Egypt
November 24, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The U.S. State Department responded to Mohamed Morsi’s grab of near dictatorial powers, and to the protests of the Egyptian people thereto, with this statement: The decisions and declarations announced on November 22 raise concerns for many Egyptians and for the international community. One of the aspirations of the revolution was to ensure that power would not be overly concentrated in the hands of any one person or institution. The
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November 23, 2012 — John Hinderaker
As Paul noted earlier today, Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi followed up his supposed diplomatic triumph in Gaza by claiming new, more or less dictatorial powers. Morsi’s announcement was greeted with outrage by many Egyptians, some of whom took to the streets: [A]nti-Morsi demonstrators set fire to Muslim Brotherhood offices in cities across Egypt on Friday. As enraged demonstrators torched Muslim Brotherhood offices in several Egyptian cities, a defiant Egyptian President
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November 23, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Yesterday, in commenting on President Obama’s apparent conclusion that the Muslim Brotherhood represents the wave of the future in the Middle East, I noted the unimpressive nature of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi’s electoral victory. But it is not popularity that makes Morsi and the Brotherhood look like the wave of the future. Rather, it is their will to power — the same sort of will that made Hitler and Stalin
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November 22, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
I haven’t seen a better analysis of the cease-fire agreement that ended, for now, the conflict between Israel and Hamas than this one by David Goldman in FrontPage Magazine. Here are excerpts: Hamas fires 275 rockets at Israel and is rewarded with de facto acceptance as a legitimate negotiating partner in the Middle East peace process, as well as with a relaxation of the Israeli blockade of the Gaza coast.
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November 20, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Israel apparently has succeeded in significantly degrading Hamas’ rocket capacity. Hamas continues to launch rockets into southern Israel, but for the first time in several days it launched none of the longer range missiles that can reach Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Israel’s priority has been to take out these missiles and it seems to be succeeding. Unfortunately, Hamas is thought to retain thousands of missiles capable of reaching southern Israel.
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October 20, 2012 — John Hinderaker
The “Arab Spring” continues apace. Last night Sonia Dridi, a reporter on French television, was broadcasting live from Cairo, in or near Tahrir Square, when the surrounding crowd decided to assault her, just for fun. In the end, she wasn’t harmed as badly as Lara Logan, but the incident was broadly similar. You can see it in the video below, which is puzzling in some respects. I can’t explain why
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September 24, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
In his interview on Sixty Minutes, President Obama was asked whether recent events in the Middle East have given him any pause about his support for the governments that came to power following the Arab Spring. Obama began his response by saying that the question “presumes that somehow we could have stopped this wave of change.” Actually, the question presumes no such thing. Even if the U.S. cannot prevent the
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September 23, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The other night, Sean Hannity suggested to Sen. Jim DeMint that the U.S. should cut off funding to Egypt. DeMint politely brushed the suggestion aside. If not even Jim DeMint is prepared to support cutting Egypt off, then clearly a cut-off isn’t going to happen. But should it? Before answering, read the New York Times’ account of its interview with Egyptian President Morsi. Morsi told the Times that it is
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September 23, 2012 — Scott Johnson
Today’s New York Times features an astounding interview with Egypt’s Islamist President Mohamed Morsi. Morsi is the man from the Muslim Brotherhood. Don’t tell President Obama, but these people are dedicated enemies of the United States. Morsi gave the interview to the Times in anticipation of his appearance in New York at the United Nations this week. You really have to read the interview to believe it. It could hardly
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September 13, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The Marine Corps has issued a statement regarding its involvement in the recent actions in Egypt and Libya. In Egypt, the Corps says that, contrary to the report I wrote about earlier today, the U.S. Ambassador did not impose restrictions on weapons or weapons status on the Marine Corps Embassy Security Group detachment. The Marines in Cairo were allowed to have live ammunition in their weapons. The specific Rules of
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September 13, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
According to multiple reports on U.S. Marine Corps blogs, the Marines defending the American embassy in Egypt were not permitted by the State Department to carry live ammunition. This decision, of course, limited their ability to respond to attacks like those this week on the U.S. consulate in Cairo. Or, as one Marine blogger put it, the decision “neutralized any U.S. military capability that was dedicated to preserve. . .life
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September 13, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
President Obama claims to have learned that, as president, you can’t “shoot first and aim later.” Yet today, our self-congratulatory chief executive did just that. In an interview on Wednesday night, Obama said of Egypt, “I don’t think that we would consider them an ally, but we don’t consider them an enemy.” Actually, Egypt is, by law, an ally of the United States. It was designated as a Major Non-NATO
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September 13, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
Bill Otis offers another suggestion for how Mitt Romney should address the atrocity in Libya and his opponents’ claims that Romney erred in criticizing the Obama administration’s initial statement about that atrocity. I post Bill’s suggested statement because it is a near-perfect expression of how I view the matter. Whether it would be politicially wise for Romney to make this statement is a separate question. My inclination would be to
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September 12, 2012 — John Hinderaker
Barack Obama, the man who never in his life has taken responsibility for anything, has started trying to shift the blame for the State Department’s too-revealing response to the Cairo embassy mob attack. Our friend Jennifer Rubin has the scoop: Right Turn has learned that the ambassador to Egypt, longtime foreign service officer Anne W. Patterson, was not in Egypt during the siege of the embassy. According to sources directly
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September 12, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The attacks on the U.S. embassies in Egypt and Libya should not have surprised the Obama administration, nor should the deadly nature of the Libyan attack have been unexpected. As David Pryce-Jones notes: The murderers of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three of his colleagues in Benghazi were Salafis, that is to say Muslims who believe in returning to the violence and conquest of the early years of Islam. A few
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September 11, 2012 — Scott Johnson
Worked up over YouTube videos depicting Mohammad in an unflattering light, Islamists in Cairo attacked the United States embassy in Cairo today. They seized and burned the American flag while trying to replace it with a black flag bearing the inscription: “There is no god but Allah and Mohammad is his messenger.” Hey, message received. The embassy issued the following statement: The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns
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September 4, 2012 — Paul Mirengoff
The Obama administration is set to eliminate a significant portion of Egypt’s $3.2 billion debt to the U.S. According to the Washington Post, the debt-relief package will likely approach $1 billion. Obama plans to grant this relief even as Egypt’s Islamist president Morsi cracks down on his domestic opponents, seeks control over the Sinai, and cozies up to Iran. The only concession Morsi appears to have made to the U.S.
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