The overthrow of Egypt's Morsi - a deep political tapestry

[David Guyatt]

The continuing decline of Washington's influence:

Washington Islamist strategy in crisis as Morsi toppled

by F. William Engdahl

The swift action by Egypt's military to arrest Mohamed Morsi and key leaders of his Muslim Brotherhood organization on July 3 marks a major setback for Washington's "Arab Spring" strategy of using political Islam to spread chaos from China through Russia across the energy-rich Middle East.

VOLTAIRE NETWORK | 4 JULY 2013 ITALIANO

Morsi's own defense minister, armed forces chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announces the Islamist President's overthrow after a week of bloodshed that killed nearly 50 people.Morsi rejected the Defense Ministers demand that he quit to avert a bloodbath. He said he stood by his "constitutional dignity" and demanded the army's withdrawal of its ultimatum. It may become the major turning point of America's decline as world Sole Superpower when future generations of historians view events.One year after the secretive Muslim Brotherhood seized power and put their man, Mohammed Morsi in as President and dominated the Parliament, Egypt's military has moved in, against a backdrop of millions of people on the streets protesting Morsi's imposition of strict Sharia law and failure to deal with the collapsing economy. The coup was led by Defense Minister and army chief General Abdel Fattah el-Sissi.Significantly, el-Sissi was appointed as a devout Muslim younger general by Morsi last year. He was also trained and well-regarded in Washington by Pentagon leadership. That he leads the coup indicates the depth of the rejection of the Brotherhood inside Egypt. Al-Sissi announced Wednesday night, July 3, that the head of the Constitution Court will act as provisional president and form an interim government of technocrats to run the country until early presidential and parliamentary elections. He was flanked by Christian, secular opposition and Muslim leaders. Al-Sissi said that all the army's efforts to affect a national dialogue and reconciliation were welcomed by all factions and blocked by President Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood.

Outrage aimed against US

Perhaps the most significant aspect of the mass mobilization of protesters in recent weeks that culminated in the decision by the military to actively take control was the clear anti-Washington character of the street protests. Demonstrators carried hand-made posters denouncing Obama and his pro-Muslim Brotherhood Cairo Ambassador, Anne Patterson.Egypt's Cairo Ambassador, Anne Patterson was a special target of the protests. Patterson made remarks June 18 to discourage the anti-Morsi protesters. She told Egyptians, "Some say that street action will produce better results than elections," Patterson said. "To be honest, my government and I are deeply skeptical." Then in an even more explicit interview with the Egyptian Ahram Online in May, the US diplomat refused to be critical of Morsi and stated, "The fact is they ran in a legitimate election and won. Of course it is challenging to be dealing with any new government. However, at the state institutional level, we are for instance still liaising with the same military and civil service personnel, and thus have retained the same long-established relations." [1]The military action also came against the explicit intervention of US President Obama and his Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey. Obama called the Egyptian president and Dempsey phoned Chief of staff General Sedki Sobhi, hoping to defuse the three-way crisis between the regime, the army and the protest movement. Now Obama stands with more than egg on his face. [2]Significantly, Saudi King Abdullah and leaders of the conservative UAE emirates, with notable exception of the pro-Muslim Brotherhood Emir of Qatar, have openly greeted the military action in Egypt. Saudi state news agency SPA reported, "In the name of the people of Saudi Arabia and on my behalf, we congratulate your leadership of Egypt in this critical period of its history. We pray for God to help you bear the responsibility laid upon you to achieve the ambitions of our brotherly people of Egypt," as official statement from the King. [3]A news blog reported close to Israeli military and intelligence circles, says that the Egyptian military acted with quiet backing by Saudi Arabia and other conservative Gulf nations. According to these reports, should the Obama administration cut off the annual US aid allocation of $1.3 billion to Egypt's military, Saudi Arabia and the UAE would make up the military budget's shortfall. As well, they state, Saudis, UAE and other Gulf nations, such as Bahrain and Kuwait, "would immediately start pumping out substantial funds to keep the Egyptian economy running. The Egyptian masses would be shown that in a properly managed economy, they could be guaranteed a minimal standard of living and need not go hungry as many did under Muslim Brotherhood rule. According to our sources, the Saudis and the UAE pledged to match the funds Qatar transferred to the Muslim Brotherhood's coffers in Cairo in the past year, amounting to the vast sum of $13 billion." [4]Whether the report of pledged aid materializes or not, the military intervention in Egypt is sending tectonic shock waves across the entire Islamic world. A week ago as mass protests in Egypt swelled, Qatar's openly pro-Muslim Brotherhood Sheikh Hamad al-Thani surprisingly turned rule over to his 33-year old son, reported a moderate. The son immediately fired the pro-Brotherhood Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim. Qatar had given Morsi's Egyptian Btotherhood some $8 billion and Muslim Brotherhood's spiritual leader, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, has lived in Doha for decades, using it as a base to project his often controversial sermons. Qatar's government-ownedAl Jazeera channel has also been criticized for shifting in recent years from being a respected independent Arab news channel to becoming the partisan voice of the Muslim Brotherhood. [5]Significantly, one of the first acts of the Egyptian military was to close the Al Jazeera studio in Cairo.The major defeat of the Brotherhood in Egypt will also have major shock waves in Turkey where the pro-Brotherhood AKP party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Mass protests have been brutally put down by Erdogan with police using tear gas and powerful water cannons. Erdogan had allowed Turkey to be used as a major staging ground to send mercenaries, financed largely by Qatar, into Syria to try to topple the government of Bashar al-Assad and replace him with a Muslim Brotherhood regime. Egypt's Morsi shortly before his fall, called for a Jihad to topple Assad.The crucial question now will be what Obama's response to the collapse of Washington's "Arab Spring". The "Arab Spring" of yesterday has just become Washington's Siberian Winter nightmare.

Saudis' Unprecedented Break with Washington over Egypt

by F. William Engdahl

One of the least commented aspects of ousting Egypt's Morsi is the defiant act of the Saudi Royal House in backing the ouster of the Brotherhood and supporting the military restoration. The Saudi move is unprecedented in its open defiance of White House declared backing for the Muslim Brotherhood. The implications of the split are huge.

VOLTAIRE NETWORK | FRANKFURT (GERMANY) | 18 JULY 2013 ITALIANO

King Abdullah, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques.

Twilight in the desert?

Since the time in 1945 on his return from the fateful Yalta Conference, that US President Roosevelt met Saudi King Ibn Saud and won exclusive rights for US Rockefeller-group oil companies to Saudi Arabia's vast oil wealth, the relationship between Saudi and US foreign policy has been one of almost satrapy status for the Saudis. [1] Following the Kissinger-orchestrated 1973 "oil shock" in which OPEC raised its price by some 400%, Washington extracted a pledge from the Saudis that they would insure that OPEC sold its oil only in dollars, thereby ensuring the continued dominance of the US dollar as world reserve currency. In return, Washington agreed to sell US arms including training the Saudi Air Force. [2]And in 2010 just as Washington launched its Arab Spring "democracy" offensive in Tunisia, Egypt and across the Islamic arc of crisis, the Obama Administration announced the largest arms deal in US history. The US agreed to sell the Saudis 84 F-15s new and upgrade another 70 as part of a €46 billion deal, the biggest arms deal in US history, as it prepared to isolate Iran. [3]As we reported in an earlier article, before the Egyptian military coup, the Saudis had given secret assurance to Defense Minister and Chief of the Army, General Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, that the Saudis along with other conservative Gulf oil states including Kuwait and UAE would guarantee financial support should the Obama Administration cut the €1 billion annual aid to Egypt's military in retaliation for ousting their man, Morsi. [4]On July 17, the newly-sworn-in Egyptian transitional government confirmed that it has received €6 billion in grants, loans and fuel from Saudi Arabia and the UAE.Saudi Arabia approved €4 billion in aid to Egypt and the UAE has offered €2 billion in desperately needed support for the economy. The Saudi funds comprise a €1.5 billion central bank deposit, €1.5 billion in energy products, and €750 million in cash, Saudi Finance Minister Ibrahim Al-Assaf said. The UAE will make a €750 million grant to Egypt and a €1.5 billion loan in the form of an interest-free deposit with Egypt's central bank. [5]The news is a double slap-in-the-face to Washington who had insisted that Morsi's government buckle under to harsh IMF conditionalities as precondition for financial help.

Qatar reacts dramatically

Conspicuously, one Gulf energy-rich state absent from the aid is Qatar whose Emir Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani had poured more than €6 billion in Egypt since the revolution two-and-a-half years ago and perhaps another €7 billion to bankroll Islamists in Libya, Syria and Gaza, the Palestinian enclave run by Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. Qatar is home to the US Central Command's Forward Headquarters and the Combined Air Operations Center. And, most notably, until the Saudi and UAE-backed military coup against Brotherhood rule in Egypt on July 3, Qatar was home to leading members of the Muslim Brotherhood and one of its major financial backers in Syria, Egypt, Libya, and across the Islamic world. [6]Within minutes of the Saudi and UAE backed Egypt coup, the Emir of Qatar took note of the implications and announced his abdication in favor of his son, Tamim. Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani, who had shaped Qatar's pro-Muslim Brotherhood foreign policy, has been silenced, replaced by a military man who had been serving as deputy interior minister. The new Qatar leadership is now using words like "reassessment", "recalibration" and "corrections" to discuss their foreign policy. In brief, they dare not risk total isolation within the Saudi-dominated Gulf Arab states. [7]The Saudi decision to take bold action to stop what it saw as a disastrous US Islamic strategy of backing Brotherhood revolutions across the Islamic world has dealt a blow to the mad US strategy of believing it can use the Brotherhood as a political force to control the Islamic world more tightly and use it to destabilize China, Russia and the Islamic parts of Central Asia.The Saudi monarchy began to fear that the secretive Brotherhood would one day rise against their rule as well. They never forgave George W. Bush and Washington for toppling the Baath Party secular dictatorship of Saddam Hussein in Iraq that brought a majority Shi'ite to power there, nor the US decision to topple close Saudi ally Mubarak in Egypt. America's dutiful "vassal state" in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, revolted on July 3 by backing and supporting the military coup in Egypt.Aside from loudly protesting the Egyptian generals' coup against their Brotherhood allies, Washington so far has been able to do little, an indication of the declining US global power. The Pentagon has sent two amphibious assault ships carrying 2,600 Marines to the southern Egyptian Red Sea coast. The huge USS Kearsarge with 1,800 Marines and the USS San Antonio with 800 Marines, "moved up into the Red Sea and parked off Egypt, because we don't know what's going to happen," stated General James Amos, commandant of the Marine Corps.Washington is suddenly in a major foreign policy disarray as the new Egyptian interim government is sworn in.

[Magda Hassan]

Yes, Qatar has lost out big time to the Saudis on this. Qatar are also one the key backers of the FSA mercenaries in Syria. Their dictator recently retired and was replaced by some one else in the family. Morsi and Erdogan were (Muslim) brothers too. And things are not going so well for Erdogan either. All people like their secularism except those who would impose their own mental straight jacket on others. Meanwhile Israel just signed a weapons deal with Saudi Arabia. And the Palestinains are still ignored by all the Arab 'leadership'.

[Jan Klimkowski]

Intriguing stuff, but I believe there are additional layers to the onion skin.

For starters.

Firstly, there are parts of both the US deep state and the military-multinational-intelligence complex who are closely aligned with Saudi interests and may already see the puppet Obama as but a moment in history.

See for instance: Peter Dale Scott - US Government Protection of Al-Qaeda Terrorists and the US-Saudi Black Hole

Secondly, as the philosophy of Gladio demonstrates, Chaos and Carnage have their own attraction for Those who would Control us.

[David Guyatt]

Firstly, there are parts of both the US deep state and the military-multinational-intelligence complex who are closely aligned with Saudi interests and may already see the puppet Obama as but a moment in history.

My first thought too Jan. Obama is the past waiting to happen. I figured a sort of middle eastern October Surprise might been in the offing.

We'll see...

[Magda Hassan]

Handle with care because Iran have their own interests here as well but it is interesting. One billion still buys quite a lot.

Saudi King paid 1$ billion to help army remove Morsi

Saudi political activist, known as Mujtahidd, has revealed that Al Saud government has helped Egyptian defense minister with one billion dollars to topple former president Mohamed Morsi.
Mujtahid who has gathered lots of attention for his tweeter campaign against Saudi government, said in his latest tweets that Commander-in-Chief of Egyptian armed forces General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi who is also country's defense minister, received a one billion dollar aid from Saudi Arabia for removing Morsi from power on July 3.
Mujtahid wrote Saudi government is now very much concerned that Sisi has failed to establish the new setting in Egypt successfully, as millions of Morsi supporters continue their week-long protests throughout Egypt calling for his return.
"King Abdullah knows well that failure of the coup in Egypt will be a disaster for Al Saud because any new government will be stronger and will adopt anti-Saudi Arabia policies," he wrote.
He added, "That is why King Abdullah is one of the supporters of unlimited use of force in cracking down protesters, even if it leads to killing of thousands and even tens of thousands of people".
"King Abdullah not only supported the coup and tried to convince others to accept new changes, he also helped Sisi not to worry about his most important concerns," Mujtahid said.
He continued, "Sisi was worried that the crisis would break down the economy and this would hurt reputation of the coup, therefore King Abdullah pledged to help him receive enough aid to crack down supporters of the law".
Mujtahid believed what the Egyptian army has received up until now is just a small part of what has been promised by the Saudi regime and according to his findings "much more is on the way".
He said Saudi King is using his political, financial and media powers to convince US and European officials not to adopt strong stances toward the crisis in Egypt and make as much comments only enough to persuade public opinion in their own countries.
Even though Morsi was removed from power by the force of the army, none of the Western government has recognized it as a coup.
The US administration made a technically legal move to decide not to decide if the Egyptian military's ouster of the country's first democratically elected president was a "coup."
"The law does not require us to make a formal determination ... as to whether a coup took place, and it is not in our national interest to make such a determination," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Friday.
SHI/SHI

[Jan Klimkowski]

Can you imagine the western political and MSM frothing outrage if Assad's forces in Syria had murdered at least 70 peaceful protestors, with snipers using live fire heavily implicated?

Filthy Saudi Lucre buys a lot of murderers.

And a lot of moral hypocrisy:

The US administration made a technically legal move to decide not to decide if the Egyptian military's ouster of the country's first democratically elected president was a "coup."
"The law does not require us to make a formal determination ... as to whether a coup took place, and it is not in our national interest to make such a determination," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Friday.

Or more accurately: "Our national interest is not served by telling the truth, so we'll duck the issue", State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Friday...

[Peter Lemkin]

Handle with care because Iran have their own interests here as well but it is interesting. One billion still buys quite a lot.

Saudi King paid 1$ billion to help army remove Morsi

Saudi political activist, known as Mujtahidd, has revealed that Al Saud government has helped Egyptian defense minister with one billion dollars to topple former president Mohamed Morsi.
Mujtahid who has gathered lots of attention for his tweeter campaign against Saudi government, said in his latest tweets that Commander-in-Chief of Egyptian armed forces General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi who is also country's defense minister, received a one billion dollar aid from Saudi Arabia for removing Morsi from power on July 3.
Mujtahid wrote Saudi government is now very much concerned that Sisi has failed to establish the new setting in Egypt successfully, as millions of Morsi supporters continue their week-long protests throughout Egypt calling for his return.
"King Abdullah knows well that failure of the coup in Egypt will be a disaster for Al Saud because any new government will be stronger and will adopt anti-Saudi Arabia policies," he wrote.
He added, "That is why King Abdullah is one of the supporters of unlimited use of force in cracking down protesters, even if it leads to killing of thousands and even tens of thousands of people".
"King Abdullah not only supported the coup and tried to convince others to accept new changes, he also helped Sisi not to worry about his most important concerns," Mujtahid said.
He continued, "Sisi was worried that the crisis would break down the economy and this would hurt reputation of the coup, therefore King Abdullah pledged to help him receive enough aid to crack down supporters of the law".
Mujtahid believed what the Egyptian army has received up until now is just a small part of what has been promised by the Saudi regime and according to his findings "much more is on the way".
He said Saudi King is using his political, financial and media powers to convince US and European officials not to adopt strong stances toward the crisis in Egypt and make as much comments only enough to persuade public opinion in their own countries.
Even though Morsi was removed from power by the force of the army, none of the Western government has recognized it as a coup.
The US administration made a technically legal move to decide not to decide if the Egyptian military's ouster of the country's first democratically elected president was a "coup."
"The law does not require us to make a formal determination ... as to whether a coup took place, and it is not in our national interest to make such a determination," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Friday.
SHI/SHI

What a moral cesspool S.A. is!! They seem to have paid for much evil in the recent past! Suspected of paying for and possibly facilitating 9-11, al Qaeda, overthrow of Libya, destabilization of Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, [and much, much more!] and now this!......well I hope the Blowback gets the Sheiks right were it hurts!

[Peter Lemkin]

AS I write this at 8am CET the Egyptian Police, Intelligence and Military plus their various thugs are attacking the pro-Morci demonstrators [men, women, children] with tear gas and live bullets. Minimum 200+ dead and thousands seriously injured. Bulldozers are destroying tents, food, medical areas, etc. Most shot were shot by snipers and the locations of wounds I saw with my own eyes were to kill, not maim, not random shots. This is going to be a bloodbath, and likely escalate over many days - as the pro-Morci forces have vowed to move to other locations and many are willing to fight to the death. Few of them [pro-Morci protestors] have any weapons other than sticks and rocks against the US-supplied Egyptian Military with every weapon imaginable. Tanks and armored personal carriers are being brought in, and helicopters are overhead. Prepare for the worst massacre in Egypt yet. ......

IMO, best live views are now on Al Jazeera http://www.aljazeera.com/watch_now/

[Magda Hassan]

Neocons Seek Control' in Egypt

By Chris Rossini

August 12, 2013 "Information Clearing House - Neocons swindle their constituents into believing that they want to spread American values throughout the world. They talk about things like "bringing stability," yet only chaos has followed neocon-prescribed international interventions.

The cold hard truth is that what neocons really want is control. Everything else is just commentary. Let's take recent events in Egypt for example. The unelected Hosni Mubarak, who the U.S. propped up financially for 30 years, was finally removed from power. The so-called "Arab Spring" ushered in Egypt's first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi.

This should all sound good to the neocons, right? You would think that if a step backwards were to be taken (say a military coup), the neocons would throw a fit.

Ahh…but you would be wrong.

Jonathan Tobin tells us that, "There is more to democracy than voting." If the military didn't take over, he writes, "… there is little doubt that Morsi and the Brotherhood would never have peacefully relinquished power or stopped until they had remade Egypt in their own image."

Tobin must have a crystal ball to see the future so clearly.

Tobin believes that it's not only imperative for the Muslim Brotherhood to be ousted militarily, but they must never return to power again!

He writes that "any solution that risks giving Morsi another chance to consolidate power would be a disaster for Egypt and the United States."

Americans might be asking themselves at this point: "Why is the U.S. involved in this at all?"

Tobin then gives his prescription: "Washington must be prepared to stick with the military no matter what happens in the streets of Cairo."

No matter what happens? Is Tobin encouraging that the military use violence against peaceful protestors? Already dozens of protestors have been killed does he condone this?

Why would Tobin be so comfortable making such an outlandish statement in the first place? Why is he so comfortable with the Egyptian military?

Well, Foreign Policys John Reed gives an important clue. He points out that the U.S.:

"…largely built the modern Egyptian armed forces. In fact, the Egyptian Army as the entire military is colloquially known there may be one of the U.S. government's best friends in the entire Arab world. American presidents have been encouraging stability in the region for more than 30 years by making the Egyptian military the muscle behind a regional superpower one built and trained by Washington.

Whatever the U.S. builds (and continually funds) it effectively controls.

Control is the aim of neoconservatism, and what the whole disgusting endeavor in Egypt is all about.

This article was originally published at Neocon Watch -

[Magda Hassan]

Everyone keeps asking if I can confirm the Brotherhood's deathtoll of 100s -it's impossible for me to say but the gunfire has been constant بل ترو ‏@Beltrew