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White House deputy press secretary Josh Earnest on Friday condemned a spate of sexual violence during protests in Egypt and called on the Egyptian government to intervene. "Sexual violence, including gang rape, has occurred during recent demonstrations in Egypt, and this is a cause of great concern to the United States, the international community and to many Egyptians," Earnest told reporters aboard Air Force One. "These victims are the mothers, wives, daughters and sisters of Egypt. The Egyptian government has a responsibility to take legal measures to prevent sexual violence and to prosecute people who are involved in such crimes."

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee tells Newsmax that President Obama won’t succeed in restarting peace talks in the Middle East because the Palestinians have “zero interest” in negotiations. The 2008 Republican presidential candidate also says the administration’s dealings with Mohammed Morsi and Egypt are “foreign policy gone wild,” and warns that the United States will be viewed as a “toothless tiger” if Obama doesn’t respond as promised to the use of chemical weapons in Syria. … “You’ve got a Palestinian government that refuses Israel’s right to exist. It’s really hard to negotiate with someone when they don’t even believe you...

The U.S. Senate Thursday defeated an amendment that aimed to prevent the Obama administration from transferring F-16 fighter aircraft and Abrams tanks to an Egypt in disarray. A vote to block the measure proposed by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.)—an amendment to the debt limit bill—passed by a 79–19 vote. In a strong-worded floor statement Paul questioned the wisdom of providing the sophisticated weaponry at a time when “many see Egypt descending into chaos.” … “I think this is particularly unwise since Egypt is currently governed by a religious zealot, a religious zealot who said recently that Jews were ‘bloodsuckers’ and...

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi defended his rancorous anti-Semitic comments, claiming that they were taken out of context. Morsi asserted in September 2010 that peace negotiations are "a waste of time and opportunities" as Arabs and Muslims get nothing out of engagement with "the descendants of apes and pigs." An Egyptian television shown this month aired the remarks, which were translated and distributed by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). "I was talking about the practices and behavior of believers of any religion who shed blood or who attack innocent people or civilians. That's behavior that I condemn," Morsi said,...

The struggle between political forces in Egypt could “lead to the collapse of the state,” the country’s army chief said Tuesday. In a posting to the army’s Facebook page, General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said political and economic issues now represented a “real threat” to security. "The continuation of the struggle of the different political forces ... over the management of state affairs could lead to the collapse of the state," General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said. He added that the army would remain "the solid and the cohesive block" on which "the foundation of the state rests." Al-Sisi, who is also...

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi declared a 30-day state of emergency, Sunday night, in the cities of Port Said, Suez and Ismailiya, in response to violent anti-government demonstrations around the country. The state of emergency includes a curfew... Morsi said, "The attacks we have been seeing for the last few days are unacceptable actions against Egypt and the revolution, and I will fight the attackers with utmost power and determination."

Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi is evidently not that good at explaining himself. Josh Rogin at Foreign Policy’s The Cable blog reports on the conversation Morsi had last week with senators McCain, Ayotte, Graham, Whitehouse, Blumenthal, Gillibrand and Coons while they were in Cairo. Rogin spoke with Senator Coons, who said that, during their meeting with Morsi, the senators emphasized their disapproval with his 2010 remarks about Israeli Jews, whom he called the “descendants of apes and pigs.” Morsi dispelled their concerns, though, explaining, in essence, that the Jews who control the American media were making much ado about nothing. Rogin...

The White House has condemned anti-Semitic remarks by Mohammed Morsi, the Egyptian president, who once described Israelis as the “descendants of apes and pigs”. Mr. Morsi’s slurs, which emerged in recordings from 2010, were termed “deeply offensive” by Jay Carney, Mr. Obama’s press secretary, who said concerns had been raised with Egyptian officials. Mr. Carney urged Mr. Morsi, who has promised to respect Egypt’s decades-old peace treaty with Israel, to promptly state publicly that he respects people of all faiths. … Jewish groups have sharply criticized the remarks and said they raised troubling questions about the future of America’s delicate...

Vice-president Mekki has resigned, citing the new constitution, which does away with the post. Egyptians are voting in the second and final phase of a referendum on the country's Islamist-authored constitution. The vote on the draft charter comes amid four weeks of clashes between supporters and opponents of President Mohamed Morsi. Mekki said he intended to quit once the charter is adopted as the new constitution eliminates the role of vice president. However, statement by Mekki read on state TV, suggested that his motive might in-fact be a disagreement with the Islamist policies of President Mohammed Morsi.

Does Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi desire to become a dictator...or another Abraham Lincoln? Did that question make you burst out laughing? If so, please be prepared for an even bigger laugh when you watch Atlantic editor Steve Clemons expend brain cells while struggling to figure out the answer to that question in his column. So laughable are the efforts of Clemons trying to come up with what to even slightly aware people is the obvious answer that you might need an oxygen mask due to an inability to catch a breath:

An Egyptian panel rushed through a draft constitution seen as undermining basic freedoms on Friday, resulting in mass protests in Cairo. AFP reported that tens of thousands of protesters rallied as the opposition piled pressure on President Mohammed Morsi. "Down with the constitutional assembly," vast crowds armed with megaphones chanted as they filed into Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the uprising that overthrew Hosni Mubarak in early 2011. Banners condemned "dictatorial Morsi" while protesters shouted "down with the rule of the Guide," a reference to the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood movement, through whose ranks Morsi rose before becoming president....

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi has agreed to pull back decrees announced last Thursday granting himself sweeping new powers. The Islamist leader originally told a panel of Egypt's top judges that he would not change his stance on the edicts, insisting that he was acting within his rights. But according to a report by a television network allied with the Muslim Brotherhood, an agreement worked out with top judicial authorities was reached late Monday. The decrees had barred the judiciary from disbanding the Constitutional Assembly or the Upper House of the Parliament, placing the presidency and the committee writing the new Constitution...

As clashes between Egyptian police forces led by Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi and Egyptian protesters angry at Morsi’s power grab escalated, the US embassy in Cairo weighed in. You may remember the embassy’s last embarrassing tweeting escapade on 9/11, when embassy staff tweeted apologies for a YouTube video even as the embassy was stormed. Today, as the embassy fell under assault, they tweeted:

Egypt's highest judicial body, the Supreme Judicial Council, is condemning the decrees granting President Mohamed Morsi sweeping powers, branding them an unprecedented attack on the independence of the judiciary. And a broad spectrum of Egypt's judiciary is expressing support for the country's outgoing judicial head, Abdel Mejid Mahmoud, who was fired by the president Thursday. Mahmoud received a standing ovation by members of Egypt's Judge's Club, after telling them that he will appeal the president's decision to the judiciary. Mahmoud said he will insist on the application of all legal articles, including those that deal with the powers of the...

ISMAILIA (EGYPT): Militants bombed security bases being built in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, injuring three people, authorities said, as the state tries to reassert control over territory that slipped from its grip after the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak. A massive explosion partly destroyed the wall of a security base being built for border guards in the town of Rafah at the border with the Gaza Strip overnight, but without causing injuries. Further south, three workers were injured by a separate blast that damaged a compound being built in Quseima for a different security agency responsible for guarding a pipeline that...

CAIRO: An angry mob of around 300 men near Egypt’s Tahrir Square attacked and ripped three women’s clothes off and chased them near one of the field hospitals by the square. The state-run al-Ahram newspaper reported that the women, of an unknown age, had their clothes torn from their bodies by the mob, assaulted and were then chased near the frontlines of the ongoing clashes with police on Sunday early afternoon. The report said that protesters nearby who saw the incident intervened and rescued the women from further assault. On Friday, as tens of thousands converged on the main Egyptian...

Morsi now wields total control over Parliament, the Judiciary, and the military to a degree Mubarak in his jail cell can only marvel at. Old CIA wisdom: He may be an SOB but he's our SOB. New post-Arab Spring CIA wisdom: He may be an SOB but at least he's not our SOB.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu agreed to a ceasefire for halting the eight-day Israeli Gaza operation Wednesday night, Nov. 21, after President Barack Obama personally pledged to start deploying US troops in Egyptian Sinai next week, debkafile reports. The conversation, which finally tipped the scales for a ceasefire, took place on a secure line Wednesday morning,�just hours before it was announced in Cairo. The US and Israeli leaders spoke at around the time that a terrorist was blowing up a Tel Aviv bus, injuring 27 people.

Now that a cease-fire has been declared between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, there are several concerns that still must be addressed: Who was behind this escalation in the first place and why did it occur at this particular moment in time? Egyptians have been turning against the Muslim Brotherhood in recent weeks, which could help explain the situation in neighboring Gaza. This is mainly because of the deteriorating economic situation in Egypt since the Brotherhood came to power. … It was not difficult for the MB to request—and probably help their sister Hamas organization—in flooding Israel with rocket attacks...

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu agreed to a ceasefire for halting the eight-day Israeli Gaza operation Wednesday night, Nov. 21, after President Barack Obama personally pledged to start deploying US troops in Egyptian Sinai next week, DEBKAfile reports. The conversation, which finally tipped the scales for a ceasefire, took place on a secure line Wednesday morning, just hours before it was announced in Cairo. Clinton was sympathetic to this argument. Soon after, President Obama was on the phone to Netanyahu with an assurance that US troops would be in place in Sinai next week, after he had obtained President Morsi’s...

Israel decided to refrain from a ground invasion of Gaza after it was warned that such a move could spell the end of the peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan, Channel 2 reported Thursday. According to the report, Mossad Head Tamir Pardo, who went to Cairo as Israel's representative in the contacts that preceded the ceasefire, was told in messages from Cairo and from Washington that the peaceful relations between Israel, Jordan and Egypt were at risk. .....

Israel decided to refrain from a ground invasion of Gaza after it was warned that such a move could spell the end of the peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan, Channel 2 reported Thursday. According to the report, Mossad Head Tamir Pardo, who went to Cairo as Israel's representative in the contacts that preceded the ceasefire, was told in messages from Cairo and from Washington that the peaceful relations between Israel, Jordan and Egypt were at risk.

PM: Israel is giving the cease-fire with Hamas a chance; Barak: Truce is not an agreement but a set of understandings between Israel and Egypt, Hamas and Egypt; IDF official: Hamas will be shocked by level of damage in Gaza. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that Israel is prepared to act if Hamas breaks the Egypt-mediated truce. "The operation's goals were met," Netanyahu said. "I know there are citizens that expect a harsher stand in Gaza - and we are prepared to make one. We choose when to act, against who to act and how to act," Netanyahu...

Mr. Morsi says his diktat will merely last as long as it takes the country to adopt a new constitution, which is what authoritarians always say. They claim to be a necessary step on the way to democracy, but democracy never arrives. Mr. Morsi's rationalization is that he must have this power to "protect the revolution," as if the demonstrators who deposed Hosni Mubarak in 2011 merely wanted another Mubarak with a beard and prayer rug. Mr. Morsi is claiming more power than Mr. Mubarak ever had. Egyptians took to the street on Friday in protest, sometimes violently, and nearly...

Egypt's president on Thursday issued constitutional amendments that placed him above judicial oversight and ordered the retrial of Hosni Mubarak for the killing of protesters in last year's uprising. Mohammed Morsi also decreed immunity for the Islamist-dominated panel drafting a new constitution from any possible court decisions to dissolve it, a threat that had been hanging over the controversial assembly. Liberal and Christian members withdrew from the assembly during the past week to protest what they say is the hijacking of the process by Morsi's allies, who they saw are trying to push through a document that will have an...

A day after Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi brokered a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, he widely expanded his own powers. It’s been met with both approval and anger, with accusations that he cares only about his followers, not all Egyptians. Clashes between Morsi's supporters and opponents swept the nation on Friday, with police firing tear gas at demonstrators in Cairo. Rallies sprung up in several different cities, after Morsi signed a controversial decree expanding his powers – a move that has divided the country on whether the leader has the right to do so. And as the controversy around Morsi...

Hamas fires 275 rockets at Israel and is rewarded with de facto acceptance as a legitimate negotiating partner in the Middle East peace process, as well as with a relaxation of the Israeli blockade of the Gaza coast. Israel is prevented from exacting a price for Hamas’ actions sufficient to deter future attacks or degrade Hamas’ capabilities. In one stroke, the Obama administration has overturned thirty years of American policy, which rejected negotiations with Hamas and other terrorist organizations. Secretary of State Clinton, to be sure, did not negotiate directly with Hamas, but rather with Egypt’s President Mohammed Morsi, who...

The Egyptian revolution took another bad turn Thursday, as President Mohamed Morsi gave himself dictatorial powers over the legislature and courts. The world has feared that the Muslim Brotherhood would favor one-man, one-vote, once, and the Morsi coup is an ominous sign. "The people wanted me to be the guardian of these steps in this phase," Reuters quoted Mr. Morsi as saying on Friday. "I don't like and don't want—and there is no need—to use exceptional measures. But those who are trying to gnaw the bones of the nation" must be "held accountable." Mr. Morsi says his diktat will merely...

According to reports from Egypt, the Constitutional Court is seeking to impeach new Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi after Morsi seized quasi-dictatorial power, sparking protests around the country. Morsi waited for the Obama administration’s praise over the Israel-Hamas ceasefire to make the move. Local media reports a courts spokesperson stating, “the judges are prepared to exercise the right to shift the head of state after he flouted the laws and the constitution.” The problem is that there is no operating constitution in Egypt; the constitution was suspended in March 2011, after the revolution, and no new constitution has been approved....

Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi's decree exempting all his decisions from legal challenge until a new parliament was elected caused fury amongst his opponents on Friday who accused him of being the new Hosni Mubarak and hijacking the revolution.

CAIRO — With a constitutional assembly on the brink of collapse and protesters battling the police in the streets over the slow pace of change, President Mohamed Morsi issued a decree on Thursday granting himself broad powers above any court as the guardian of Egypt’s revolution, and used his new authority to order the retrial of Hosni Mubarak. Mr. Morsi, an Islamist and Egypt’s first elected president, portrayed his decree as an attempt to fulfill popular demands for justice and protect the transition to a constitutional democracy. But the unexpected breadth of the powers he seized raised immediate fears that...

The top leader of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood denounced peace efforts with Israel and urged holy war to liberate Palestinian territories on Thursday—one day after the country's president, who hails from the movement, mediated a cease-fire between Israelis and Palestinians to end eight days of fierce fighting. “The enemy knows nothing but the language of force,” said Mohammed Badie. “Be aware of the game of grand deception with which they depict peace accords,” he said in a statement carried on the group’s website and emailed to reporters. His statement was a sharp deviation from the role played by President Mohammed Morsi...

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood is calling for a jihad (“holy war”) to liberate the Palestinian Authority areas. "Jihad is obligatory” for Muslims, top Islamic cleric Mohammed Badei said, adding that peace deals with Israel are a “game of grand deception". .....

CAIRO — Egypt's Islamist President Mohamed Morsi assumed sweeping powers on Thursday, drawing criticism that he is seeking to become a "new pharaoh" and raising questions about the gains of last year's uprising which ousted Hosni Mubarak. The move is a blow to the pro-democracy movement that toppled the long-time president, himself derided by many as a pharaoh, and raises concerns that Islamists will be further ensconced in power. Opposition forces denounced the declaration as a "coup" and called for nationwide protests on Friday. "The president can issue any decision or measure to protect the revolution," according to a decree...

WASHINGTON -- President Obama skipped dessert at a long summit meeting dinner in Cambodia on Monday to rush back to his hotel suite. It was after 11:30 p.m., and his mind was on rockets in Gaza rather than Asian diplomacy. He picked up the telephone to call the Egyptian leader who is the new wild card in his Middle East calculations. Over the course of the next 25 minutes, he and President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt hashed through ways to end the latest eruption of violence, a conversation that would lead Mr. Obama to send Secretary of State Hillary Rodham...

The trajectory of conflicts like these are fairly clear. Israel bombs some terrorist targets and then launches a ground incursion into Gaza to suppress terrorist activities. But the Obama Administration is already working against a ground offensive behind the scenes, as a New York Times report mentions. Obama supposedly called Netanyahu to discuss options for “de-escalating” the situation, but all those options are going to involve signing on to another meaningless cease fire while Hamas continues carrying out attacks, on and off. Netanyahu has made calling off a ground operation contingent on an end to rocket attacks. Which Obama isn’t...

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi made several decrees Thursday that will shape the country’s constitution and, he says, safeguard its “revolutionary” future. They include a ruling that none of his decisions can be overturned by any authority. Morsi gave the Constituent Assembly a two month deadline to finish drafting a new constitution, ruling that no authority may dissolve it until the country's defining document is completed. He further ruled that no authority may dissolve the Shura Council, the upper house of Egypt's parliament. In a move likely to bring criticism that the Egyptian president is inappropriately expanding his powers, he also...

Egypt's President Mohammed Mursi has issued a declaration banning challenges to his decrees, laws and decisions. The declaration also says no court can dissolve the constituent assembly, which is drawing up a new constitution. President Mursi also sacked the chief prosecutor and ordered the re-trial of people accused of attacking protesters when ex-President Mubarak held office. Egyptian opposition leader Mohammed ElBaradei accused Mr Mursi of acting like a "new pharaoh". Mr ElBaradei said the new declaration effectively placed the president above the law. "Morsi today usurped all state powers and appointed himself Egypt's new pharaoh. A major blow to the...

CAIRO (Reuters) - Thousands of Islamists rallied in Cairo on Friday to demand immediate introduction of sharia and called on President Mohamed Mursi to resist opposition to Islamic law. Islamists, Liberals and non-Islamists have locked horns over what civic freedoms women, Christians and minority groups will enjoy under a new constitution being drafted by an Islamist-dominated panel. The constitution is supposed to become the cornerstone of democratic transition after the uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak last year. Without it, the country cannot hold elections to replace a parliament that a court declared void in June. The Islamist camp is divided....

WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — Islamists in the Middle East are speaking out following President Barack Obama’s re-election Tuesday night. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood feels that the only foreign policy change Obama can bring is by “accepting the will of the Arab people.” “We must rely on ourselves and on our resources and build our country,” Issam Al-Aryan, a top Muslim Brotherhood official, said, according to The Times of Israel. “In the absence of direct American influence, Egypt can affect and lead the process of building a democratic and constitutional regime that will become a dream for African and the southern hemisphere.”...

‘Destroy The Idols,’ Egyptian Jihadist Calls For Removal Of Sphinx, Pyramids Monday, 12 November 2012By AL ARABIYA Murgan Salem al-Gohary, an Islamist leader twice-sentenced under former President Hosni Mubarak for advocating violence, called on Muslims to remove such “idols.” (Courtesy: Dream TV) An Egyptian jihad leader, with self-professed links to the Taliban, called for the “destruction of the Sphinx and the Giza Pyramids in Egypt,” drawing ties between the Egyptian relics and Buddha statues, local media reported this week. Murgan Salem al-Gohary, an Islamist leader twice-sentenced under former President Hosni Mubarak for advocating violence, called on Muslims to remove such...

Paul Berman, the New York intellectual, is perhaps the most penetrating and imaginative essayist writing about Islamist movements and ideas alive today. In 2010 he published The Flight of the Intellectuals, a stylish account of the Muslim Brotherhood: the Islamist political movement founded in Egypt in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna (known in Arabic as al-Ikhwan al-Muslimeen). According to Berman, the party was shaped decisively in both its ideology and organisational methods by mid-century European totalitarianism and was a politically hardened, ideologically-driven and anti-Semitic movement. It was from this inconvenient truth that much of the western media and many public intellectuals...

The Simon Wiesenthal Center, which monitors anti-Semitic incidents worldwide, has made a strong condemnation of Egypt’s new President Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, after he attended a sermon where the preacher called for the “destruction and dispersal of the Jews.” A video emailed by the center showed Morsi at a mosque in the Mediterranean town of Marsa Matruh, where the congregation answers “Amen” to a cleric who recites a list of prayers in a traditional ritual. In one of the prayers, the cleric asked God to “destroy the Jews and their supporters and disperse them, rend them asunder.” Morsi...

Perhaps the most radical change in U.S. foreign policy under President Obama has occurred here in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood, long shunned as a collection of dangerous Islamist extremists, is now the de facto object of American support. Not only that: Ultraconservative Salafist politicians, who make the Brotherhood seem like moderate pragmatists, are now regular visitors to the U.S. Embassy and, on the theory that it is better to have them inside the tent than out, they are able to visit the United States to learn how things work in the land of Jeffersonian democracy. Of course, the new...

The translators at MEMRI – the Middle East Media Research Institute – have posted a new video showing Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi attending Friday prayers at a mosque in the Matrouh governorate in northern Egypt. During the religious service, the Muslim cleric Futouh Abd Al-Nabi Mansour gave a sermon that included a prayer to destroy or deal harshly with the Jews, and to grant victory over the “infidels.” In the clip, it appears that Morsi is mouthing the word “Amen” after each of the cleric’s pronouncements. During his Friday sermon, Mansour, who heads the region’s Islamic Endowment, said: [...] Oh...

Wednesday, 05 September 2012 11:50 Obama Prepares Huge Bailout for Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt Written by  Alex Newman font size Print The Obama administration is close to finalizing a massive $1-billion bailout for the increasingly totalitarian Muslim Brotherhood regime ruling over Egypt, according to U.S. government officials cited in news reports. The move is already drawing fierce criticism from opponents arguing that bailing out the new Islamist ruler, who is already working to bolster Egyptian ties with the communist Chinese dictatorship while becoming increasingly despotic at home, would be a mistake on multiple levels.   In addition to forgiving the...

A letter from the desk of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi is sparking controversy in Egypt leaving people in disbelief that the Muslim Brotherhood leader had actually referred to the Israeli president as a "great friend." Yet skeptical Egyptians who have called the letter a "Zionist fabrication" have now been silenced, as a spokesman for Morsi confirmed on Thursday the authenticity of the letter, which was given to Shimon Peres by Atef Salem, Egypt's ambassador to Israel, on Wednesday at an official ceremony in the president's residence. The contents of the letter, which were leaked to the press, caused an uproar...

Egypt’s Brotherhood top officials face investigation over attacks on women protesters Joseph Mayton | 15 October 2012 Protests in Egypt turned violent on Friday near Tahrir Square. CAIRO: Two top Muslim Brotherhood officials are being investigated by Egypt’s Attorney General Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud over their role in allegedly inciting President Mohamed Morsi supporters to attack female protesters around Tahrir Square last Friday. Mohamed el-Beltagy and Essam el-Erian are under investigation, Mahmoud said. Mahmoud himself had only the day before defied an order to step down from his position after President Morsi attempted to push him out after a court acquitted former...

Two Coptic Christian children, aged 10 and 9, have been arrested for insulting religion in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Beni Suef, Ahram Online reported on Wednesday. According to the report, the two children were arrested on Tuesday after the imam of their local mosque filed a complaint against them. By order of the prosecution the two boys, Nabil Nagy Rizk and Mina Nady Farag, are now being held in the Beni Suef juvenile detention pending further investigation on Sunday, said the report. Ibrahim Mohamed Ali, the village imam, has accused the children of tearing up pages of the Koran....

Visit any Coptic church in the United States and you immediately recognize the newcomers. You see it in their eyes, hear it in their broken English, sense it in how they cling to the church in search of the familiar. They have come here escaping a place they used to call home, where their ancestors had lived for centuries. Waves of Copts have come here from Egypt before, to escape Gamal Abdel Nasser's nationalizations or the growing Islamist tide. Their country's transformation wasn't sudden, but every year brought more public Islamization. As the veil spread, Coptic women felt increasingly different,...