Just weeks before Egypt's presidential election, the ruling military junta appears to have struck back at the Islamists.
Egypt's presidential election commission just removed 10 candidates from the ballot...and they include ex-intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, Khairat Shater, the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate and Hazem Salah abu Ismail, a popular Salifist candidate backed by the al-Nour Party.
If this stands, it makes the presidential election a shoo-in for Amr Moussa, the ex-secretary general of the Arab League known for his anti-Western and anti-Israel views.
What happened here is pretty obvious. The generals would like to avoid open conflict with the Islamists, but they have no intention of giving up their prerogatives and their tax free financial empire. So they cut a deal with Amr Moussa. Dumping Suleiman was just a sacrifice to give this an appearance of fairness and legality.
Shater and Ismail both had a small handle enabling the commission to force them out. In Shater's case, it was the trumped up charges of money laundering and 'terrorism' by the Mubarak regime that put him in prison for awhile. In Ismail's case, it was that his mother somehow obtained dual American-Egyptian citizenship.
It remains to see whether this is going to stand. The Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party had a second candidate ready in the wings, Mohamed Morsi. And the Salifis have Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh. But a change at this point obviously hurts both candidates, the Islamists and Salafis are livid and it remains to be seen whether the military junta is going to be able to pull this switcheroo off.
1 comment:
What most people in the media, the US government, and the incompetent boobs in the CIA seem to think is that the Mubarak government was ousted because the people took to the streets and demanded their freedom. In actuality, what happened was the military chose to stand down. Once the military made this choice, Mubarak's fate was sealed. At that point, there was nothing we or any one else could have done.
It seems that the generals would like to pull of the "switcheroo." In order to remain in power, the generals need the support of the rank and file soldiers under them. Ultimately the success or failure of the switcheroo depends on now the rank and file soldiers react. Again, it ultimately comes down to the military.
As for the protests, no one in a position of authority gave any serious thought to who was organiziing and funding the protests. Instead the media and US government officals acted as giddy as school girls gushing over their first love when discussing Egyptian "democracy" without giving any serious thought to how such "democracy" night affect our interests.
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