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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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  • U.S. Bombing of Yemen is “Unconstitutional”  

      “President Trump has not only launched us into a new military escapade in the Middle East, he’s done so in breach of our Constitution, which requires congressional authorization to start a war,” said Isaac Evans-Frantz, director of Action Corps.

  • Yemen: Is the Scandal the Leak or the Slaughter? 

    The YDP released a report on Tuesday analyzing 38 strikes on Yemen the U.S. launched from March 15 to March 21 and found that 55 percent of the bombings hit non-military targets.

  • Israel Escalates Genocide, Kills Journalists

    Kouddous now notes: “Israel has now issued forced displacement orders for Jabaliya. The attack is unhinged and relentless.” Israel has been widely condemned as pursuing a goal driving out the Palestinians to take more of their land, including by UN specialists. 

  • Does Chuck Schumer Know What Genocide Is?

    Last December, both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch issued reports which unequivocally concluded that Israel has been engaging in genocide in Gaza. “But very few members of Congress dare to acknowledge that reality,”

  • The Israeli-American Trump Mega-Donor Behind Speech Crackdowns

    The Trump administration’s effort to deport a Columbia University graduate student, Mahmoud Khalil, in retaliation for Khalil’s role in campus protests opposing Israel’s war in Gaza, showed the lengths the White House is prepared to go to police speech about Israel.

  • The ‘War on Seniors’

    The future of Social Security is on the line. Nancy Altman, president and co-founder of Social Security Works, has “never been this worried” about the future of the program. Meanwhile, Martin O’Malley, commissioner of the Social Security Administration (SSA) from 2023 to 2024, is warning that Elon Musk and Donald Trump’s steps to hollow out…

  • Israel Restarts Large-Scale Bombing of Gaza, Killing Over 400

    “Pictures and videos from Gaza that have surfaced online show there is a large number of child casualties. ‘Israeli bombardment has returned to Gaza, bringing massacres with it once again,’ Al Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif wrote on X. ‘The bodies of children, killed in their sleep, lay scattered in the aftermath.’ The massive attack came…

  • Trump Bombing Yemen for Israel

    U.S. warplanes struck Sana’a and seven other provinces in Yemen in what U.S. defense officials described as the beginning of a large-scale military campaign against the Houthis.

  • Is Trump Going to Tank the Economy?

    Though the Trump-Vance administration inherited the strongest economy for an incoming administration in a quarter century, experts say there are already signs flashing red on the economy.

  • Protests Target Swiss for Caving on Geneva Conventions and Israel

    “Switzerland intentionally sabotaged (and then cancelled) the Conference of High Contracting Parties to the 4th Geneva Convention on behalf of the Israeli regime.”

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