News Items

  • 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. That’s one camp. The people of Egypt (most of them now) are the other. The Americans want Mubarak to stay on for longer while they look for a suitable successor that would be best for U.S. interests. Mubarak’s tactic is to make Egyptians choose between…

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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 that principle, in the Arab/Muslim region it has generally supported radical Islamists in fear of secular nationalism (as has the UK).  Familiar examples include Saudi Arabia, the ideological center of radical Islam (and of Islamic terror), Zia ul-Haq, the most vicious of Pakistan’s dictators, Reagan’s…

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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 over Egypt. As citizens, we expect our president to uphold those values. For thirty years, our government has spent billions of dollars to help build and sustain the system the Egyptian people are now trying to dismantle.

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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 ago.”

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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 the protests. Mahmoud Saad, a popular TV host, has told other journalists that his disappearance from his daily show, Masr El-Naharda (Egypt Today), comes in protests against pressure to defame protesters as rioters “destroying the country”. The state is clearly starting to launch a media…

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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 worse if you use violence” many journalists were telling police officers outside the building. In the industrial city of Mahala, police virtually cordoned off the city. My sources in the city tell me the police ordered early dismissal of textile factory workers to preempt any…

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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 street in the center of the city. There have been minor clashes with protesters in various parts of Cairo, as well as in Assiyut – a city to the south. At the moment, security forces are cordoning off Tahrir Square. Private security guards in the…

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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 frequencies were not legally authorized. But critics, including many from abroad, have accused the Kiev government of using the case as a way to bludgeon a troublesome media voice into silence. … [See full piece on consortiumnews.com]

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  • Ortega: From “Revolutionary to Absolute Overlord”

    “As the cream of Nicaraguan society was celebrating Christmas 1974 at a glittering cocktail party, the unthinkable happened. Masked gunmen from the Sandinista National Liberation Front burst in, killed the host and took the other guests hostage. In exchange for their lives, the dictator Anastasio Somoza gave the Sandinistas one million dollars and free passage…

  • Propaganda Campaigns on Nicaragua and Cuba

    “I was in Nicaragua last week and I observed a transparent and free election process. The media repeat falsehoods regarding the Nicaraguan government as if they are administration spokespeople instead of journalists. All parties campaigned freely, and those in jail violated a law which prohibits receiving money from foreign governments. The Nicaraguans would never allow…

  • The Pentagon’s $7.3 Trillion Dollar Bill

    “In any reasonable world, such a military budget should be considered both unaffordable and deeply unsuitable when it comes to addressing the true threats to this country’s ‘defense,’ … Worst of all, providing a blank check to the military-industrial-congressional complex ensures the continued production of troubled weapon systems like Lockheed Martin’s exorbitantly expensive F-35 Joint…

  • Climate: Biden Must Use Executive Authority to “Stop Expansion of Fossil Fuels, Reject Industry Scams”

    “Everyone can see that the climate provisions of the Build Back Batter Act have been substantially weakened — and there are still doubts about its final passage nonetheless. But it’s important to understand that the fate of climate action does not rest on a handful of recalcitrant Senators or world leaders. There is plenty that…

  • The Other Climate Threat: Nuclear Winter

    “While there’s a widespread myth that the danger of nuclear war has diminished, this illusion is not the only reason why the climate movement has failed to include prevention of nuclear winter on its to-do list. Notably, the movement’s organizations rarely even mention nuclear winter. Another factor is the view that unlike climate change, which…

  • Watchdog Calls for Postmaster General and Board Chair to Go for Sabotaging Service

    “Every American is facing real, adverse consequences from Mr. DeJoy’s leadership: paying more for slower, less reliable mail and packages. We are grateful for the tremendous efforts of postal employees during the ongoing pandemic to deliver for their neighbors, despite the failures in leadership at the Postal Service.

  • Miriam Adelson Picks Up Where Late Husband and GOP Kingmaker Left Off

    “It’s big news when a political party’s biggest funder announces, after a period of mourning for the death of their spouse, that they will be continuing their role as the go-to funder for congressional and presidential candidates in 2022 and 2024. You also might expect a discussion of how that donor expects to influence U.S.…

  • The Pandemic “Massive Strike Wave”

    “These commentators failed to pick up on the strike wave because the walkouts were fundamentally different from walkouts in the past. Instead of calling upon unions and going on traditional strikes, many non-union workers organized on social media and simply walked out.”

  • Pentagon “Cover-up” of Afghan Drone Strike that Killed Family “Beyond Outrageous”

    Representatives of BanKillerDrones.org say the Pentagon “must be called upon by people around the world and by the U.S. Congress to make public all of the communications and logs, including communications with the White House, pertaining to the August 29, 2021 drone attack that killed 10 members of the Ahmadi family in Kabul, including seven children.”

  • Biden’s “Slap in the Face to Black Voters”: Pushing for Former Chicago Mayor Emanuel to Become Ambassador to Japan

    “If Rahm Emmanuel’s appointment as Ambassador for Japan is confirmed, all the organizing efforts put in to remove him as Mayor of Chicago will go in vain! Rahm showed the entire world, he cannot be trusted as a public servant when he concealed the murder tape of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald for his political gain.”

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