A GOOD PIECE
By Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
"The Egyptian revolution is being dissolved right in front of the world's eyes by an optical illusion.
The protesters who have been on the streets for two weeks still want President Hosni Mubarak out. Now. Yet United States President Barack Obama is firmly in not-so-fast mode, glad that "Egypt is making progress". Obama has not mentioned even once the capital words "free elections".
Washington's "orderly transition" road map - fully supported by Tel Aviv and European capitals - is a facelift. Mubarak stepping down has become an afterthought; the already anointed successor is Vice President Omar Suleiman, the former head of the Mukhabarat, whom the protesters call "Sheik al-Torture".
Sheik al-Torture already behaves as a president - while the actual president is still inhabiting his palace, but as a ghost. The regime, a brutal military dictatorship, remains an immovable subject - even while being denounced by the protesters as illegitimate from A to Z, from the executive to the legislative. The key point is that acting president Suleiman is the regime. If French philosopher Jean Baudrillard was alive, he would say this revolution never took place - except on the world's television screens......
It doesn't matter that the Egyptian street abhors him; for the top echelons of the army he is the new rais. Al-Jazeera describes him as "the point man" for Egypt's secret relations with Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu loves him. Former bouncer and Deputy Prime Minister of Israel Avigdor Lieberman has expressed "his respect and appreciation for Egypt's leading role in the region and his personal respect for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Minister Suleiman".
According to a 2006 diplomatic cable on WikiLeaks, the CIA - what else? - also loves him; "Our intelligence collaboration with Oman Soliman [sic] is now probably the most successful element of the relationship" with Egypt. Suleiman always negotiated directly with top CIA officials....
The street is under no illusions. They know the army - the strongest player in the Egyptian political equation - might even invest in a massive crackdown if it feels threatened. The spark could be anything from an imaginary threat from "foreign powers" to a feeling that they will never be ready to cede power to civilians for the first time since 1956.
Minister of Defense Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, for instance, is impervious to "economic and political reforms that he perceives as eroding central government power", according to a WikiLeaks cable. But for the moment the army is more than comfortable with Sheik al-Torture running the show. And so are the democrats in Washington. "
By Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
"The Egyptian revolution is being dissolved right in front of the world's eyes by an optical illusion.
The protesters who have been on the streets for two weeks still want President Hosni Mubarak out. Now. Yet United States President Barack Obama is firmly in not-so-fast mode, glad that "Egypt is making progress". Obama has not mentioned even once the capital words "free elections".
Washington's "orderly transition" road map - fully supported by Tel Aviv and European capitals - is a facelift. Mubarak stepping down has become an afterthought; the already anointed successor is Vice President Omar Suleiman, the former head of the Mukhabarat, whom the protesters call "Sheik al-Torture".
Sheik al-Torture already behaves as a president - while the actual president is still inhabiting his palace, but as a ghost. The regime, a brutal military dictatorship, remains an immovable subject - even while being denounced by the protesters as illegitimate from A to Z, from the executive to the legislative. The key point is that acting president Suleiman is the regime. If French philosopher Jean Baudrillard was alive, he would say this revolution never took place - except on the world's television screens......
It doesn't matter that the Egyptian street abhors him; for the top echelons of the army he is the new rais. Al-Jazeera describes him as "the point man" for Egypt's secret relations with Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu loves him. Former bouncer and Deputy Prime Minister of Israel Avigdor Lieberman has expressed "his respect and appreciation for Egypt's leading role in the region and his personal respect for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Minister Suleiman".
According to a 2006 diplomatic cable on WikiLeaks, the CIA - what else? - also loves him; "Our intelligence collaboration with Oman Soliman [sic] is now probably the most successful element of the relationship" with Egypt. Suleiman always negotiated directly with top CIA officials....
The street is under no illusions. They know the army - the strongest player in the Egyptian political equation - might even invest in a massive crackdown if it feels threatened. The spark could be anything from an imaginary threat from "foreign powers" to a feeling that they will never be ready to cede power to civilians for the first time since 1956.
Minister of Defense Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, for instance, is impervious to "economic and political reforms that he perceives as eroding central government power", according to a WikiLeaks cable. But for the moment the army is more than comfortable with Sheik al-Torture running the show. And so are the democrats in Washington. "
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