America’s Middle Eastern Puppet Regimes Are Falling Like Dominoes
Washington’s Blog
The images from the protests in Cairo, Egypt today are stunning. See this, this and this.
President Mubarak’s family has already fled the country.
As Raw Story notes:
Demonstrators calling for economic and political reforms broke through police barriers and began marching in Cairo’s streets.
Protesters gathered outside the Supreme Court in downtown Cairo and held large signs that read “Tunisia is the solution” amid massive police deployment, an AFP correspondent said.
Chanting “Down with Mubarak” — in reference to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak who has been in power for three decades — they broke through several police cordons and began marching towards Tahrir Square, in scenes seldom witnessed in Egypt.
Others shouted “Tunisia is not better than Egypt” as the crowds began to swell.
A security official told AFP that at least 20,000 to 30,000 police had been mobilized in the center of the capital alone, and that the area housing the interior ministry had been sealed off.
***
The protest, called by the pro-democracy youth group the April 6 Movement, coincided with a national holiday to mark Police Day.
The Christian Science Monitor reports:
The fact that the protests took place across the nation, and were not led by a particular political movement or opposition party, set them apart from demonstrations in the last decade, he says.
“This time it is really a national movement,” he says. “It’s quite remarkable that the slogans raised by the demonstrators were not typical of any political party. They were general slogans about democracy, ending the state of emergency, and lowering prices. This is the beginning of a process.… The government will not respond favorably so I think the continuation of the protests is almost certain.”
While some Americans assume this is a “Arab affair”, the fact is that Egypt’s president Mubarak is a yes-man to the U.S., and the fall of the Tunisian and now Egyptian leaders are really the ouster of U.S. puppet regimes in the Middle East.
As Eric Margolis wrote last week:
Oops! Something has gone terribly wrong with Washington’s plans for regime change in the Mideast. Wasn’t there supposed to be a US and British engineered revolution against Iran’s mullahs, followed by installation of a cooperative pro-western government and a bonanza for western oil companies?
The revolution came, all right, but in the wrong place. The explosion of popular fury in Tunisia that ousted its dictator of 23-years is sending shock waves across the Arab world and has alarm bells ringing in Washington.
Pay no attention to President Barack Obama’s pious bromides welcoming the revolution in Tunisia. The US, France and their Arab satraps are deeply worried that Tunisia’s popular revolution could spark similar uprising against the dictatorships or monarchies in other members of America’s Mideast Raj, notably Egypt.
It has come to light that Tunisia’s ruling elite had dinners and wine flown in from Paris at government expense for lavish parties in their beachside villas. Shades of the Iranian revolution, when women of the ruling elite in Tehran used to send their dirty laundry to Paris for hand washing, or fly to Paris to have their hair done for a soiree.
***The US and France have always hailed Tunisia as a poster-boy for “moderation, stability, and democracy. ”
Translation: 1. moderation: following orders from Washington and making nice to Israel; 2. stability: crushing all opposition, particularly Islamist-oriented parties, muzzling the media, and paving the way for US business; 3. democracy: holding fake elections every few years. The US media soft-soaped Ben Ali and gushed over Tunisia’s “moderate” virtues. They did the same for Egypt’s Anwar Sadat.
America’s other “moderate” Arab clients, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Yemen, Oman and some of the Gulf states, followed precisely the same model of ersatz elections, ferocious internal oppression, and absolute obedience to Washington.
Tunisia closely resembled other Arab non-oil states in having very high unemployment, social and intellectual stagnation, lack of free speech or expression, and no hope for the future unless one had links to the rapacious, self-serving, western-backed ruling oligarchy. On top of this, in most Arab states, over 60% of the population is under 25.
***Mainstream Islamist parties in the Mideast have nothing to do with al-Qaida (which barely exists any more) or anti-Western programs. Their primary concern is getting rid of the western-backed oligarchies that keep the Muslim world backwards and in thrall. Their platform is sharing resource wealth, social welfare, education, uprooting thieving oligarchies and fighting endemic corruption.
The big question now is will Tunisia’s dramatic events be a harbinger of other explosions across the volatile Arab world? All eyes are on Egypt, the home of a third of all Arabs. Egypt’s 83-year-old military ruler, Husni Mubarak, is a giant version of Tunisia’s Gen. Ben Ali.
Mubarak was engineered into power by the US after the killing of longtime CIA “asset” Anwar Sadat. Gen. Mubarak has ruled Egypt like a modern-day pharaoh ever since, crushing both violent extremist and legitimate political opposition. Mubarak’s rigged elections, winked at by Washington, are every bit as egregious as Tunisia’s.
So could the flames of Tunisia’s revolution spread to Egypt?
Today, we got the answer.
Hopefully, moderate Arab governments will replace the deposed regimes, and thus bring real stability to the region. Moderate regimes are those that are not fundamentalists of one type or another, not puppets of any superpower (the U.S. or China), and which focus on implementing sustainable economic and human rights policies which benefit the most of their people possible, instead of just the ruling elite.
are we threatening to reduce aid that props up some of the governments
It appears we are doing that in Palestine..( I pray NOT )
US threat to Palestinians: change leadership and we cut funds
Obama administration told Palestinian Authority its leaders must remain in office if it wants to retain US financial backing
The government of Barack Obama (right) 'expects to see the same Palestinian faces', such as President Mahmoud Abbas (left), if it is to continue funding the Palestinian Authority.
Seumas Milne and Ian Black Monday 24 January 2011 20.00 GMT
The Obama administration has privately made clear that it will not allow any change of Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, the leaked papers reveal, let alone any repetition of the Hamas election victory that briefly gave the Islamists control of the Palestinian Authority five years ago.
That is despite the fact that the democratic legitimacy of both the Palestinian president and Fatah leader, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), and prime minister, Salam Fayyad, is strongly contested among Palestinians, and there are no plans for new elections in either the West Bank or Gaza.
"The new US administration expects to see the same Palestinian faces (Abu Mazen and Salam Fayyad) if it is to continue funding the Palestinian Authority," the then assistant secretary of state David Welch is recorded as telling Fayyad in November 2008. Most of the PA's funding comes from the US and European Union.
Almost a year later, the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, reacted angrily to news that Abbas had threatened to resign and call for new presidential elections. She told Palestinian negotiators: "Abu Mazen [Mahmoud Abbas] not running in the election is not an option – there is no alternative to him." The threat was withdrawn and no election was held.
The US consulate in Jerusalem reported to Washington in December 2009 that "despite all its warts and imperfections, Fatah remains the only viable alternative to Hamas if Palestinian elections occur in the near future," according to a cable released by Wikileaks.
The US government's private determination to use its financial and military leverage to keep the existing regime in place — while publicly continuing to maintain that Palestinians are free to choose their own leaders — echoes the Bush administration's veto on attempts to create a Palestinian national unity administration after Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007.
Unlike the PLO, Hamas rejects negotiations, except for a long-term ceasefire, and refuses to recognise Israel. Supported by Iran and Syria, the group is classed as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US and the EU.
The leaked documents quote General Keith Dayton, the US security co-ordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority who was in charge of building up PA security forces until last October. He warned Palestinian leaders in 2007 about rumours that the "Fatah old guard" were undermining Fayyad, who he confirmed as the linchpin of US strategy in the West Bank.
"As much as President Bush thinks Abu Mazen is important," Dayton told them, "without Fayyad, the US will lift its hand from the PA and give up on Abu Mazen." Unlike Abbas, Fayyad – a US-trained economist who formerly worked for the World Bank and and the IMF – is not a member of the secular Fatah party.
Abbas was elected president in 2005, but his mandate expired in 2009 and is no longer recognised by Hamas, among others, as the legitimate Palestinian leader. Fayyad was appointed prime minister by Abbas after the Hamas takeover of Gaza but his legitimacy is also strongly contested as his appointment was never confirmed as required by the PA's parliament.
The Obama administration's determination to keep control of who runs the PA underlines the continuity of policy from the Bush years. In the runup to the 2007 Hamas takeover of Gaza, the then US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was revealed in leaked US official documents to have as good as instructed Abbas to "collapse" the then joint Fatah-Hamas national unity government.
The dependence of the existing PA and PLO leadership on US support is well understood by those leaders, as the documents underline. Referring to Obama's attempt to kickstart Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in 2009, US state department official David Hale told chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat: "We need the help of friends like you."
Erekat replied that the US president's "success is my survival".
The US consulate in Jerusalem reported in December 2009: "It is axiomatic amongst our contacts that Fatah remains the only near-term alternative to Hamas in Palestinian politics. Despite the toll of corruption and stagnant peace process, our contacts believe that only Fatah has the national liberation credentials, breadth of appeal and organisational structure to mobilise and win a Palestinian election for the foreseeable future ... Despite all its warts and imperfections, Fatah rermains the only viable alternative to Hamas if Palestinian elections occur in the near future."
As more and more has been revealed, to me it seems, IF TRUE, that it is a poor choice that we are making .. It has now been reported by the Palestinian Papers that the PLO KNEW ahead of time about Operation Cast Lead .. and that 'deals' were made regarding - where to bomb and where NOT to bomb WITH Israel.. I don't understand supporting anyone who is willing to have it's own people killed .. I don't know why this one hasn't blown up .. Al Jazeera has been attacked in two places in the last four days ..I wonder how this will turn out ? If I were a Palestinian I would trust NO ONE .. NOT us, not my own leaders . .. of course I would have NEVER trusted Israel .. so we will see.
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