?
Karl Marx, in his famous treatise on Louis Bonaparte’s coup d’état of 2 December 1851, pointing out its similarities to the coup undertaken by Napoleon Bonaparte a little over 50 years before, remarked that history has the tendency to repeat itself, ‘the first [time] as tragedy, then as farce’. As with so many other […]
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“They Want to Abort This Revolution, But We Will Win”: Interview with Nawal El Saadawi
Amy Goodman: Your feelings today in the midst of this popular rebellion against the Mubarak regime, calling on Mubarak to leave? Do you agree? Nawal El Saadawi: We are in the streets every day, people, children, old people, including myself. I am now 80 years of age, suffering of this regime for half a […]
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Egypt: Mubarak Tries to Intimidate Protesters with F16s
US tax dollars at work. . . . Cf. “Security Assistance: State and DOD Need to Assess How the Foreign Military Financing Program for Egypt Achieves U.S. Foreign Policy and Security Goals,” GAO-06-437 (11 April 2006). See, also, “Egypt’s Minister of Defense Joins Protesters in Tahrir Square” (Al-Masry Al-Youm, 30 January 2011). | Print
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Egypt: MSM on Baradei, Muslim Brotherhood, and the 6th of April
IT IS NOT TRUE WHAT MSM IS BROADCASTING ABOUT PROTESTERS CALLING ON BARADEI TO LEAD TRANSITIONAL GOVT! WE DO NOT WANT THE ARMY! THE ARMY HAS BEEN RULING SINCE 1952. THEY R NOT NEUTRAL PLAYERS. It is not true what some MSM outlets r broadcasting about the Muslim Brotherhood and the 6th of April leading […]
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Egypt to Mubarak: Your Time Is Up
Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. Cf. Nancy A. Youssef, “Why Has Egypt’s Army Not Confronted the Protests?” (McClatchy Newspapers, 30 January 2011). | Print
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Mubarak Addresses the Egyptian People
Mubarak: Leave, stay, leave, stay, leave, stay. . . . God damn you, Zine Ben Ali. May you burn in hell. It’s impossible to fix things now. Damn it. I think I’ll go make a speech — maybe things will quiet down a little.
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What Hillary Rodham Clinton Really Meant to Say on Egypt
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton: We are deeply scared about our empire in the region and slightly embarrassed that we fund the Egyptian security forces to repress their own people, and we call on the 30-year dictatorship in Egypt to do everything in its power to protect our interests. . . . As […]
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In Solidarity with the People of Egypt
“We need more protests abroad in front of Egyptian embassies.” — Hossam el-Hamalawy Ann Arbor Atlanta Austin Boston Chicago Cincinnati Columbus, Ohio Dearborn Kansas City Los Angeles Manhattan Portland, Oregon Queens San Francisco Seattle Washington, DC Auckland, New Zealand Berlin, Germany Beirut, Lebanon Caracas, Venezuela Copenhagen, Denmark Dublin, Ireland Edmonton, Canada Istanbul, Turkey London, […]
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Egypt: On the Appointment of Suleiman As Vice President
Only a few days after the start of the revolution, the regime is beginning to take desperate measures. Appointing Omar Suleiman as vice president means telling everybody that Hosni Mubarak is over and out and that Gamal Mubarak will never be president. At the same time it means telling the people that Suleiman, the man […]
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Egypt: Mubarak Bans Al Jazeera
Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. Cf. “Egypt Shuts Down Al Jazeera Bureau” (Al Jazeera, 30 January 2011). | Print
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The Shifting Balance of Power in the Middle East: The Cases of Egypt and Lebanon
America’s international standing is under mounting strain on multiple fronts. Nowhere is this more glaring than in the Middle East, where the balance of influence (and hence power) is shifting away from the United States and toward Iran, Turkey, and their allies. This trend may, in fact, accelerate as a consequence of ongoing unrest in […]
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Egypt: Can the Army Neutralize the People?
Hope is a powerful feeling, it is contagious, and it tends to increase geometrically. And hope is exactly what Tunisia gave our Arab people everywhere. Tunisia the land of the revolution where today three martyrs fell in the Kasbah, is still the inspiration of a whole Nation. Our great dormant nation, from Rabat to Baghdad. […]
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Two Scenarios for the People and the Army in Egypt: Interview with Mohammed Ezzeldin
Mohammed Ezzeldin: We have two main scenarios now regarding the relation between the people and the army. We have the Tunisian scenario. There’s a division in the ruling elites, there is division in the regime, so the army will be neutral: the tanks and soldiers and officers in the streets, they are just maintaining the […]
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People “Want a New Government” in Egypt: Interview with Ahmad Shokr, Editor, Al-Masry Al-Youm
Ahmad Shokr: Well, the scenes right now are quite remarkable. Literally, tens of thousands are taking to the streets amidst a huge security presence. I’m standing in front of a demonstration of at least a few thousand people who have taken over one of the main bridges in Cairo, calling for the ouster of Hosni Mubarak’s regime. They have raised their hands, stating that they’re peaceful protesters, but have been met by a shower of rubber bullets and tear gas.
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Military Coup or Popular Revolution? Egyptian Presidential Guard Head to State TV Station, Cheered On by Protesters
“The presidential armed guard units, through the streets, headed towards the national television station, the state-run television station. A bit of a confusing picture there in Cairo, because we are seeing protesters cheering the presidential guard, happy that these troops are arriving.” This video was uploaded to YouTube on 28 January 2011. The text above […]
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Quick Notes on Tunisia and Egypt: The American Hand
1. The change in the composition of the Tunisian government ousting RCD ministers seems to have satisfied the UGTT. This is a sign that the protest now will be weakened. The protest was gathering sympathy again with an ever recurring discussion on regionalism and regional identity. The people are aware and they are pushing their […]