[Flashback February 2011. Since our Egypt and Libya policy are ending in disaster with the Muslim Brotherhood taking power in both countries, with Christians being slaughtered and in the case of Egypt, being attacked by government armored vehicles, and the Obama administration selling tanks, choppers, small arms, and missiles to Egypt and other countries in the Islamic world, we thought a second look at the editor’s previous coverage of this category is in order. The category list is on the lower right hand pane of the page. – Editor]
Now the hard left is finally talking about torture and other undemocratic abuses in Egypt and Jordan, as well as the despotism of virtually all Arab regimes. Do you recall any campus protests against Egypt or Mubarak? Do you recall any calls for divestment and boycotts against Arab dictators? No, because there weren’t any. The hard left was too busy condemning the Middle East’s only democracy, Israel. Radical leftists and campus demonstrators, by giving a pass to the worst forms of tyranny, encouraged their perpetuation. Now, finally, they are jumping on the bandwagon of condemnation, though still not with the fury that they reserve for the one nation in the Middle East that has complete free speech, gender equality, gay rights, an open and critical press, an independent judiciary and fair and open elections.
The double standard is alive and well on the hard left, and its victims include the citizens of Arab regimes who suffer under the heal of authoritarian dictators. Even more important they include victims of genocides, such as those perpetrated in Rwanda, Darfur and Cambodia—victims who did not prick the consciences of the hard left because the perpetrators were Arabs or Communists, rather than Americans or Israelis.
The same must be said for the United Nations, which rewarded Arab despots by according them places of honor on human rights bodies that devoted all of their energies to demonizing Israel. In a recent op ed, Amnon Rubenstein, the conscious of Israel, has pointed out that the UN Human Rights Commission, to which both Egypt and Tunisia were elected, has gone out of its way to compliment both regimes. Egypt was praised for steps it has “taken in recent years as regard to human rights….” Tunisia was lauded for constructing “a legal and constitutional framework for the promotion and protection of human rights.” Israel, on the other hand, was repeatedly condemned for violating the human rights not only of Palestinians, but of its own citizens as well.
Nor do I recall Bishop Tutu urging the Cape Town Opera to boycott Egypt, Tunisia or Jordan as he urged them to boycott Israel. I do recall Jimmy Carter, who has falsely accused Israel of Apartheid, embracing some of the Arab’s worlds worst tyrants and murderers. Many who claim the mantle of human rights ignore or even embrace the worst human rights violators and direct their wrath only against the Jewish nation.
The anti-American and anti-Israel hard left is a topsy-turvy world where the worst are declared the best and the best are condemned as the worst. This topsy-turvy view has become a staple of higher education, particularly among Middle East study programs in many colleges and universities. Among many on the hard left, where the only human rights issue of concern seems to be Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, the views of convicted terrorists Marwan Barghouti are preached as gospel. This is what Barghouti, who is serving a life sentence for planning terror attacks against civilians, but who remains among the most popular Palestinian leaders, recently said about Israel: “The worst and most abominable enemy known to humanity and modern history.” It is this skewed view of modern history that runs rampant through the hard left and that gives exculpatory immunity to Arab and Muslim tyrants.
There is only one acceptable standard of international human rights: the worst must come first. Under that universal standard, any person or organization claiming the mantle of human rights must prioritize its resources. It must list human rights violators in order of the severity of the abuses and the ability of its citizens to complain about those abuses. It must then go after the worst offenders first and foremost, leaving right-left politics out of the mix. This standard must be applied by individuals, such as Bishop Tutu, by organizations, such as the United Nations, by the media and by everyone who loves human rights. Until that standard is universally applied, despotism will continue, interrupted only occasionally by revolutions such as those taking place in Tunisia and Egypt.
The irony, of course, is that in the most repressive regimes, such as Iran, revolution is well nigh impossible. Revolution is far more likely to occur is moderately despotic regimes, such as Tunisia and Egypt, where at least some basic liberties were preserved. It is the citizens of the most despotic regimes that need the most help from human rights activists. But don’t count on it because too many so-called “human rights” leaders and organizations misuse the concept of “human rights” to serve narrow political, diplomatic or ideological agendas. Unless we restore human rights to its proper role as a neutral and universal standard of human conduct, the kind of tyranny and despotism that stimulated the current protests will continue.
[Flashback February 2011. Since our Egypt and Libya policy are ending in disaster with the Muslim Brotherhood taking power in both countries, with Christians being slaughtered and in the case of Egypt, being attacked by government armored vehicles, and the Obama administration selling tanks, choppers, small arms, and missiles to Egypt and other countries in the Islamic world, we thought a second look at the editor’s previous coverage of this category is in order. The category list is on the lower right hand pane of the page. – Editor]
They are in with Hezbollah and Hamas and help control Gaza, but oh no they love freedom and secular Democracy…
…and you can fool some of the people all of the time. This is coming from the president that said the same thing about the Iranian Mullah’s when he helped them come to power in Iran.
[Note: As is so often the case, when a video is damning to a leftist YouTube sees to it that the video is removed. Conservative bloggers and commentators are harassed by YouTube which is why so many conservatives are posting video at DailyMotion and other similar services.]
[Flashback February 2011. Since our Egypt and Libya policy are ending in disaster with the Muslim Brotherhood taking power in both countries, with Christians being slaughtered and in the case of Egypt, being attacked by government armored vehicles, and the Obama administration selling tanks, choppers, small arms, and missiles to Egypt and other countries in the Islamic world, we thought a second look at the editor’s previous coverage of this category is in order. The category list is on the lower right hand pane of the page. – Editor]
Bloggers who speak both Arabic and English are saying that in English the Muslim Brotherhood is talking peace, love, democracy, can’t we all just get along; in Arabic they are saying prepare for violence and to unite against Israel, Arab Christians, and the West.
The left appears to have been fooled again, as this is exactly what happened in the run up to the Mullah’s taking power in Iran. The Mullah’s completely hoodwinked the Carter Administration. We know now from recent unsealing of documents from the National Archives that the Carter Administration actually helped the Mullah’s come to power. The result has been incredible levels of death and suffering.
Democrat Strategist Kirsten Powers gives her perspective at The Daily Beast (Daily Beast normally is not very reliable but once in a while they have something solid and this was). Powers has family in Egypt so her perspective has street cred and she makes it clear that the left has been fooled [again]:
I spent much of yesterday interviewing American experts on the region—including two Brookings [Brookings is a left-wing think tank – Editor] Institution scholars who are experts on the Muslim Brotherhood—and was reassured over and over that the organization has reformed and does not seek to establish a fundamentalist state. One claimed that Brotherhood officials have said they view Copts as equal citizens.
My relative laughed at this. He says when Brotherhood members have been asked about how they would treat Christians they are vague. When asked about whether they would nationalize the banks, they are vague. Even one of the Brookings scholars told me that the Brotherhood would probably segregate the sexes. This is far from a secular group.
They are vague because they are using Iran as a model. They are vague because they are using a Taqiyyah strategy. They are vague because if they had been more forward up front the United States, Israel and Mubarak’s police would have eliminated much of the Muslim Brotherhood’s leadership in advance. It seems clear now that the killings of Christians and the burning of churches in Egypt was a precursor to see if they could get away with violence without fear of retaliation guided by government sponsored intelligence.
The Muslim Brotherhood is the overseer and grand daddy of all terror organizations.
Walid Shoebat, a former PLO terrorist whose family as been among the leadership of the Muslim brotherhood spoke out:
RIA Novosti (Russia) Reports that the Muslim Brotherhood has stated that it will end the Israeli Peace Treaty if it takes power. apparently they are getting confident enough to start putting off the false pretenses:
Egypt’s banned Muslim Brotherhood movement has unveiled its plans to scrap a peace treaty with Israel if it comes to power, a deputy leader said in an interview with NHK TV.
Rashad al-Bayoumi said the peace treaty with Israel will be abolished after a provisional government is formed by the movement and other Egypt’s opposition parties.
“After President Mubarak steps down and a provisional government is formed, there is a need to dissolve the peace treaty with Israel,” al-Bayoumi said.
Egypt was the first Arab country to officially recognize Israel and sign a peace agreement with the Israeli government in 1979. It is also a major mediator of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
So much for peace, love and can’t we all just get along…
It seems to be official. Obama is siding with the Muslim Brotherhood. The continued parallels between Obama and Carter still manage to amaze me even though it shouldn’t.
Mini-Update – Left-wing Brookings Institute: “Don’t fear Muslim Brotherhood“. Wow, either these people are the worlds biggest dupes, or the growing antisemitism of the academic left is so pronounced that it has gone just this far.
For the first time, a U.S. government supports granting a government role to an extremist Islamic organization: the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.
On Monday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Egypt’s new government will have to include a “whole host of important non-secular actors.” Most prominent among these is clearly the Muslim Brotherhood – which has made Islamic world domination one of its ultimate goals. It also opposes Egypt’s 30-year-old peace treaty with Israel.
Gibbs said the Muslim Brotherhood must reject violence and recognize democratic goals for the U.S. to be comfortable with it assuming a role in the new government. This caveat does not significantly alter the new American approach, which is very different than that of the previous Administration, in which George W. Bush pushed Mubarak for democratic reforms but never publicly accepted a role for Islamists.
Today, new White House chief of staff William Daley moderated the position very slightly, saying the U.S. hopes for a “strong, stable and secular Egyptian government.” Noting that the strengthening of the Muslim Brotherhood is “some people’s expectation [and] some people’s fear,” Daley acknowledged that the situation in Egypt is largely out of American control.
Obama’s new position, while not totally surprising, is worrisome to many. “The White House appears to be leaving Hosni Mubarak, an ally for three decades and lynchpin of Mideast stability, twisting slowly in the wind,” writes David Horowitz of the Freedom Center. “And worse, it appears to be open to allowing the Muslim Brotherhood to play a key role in a ‘reformed’ Egyptian government, as long as the organization renounces violence and supports democracy. If the Obama White House really believes this is possible, it is even more hopelessly incompetent than we imagined!”
American Thinkerhas a good summation of what is going on. We are witnessing the collapse of the Middle East:
If Egypt should fall, it will mark the beginning of the end for what little remaining stability there is in the Middle East. Jordan is facing similar unrest, as are Algeria and Yemen. Lebanon and Tunisia fell in January. It is highly unlikely that these events are unrelated. A combination of leftist and Islamist forces provoked the protests, and we are likely looking at a ring of radical Islamic states rising up to surround Israel. Once their power is solidified, perhaps in a year or two, they will combine forces to attack Israel. If Israel falls, the United States will stand alone in a sea of virulent enemies and impotent allies.
So whom does Obama support, Mubarak or his enemies?
Obama wasted no time in telling us. He supports Mubarak’s opponents, and he probably has been all along. The Los Angeles Times reported on Sunday that the Obama administration favors a role for the Muslim Brotherhood in a new Egyptian government.
The Muslim Brotherhood, the oldest extremist Muslim organization, is behind practically every Muslim terrorist organization ever formed. And while they may have publicly renounced violence as the LA Times article claims, internal documents tell a completely different story.
And if that weren’t bad enough, Obama’s latest comment to Egypt’s leader is that “an orderly transition … must begin now.”
Must begin. Now.
Simply stunning.
Juxtapose Obama’s statements toward our allies with his reaction to the genuine uprising that occurred last year in Iran. Tunisia: “Reform or be overthrown.” Egypt: “an orderly transition … must begin now.” Iran: “It is not productive … to be seen as meddling.” Meanwhile, candidate Obama claimed that the terrorist groups Hamas and Hezb’allah have “legitimate claims,” and we all remember his mindless counterterrorism czar, John Brennan, reaching out to “moderate” Hezb’allah members last spring. Hezb’allah moderates?
The seeming inconsistency is astonishing. Unfortunately, there is a consistency. Obama uniformly sides with our enemies but rarely, if ever, with our friends and allies. His administration is packed with far-left radicals and vicious anti-Semites. And therein lies the rub, because what we are witnessing in reality is this president’s un-American, anti-American, treasonous ideology in full play.
Perhaps this is the real reason for Bill Ayers’s, Bernardine Dohrn’s, Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin’s and Evans’s tripsto Egypt in 2009. Following those trips, these same people made multiple visits to the White House.
Obama’s breathlessly arrogant answer? Not the same Ayers, Dohrn, Benjamin, and Evans. Sure.
A few years back, I cited a quote by Lynn Stewart, the National Lawyers Guild attorney jailed for helping blind sheikh Omar Adel Raman foment terror from his New York jail cell. One might think that atheistic radical leftists would be foursquare against a political movement that tramples women’s rights, murders homosexuals, and enforces strict theocratic mandates. No such luck, Stewart said:
They [radical Islamic movements] are basically forces of national liberation. And I think that we, as persons who are committed to the liberation of oppressed people, should fasten on the need for self-determination. … My own sense is that, were the Islamists to be empowered, there would be movements within their own countries … to liberate.
” … movements within their own countries … to liberate.” Given recent developments, Stewart’s statement was prescient. But I think it had a special meaning. Because when movement leftists like Stewart talk about “liberation,” they are really talking about communism.
It has been my longstanding assertion that Muslim terrorism is simply a false flag operation, managed in the background by our main enemies, Russia and Red China. Almost since the beginning, Muslim terrorist organizations have been supported and nurtured by the Soviet Union or its Middle Eastern surrogates.
Yasser Arafat’s PLO is a prime example. Created by the KGB, the PLO was always about providing a Soviet counterweight to Israel in the Middle East. They were uninterested in the Palestinian cause, and they said so! Alexander Litvinenko, the KGB defector poisoned by Polonium 210 in what was assumed to be a KGB hit, claimed in his book, Allegations, that al-Qaeda’s number two man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was a Soviet agent. And while today Hezb’allah is the de facto ruler of Lebanon, the real power is Ba’athist Syria.
David Horowitz wrote of the alliance between leftists and Muslim terrorists in his seminal book: Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left. He describes in detail how the left and Muslim radicals work together to achieve their mutual ends: the destruction of America.
It is incomprehensible that President Obama does not recognize the strategic significance of what is happening, and if he does, then his support of Egypt’s sham “democracy movement” is a naked betrayal of our Middle Eastern allies and, by extension, our own country.
Unfortunately, his view is shared by some Republicans who are so in love with the idea of “democracy” that it doesn’t matter to them that the “democrats” in this case include fanatic mass murderers. At best, it can be seen only as incredibly myopic and ignorant to support Mubarak’s enemies. People make the same mistake Carter did with Iran and Nicaragua: they commit the logical error of assuming that just because a country’s current leadership is flawed and “undemocratic,” that automatically means that someone else would do better. Newsflash: they can do worse, and almost without exception, they do, because people who take power by street riot have no interest in “democracy.”
If their street revolutions are successful, these Middle Eastern countries will rapidly degenerate into radical Muslim thugocracies allied with our communist enemies. Israel will be the first target, and with Obama’s radically anti-Israel orientation, the Israelis will stand alone. We will be next. One wonders if Obama will then stand to defend the country he swore to, or if he will be out in the streets with his fellow radical leftists burning American flags.
[Flashback February 15, 2011. Since our Egypt and Libya policy are ending in disaster with the Muslim Brotherhood taking power in both countries, with Christians being slaughtered and in the case of Egypt, being attacked by government armored vehicles, and the Obama administration selling tanks, choppers, small arms, and missiles to Egypt and other countries in the Islamic world, we thought a second look at the editor’s previous coverage of this category is in order. The category list is on the lower right hand pane of the page. – Editor]
From Tahrir Square (know as “Liberation Square”) in modern Cairo, Egypt to Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts – the epicenter for important Middle East foreign policy at Harvard University, recent geopolitical events in the Middle East have weighed heavily on the minds of politicians, scholars and human rights activists. Uprisings from a young, educated and social media savvy generation helped fuel the transition from a dictatorship led by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to a transition government backed by the Egyptian military to hopefully usher in a viable democratic election and due rule of law process. One would hope. So, why is the state of affairs for Egypt important to folks in Massachusetts as well as across the nation? In the day-to-day activities or our lives, including trudging through the highest unemployment rates in nearly 20 years and the instability of foreign oil dependency, why should we be concerned with what happens in the land of King Tut?
According to leading environmental economist at Cardno ENTRIX, John M. Urbankchuk, globalization of economics sits at the core of our nation’s discussions and decision-making process with respect to U.S. exports. “Egypt is important for a number of reasons not the least of which is the Suez Canal,” says Urbanchuk. In as much as it is unclear whether the current new administration in Egypt will flourish or flounder, a potential shift toward a fundamental Islamic government would more than likely alter the relations and create tensions between the U.S. and Egypt and our most critical ally, Israel. Urbanchuk notes with this potential geopolitical change, factors affecting access to trade through the Suez Canal would increase time of delivery of goods and cost for the EU and the U.S. should cargo need to transit around the Horn of Africa.
Since 1869, the Suez Canal –owned and operated by the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) of the Arab Republic of Egypt–has made off-shore trading extremely manageable and profitable for all involved. International treaty has long afforded the passage to be used by all to create a direct route from the Middle East to Asia and has been used for both war and peaceful purposes. The commodities “food chain” feeds directly through this short cut to allow U.S. exports to flow expeditiously from the Arabian Sea through the Red Sea to the Eastern Mediterranean.
The United States and Egypt have long been tied to the hip economically as well as politically. Good foreign relations between the two has been the mainstay which has kept the flow of oil production steady and the protection of one of our greatest allies, Israel. Urbanchuk further emphasizes the important inter-relationship pointing out in FY 2010 alone, Egypt ranked as our 12th largest market at nearly $1.6 billion. “They are our 4th largest market for corn, 6th largest for wheat, and 7th for soybeans,” calculates Urbanchuk. The question one needs to ask is what would happen if suddenly our trade were hampered by the escalation of extreme resistance by fundamentalist groups seeking to drive Western political influence and oil interests out of the Middle East?
In the 2007, a final report to the Secretary of Energy, entitled, “Hard Truths: Facing the Hard Truths About Energy,” the National Petroleum Council’s special advisory committee to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) outlines the importance of everyday life factors that depend on the Middle Eastern and other offshore production of energy. By 2030, the Council projects energy demands will be up by 50-60 percent due to a growing population and desire for improved living. Not only is the United States the largest player in the global energy game, but one of the largest importers of gas and coal and the third largest consumer of oil. Equally interdependent is our foreign relations with the Middle East and other emerging world governments including India, Russia and China. As the global market demands expand, the U.S. must not only continue to lead engagement in timely foreign policy to keep open markets, free trade and rule of law embedded in negotiations, but lead by example.
Currently, the Obama Administration seems to have a policy disconnect. On the one hand, in his S.O.T.U. speech, Obama calls for sweeping reforms for energy efficiency and research to end dependency on fossil fuels…which is optimistic at best according to experts in the field. Experts believe the approach toward less foreign dependency of energy in a stepped manner, will not upset the delicate global inter-dependency energy plays. However, at the current status, much is at stake in the geopolitical landscape including the need to tie-in decision making among Cabinet and U.S. government departments interdependent on intelligence that will strengthen energy security and viability. In addition, how the new nascent democracies tie into the concept of free trade will be a debate worth watching as more countries join the World Trade Organization (WTO) to formulate and further shape global trade policy. Acceptance or non-acceptance of free market enterprise may ultimately lead to driving costs of access and production upwards.
To the average U.S. consumer concentrating on getting the kids off to school and putting food on the table, this may seem daunting. All one has to do is just remember the oil crisis during the Carter Administration and the lines at the gas stations across the country and it all makes sense. Fueled by the ousting of the Shah and the assumption of a new fundamentalist government lead by a cleric and former prisoner, Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, America experienced unstable oil prices, high unemployment and a V-8 moment when it came to increasing dependency on foreign oil sources. Should the recent chain of events in Egypt parallel that of Iran whereby this new democratic transition government is eventually squeezed out by cleric intervention after one year in office, a déjà vu in the theatre of Middle Eastern oil production could come into play.
There is much to do domestically with a crushing recession still gripping our nation, yet the United States still must keep its big toe in the cursory depths of the canals and straits which keep us interdependent to a global energy market.
In seeking ways to diversify our energy supply, America still must play the “honest broker” role in the world to help new leaders understand the importance of open trade and free markets. As more suppliers enter the market and use these commodities for political gain, our purse strings will surely incur repeated fluctuations. Will we decide the cost of freedom from foreign oil dependency overtime far outweighs the U.S. becoming isolationist and no longer number one in the world market as the Obama Administration would like us to believe? America must lead by example, or our economy will undoubtedly fall prey to an international trade rollercoaster.
Lisa-Marie is the principal for The Cashman Group specializing in Crisis, Strategic and Political Communications. She is an elected member of her Republican Town Committee since 1999 and political strategist to several congressional and state campaigns.
“If you are not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” – Malcolm X
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