I urge you to go on the web to NY Times.com and today's main article
"Egypt Protests Continue as Military Stands By." The LA Times is way
behind. Vast changes in the Middle East have begun. -Ed
From: Karen Pomer
Subject: SAT JAN 29th: Stand in Solidarity with the Egyptian People - LA
LA Stands in Solidarity with the
Egyptian People
Protest at the Consulate General of Egypt
Demand the release of political prisoners
Egyptian People
Protest at the Consulate General of Egypt
Demand the release of political prisoners
WHERE:
Outside Egyptian Consulate
4929 WILSHIRE BLVD, SUITE #300
LOS ANGELES CA 90010
@ Wilshire / Highland
WHEN: Sat, Jan 29th, Noon-1:30 PM
Inspired by the successful ouster of the tyrant of Tunisia and the continued
mobilizations in that country for justice,the Egyptian people have organized
massive marches and rallies throughout their country for the past 3 days,
fighting off vicious police attacks and mass arrests to call for the ouster
of the hated Mubarak regime. They have shown they will not give up - even in
the face of guns, tear gas and other weapons supplied and paid for by the U.S.
Hundreds of activists have been jailed and we demand their immediate
release. A free Egypt is the key to justice throughout the Arab world.
Come stand in solidarity with the brave people of Egypt!l
Contact zebraslk@gmail.com, or call 213-309-2713 to endorse and support the rally.
FACEBOOK INVITE:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?invites&eid=124884794192571#!/event.php?eid=136377153093178
You can also call the Egyptian Consulate General to demand a release of the
prisoners
TEL: (323) 933-9700
(323) 933-9757
(323)933-1401
FAX: (323)933-9725
***
Outside Egyptian Consulate
4929 WILSHIRE BLVD, SUITE #300
LOS ANGELES CA 90010
@ Wilshire / Highland
WHEN: Sat, Jan 29th, Noon-1:30 PM
Inspired by the successful ouster of the tyrant of Tunisia and the continued
mobilizations in that country for justice,the Egyptian people have organized
massive marches and rallies throughout their country for the past 3 days,
fighting off vicious police attacks and mass arrests to call for the ouster
of the hated Mubarak regime. They have shown they will not give up - even in
the face of guns, tear gas and other weapons supplied and paid for by the U.S.
Hundreds of activists have been jailed and we demand their immediate
release. A free Egypt is the key to justice throughout the Arab world.
Come stand in solidarity with the brave people of Egypt!l
Contact zebraslk@gmail.com, or call 213-309-2713 to endorse and support the rally.
FACEBOOK INVITE:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?invites&eid=124884794192571#!/event.php?eid=136377153093178
You can also call the Egyptian Consulate General to demand a release of the
prisoners
TEL: (323) 933-9700
(323) 933-9757
(323)933-1401
FAX: (323)933-9725
***
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/01/28
Egypt's Day of Reckoning
Mubarak regime may not survive new protests as flames of anger spread
through Middle East
Egypt's Day of Reckoning
Mubarak regime may not survive new protests as flames of anger spread
through Middle East
by Robert Fisk
The Independent/UK : January 28, 2011
A day of prayer or a day of rage? All Egypt was waiting for the Muslim
Sabbath today - not to mention Egypt's fearful allies - as the country's
ageing President clings to power after nights of violence that have shaken
America's faith in the stability of the Mubarak regime.
Five men have so far been killed and almost 1,000 others have been
imprisoned, police have beaten women and for the first time an office of the
ruling National Democratic Party was set on fire. Rumours are as dangerous
as tear gas here. A Cairo daily has been claiming that one of President
Hosni Mubarak's top advisers has fled to London with 97 suitcases of cash,
but other reports speak of an enraged President shouting at senior police
officers for not dealing more harshly with demonstrators.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the opposition leader and Nobel prize-winning former UN
official, flew back to Egypt last night but no one believes - except perhaps
the Americans - that he can become a focus for the protest movements that
have sprung up across the country.
Already there have been signs that those tired of Mubarak's corrupt and
undemocratic rule have been trying to persuade the ill-paid policemen
patrolling Cairo to join them. "Brothers! Brothers! How much do they pay
you?" one of the crowds began shouting at the cops in Cairo. But no one is
negotiating - there is nothing to negotiate except the departure of Mubarak,
and the Egyptian government says and does nothing, which is pretty much what
it has been doing for the past three decades.
People talk of revolution but there is no one to replace Mubarak's men - he
never appointed a vice-president - and one Egyptian journalist yesterday
told me he had even found some friends who feel sorry for the isolated,
lonely President. Mubarak is 82 and even hinted he would stand for president
again - to the outrage of millions of Egyptians.
The barren, horrible truth, however, is that save for its brutal police
force and its ominously docile army - which, by the way, does not look
favourably upon Mubarak's son Gamal - the government is powerless. This is
revolution by Twitter and revolution by Facebook, and technology long ago
took away the dismal rules of censorship.
Mubarak's men seem to have lost all sense of initiative. Their party
newspapers are filled with self-delusion, pushing the massive demonstrations
to the foot of front pages as if this will keep the crowds from the
streets - as if, indeed, by belittling the story, the demonstrations never
happened.
But you don't need to read the papers to see what has gone wrong. The filth
and the slums, the open sewers and the corruption of every government
official, the bulging prisons, the laughable elections, the whole vast,
sclerotic edifice of power has at last brought Egyptians on to their
streets.
Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League, spotted something important at the
recent summit of Arab leaders at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
"Tunisia is not far from us," he said. "The Arab men are broken." But are
they? One old friend told me a frightening story about a poor Egyptian who
said he had no interest in moving the corrupt leadership from their desert
gated communities. "At least we now know where they live," he said. There
are more than 80 million people in Egypt, 30 per cent of them under 20. And
they are no longer afraid.
And a kind of Egyptian nationalism - rather than Islamism - is making itself
felt at the demonstrations. January 25 is National Police Day - to honour
the police force who died fighting British troops in Ishmaelia - and the
government clucked its tongue at the crowds, telling them they were
disgracing their martyrs. No, shouted the crowds, those policemen who died
at Ishmaelia were brave men, not represented by their descendants in uniform
today.
This is not an unclever government, though. There is a kind of shrewdness in
the gradual freeing of the press and television of this ramshackle
pseudo-democracy. Egyptians had been given just enough air to breathe, to
keep them quiet, to enjoy their docility in this vast farming land. Farmers
are not revolutionaries, but when the millions thronged to the great cities,
to the slums and collapsing houses and universities, which gave them degrees
and no jobs, something must have happened.
"We are proud of the Tunisians - they have shown Egyptians how to have
pride," another Egyptian colleague said yesterday. "They were inspiring but
the regime here was smarter than Ben Ali in Tunisia. It provided a veneer of
opposition by not arresting all the Muslim Brotherhood, then by telling the
Americans that the great fear should be Islamism, that Mubarak was all that
stood between them and 'terror' - a message the US has been in a mood to
hear for the past 10 years."
There are various clues that the authorities in Cairo realised something was
afoot. Several Egyptians have told me that on 24 January, security men were
taking down pictures of Gamal Mubarak from the slums - lest they provoke the
crowds. But the vast number of arrests, the police street beatings - of
women as well as men - and the near-collapse of the Egyptian stock market
bear the marks of panic rather than cunning.
And one of the problems has been created by the regime itself; it has
systematically got rid of anyone with charisma, thrown them out of the
country, politically emasculating any real opposition by imprisoning many of
them. The Americans and the EU are telling the regime to listen to the
people - but who are these people, who are their leaders? This is not an
Islamic uprising - though it could become one - but, save for the usual talk
of Muslim Brotherhood participation in the demonstrations, it is just one
mass of Egyptians stifled by decades of failure and humiliation.
But all the Americans seem able to offer Mubarak is a suggestion of
reforms - something Egyptians have heard many times before. It's not the
first time that violence has come to Egypt's streets, of course. In 1977,
there were mass food riots - I was in Cairo at the time and there were many
angry, starving people - but the Sadat government managed to control the
people by lowering food prices and by imprisonment and torture. There have
been police mutinies before - one ruthlessly suppressed by Mubarak himself.
But this is something new.
Interestingly, there seems no animosity towards foreigners. Many journalists
have been protected by the crowds and - despite America's lamentable support
for the Middle East's dictators - there has not so far been a single US flag
burned. That shows you what's new. Perhaps a people have grown up - only to
discover that their ageing government are all children.
Internet and text messages fail in 'facebook revolution'
Egyptian authorities last night disrupted internet services and mobile-phone
text messaging in efforts to stop protesters keeping in touch on social
networking sites. The measure was taken as members of an elite
counter-terrorism police unit were ordered to take up positions in key
locations around Cairo in preparation for a wave of mass rallies today.
Among the places where they are stationed is Tahrir Square, where one of the
biggest demonstrations took place. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other
social networking sites have played a vital role in Egypt's protest
movement, just as they did in Tunisia, enabling demonstrators to keep in
touch and to organise rallies.
Who could succeed Hosni Mubarak?
Gamal Mubarak
Protesters on the streets of Egypt aren't just rallying against the
30-year-reign of President Hosni Mubarak, they are also taking aim at his
son Gamal Mubarak, 47, an urbane former investment banker who has scaled the
political ladder, prompting speculation that he is being groomed for his
father's post.
The youngest son of Mr Mubarak and his half-Welsh wife, Suzanne, Gamal was
educated at the elite American University in Cairo, going on to work for the
Bank of America.
He entered politics about a decade ago, quickly moving up to become head of
the political secretariat of his father's National Democratic Party (NDP).
He was heavily involved in the economic liberalisation of Egypt, which
pleased investors but provoked the ire of protesters, who blame the policies
for lining the pockets of the rich while the poor suffered.
Although he has always denied having an eye on his father's throne, a
mysterious campaign sprung up last year, with posters plastered across Cairo
calling for Gamal to stand for president in elections scheduled for later
this year. His 82-year-old father has not yet declared his candidacy.
Certainly the protesters appeared unhappy with the chosen son, chanting
"Gamal, tell your father Egyptians hate you" and tearing up his picture.
Mohamed ElBaradei
Protests in Egypt today will be different from the others that have swept
the Middle East in recent weeks in one important way. Mohamed ElBaradei,
former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), landed at
Cairo airport last night to lead rallies against Hosni Mubarak's rule.
The 68-year-old was born in the Egyptian capital, from where he launched a
legal career. He joined the IAEA in the 1980s, becoming head of the UN body
in 1997.
The 2003 invasion of Iraq thrust Mr ElBaradei into the public consciousness.
He demurred on the US rationale for attacking Saddam Hussein, describing the
war as "a glaring example of how, in many cases, the use of force
exacerbates the problem rather than solving it". The award, jointly with the
IAEA, of the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize further rankled with the Bush
administration.
He has long been urged to challenge the 82-year-old President, but hitherto
has bided his time, insisting first on electoral reform, but his
participation in today's protests indicate he is ready. Recent speeches,
including recently at Harvard, when he joked that he was "looking for a job"
have done nothing to dissuade his supporters, but at 68 his presidency would
surely be only a short-term fix to Egypt's problems.
© 2011 The Independent
The Independent/UK : January 28, 2011
A day of prayer or a day of rage? All Egypt was waiting for the Muslim
Sabbath today - not to mention Egypt's fearful allies - as the country's
ageing President clings to power after nights of violence that have shaken
America's faith in the stability of the Mubarak regime.
Five men have so far been killed and almost 1,000 others have been
imprisoned, police have beaten women and for the first time an office of the
ruling National Democratic Party was set on fire. Rumours are as dangerous
as tear gas here. A Cairo daily has been claiming that one of President
Hosni Mubarak's top advisers has fled to London with 97 suitcases of cash,
but other reports speak of an enraged President shouting at senior police
officers for not dealing more harshly with demonstrators.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the opposition leader and Nobel prize-winning former UN
official, flew back to Egypt last night but no one believes - except perhaps
the Americans - that he can become a focus for the protest movements that
have sprung up across the country.
Already there have been signs that those tired of Mubarak's corrupt and
undemocratic rule have been trying to persuade the ill-paid policemen
patrolling Cairo to join them. "Brothers! Brothers! How much do they pay
you?" one of the crowds began shouting at the cops in Cairo. But no one is
negotiating - there is nothing to negotiate except the departure of Mubarak,
and the Egyptian government says and does nothing, which is pretty much what
it has been doing for the past three decades.
People talk of revolution but there is no one to replace Mubarak's men - he
never appointed a vice-president - and one Egyptian journalist yesterday
told me he had even found some friends who feel sorry for the isolated,
lonely President. Mubarak is 82 and even hinted he would stand for president
again - to the outrage of millions of Egyptians.
The barren, horrible truth, however, is that save for its brutal police
force and its ominously docile army - which, by the way, does not look
favourably upon Mubarak's son Gamal - the government is powerless. This is
revolution by Twitter and revolution by Facebook, and technology long ago
took away the dismal rules of censorship.
Mubarak's men seem to have lost all sense of initiative. Their party
newspapers are filled with self-delusion, pushing the massive demonstrations
to the foot of front pages as if this will keep the crowds from the
streets - as if, indeed, by belittling the story, the demonstrations never
happened.
But you don't need to read the papers to see what has gone wrong. The filth
and the slums, the open sewers and the corruption of every government
official, the bulging prisons, the laughable elections, the whole vast,
sclerotic edifice of power has at last brought Egyptians on to their
streets.
Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League, spotted something important at the
recent summit of Arab leaders at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
"Tunisia is not far from us," he said. "The Arab men are broken." But are
they? One old friend told me a frightening story about a poor Egyptian who
said he had no interest in moving the corrupt leadership from their desert
gated communities. "At least we now know where they live," he said. There
are more than 80 million people in Egypt, 30 per cent of them under 20. And
they are no longer afraid.
And a kind of Egyptian nationalism - rather than Islamism - is making itself
felt at the demonstrations. January 25 is National Police Day - to honour
the police force who died fighting British troops in Ishmaelia - and the
government clucked its tongue at the crowds, telling them they were
disgracing their martyrs. No, shouted the crowds, those policemen who died
at Ishmaelia were brave men, not represented by their descendants in uniform
today.
This is not an unclever government, though. There is a kind of shrewdness in
the gradual freeing of the press and television of this ramshackle
pseudo-democracy. Egyptians had been given just enough air to breathe, to
keep them quiet, to enjoy their docility in this vast farming land. Farmers
are not revolutionaries, but when the millions thronged to the great cities,
to the slums and collapsing houses and universities, which gave them degrees
and no jobs, something must have happened.
"We are proud of the Tunisians - they have shown Egyptians how to have
pride," another Egyptian colleague said yesterday. "They were inspiring but
the regime here was smarter than Ben Ali in Tunisia. It provided a veneer of
opposition by not arresting all the Muslim Brotherhood, then by telling the
Americans that the great fear should be Islamism, that Mubarak was all that
stood between them and 'terror' - a message the US has been in a mood to
hear for the past 10 years."
There are various clues that the authorities in Cairo realised something was
afoot. Several Egyptians have told me that on 24 January, security men were
taking down pictures of Gamal Mubarak from the slums - lest they provoke the
crowds. But the vast number of arrests, the police street beatings - of
women as well as men - and the near-collapse of the Egyptian stock market
bear the marks of panic rather than cunning.
And one of the problems has been created by the regime itself; it has
systematically got rid of anyone with charisma, thrown them out of the
country, politically emasculating any real opposition by imprisoning many of
them. The Americans and the EU are telling the regime to listen to the
people - but who are these people, who are their leaders? This is not an
Islamic uprising - though it could become one - but, save for the usual talk
of Muslim Brotherhood participation in the demonstrations, it is just one
mass of Egyptians stifled by decades of failure and humiliation.
But all the Americans seem able to offer Mubarak is a suggestion of
reforms - something Egyptians have heard many times before. It's not the
first time that violence has come to Egypt's streets, of course. In 1977,
there were mass food riots - I was in Cairo at the time and there were many
angry, starving people - but the Sadat government managed to control the
people by lowering food prices and by imprisonment and torture. There have
been police mutinies before - one ruthlessly suppressed by Mubarak himself.
But this is something new.
Interestingly, there seems no animosity towards foreigners. Many journalists
have been protected by the crowds and - despite America's lamentable support
for the Middle East's dictators - there has not so far been a single US flag
burned. That shows you what's new. Perhaps a people have grown up - only to
discover that their ageing government are all children.
Internet and text messages fail in 'facebook revolution'
Egyptian authorities last night disrupted internet services and mobile-phone
text messaging in efforts to stop protesters keeping in touch on social
networking sites. The measure was taken as members of an elite
counter-terrorism police unit were ordered to take up positions in key
locations around Cairo in preparation for a wave of mass rallies today.
Among the places where they are stationed is Tahrir Square, where one of the
biggest demonstrations took place. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other
social networking sites have played a vital role in Egypt's protest
movement, just as they did in Tunisia, enabling demonstrators to keep in
touch and to organise rallies.
Who could succeed Hosni Mubarak?
Gamal Mubarak
Protesters on the streets of Egypt aren't just rallying against the
30-year-reign of President Hosni Mubarak, they are also taking aim at his
son Gamal Mubarak, 47, an urbane former investment banker who has scaled the
political ladder, prompting speculation that he is being groomed for his
father's post.
The youngest son of Mr Mubarak and his half-Welsh wife, Suzanne, Gamal was
educated at the elite American University in Cairo, going on to work for the
Bank of America.
He entered politics about a decade ago, quickly moving up to become head of
the political secretariat of his father's National Democratic Party (NDP).
He was heavily involved in the economic liberalisation of Egypt, which
pleased investors but provoked the ire of protesters, who blame the policies
for lining the pockets of the rich while the poor suffered.
Although he has always denied having an eye on his father's throne, a
mysterious campaign sprung up last year, with posters plastered across Cairo
calling for Gamal to stand for president in elections scheduled for later
this year. His 82-year-old father has not yet declared his candidacy.
Certainly the protesters appeared unhappy with the chosen son, chanting
"Gamal, tell your father Egyptians hate you" and tearing up his picture.
Mohamed ElBaradei
Protests in Egypt today will be different from the others that have swept
the Middle East in recent weeks in one important way. Mohamed ElBaradei,
former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), landed at
Cairo airport last night to lead rallies against Hosni Mubarak's rule.
The 68-year-old was born in the Egyptian capital, from where he launched a
legal career. He joined the IAEA in the 1980s, becoming head of the UN body
in 1997.
The 2003 invasion of Iraq thrust Mr ElBaradei into the public consciousness.
He demurred on the US rationale for attacking Saddam Hussein, describing the
war as "a glaring example of how, in many cases, the use of force
exacerbates the problem rather than solving it". The award, jointly with the
IAEA, of the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize further rankled with the Bush
administration.
He has long been urged to challenge the 82-year-old President, but hitherto
has bided his time, insisting first on electoral reform, but his
participation in today's protests indicate he is ready. Recent speeches,
including recently at Harvard, when he joked that he was "looking for a job"
have done nothing to dissuade his supporters, but at 68 his presidency would
surely be only a short-term fix to Egypt's problems.
© 2011 The Independent
Robert Fisk is Middle East correspondent for The Independent newspaper. He
is the author of many books on the region, including The Great War for
Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East.
is the author of many books on the region, including The Great War for
Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East.
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