Live: Al Jazeera coverage of Egypt’s growing revolution

[Sounder]

I can't tell you how much I appreciate the head's up from you and Sounder. I was beginning to feel like a sucker, wasting my time and energy on a futile and asinine "dialogue" with Mr. Cut-and-Paste. It's like being stuck in an elevator with a malicious robot. It's good to know that there are actual humans here, and that they're interested.

Alice, you are probably the most treasured poster on RI. You provide more perspective on ‘how the world works’ than the rest of us combined. It is only from people like you that we are enabled to make RI into something more than a social mapping and conformity exercise.

I do appreciate American cut-and-paste in that it’s handy to have that bright red flag waving in front of your face as your read or skip the latest indoctrination attempt.

Sadly, until more people grow some backbone, repetition will remain a strong tool for the propaganda of the infinite money men.

[stefano]

I can't tell you how much I appreciate the head's up from you and Sounder. I was beginning to feel like a sucker, wasting my time and energy on a futile and asinine "dialogue" with Mr. Cut-and-Paste. It's like being stuck in an elevator with a malicious robot. It's good to know that there are actual humans here, and that they're interested.

Alice, you are probably the most treasured poster on RI. You provide more perspective on ‘how the world works’ than the rest of us combined. It is only from people like you that we are enabled to make RI into something more than a social mapping and conformity exercise.

Signed! This thread might be the only thing that keeps me coming back to RI. The rest of the discussion has become a bit narrow in its focus, I find. You ought to know I'm interested, but can't find all that much time, plus every post of yours sends me off to do homework again. But please know that your posts absolutely are valued very highly.

the "journalists" in question were not operating as journalists, but as enemy agents. They entered the country under false pretenses as tourists, and booked into the Marriott Hotel, where they secretly set up an operations center complete with highly sophisticated satellite transmission and other equipment not consistent with their later claim to be simply field reporters. They did not bring this equipment in with them, so it was provided by someone inside the country. Al-Jazeera already has offices downtown, near Tahrir Square. These "journalists" (who pretended to be tourists) never went there. As the police was closing in on the funding of terrorists, first Qatar used its embassy to disburse funds to saboteurs and vandals; when this avenue was shut down, these so-called "reporters" were tasked with the job of funneling money to the terrorists and of fabricating false reports of Egypt "on the brink of civil war", presumably to justify foreign intervention.

How do you know this? I spent a bit of time looking after you posted and couldn't find anything very reliable about the trial - almost all news reports use the same language, which is very odd as the courtroom was supposedly packed with reporters, so how could there not be different texts? But nor could I find anything to support (or even report) the prosecution's case, apart from this video that Egyptian TV famously dubbed with the music from an action movie, and which shows pretty standard video equipment as far as I know, and the underwhelming sum of $700. There has been no confession, right? What were the proofs that the conviction was based on?

The actual figure [for military-owned companies' share of GDP] is 1.8%

Where is this figure from? I've seen guesses from 5% to 40%, and no one seems to have a firm idea.

As for the claim that the "chief executives of 55 of Egypt’s largest companies, contributing a third of that GDP, are former generals," that may or may not be true. What is true is that former generals are in great demand throughout the private sector, because of their reputation for discipline, excellent technical training and skills, honesty and capacity for leadership.

Honesty? Well that's not what I've heard. As I have it the reason the Mahalla Al-Kubra labour unions began striking in 2008 - basically the original anti-system energy that started this ongoing revolution - was because of the way their managers, former officers with strong connections to the military, had asset-stripped and indebted their companies, paying huge salaries, while keeping wages low. Those strikes were repressed by Mubarak's interior ministry of course. (Actually, do you now think that whole business was remote-controlled? That was the springboard for April 6...)

In fact the biggest reason I've been sceptical about Sisi has to do with this dynamic, not what he did to Moursi and the Brothers. It's based on the fact that he was head of the SCAF, and on what I know about the SCAF. I'm afraid that he will use his popularity and legitimacy to repress labour in the same way, and use the machinery of state to squeeze workers and the poor (and use the additional argument that it is urgent to rebuild the economy etc., now is not the time to be asking for a raise), for the benefit of the military as an economic operator, for Saudi conglomerates, and for various other industrialists. The statements I've seen so far have been good, I suppose, like the new revised budget with a lower subsidy budget, but there is still no detail as to how the government plans to hit that target, how exactly they intend to make the rich bear the brunt of it. Of the subsidies I mean - I like the capital gains / dividend tax, so that is evidence against my point of view I suppose. I'm just still fearing some sort of repression of protests against higher prices, and it doesn't help that I feel it's impossible to know what is going on in Egypt (apart from, as we've said, your richly informative posts).

[beeline]

Signed! This thread might be the only thing that keeps me coming back to RI. The rest of the discussion has become a bit narrow in its focus, I find. You ought to know I'm interested, but can't find all that much time, plus every post of yours sends me off to do homework again. But please know that your posts absolutely are valued very highly.

Can I add a third??? Alice's perspective on Egypt and the ME in general really allows me to see through the MSM bullshit. Love you, Alice!

[coffin_dodger]

Alice - ditto the positive sentiments above - you're the one of the main reasons for visiting RI these days.

[AlicetheKurious]

Bless you all, really, for letting me know; because it was getting a little creepy, that feeling that it was just me and it.

the "journalists" in question were not operating as journalists, but as enemy agents. They entered the country under false pretenses as tourists, and booked into the Marriott Hotel, where they secretly set up an operations center complete with highly sophisticated satellite transmission and other equipment not consistent with their later claim to be simply field reporters. They did not bring this equipment in with them, so it was provided by someone inside the country. Al-Jazeera already has offices downtown, near Tahrir Square. These "journalists" (who pretended to be tourists) never went there. As the police was closing in on the funding of terrorists, first Qatar used its embassy to disburse funds to saboteurs and vandals; when this avenue was shut down, these so-called "reporters" were tasked with the job of funneling money to the terrorists and of fabricating false reports of Egypt "on the brink of civil war", presumably to justify foreign intervention.

How do you know this? I spent a bit of time looking after you posted and couldn't find anything very reliable about the trial - almost all news reports use the same language, which is very odd as the courtroom was supposedly packed with reporters, so how could there not be different texts? But nor could I find anything to support (or even report) the prosecution's case, apart from this video that Egyptian TV famously dubbed with the music from an action movie, and which shows pretty standard video equipment as far as I know, and the underwhelming sum of $700. There has been no confession, right? What were the proofs that the conviction was based on?

Ah, there's that language barrier again. There's a huge difference between the amount of information you can glean from just watching the video, and what you can witness for yourself when you watch it and listen as one of the defendants (the only one who speaks Arabic) is interviewed on the scene by investigators. It's amazing how much you miss if you don't understand what he says.

Because of those who've been so nice, I've taken the trouble of translating the interview. It's as accurate as I can make it, but given the time constraints, not as elegantly or neatly formatted as it could have been.

Melodramatic music aside, the video is pretty informative. It records what the police found when they arrived at the hotel suites of these supposed tourists: sophisticated film editing and satellite up-link equipment, and the accouterments of a recording studio, complete with studio cameras and studio lights. They also found gas masks, mobile field cameras, and scribbled notes about the so-called "student demonstrations". What we're watching is a video filmed by police, edited, and leaked to a privately-owned TV channel, Tahrir, who dubbed in the music and aired it as an exclusive.

First, the investigator asks the subject to empty his pockets and state the amount of cash on his person; this is filmed (like everything else) to document the amount, so he can't later claim it was less or more.

Before the interview starts, the subject states for the record that he has been shown a legal warrant, has not been harmed or threatened in any way, and that nothing has been done to coerce him to talk with the police.

The dialogue is mostly between two investigators and one of the defendants, who speaks with an Egyptian accent. He is Al-Jazeera English's Cairo Bureau Chief Mohamed Fadel Fahmy. The other, Peter Greste, is Australian and doesn't speak Arabic:

Fahmy is asked what all this equipment is for. He answers that none of it belongs to him or to his friend, and that it's all the property of Al-Jazeera English, for the use of their technicians and cameramen. The investigator asks him who are these technicians and cameramen, and he doesn't answer. The investigator asks him if he knows who they are, and he answers, "Yes, of course," and insists that they are fully licensed to operate and are registered as such with the authorities. He's asked what their names are, and he doesn't answer. He just repeats that they have legal identification issued by the Ministry of Media Affairs. The investigator asks again, "So, who are they?" No answer.

Another investigator asks him, "When you conduct an interview at night, aren't the cameramen supposed to be present?" He answers, "We never conduct interviews here." The investigator asks, "And all these lights set up here, and all this..." Fahmy interrupts and contradicts his own previous statement, "Yes, we have interviews here in the room." The investigator repeats, "So you do have interviews in this room. Who did you interview most recently?" Then Fahmy contradicts himself once again, and says, "We don't interview anyone inside, here in the room. We interview people on the street. We don't bring people here and interview them in the room. You understand what I mean?" The investigator asks him, "But what about all this equipment set up, ready to film? You set it all up here and then bring it into the street?" Fahmy says, "That's for the correspondent, for when he's talking." The investigator asks, "Who is this correspondent?" He answers, "I am, and the man sitting next to me (referring to Peter Greste)." The investigator asks, "Who is he?" Fahmy answers, "Peter." The investigator asks, "Mr. Peter?" Fahmy answers, "Yes."

The first investigator asks, "So, who was the last person you interviewed?" Fahmy says, "Uhhhhh...." waving his hand around. Then he says, "We didn't interview anyone here, in this room." The investigator asks, "So, who did you interview?" He answers, "We filmed a lot of things, a whole lot of things. Uhhhhhhh....the funeral of Fouad Negm, for example." (a famous poet who died several months ago). He waves his hand again. "We filmed a whole lot of things. We film on a daily basis."

Gap

Fahmy says, "We don't receive a monthly salary." The investigator asks, "[You get paid for] each program you send in...?" Fahmy interrupts, "No, we don't get paid for specific programs." The investigator: "So you conduct interviews, and then you get paid for each interview." Fahmy says, "No." The investigator asks, "How do you get paid?" Fahmy answers, "In any company like 'Dream' or 'ONtv' (well-known independent Egyptian tv networks), there's something called a 'collaborator'. You get a payment for work. You get paid every month. It's like a salary." The investigator says, "So, as payment for each interview you conduct, each program you do, you get paid a certain sum." Fahmy nods. The investigator asks, "Is this sum fixed or variable?" He answers, "It's fixed. I mean, it's not... But to a certain extent, it's fixed."

The investigator asks, "Who bought you all this equipment you have upstairs?" Fahmy answers, "It belongs to the channel, not to me." The investigator: "And your hotel room, who pays for it?" He answers, "The channel. I mean, the channel pays, not me." The investigator: "But why are you staying in a hotel room, why aren't you operating out of a studio or a rental elsewhere?" Fahmy answers, "Personally, (garbled) working there." The investigator asks, "Why did they choose a hotel for you to work out of?" Fahmy shrugs, then says, "It could be any hotel." The investigator says, "Yes, but why a hotel? Why not a studio? Why not a rental property somewhere?" Fahmy lowers his voice confidently, and says, "I used to work for CNN, and I've worked for many, many channels. Any channel works out of the Semiramis Hotel, the Marriott Hotel, the Novotel..." The investigator responds, "That's if there's a specific news event to be covered. But complete residency in a hotel, and based on what you've said, you film your programs completely on the street and don't need the hotel room for filming." Fahmy says, "It's a place of work, nothing more." The investigator asks, "So if it's a place of work, why a hotel room, why not rent studio space or office space?" Fahmy says, "As a matter of fact, we are indeed looking for place to rent." The investigator asks, "How long have you been residing in this hotel?" Fahmy answers, "Three months." The investigator asks, "And in three months, you haven't found a place to rent?" Fahmy answers, "No, we've been looking." Then he smiles and points to himself, "Not me, the channel. I'm an employee."

The investigator asks, "Who deals directly with you from Al-Jazeera?" He answers, waving his hand vaguely, "The management." The investigator asks, "Who in the management?" Fahmy says, "The management in Qatar." The investigator repeats, "The management in Qatar." Then the investigator continues, "Who from the management in Qatar? Like who and who?" Fahmy gets a really fake bewildered expression on his face and says, "Managers." The investigator, beginning to sound exasperated, asks, "What are their names?"

Then someone comes in (clearly a high-level officer) and interrupts off-camera asking Fahmy if he has a filming permit. Fahmy answers, "Me, personally, me?" The officer says, "Yes." Fahmy says, "The channel has ID cards, not Al-Jazeera Arabic or Direct..." The officer interrupts him, "Did you get an ID card issued by the Journalism Center?" Fahmy asks, "Me?" The officer answers, "Yes." Fahmy says, "I did have one." The officer asks, "You did?" Fahmy says, "I did." The officer asks, "Have you renewed it?" Fahmy answers, "No, not yet." The officer asks, "How long as it been expired?" Fahmy answers, "I don't remember. But it's been a long time. It was from the time I was with CNN. They issued it for me. If you go there, you'll find it. When I left CNN, they took it back. Now I've been with Al-Jazeera for exactly three months."

The first investigator asks, "When was the last time you were in Qatar?" Fahmy looks around, as though trying hard to remember, then answers, "In September, when I went for the job interview." The first investigator asks, "That's the only time?" Fahmy says yes. The investigator asks, "And from Qatar did you go first to Turkey or come directly here?" Fahmy says, "No, I came directly here from Qatar, and started working right away." The investigator repeats, "You started working right away." Then he asks, "And do you get paid through a bank, or does someone come here and pay you?" Fahmy answers, "Through a bank." The investigator asks, "And when they pay the hotel bills, do they pay, or do you pay and send them the bills?" Fahmy answers, "No, they pay." The investigator asks, "So do they send someone to pay the bills?" Fahmy says, "They send an employee." The investigator asks, "An employee from the channel? He comes and settles the bill?" Fahmy nods yes. The investigator asks, "And who is this employee?" Fahmy says, "The one who's in charge of the accounts." The investigator asks, "What's his name?" Fahmy waves his hand and finally answers, "Mustafa." The investigator asks, "Mustafa what?" Fahmy says, "Mustafa," then mumbles something that sounds like "Awa".

The investigator says, "The reason I ask, is that I want to corroborate what you're saying. I need the name and contact details of someone whom I can ask if what you're telling us is true." Fahmy answers loudly this time, and says, "Mustafa Hawa." The investigator asks, "Where is his office? Where is he?" Fahmy says, "No, I've never been in Al-Jazeera's offices. Al-Jazeera's offices are near the museum, near the Ramses Hilton. That's their headquarters. I've never been there." The investigator says, "Yes, that's their headquarters. And is that where this Mustafa works?" Fahmy says, "I have no idea." The investigator asks, "So how do you deal with him?" Fahmy answers, "He comes here and pays the bills." The investigator asks, "So, you phone him and tell him, 'come and pay,' and he comes." Fahmy answers, "Yes." Then he pauses, and says, "It's not me. I'm just a correspondent." The investigator asks, "Do you have a phone number for this Mustafa?" Fahmy says, "Sure, of course." Then he added something I didn't understand, "And besides, the (something) brought him in before, for three days."

The investigator continued, "When you file a story, how do you send it?" Fahmy said, "By internet." The investigator said, "We found two devices here: one that delivers data via the internet, and the other delivers data via the telephone." Fahmy nods yes. The investigator asks, "Which one do you use to upload your stories?" Fahmy says, "No, not me. I don't know anything about how to use them. (Imitating a sock-puppet in a "talking" gesture): I'm just a correspondent. I don't know anything about technicalities. When they were asking me upstairs, I told them I have no idea what they're connected to or anything like that."

The second investigator, who's been pretty much silent throughout the interrogation then asks, "So who adjusts your cameras?" Fahmy answers, "There's a team. A cameraman, some young men, that's their job." The second investigator asks, "Do you sell your work to Al-Jazeera only, or also to the BBC?" Fahmy answers, "No. I worked with CNN for three years. Then I worked for big channels....NBC, then I wrote some articles...." The second investigator asks, "Who else do you give your work to, other than Al-Jazeera?" Fahmy answers, "No, at the current time, there's nobody else." The second investigator asks, "Is Peter a news correspondent?" Fahmy answers, "Yes." The second investigator asks, "What's his name?" Fahmy answers, "Peter Greste." The second investigator: "And what sort of things do you film?" Fahmy says, "Anything and everything." The second investigator: "Here in the room?" Fahmy says, "Here, we just film the news correspondent." The second investigator asks, "When was the last time you filmed in the street?" Fahmy: "Today. Today there was a bombing in Sharqeya." The second investigator: "And did you go to film it?" Fahmy says, "No, we didn't go to film it. We buy pictures from Reuters and broadcast them, then we go on-camera and say, "The Interior Ministry told us such-and-such, and the Ministry of Health told us such-and-such, and...that's all."

The second investigator: "What else have you covered besides the bombing in Sharqeya?" Fahmy answers, "Mansoura, the same thing." (The Central Security Headquarters in Mansoura was bombed last winter). The second investigator: "You didn't go to film?" Fahmy, "No, not at all. At all." The second investigator asks, "So what are these small cameras for?" Fahmy answers, "The small cameras are there, but we didn't go to film in Mansoura, and we didn't..." The second investigator interrupts him, "You just go into the street and film ordinary people." Fahmy: "Uhhhhhh, yes." The second investigator asks, "And does Peter have any license, any kind of official document that identifies him as a news correspondent?" The first investigator says, "I've already checked with the Department, and he doesn't have any permit to work in Egypt." Fahmy nods. The first investigator continues, "And neither do you." Fahmy says, "Uhhhhh....we've applied, but we haven't received anything yet." The first investigator, "Is there anybody who works with you who does have a permit and is registered?" Fahmy says, "Yes, the cameraman." The first investigator asks, "Who is he?" Fahmy answers, "Omar and Mahdi." The first investigator sounds exasperated, "Omar who? I need a proper full name." Fahmy says, "Omar Mohamed." The investigator asks, "Omar Mohamed what?" (In Egypt, people are officially identified by three names: their first name, their father's first name and their grandfather's first name.) Fahmy says, "I don't know." The second investigator asks, "Mahdi who?" Fahmy answers, "Mahdi El-Anani. He and Omar have valid permits, they've been in the business for 30 years here. They're very respectable people, they've worked with ????? and Gohar (a well-known owner of a satellite news up-link company), very respectable people like that, and there's nothing bad about them." The second investigator asks, "You have SNG cameras?" Fahmy pretends he doesn't understand. The first investigator repeats, "You have SNG equipment?" This time Fahmy doesn't hesitate; he rather vehemently says, "No, not at all, at all."

The first investigator asks, "Did you ever happen to go down to the street to film demonstrations or marches at any universities, so you could cover the stories for your news reports?" Fahmy answers, "No. We take it from Reuters, or AP or any channel that is subscribed with them. They go down and do the filming and then you find all the channels broadcasting the same images. Everybody gets it from them. We take the material, we write our own copy, and then we broadcast it. We don't go out ourselves and film." The second investigator asks, "And you comment about the events?" Fahmy nods yes. "So, what's Peter's job?" Fahmy answers, "The same thing. Sometimes (a loud phone rings, covering his words)." The second investigator: "So you have other correspondents here?" Fahmy answers, "At this time, no."

The second investigator asks him conversationally, "Why didn't you get proper permits and documentation when you came to work here?" Fahmy answers, "I've been working for Al-Jazeera for three months, and during that time I asked Al-Jazeera on numerous occasions to make sure that I'm working legally, according to Egyptian law, and each time they assured me that everything was perfectly in order, and that they'd never let me work for them if it wasn't." The second investigator says, "In any case, we're here with a warrant issued by the Prosecutor-General's office, and you've been present during the search of these premises. Mr. Peter has also been present during the whole time. Any evidence we've gathered will be handed over to the Prosecutor-General, who will examine it and ask you further questions. It's really up to them to determine what's right and what's wrong. If we've made a mistake, we will thank you for your trouble and you'll be on your way."

The prosecution presented its case, complete with evidence, in the presence not only of a lot of international reporters, but also a lot of diplomats from various countries. All the charges against the three (an Al-Jazeera producer was also arrested and tried with the two in the video), as well as their co-defendants, were proven to the satisfaction of a panel of judges who knew the eyes of the world were on them, and who found that the evidence fully justified a guilty verdict. Some of the defendants were found "not guilty" and released immediately. Those who have been found guilty and sentenced, still have two more levels of appeals before the verdict and sentence are considered final.

Interestingly, two of these gentlemen's lawyers, who were hired and paid for by Al-Jazeera in Qatar, have recently quit. They said that Al-Jazeera had been very uncooperative, was only interested in exploiting the case as much as possible to attack Egypt, and beyond that, didn't seem at all concerned about their clients.

The actual figure [for military-owned companies' share of GDP] is 1.8%

Where is this figure from? I've seen guesses from 5% to 40%, and no one seems to have a firm idea.

Earlier this year, the Armed Forces themselves issued a detailed press release debunking all the made-up stuff being published without any basis in fact or sourcing, which described the military-owned industries and their worth, and their percentage of GDP. It was read out by the official spokesperson. I'll try to find it for you later, but it'll be in Arabic, and I'll try to translate it

Stefano, I'll discuss the other topics with you another time. Transcribing that interview took a lot out of me, after an already long day. Don't get me wrong, I truly appreciate the interest, but I'm done for now.

[stefano]

Because of those who've been so nice, I've taken the trouble of translating the interview. It's as accurate as I can make it, but given the time constraints, not as elegantly or neatly formatted as it could have been.

Thanks! That was very generous of you, and definitely very informative. I'd thought it might make sense to have an interview setup in the room to talk to people who were afraid to be seen going into AJ's studio, but for Fahmy to then deny they were doing anything like that is suspicious in the extreme. As is everything he says, so thanks again for that.

Interestingly, two of these gentlemen's lawyers, who were hired and paid for by Al-Jazeera in Qatar, have recently quit. They said that Al-Jazeera had been very uncooperative, was only interested in exploiting the case as much as possible to attack Egypt, and beyond that, didn't seem at all concerned about their clients.

Thanks - I didn't know that...

The lead defence lawyer, Farag Fathy, stood up in court on Thursday [15 May] and announced he and two colleagues representing Greste and Mohamed would no longer represent the reporters.

"Al-Jazeera is using my clients. I have emails from [the channel] telling me they don't care about the defendants and care about insulting Egypt," he told the court.

Fathy said the network was using the case for self-promotion and endangering the reporters’ chances for freedom by pursuing the Egyptian government in civil litigation. He also accused al-Jazeera of "fabricating quotes" attributed to him.

Earlier this year, the Armed Forces themselves issued a detailed press release debunking all the made-up stuff being published without any basis in fact or sourcing, which described the military-owned industries and their worth, and their percentage of GDP. It was read out by the official spokesperson. I'll try to find it for you later, but it'll be in Arabic, and I'll try to translate it

Thanks - you can link to the Arabic and I'll try to work through it. I started studying Arabic formally again this year, seeing as I clearly won't have a proper picture of what's going on until I can read Arabic media fluently (and that was part of my plan when I moved to North Africa in the first place), but I stopped studying for a few years and got very rusty. My teacher's Egyptian as it happens. It's a gradual process and it'll be years before I can easily follow a rapid conversation in 3ameya as in that clip, but I'm sort of getting there when it comes to written formal Arabic.

Transcribing that interview took a lot out of me, after an already long day. Don't get me wrong, I truly appreciate the interest, but I'm done for now.

Of course, thanks again for the effort.

Good news from yesterday, that tends to support Sisi's bona fides and looks promising for long-term economic health:

- a 10% withholding tax on capital gains and dividends, on gains and dividends from both listed an unlisted companies. Definitely better to improve the fiscal picture this way than by pushing up VAT as the Washington consensus demands. It looks like the VAT plan is to overhaul the current sales tax to close loopholes and boost revenues without affecting end prices. Again, good policy.

- Nassif Sawiris got three years in jail (in absentia) and a fat fine for tax dodging. Sawiris is exactly the kind of operator with old deep state and Saudi links that I was nervous about, so it's reassuring that they're going after him.

[American Dream]

Lots of information and analysis to be found here:

Egypt Monthly Edition on Jadaliyya (June 2014)

Jul 02 2014
by Jadaliyya Egypt Editors



[6 May 2012, march against arbitrary detention and military trials.
Photo courtesy of Gigi Ibrahim via Flickr.]

[This is a monthly archive of pieces written by Jadaliyya contributors and editors on Egypt. It also includes material published on other platforms that editors deemed pertinent to post as they provide diverse depictions of Egypt-related topics. The pieces reflect the level of critical analysis and diversity that Jadaliyya strives for, but the views are solely the ones of their authors. If you are interested in contributing to Jadaliyya, send us your post with your bio and a release form to post@jadaliyya.com [click “Submissions” on the main page for more information]. Ahmed Fouad Negm: A Profile from the Archives Jadaliyya’s Profiles Page writes a biography on ...

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[AlicetheKurious]

I'd thought it might make sense to have an interview setup in the room to talk to people who were afraid to be seen going into AJ's studio, but for Fahmy to then deny they were doing anything like that is suspicious in the extreme. As is everything he says, so thanks again for that.

It's a lot more than "suspicious" -- even without all the evidence and testimony presented at trial, this video all by itself is compelling proof of several crimes. Crimes that would be prosecuted and lead to prison sentences in every single one of the countries that are now shocked, just shocked, at this "suppression of thought and expression" and this "attack against journalism". Imagine if this very same network, Al-Jazeera, had tried pulling the same stunt in the US? Now imagine if they'd been discovered doing it at the same time that the US was being subjected to the same kind of terrorism that Egypt is. They wouldn't have had any trial: like Sami El-Haj, they'd have been kidnapped and thrown into Gitmo to be tortured for 7 years without even being charged. The hypocrisy is breathtaking. I for one am very happy, because the imperialist West is doing more to turn ordinary people here against it than people like me could have done in a million years. On behalf of free people everywhere, thank you.

I started studying Arabic formally again this year, seeing as I clearly won't have a proper picture of what's going on until I can read Arabic media fluently (and that was part of my plan when I moved to North Africa in the first place), but I stopped studying for a few years and got very rusty. My teacher's Egyptian as it happens. It's a gradual process and it'll be years before I can easily follow a rapid conversation in 3ameya as in that clip, but I'm sort of getting there when it comes to written formal Arabic.

My deepest sympathies. Written formal Arabic is really important, but spoken dialect is crucial. Talk to your teacher (in Arabic) and get him to recommend good movies. I have a ready list of really good Egyptian movies, if you want. You can watch them online, or download them from movie sites.

- Nassif Sawiris got three years in jail (in absentia) and a fat fine for tax dodging. Sawiris is exactly the kind of operator with old deep state and Saudi links that I was nervous about, so it's reassuring that they're going after him.

I was shocked when I read that, and immediately tried to verify it. It doesn't even make sense, for a lot of reasons. All I found was extremely dubious sites (like AhramOnline) reporting it. If true, this would be big news, and there's nothing about it anywhere serious. I even called my husband at work (he's very plugged in to things in the business world), and he dismissed it as silly. I'm not saying I'm positive it's a lie, but it probably is. Whatever you may think about the Sawiris clan, they are scrupulous about obeying the law. I'd file it for now under a big question mark.

[Ben D]

Sheeesh.....I'm not impressed with judge of character of President Abdel Fattah El Sisi....Tony Blair To Advise Egypt Strongman Sisi

[seemslikeadream]

Can Tony Blair Mess up Egypt even Worse?
By Juan Cole | Jul. 3, 2014 |

By Juan Cole
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair has agreed to advise the government of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Blair maintains that he will not be paid to do so, but critics suggest that he will have an opportunity to engage in influence-peddling with British firms investing in Egypt. Blair is rumored to make $30 million a year from consulting and business deals.
That a former prime minister of a major European democracy should publicly associate himself with the regime of al-Sisi is shameful. Al-Sisi has ordered a brutal crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins that left over a thousand dead and went on to have some 20,000 Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters arrested. Dozens of major Muslim Brotherhood figures have been arbitrarily condemned to death, often without much in the way of formal court proceedings (presentation of evidence, ability to face one’s accuser, etc.). The government has also turned on the progressive youth movements that demanded a recall election last year this time, jailing dozens of prominent youth leaders for daring to engage in unauthorized protests. But unauthorized protests were precisely what allowed al-Sisi to come to power.
One of the attractions for Blair in working with the United Arab Emirates and al-Sisi is apparently that the latter two have turned against the Muslim Brotherhood. Blair is a profound Islamophobe and hates the Muslim religious Right, even though he has been perfectly happy to shill for the Christian religious Right. Al-Sisi has declared the Muslim Brotherhood a “terrorist organization” despite the group’s decades of peaceful organizing and avoidance of violence. Saudi Arabia and the UAE have also lobbied the UK government to investigate the Brotherhood in Britain as a terrorist group.
Since Blair was so good at railroading Iraq on false charges of having weapons of mass destruction, he no doubt has been hired in part to do a similar number on the Brotherhood. (The Muslim Brotherhood and I don’t share values, but they are not terrorists and there are no grounds to exclude them from a legitimate role in a democratic society. If the Morsi group committed crimes while in office, they should be tried, but you can’t inflict collective punishment on the whole organization).
The Muslim Brotherhood has many flaws, from a Liberal point of view, but it actually provided far more freedom of conscience and pluralism when in power in Egypt in 2012-2013 than does the government of Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah doesn’t dislike the religious Right. He *is* the religious Right.
So Blair has a big problem with the Brotherhood but none whatsoever with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which is far more dictatorial and controlling on religious grounds than was President Muhammad Morsi. It all depends on how pliant you are toward the business and financial centers in the City, apparently.
Blair is highly selective in his outrage. In 2007 he notoriously took BP executives along on a trip to see Muammar Gaddafi in Libya. Blair praised the mercurial Brother Leader, saying that “There is nothing I’ve ever agreed with him that should be done that hasn’t been done.” Gaddafi was behind the blowing up of a civilian aircraft over Britain and had helped train the more violent elements of the Irish Republican Army, but all that was suddenly forgiven because Gaddafi would help fight “terrorism” (which is to say, Libyans who were insufficiently obedient) and would offer BP bids worth, ultimately, some $18 billion.
Egypt has electricity shortages and desperately needs to move quickly to solar and wind energy and away from hydrocarbons. But al-Sisi is now being advised by someone close to BP. Is Blair capable under these circumstances of advising al-Sisi impartially that Egypt should move rapidly to green energy?
Egypt’s tourism industry has been deeply damaged by the bombings and insecurity caused by al-Sisi’s marginalization of some 20% of the electorate. Al-Sisi should lighten up. If Brotherhood members were allowed back into the political process, that would make them less likely to be radicalized. Otherwise, getting the tourism industry going again will be an uphill battle. There were bombings this week at the presidential palace in commemoration of the anniversary of the 2013 “revocouption” (or popular protests plus military coup) against Morsi by al-Sisi.
Blair himself is said to have sold out to billionaire press lord Rupert Murdoch. That model, of saying you are for workers while you actually serve the 1%, was actually developed by the british governeent.
With his Neoliberal biases (urging privatization of public companies and goods) and his hatred of political Islam, Blair will reinforce the worst instincts of the current government. As he showed in his dalliance with Gaddafi, he is less interested in human rights than in profits for British firms. And that is likely the same trade-off he will make in Cairo.
Meanwhile, Ahmad Maher of April 6 and Manienoor El Masry of the Revolutionary Socialists languish in Gen. Sisi’s jails. Does Blair care about these youth leaders of the 2011 revolution, or are they now just inconvenient.

[chump]

Count me in on the positive sentiments. I've been crossing my fingers that Alice is right about Sisi. Last night, I saw this about Blair becoming Sisi"s economic advisor and thought it deserved a mention.

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2014/07 ... more-30343

Tarpley and “Cartalucci”… Meet al-Sisi’s New Economic Adviser, Tony Blair
Posted on July 2, 2014 by willyloman

by Scott Creighton

Webster Tarpley and the hearts and minds psyop called “Tony Cartalucci” have been steadily praising the efforts of one Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, our latest puppet dictator in Egypt, for quite sometime now.

Despite the fact that he rose to power only after meeting with U.S. state department and then did so with the same sort of brutal “protesters” we saw in places like Syria, Libya and most recently in Ukraine and Thailand, Mr. Tarpley and “Cartalucci” both continued to present al-Sisi as some sort of counter-IMF, anti-U.S. hero doing the work of the masses.

They continued supporting him after he sucked-up to Israel, the U.S. war department and Saudi Arabia. Tarpley and “Cartalucci” continued supporting him, often writing screeds calling out the thousands of alternative journalists who could see al-Sisi for the Mubarak-styled monster he was, even after he slaughtered over 2,500 to gain power and then jailed 20,000 others to keep it prior to his sham “election”

Today news has come out from several sources that Tony Blair is going to be al-Sisi’s new economic adviser, telling him how and where Egypt should invest and helping bring all those lucrative multinational trade deals to impose on the people of Egypt along the way.

Is there a mea-culpa expected in the near future for the Sisi twins? Don’t count on it. Shills don’t do take-backs. They aren’t allowed.

“The former prime minister, now Middle East peace envoy, who supported the coup against Egypt‘s elected president Mohamed Morsi, is to give Sisi advice on “economic reform” in collaboration with a UAE-financed taskforce in Cairo – a decision criticised by one former ally.

The UAE taskforce is being run by the management consultancy Strategy&, formerly Booz and Co, now part of PricewaterhouseCoopers, to attract investment into Egypt’s crisis-ridden economy at a forthcoming Egypt donors’ conference sponsored by the oil-rich UAE, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.” Guardian

“A spokeswoman for Blair told the Guardian that his attempts to garner support for Egypt from the international community was not being done “for any personal gain whatsoever.”

“He is giving advice, he will have meetings, that’s all,“ she said, stressing that neither Blair nor any organizations associated with him would make money out of Egypt.

She added that he believe the Sisi government “should be supported in its reform agenda and he will help in any way he can, but not as part of a team.”” RT

Yes, that Blair and Saudi Arabia supported economic reform agenda they speak about is the very same neoliberal agenda they have been backing for decades.

It’s the same brutal austerity measures/IMF reforms agenda Webster Tarpley and “Cartalucci” pretend to oppose…

… and the same agenda I said necessitated the removal of the President Morsi and the removal of Egypt’s anti-neoliberal constitution of 2013.

And here we are, not too much later, and we see Tony Blair of all people signing on to help Saudi Arabia and Booz & Co. That company by the way “… was spun off from Booz Allen Hamilton in conjunction with a private equity takeover by The Carlyle Group in 2008″

In April of this year, Booz & Co was bought by PricewaterhouseCoppers who is really the company behind the deal. You don’t get more globalist and neo-liberal than them. They’ve been involved in tons of scandals over the years: American International Group Inc., Tyco settlement, House of Lords inquiry in the UK , JP Morgan Securities audit and my favorite World Bank Favouring for Water Privatization in Delhi

So, that’s who is in bed with al-Sisi. That is what brought you the so-called “real revolution” in Egypt (“real revolution” according to Webster Tarpley and “Tony Cartalucci” both supposedly leaders in the anti-globalization, anti-neoliberal movements)

I don’t really expect a retraction from them at this point. After all, shills aren’t allowed much leeway when it comes to their “money-shot” topics. More likely Tarpley will simply continue supporting everything Obama does and “Tony” will keep pretending the fascist coup in Thailand is just peachy-keen.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... mic-reform

Tony Blair to advise Egypt president Sisi on economic reform
Former PM criticised over link to United Arab Emirates-funded programme that promises lucrative 'business opportunities'...

... It is understood that correspondence from Blair's office in support of Egypt's economic reform and investment programme suggests lucrative "business opportunities", in Egypt and the Gulf, are expected for those taking part. Blair's spokeswoman said: "We are not looking at any business opportunities in Egypt."

The former political associate said a bargain had been struck. "Tony Blair has become Sisi's éminence grise and is working on the economic plan that the UAE is paying for. For him, it combines both an existential battle against Islamism and mouth-watering business opportunities in return for the kind of persuasive advocacy he provided George Bush over Iraq."

"It's a very lucrative business model," the associate added, "but he shouldn't be doing it. He's putting himself in hock to a regime that imprisons journalists. He's digging a deeper and deeper hole for himself and everyone associated with him." ....

[Morty]

Tony Blair denies he signed on as Egyptian president's adviser
Guardian reports former British prime minister agrees to advise Egypt's Sissi on 'economic reform,' drawing accusations of blurring line between private interests and position as Mideast peace envoy.
By Haaretz | Jul. 3, 2014 | 12:02 AM | 1


Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair denied a Guardian report that he has signed on as an adviser to Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, as part of a United Arab Emirates program to prop up Egypt's ailing economy.

Blair's spokesperson told Haaretz that the story is "nonsense," and that Blair has only said that it is important for the region that Egypt succeeds in reforming itself.

The Guardian reported on Wednesday that Blair has agreed to advise Egypt's Sissi on "economic reform," even as he was criticized for blurring the line between his public position as Middle East peace envoy and his private business interests.

The former prime minister has been a vocal supporter of Sissi's military coup which ousted President Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, terming it "the absolutely necessary rescue of a nation," the Guardian reported.

The UAE, which funds the program Blair has now joined, supports Sissi against the Muslim Brotherhood as part of its struggle against political Islam. According to the Guardian, the UAE and Saudi Arabia pressured British Prime Minister David Cameron to probe the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in Britain earlier in 2014.

Blair's new attachment to the Sissi regime, which according to the Guardian, has killed more than 2,500 protestors and jailed over 20,000 in the past year, has come under fire from a former close political associate.

"For him, it (the advisory role) combines both an existential battle against Islamism and mouth-watering business opportunities in return for the kind of persuasive advocacy he provided George Bush over Iraq," the former associate told the Guardian.

"It's a very lucrative business model," the associate said, "but he shouldn't be doing it. He's putting himself in hock to a regime that imprisons journalists. He's digging a deeper and deeper hole for himself and everyone associated with him."

Last week a group of former British diplomats and political figures wrote an open letter calling for Blair's resignation from his role as the Special Envoy of the Middle East Quartet, citing, among other reasons, his "blurring the lines between his public position as envoy" and his private business dealings in the region.

In contrast to what Blair's spokesperson told Haaretz, the Guardian reported a spokesperson did not deny Blair is advising Sissi, but only that he is not looking at any business opportunities in Egypt. "He is giving advice, he will have meetings, that's all," she told the Guardian. According to her, there is no personal gain involved, and Blair and his organizations will not make money out of the advisory position.

However, the Guardian noted that the UAE program promises "huge business opportunities" to those involved. According to the report, Blair's earnings from various business dealings and consultancies reportedly exceeded $34 million last year.

[AlicetheKurious]

Sheeesh.....I'm not impressed with judge of character of President Abdel Fattah El Sisi....Tony Blair To Advise Egypt Strongman Sisi

I'm not impressed with the gullibility of people on this board. The implication is that President Sisi has hired Tony Blair as "economic adviser", but even the Guardian article, which is the only source for this claim, doesn't exactly say that.

Tony Blair works for the UAE government, as a shill. A salesman. The UAE has been strongly supportive of Egypt's economic recovery. Saudi Arabia is organizing a meeting of Arab states to financially and economically support Egypt. The UAE will be a major contributor, and in fact already is.

Tony Blair will not be advising the Egyptian government. He is paid to do whatever his UAE employers tell him to. In this case, his employers want him to promote investments in Egypt. Goody for us.

President Sisi has outlined a very, very ambitious plan for Egypt, which he has said will require at least $150 billion during the first year alone. The elements of this plan include re-drawing the internal map of Egypt in such a way as to open up the entire territory for settlement, trade, agriculture and industry, so that instead of living on 6-7% of Egypt's land, the 90 million Egyptians will be spread out and able to find new work and living opportunities. Right now, Egypt is unable to fulfill its huge economic potential because the infrastructure itself is inadequate. We don't have enough highways and power plants and water treatment facilities and bridges and ports and research centers and factories and processing plants, etc., etc. We don't have enough money.

What we do have is vast mineral resources, vast areas of cultivatable land, a large young population, very long coasts on the Mediterranean and Red Seas, a massive fresh-water lake (Lake Nasser), around a third of the world's antiquities, sunny, mild weather all year round, proximity to the Arab, African, Asian and European markets, huge amounts of very pure silica, gold mines, granite and other stone quarries, textile, steel and aluminum mills that used to be among the most productive in the world but are now badly in need of renovation, one of the most important canals in the world, an incredibly rich culture, untapped energy resources that include solar power and petroleum and gas, large underground lakes and rivers, and more.

The government has already announced that henceforth, Egypt will not export raw materials, but finished goods. The public sector has already begun to produce solar cells and to support innovative agricultural projects, and months ago began to build a new system of roads and bridges that has already facilitated transport.

Egypt is waking up from a long slumber, and wants to build. Egyptian specialists have drawn up the plans, completed the studies, decided the projects and set a schedule. We will require massive investments to make this possible; at the same time, foreign investors have a rare opportunity to make a lot of money, especially in the medium and long term.

The Gulf states, led by the UAE and Saudi Arabia, want in. Who they hire to advise them is their business. We have our own people, and our own government.

This whole hysteria about Tony Blair only goes to show how desperate Egypt's enemies are.

[American Dream]

This may add depth and detail for those who are interested:

CONTINUING BUSINESS BY OTHER MEANS: EGYPT'S MILITARY ECONOMY

By L.S., 30 May 2014



Image: Character mask of capital? Egypt's new president el-Sisi embodies the identity of capital and army


While much analysis has emphasised the flexible, precarious and improvisatory subjectivities of neoliberal ‘post-fordist’ society, the post-crunch period demonstrates that militarism, graft, and un-free labour are just as crucial for contemporary accumulation. In a detailed analysis of the role of the army in the Egyptian economy, L.S. reveals a state with a vast military-industrial complex based as much on private-public partnerships and a flexibly industrial army of capital as on a growing reserve army of labour



THE ARMY CENTRE STAGE AGAIN



The enormous protests of 30 June 2013 (June30) demanding the resignation of Muslim Brotherhood president Mohamed Morsi were the result of a year of intense economic and political crisis in Egypt. Political gridlock, collapsing investments, fuel shortages, a currency crisis, rising inflation and unemployment were followed by an unprecedented crime wave and attendant vigilantism. A sense of chaos prevailed. The deeply unpopular incumbent increasingly resorted to making appeals to his Islamist base, and so was accused of being divisive as well as incompetent. In early July 2013 the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) intervened to oust Morsi to widespread acclaim, and proceeded to crack down on the Muslim Brotherhood, later slaughtering thousands at its Rabaa protest site and elsewhere. The SCAF at least temporarily stabilised the economic situation by securing massive aid transfers from Gulf allies, and the political situation by fulfilling the street’s demand to oust Morsi, tabling new elections, and importantly making a promise to roll out a new national minimum wage law. SCAF's main platform however, is indeed security and stability, and thus it has also attacked the legacy of the 25 January 2011 (Jan25) uprising, passing a new law curtailing protest, jailing key activists, and reorganising and relegitimising the police and security forces. Draconian new terrorism laws are written. An atmosphere of threat and paranoia prevails in the pro-SCAF media and on the streets, with members of revolutionary groups denounced as foreign spies and threatened by members of the public. The police again kill with impunity, especially at the many campus based protests that have occurred since Rabaa. Tahrir is empty but for army choreographed pageants where children and old men are photographed with army jackboots strapped to their heads, as air force jets trace kitsch hearts in the skies above. The army intervenes in strikes and some striking workers have been jailed. Egypt finds itself well and truly in a period of reaction.



These events have solicited much analysis and commentary about the relationship between the army and the state in Egypt, as well as fascinated speculation about the size and scope of the army’s economic sector. Despite wildly divergent estimates of its control of the economy, numerous press articles attest to the wide variety of the army’s enterprises. Denunciations of secrecy and corruption accompany lists of undertakings that may include major projects in agriculture and construction as well as a ragbag of ventures and products it is involved in, from restaurants and social clubs to bottled water and macaroni!



Some look at the jumble of uninspiring product lines and conclude that the army economic sector is generally fairly shabby and small fry, or that its military industries are marked by failure.[1] For Hazem Kandil, it is compensation for the gradual loss of prestige and influence the army has endured, especially since the ’70s, and also an imposed self-sufficiency as defence budgets decline.[2] Some note its substantial stake in the economy, but also a similar detachment: the army content to accumulate wealth behind the scenes and leave day-to-day government to a separate executive, hoping to protect its sector from liberalisation, and its budgets from scrutiny. Yezid Sayigh sees the pre-uprising army substantially integrated into the Mubarak presidential system and searching for individual economic benefits, Egypt as an ‘officer’s republic’ with men in uniform everywhere on the make. By this account the army was implicated in the previous regime but the top brass lacked a separate corporate identity or any strong intent to steer the ship of state, as was the historical case in Turkey.[3] However, since the 2011 uprising, Sayigh has also argued, the army has attempted to consolidate a system of ‘custodianship’ more comparable with the Turkish model. Yet the army is not institutionally prepared for the job, and perhaps in 2012 had still hoped to make deals with rising political forces to enshrine its prerequisites and right to intervene in times of crisis, while wanting to return to its moneymaking activities.[4] On the other hand, Robert Springborg sees Egypt essentially as a military state and has long traced its acquisition of substantial assets and the fostering by the brass of important economic projects.[5]



Much received opinion in the press and beyond however assumes a dyed-in-the-wool protectionism inherited from the army’s roots in Nasserism. Indignation at ‘huge profits’ is matched with claims of graft, inefficiency and waste in an unrestructured state sector.[6] The military is simply functionally unfit to run industries the line goes, and officers are incompetent managers, they should return to barracks. However much descriptive truth there is in these analyses, what needs to be stressed is the more recent dynamism and outwardness in the army’s economic strategy, and, indeed, the institutional advantages that are turning the army into a dominant force in a transforming economy. Advantages that are enabling it to act as a leading fraction of the capitalist class, rather than narrowly as a class of rentiers, or as a stagnant holdover of postwar statism, or as a particular, delimited state institution which has overgrown its proper functional boundaries.



THE MILITARY ECONOMY FROM NASSERIST STATISM TO NEOLIBERAL MUBARAKISM



The army was at the core of the Nasserist developmental-planner state set up by the Free Officers after the coup of 1952. They saw the British occupation, the corrupt and weak monarchy, and the control of the economy by the old elites as inimical to the army’s fundamental operational requirements. For instance, an ignominious defeat by the nascent Israeli state in the war of 1948 was blamed on courtiers’ corrupt purchase of defective European weapons supplied to the army. A new model of development based around state control of large parts of the economy and a programme of Import Substitution Industrialisation (ISI) would secure the growth of an industrial base and thus the army’s project of gaining some self-sufficiency. Uniforms, ammunition and certain armaments would be produced domestically, and popular mobilisation toward a project of national renewal and war preparedness against Israel was ensured. In the developing cold war world, the military-led regime would also be able to broker access to a ‘security rent’ from one of the contending superpowers, which a little later in the decade would become the Soviet Union.



A good starting point for a consideration of the army’s current role in the Egyptian economy however is the Sadat era. This period saw the gradual move away from the Nasserist planner state towards the liberalisation of the economy in the programme of ‘Infitah’, or opening. Sadat steered his foreign policy away from alignment with the Warsaw Pact in the Corrective Revolution of 1971, consolidating his position by bringing the army and security services to heel politically and expelling pro-Soviet elements. After the Yom Kippur war in 1973 Sadat sought peace with Israel under US tutelage, and thus also the possibility to reorient the economy away from its focus on the military and war preparedness. The army saw its position within the elite and its control of large parts of the productive apparatus challenged by the rise of a new commercial bourgeoisie, enjoying the opportunities of privatisation programmes and liberalised external trade. Following Hazem Kandil we should also stress that this was not a simple break with the past, but in a sense the resolution of a Nasser-era struggle between the top brass and the executive branch of the state over economic management and the army’s privileges.[7]



However, the army was still very well placed to take advantage of the Infitah programme of state divestment, and thus began to build its economic empire under Sadat, just as it was being marginalised politically. Furthermore, a new project of military industrialisation was inaugurated with the foundation of the Arab Organisation for Industrialisation in 1975. The AOI was an early attempt to reorient the army’s defence industries towards regional exports in partnership with the Gulf states, flush with massive petrodollar reserves following the first oil shock. The foundation of the AOI also marked the break with Russian patronage and military aid, which, beyond all wider geopolitical considerations, was seen by the army and state technocrats as limiting for being poor in technology transfers and co-production agreements. These would now hopefully be leveraged via Gulf state funds in contracts with mainly European manufacturers in which Egypt would provide the industrial capacity and labour power. Whilst Egypt and other developing countries were then learning of the impossibility of ‘buying a mode of production’ via ISI, the aim of shrinking the technology gap and developing more advanced industrial capacity would be pursued via focused arms production projects in partnership with petrodollar rich Gulf states, in the context of the Infitah. In the deal Egypt was also presenting itself as possibly meeting the security requirements of the region as whole, and the Gulf states in particular, with Israel then posited as the main enemy.



Despite a reportedly fairly successful start, the early AOI experiment was halted by the ’79 peace treaty with Israel, as the Gulf states, in a supposed display of Arab solidarity, consented to the expulsion of Egypt from the Arab League for ending the state of war with the Zionist enemy. An epochal shift in the regional power balance was the likely real reason: the peace itself diminishing Egypt’s importance as a frontline state, the Iranian revolution refocusing the security question to the Gulf and evincing need for a stronger Western security umbrella (the Gulf Cooperation Council [GCC] would be formed only 2 years later), and most importantly, the 2nd oil shock underlining the ascendency of Saudi Arabia and the GCC as regional leaders, and making it particularly easy for them to buy better quality weaponry directly from the west.



The peace and the end of the first configuration of the AOI produced a troubling resurgence of the political question of the army, with the Egyptian state now faced with the problem of what to do with a million men under arms, and an officer class indignant at demobilisation and fretful about its declining status. The size of the standing army was gradually reduced, and career structures transformed to encourage officer quiescence in anticipation of the opportunities for personal enrichment that would come with seniority and retirement. Beyond that, the Dayton peace pay-off for Egypt was large yearly US aid transfers to the military, and within that the development of co-production contracts for the assembly of US weapons systems in a transformed AOI, which would help ensure the loyalty of the officer class, and the continuing employment of industrial capacity. These aims would also be pursued by the National Services Projects Organisation (NSPO), a new agency tasked with developing new economic outlets for the army. It was during the Mubarak presidency which immediately followed that under its auspices the army would build its many and varied civilian sector industries. The army would also return to the heart of the state in the ’80s, following relative marginalisation and ‘de-politicisation’ in the Sadat era. However, by the 1990s, it would do so not as a contending power centre to the immediately ruling group, but integrated into Mubarak’s patronage system as beneficiaries of the accelerating liberalisation and privatisation programme.[8]



THE ARMY ENCOUNTERS EXPANDING GULF CAPITAL



The programme of economic liberalisation unfolding in the late Mubarak era under the tutelage of International Financial Institutions (IFIs), peaking with the Ahmed Nazif cabinet of 2004-11 – and matched by similar policies in the rest of the region – coincided with the rapid internationalisation of Gulf capital, especially as the long oil boom of the 2000s progressed. Then as up to the post-crunch period large portions of this capital has been invested in the MENA region. Adam Hanieh’s recent work has shown that the Middle East operates increasingly at the regional scale, via the penetration of these Gulf investment flows. In a break with the past however the new inflows do not primarily take the form of state to state transfers but are extended by private firms. These now make up the largest part of foreign direct investment (FDI) in the Middle East region: ‘the value of projects announced by Gulf Arab investors in the region exceeded those from any other country or region in the world for the entire 2003-2009 period.’[9] In the key sectors of finance, retail, real estate, and telecommunications, Gulf firms have displaced or merged with domestic capital. Hanieh challenges both rentier theory’s insistence on state ‘autonomy’ from society, and relatedly the conventional interpretation of the Arab Spring as merely a revolt against economically and politically illiberal statism, by insisting on capitalist class formation alongside state formation in the Gulf oil states, the internalisation by particular states of transnational capital and its exigencies, and the predominance of neoliberal economic policy in the period leading up to the revolts. The Egyptian state’s carapace may have been inherited from the Nasser era, but by the Jan25 uprising, the socio-economic situation was already transformed.



Within this new configuration of the relationship to Gulf capital, the army, the supreme nationalist institution, with its historically leading and indeed enduring role in the construction of Egypt’s national identity, also became a very willing and apt partner in the opening of the economy, as an agent in Egypt’s insertion into regional (and global) cycles of valorisation, and acting as their state/para-state guarantor and force of discipline.



Thus, ‘contrary to the army’s reputation as a pillar of protectionism’ as Marshall and Stacher note, the army has also been adept at elaborating projects which are ‘collaborative, bringing in Gulf conglomerates, as well as Western and Asian multinationals as partners.’[10] One important joint partnership, as they go on to detail, was signed in 2001 with the large Kuwaiti Kharafi group, which involves ventures in computer manufacturing, pipemaking for the region’s hydrocarbons industry, and an ‘operation called Maxalto, which relies on technology from German firm Schlumberger to manufacture smart cards’, which the army no doubt intends to develop as part of the mooted reform of Egypt’s subsidy system.[11]



Joint ventures with Gulf conglomerates forged from the privatisations of the Ahmed Nazif era have been funded by large public sector banks and loans from IFIs. Indeed, many of the contracts take the form of public-private partnerships (PPP), in numerous bridging arrangements pairing state institutions with the private sector. [For an introduction to PPP see Rob Ray’s ‘The Three P’s’ in Mute, 2007, http://tinyurl.com/l8y5hbj] During the Mubarak period for instance, the Alexandria shipyards were ‘privatised’ by being turned over to the Ministry of Defence, where it now produces warships as well as large merchant vessels and operates a repairs service for private shipping companies.[12] The army’s use of PPP, or other ‘mixed’ forms of enterprise is fully consistent with practice during the neoliberal era, which does not necessarily see a straightforward retreat of the state in favor of the private sector – the reduction of the state to a ‘skeleton service’ of security and the maintenance of basic infrastructure – but also such endogenous transformations as the applications of commercial principles to a sometimes enlarged public sector, the marshaling of the state’s financial depth to secure deals with private capital, and in the developing world especially, the transformation of planning initiatives away from ISI and towards export oriented sectors and the attraction of FDI. Thus any evidence of the army’s defence of its public sector-rooted enterprises and separate budget need not imply the corralling of a laggardly statist sector from processes of marketisation and globalisation.



This persperctive is pertinent when considering the intra-elite struggles of the late Mubarak period, when the activity of the ultra-liberal Gamal Mubarak clan threatened to impinge on the army’s sector and privileges. The clash is often given as one of the reason for the army’ support of Jan25, and sited as evidence of the army’s retrograde protectionist tendencies. A possible IMF directed reform of the army sector, including the bringing of transparency to its budgets and the imposition of taxation on its enterprises, might also have been on the cards had Mubarak fils ascended to the presidency as planned. However, the army was never opposed to privatisation as such, but to the threat posed by particular Mubarak-era magnates to its strategically important sectors. Thus the army saw steel magnate Ahmed Ezz as a rival, and the Gamal clan as angling for full privatisation of some of its key assets and projects. It also sought to prevent the disruption of its particular advantages as an army within the process of opening to large inward investments.[13]



Accordingly, in the expansion of its economic role, the army has been able to convert its custodianship of substantial portions of Egypt’s physical patrimony, which comprises huge tracts of land and important infrastructure such as the Suez Canal – long justified for reasons of national security and military preparedness – into economic assets which form the basis of investment deals with large capitalist holdings from the GCC, the west and beyond. Well before the 2011 uprising the army had diversified into real estate and resort development, heavy equipment leasing, agriculture, maritime and air transport, hydrocarbons, and renewable energy projects.[14] Many of these ventures demanding large capital outlays inviting cooperative deals with foreign capital, and in which the army’s command of land, fixed capital assets, and access to cheap, and in some cases free, labour form the bedrock. The army brass has thus been able to transform the pre-’79 permanent war footing with Israel, which was itself coextensive with a particular mode of state-led national development heavily centred on military industrialisation, into a strategic advantage as a rising capitalist fraction within the restructuring economy, and its opening to transnational, and particularly GCC, capital flows.



Particularly salient here is the Suez Canal Development Project, a long-planned modernisation scheme involving the expansion of port capacity to accommodate increased trade volume, the construction of a vast industrial zone, and a new airport. The army has always been in a good position to profit from the project. The Suez Canal is a designated military zone and its important agencies have long been managed by army officers. Here, as at Egypt’s other important ports and beyond, a ‘landlord model’ applies: the army takes control of prize assets whilst posing as custodian of strategic sectors, supervises the privatisation process whilst inserting officers in both the profit-oriented, but still state-owned, holding co, and sometimes on the boards of new private subcontractors, in which it also owns minority shares.[15] The project promises to expand revenues from Egypt’s most important economic asset, and underline its importance as a pivotal integrated production and circulation hub inserted within regional, and global, capital flows. Chinese companies have already built petrochemical, automotive and textile factories along the Canal, and GCC capital, now led by the UAE and Kuwait, is heavily involved in the project.



Revealingly, whilst in power the Muslim Brotherhood had been touting its own plans for the Canal, which would have bypassed the SCAF to make an investment deal directly with Qatar. This would have broken the army’s grip on the crown jewel of its economic expansion project, and entailed a substantial shift in economic power towards the Brotherhood, perhaps giving it the ability to get out of the bind of political deal-making with the army, (Suez income being a primary source of patronage for Egyptian state power holders).[16] Soon after the project was mooted, the anti-Morsi media was in full patriotic outcry at the selling of this glory of the nation to the Qatari sheiks. No doubt this episode substantially contributed to the SCAF’s enthusiasm in removing Morsi from power, and its decision to subsequently crush the organisation entirely as a troublesome rival. Following Morsi’s ouster, the army substantially increased its presence along the canal, has taken complete control of the bidding process for the various construction and expansion projects, and was recently deploying its soldiers in strike breaking activity at a port labour dispute.[17]



As decried by many activists, there was indeed a partly overt, partly covert political pact between the Muslim Brotherhood and the SCAF in the post-Mubarak period, made necessary because of the former’s real weakness and dependence on SCAF superintendence, but also because of their very real unity against the continuation of protests and strikes. Nevertheless, perhaps especially with this issue but also in others, the relationship also took the form of a strong factional struggle over control of the economy in a post-revolutionary situation that was both full of opportunities (with the disorganisation if not destruction of the National Democratic Party machine and the sidelining of the Gamal Mubarak clan), and constraints (endemic crisis encouraging ruling groups to pull apart in the expectation of collapse and loss of legitimacy for incumbents).

Continues at: http://www.metamute.org/editorial/artic ... ry-economy

[AlicetheKurious]

Can Tony Blair Mess up Egypt even Worse?
By Juan Cole | Jul. 3, 2014 |

Al-Sisi has declared the Muslim Brotherhood a “terrorist organization” despite the group’s decades of peaceful organizing and avoidance of violence. Saudi Arabia and the UAE have also lobbied the UK government to investigate the Brotherhood in Britain as a terrorist group.

Since Blair was so good at railroading Iraq on false charges of having weapons of mass destruction, he no doubt has been hired in part to do a similar number on the Brotherhood. (The Muslim Brotherhood and I don’t share values, but they are not terrorists and there are no grounds to exclude them from a legitimate role in a democratic society. If the Morsi group committed crimes while in office, they should be tried, but you can’t inflict collective punishment on the whole organization).

Another one bites the dust. So Juan Cole doesn't think the burning of over 70 churches, the attacks against women and Christians and journalists, the bombings, the shootings, the beatings and torture and kidnappings, the vandalism and assaults and torture that Egyptians have been subjected to by the Brotherhood justifies labeling them a terrorist organization? Really?

Egypt’s tourism industry has been deeply damaged by the bombings and insecurity caused by al-Sisi’s marginalization of some 20% of the electorate. Al-Sisi should lighten up. If Brotherhood members were allowed back into the political process, that would make them less likely to be radicalized. Otherwise, getting the tourism industry going again will be an uphill battle. There were bombings this week at the presidential palace in commemoration of the anniversary of the 2013 “revocouption” (or popular protests plus military coup) against Morsi by al-Sisi.

Oh, yeah, there were bombings this week -- not just at the presidential palace, but also at a telecommunications building in Cairo West; a total of five people dead, including a mother and her little girl, for no f*cking reason but that the Brotherhood want to take and rape Egypt once again (with the West's blessing) -- but they're not terrorists. Got that? Llighten up and allow them back into the political process (which they used to loot and destroy the country, provoking tens of millions of Egyptians to rise up and demand to be rescued from them). To promote the tourism industry. What a great idea!

You first.







One of the Brotherhood's "peaceful student demonstrations". Imagine the terrible, awful, police actually arrested these gentle lambs, just for expressing their opinion!!! I say if you like them so much, YOU take them.

Britain Expands Power to Strip Citizenship From Terrorism Suspects
By KATRIN BENNHOLDMAY 14, 2014

LONDON — Britain has passed legislation that allows the government to strip terrorism suspects of their citizenship even if it renders them stateless, taking the country’s already sweeping powers to revoke nationality a step further.

After four months of wrangling, the House of Lords, the Parliament’s upper chamber, approved on Monday a clause in a new immigration bill that removes a previous restriction on leaving individuals without citizenship. The bill became law on Wednesday, after receiving royal assent.

Britain has been one of the few Western countries that can revoke citizenship and its associated rights from dual citizens, even native-born Britons, if they are suspected or convicted of acts of terrorism or disloyalty. The government has stepped up its use of this tactic in recent years. In two cases, suspects have subsequently been killed in American drone strikes.

Britain Increasingly Invokes Power to Disown Its Citizens

APRIL 9, 2014

The new rules will broaden these so-called deprivation powers to include Britons who have no second nationality, provided that they were naturalized as adults. If the home secretary deems that their citizenship is “seriously prejudicial to the vital interests of the United Kingdom,” it can be taken away, effective immediately, without a public hearing. A suspect whose citizenship rights have been stripped has 28 days to appeal to a special immigration court.

Earlier this year, lawmakers in the upper house rejected a version of the provision, questioning its effectiveness in improving national security and voicing concerns about the moral implications of leaving people without the basic rights associated with citizenship. But after a number of concessions by the government, the clause was approved by 286 votes to 193.

Home Secretary Theresa May has agreed that the new power should be reviewed every three years by a government-appointed expert and said she would use the provision only if she had “reasonable grounds for believing” a suspect is able to obtain the citizenship of another country.

Some lawmakers questioned whether the provision would work in practice. “Would another country seriously consider giving nationality, even to someone who might have the ability to apply for nationality of that country, if it knew that British citizenship had been removed on the grounds that the person was believed to be in some way linked to, or to condone, international terrorism?” asked Helena Kennedy, a member of the House of Lords for the opposition Labour Party.

Under previous legislation, 42 people since 2006 have been stripped of their British citizenship, 20 of them last year, according to a freedom of information request filed by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, a research organization at City University London that first drew attention to the practice in December 2012.

The new legislation appears to be inspired in part by a specific case in which the government did not get its way. A spokesman for the Home Office, John Taylor, said this week that the case of Hilal al-Jedda, an Iraqi-born naturalized Briton who lost his British nationality in 2007 after being detained in Iraq on suspicion of smuggling explosives, had highlighted a “loophole” in the law.

Out of 15 appeals, the case of Mr. Jedda is the only one to have succeeded. Britain’s Supreme Court ruled in October that Mr. Jedda could not be deprived of his British nationality because it would make him stateless: Iraq bans dual citizenship and canceled Mr. Jedda’s passport in 2000 when he was naturalized in Britain. The British government was forced to reinstate his citizenship on Oct. 9, 2013.

But on Nov. 1, Mr. Jedda was stripped of his nationality a second time, and in January the Home Office rushed before Parliament the amendment allowing deprivation even if it results in statelessness. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/15/world/europe/britain-broadens-power-to-strip-terrorism-suspects-of-citizenship.html?_r=0]Link