With no large scale outbreaks of violence following yesterday's funerals
today things seem much calmer across Egypt. In Cairo supporters of the
revolution have left Tahrir Square largely deserted as they try and get
on with the business of rebuilding their country. The Muslim Brotherhood
continue to occupy a protest camp in Nasr city and are staging a sit-in
protest at the Republican Guard HQ. However they are not making any
attempts to storm any building or attack either the military or
civilians.
The UK is rather unhelpfully trying apply pressure on the Egyptian
military with the announcement that 7 players from the league 1 football
team "Crewe Alexandra" have been arrested on allegations of sexual
assault. The idea being to get the Egyptian military frantically
searching of an UK 'Crew Members' who may have been sexually assaulted
in Alexandria. Incidentally the full horror of the violence that took
place in Alexandria on Friday (5/7/13) is slowly beginning to emerge.
The worst video I've seen so far shows a group of Islamists chase three
teenage revolutionaries onto the roof of a tower block before catching
them and throwing them off - presumably to their deaths.
However the only violent incident I've heard about since Friday/Saturday
has been the attack on a natural gas pipeline to Jordan outside
El-Arish in the Sinai. This has completely shutdown the supply of
natural gas from Egypt to Jordan and seems to be the work of Islamist
terrorists keen to send a message to both Egypt and Jordan. The message
to Egypt seems to simply be that the Islamists will try to cut off a big
source of the nations revenue unless Morsi is restored. The message to
Jordan is that the Islamists will cut off the supply of natural gas to
Jordan unless it comes down on the side of Morsi. To me this strikes as
desperation on the part of the Islamists. They know they don't have the
support of the Egyptian people so instead they're resorting to
intimidation and other bully-boy tactics to get what they want.
A further sign of the Islamist's desperation is the Muslim Brotherhood
and the Salafist al-Nour Party's attempts to block the appointment of
Mohamed ElBaradei as interim Prime Minister. Although neither the
Brotherhood nor al-Nour have stated publicly their reason for objecting
to ElBaradei's appointment both have in the past accused him of being a
CIA agent. This is of course nonsense and "CIA Spy!" is the insult the
Islamist always throw at people they don't like. The real reason the
Islamists object to ElBaradei is that they know he has popular support
and that he is more intelligent than them. That makes him the man most
likely to be able to return Egypt to democratic civilian rule and the
prosperity that will bring. The Islamists instead intend to delay the
process as much as possible in order to drag Egypt down further so they
can blame the ensuing chaos on the military for ousting Morsi.
15:20 on 8/7/13.
Edited at around 23:15 on 8/7/13 to add:
Obviously with negotiations of the appointment of Mohamed ElBaradei as
Egypt's interim Prime Minister still continuing both parties have been
out on the streets in Cairo. The revolutionaries massed in Tahrir Square
while a maximum of 10,000 Morsi supporters gathered in Nasr city before
marching again on the HQ of the Republican Guard. At no point did they
attempt to breach the perimeter fence or otherwise attack the building.
Therefore there have been no reports of any injuries or deaths. Rather
predictably though the Muslim Brotherhood demonstration was proceeded by
a Salafist attack on a military checkpoint in which 1 soldier was
killed.
In the meantime though there have been frantic international discussions
about Morsi's downfall. The crash of a Asiana Boeing 777 at San
Francisco airport on Saturday (6/7/13) has not been part of this.
However the crash of an oil train in Quebec, Canada on approximately the
same date most certainly was;
The narrative of a runaway train is the plot from the 2010 film
"Unstoppable." The call-sign of the runaway train in the film is "777"
meaning that the film has become something of a byword for Rihanna's
touring activities. Rihanna's current "Diamonds" tour is obviously the
US trying to lay itself prostrate at the feet of the Gulf Monarchies.
The oil element of the story is of course the reason why the US is
trying to lay itself prostrate at the feet of the Gulf Monarchies. The
comparison with the the Arizona wildfire is clearly a reference to
global warming. Therefore the whole story is the Canadians gently
nudging their US neighbours in the ribs and suggesting that maybe they
might want to try supporting the Egyptian people this time round.
In the meantime US politics is spilt as to whether it will support the
Egyptian people or the people who've been killing all those soldiers in
the Sinai. Therefore while I appreciate that the anti-US chants in
Tahrir Square are more than justified I fear they may be taken out of
context.
Also while I've been waiting to get close enough to a PC to write this
up Teresa Heinz-Kerry (as in the ketchup, baked beans etc) - the wife of
current US Secretary of State John Kerry has been admitted to hospital
via ambulance. She is said to be in a critical condition. Although the
74 year old Heinz-Kerry underwent cancer surgery in 2009 I'm inclined to
guess that this most recent admission is either a heart attack, a
stroke or an elaborate excuse for John Kerry to find himself unavailable
over the coming days.
(Originally Posted on 8/7/13)
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