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  • Mubarak, Army, U.S., Israel vs Egyptian People

    [As government forces have attacked peaceful protesters in Tahrir Square, Emad Mekay from Cairo reports] Mubarak is clearly backed by the Americans. He took some moves after speaking with Obama and a visit by a former U.S. Ambassador to Egypt Frank Wisner. Mubarak, the army, the Americans and the Israelis are clearly on one side.…

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  • Unrest Spreads to Sinai

    A Bedouin youth casually spreads out a piece of cloth before a police headquarters in Sheikh Zwayyed town in Sinai, the vast desert area to the east of Cairo across the Suez. “I will leave when Mubarak leaves,” he says. [Full piece from Inter Press Service]

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  • Chomsky: Strategic and Economic Objectives, Not Anti-Islamization, Drives U.S. Policy

    [While many are claiming that a central goal of U.S. policy is to minimize influence of groups like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Noam Chomsky contributed this to our blog] It is well-established, including the major scholarly literature, that the U.S. supports democracy if and only if that accords with strategic and economic objectives.  Following…

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  • An Open Letter to President Barack Obama

    ————————————————————————————————————————— [To sign; for recent news releases on Egypt from the Institute for Public Accuracy] Dear President Obama: As political scientists, historians, and researchers in related fields who have studied the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy, we the undersigned believe you have a chance to move beyond rhetoric to support the democratic movement sweeping…

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  • Report from Cairo

    From Alex Ortiz in Cairo: “The army is beginning to come into Cairo … tens of thousands converged in midan al-gala’ coming from three different protest marches. Total communication blackout. Reports of senior police officers ordering their men to stand down and not beat or fire tear gas at protesters in Midan al-gala an hour…

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  • Report on Latest from Cairo

    CAIRO, Egypt [11 p.m. local time] — 1-Some government media figures appear to be joining ranks with the protesters. Mahmoud Saad, a talk show host in the Egyptian state-run TV, has announced that he will no longer appear on TV starting tonight after he came under pressure from top government officials to report “untruths” about…

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  • Police in Cairo Beating up Jounalists

    [From 9:28 a.m. ET]: Police started beating up journalists protesting outside the Press Syndicate in downtown Cairo. They beat up women journalists too who were screaming and crying for help. “Do not club women. Do not club women,” some of the men rushed to the police asking them not to target women. “You’ll make things…

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  • From Alex Ortiz in Cairo

    [The Egyptian government has apparently block Twitter, Facebook (as of Wed. morn U.S. ET) and other internet tools, though apparently some people are able to get around such restrictions. Email from 8:45 a.m. ET:] Downtown Cairo today remains in a state of high alert. There are many security forces and plainsclothed policemen visible on every…

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  • Video from Cairo

    Phone lines are intermittent and Twitter has reportedly been blocked in Egypt. Here is a live video feed: ustream.tv/channel/cairodowntown [update: ustream has been blocked, streaming now intermittently at livestream.com/cairowitness — further update, now at: www.justin.tv/cairowitness] Here is a YouTube video from earlier today:

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  • Ukraine’s Assault on a Free Press

    In Ukraine, where media diversity is often defined by which powerful oligarch controls which TV station, one network, TVi — known for its independent investigative style — is under intense legal pressure, with its owner not part of Ukraine’s power circles. TVi faces a court hearing on Tuesday over a legal claim that the station’s…

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  • YouTube Deletes Musician’s Entire Catalogue

    “It seems abundantly obvious to me that everyone who believes in free expression, whatever side of various political equations they may be on, should be concerned about what YouTube just did to me. If it could happen to me because of my allegedly controversial political viewpoints, it could happen to you because of yours.”

  • Israel Bombing Tent Camp During “Ceasefire”

    The Israeli military used bulldozers to bury Palestinians killed while trying to reach food aid near the Zikim crossing in northern Gaza, a new CNN report shows, with some bodies pushed into shallow, unmarked graves and others left exposed to decompose or be scavenged by animals.

  • Honduras Election

    Hondurans voted in general elections Sunday and the results are still too close to call. While governing Libre party candidate Rixi Moncada appears to have lost with only around 20 percent or less of the vote, hard-right National Party candidate Nasry Asfura is statistically tied with center-right Liberal Party candidate Salvador Nasralla, with about 84…

  • Trump Congo Deal: For Peace or Profit?

    U.S. President Donald Trump will host the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo on Thursday to sign what the White House called a peace agreement. 

  • U.S. War Crimes and Plans in Venezuela

    “The evidence that the U.S. Navy’s buildup in the Caribbean is not about combating drugs but rather regime change in Venezuela is overwhelming.”

  • Pesticides Causing Antimicrobial Resistance

    A coalition of conservationists, farmworkers and public health groups petitioned the Trump administration to ban the use of drugs as pesticides when they are crucial for humans, citing the dangers of cross-resistance to medically important antibiotics and antifungals. This fall, the World Health Organization warned that antimicrobial resistance threatens families worldwide. The petition requests that…

  • U.S. Bombs Somalia for 100th Time this Year

    “AFRICOM said the strikes targeted the ISIS affiliate in Somalia’s northeastern Puntland region. … AFRICOM said that the airstrikes were launched on November 21 and November 22 about 37 miles southeast of the Gulf of Aden port city of Bosaso, where U.S.-backed forces have been fighting against an ISIS affiliate in the Caal-Miskaad Mountains.”

  • Psychotherapists Challenging Insurance Company Denials

    The Psychotherapy Action Network has created an Insurance Toolkit that includes an Insurance Guide and Insurance Tracker. The guide outlines what psychotherapists and patients should know when insurance companies deny or question care, while the tracker aims to document obstacles dealing with insurance and reimbursement. 

  • Israel Strikes Beirut, Has Violated Lebanese “Ceasefire” 10,000 Times in Last Year

    “The strike comes after an unprecedented escalation in threats of launching a major military campaign that would not amount to a war according to Israeli officials. It was the first time the southern suburbs were hit since July. It comes only two days after Lebanese president Joseph Aoun said in a speech, on the occasion…

  • “The UN Embraces Colonialism” and Israel Escalates Bombing Gaza, Moving Yellow Line

    Not since the UN partitioned Palestine in 1947 against the will of the indigenous people, setting the stage for 80 years of Nakba, has the UN acted in such a baldly colonial (and legally ultra vires) way, and trampled so recklessly on the rights of a people.

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