WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will lobby lawmakers this week on the need to keep billions of dollars in aid flowing to Egypt and other countries caught up in a spasm of violent anti-American protests across the Muslim world.
The State Department said Clinton intended to meet with Congress later this week to discuss the protests, which saw U.S. diplomatic missions attacked and the U.S. ambassador to Libya killed amid fury over a film produced in the United States that many saw as an insult to Islam.
Hillary is not doing this without WH approval or urging. The only way the aid stops is if the House does the right thing. Defunding the countries would be a good start, but any subsequent violence would be blamed on Republicans not supporting the so-called fledgling democracies of the region.
These Congressional meetings will be more about both parties obtaining or denying the issue for the presidential campaign.
According to the report, Egypt's "clumsy response" to the storming of the US Embassy in Cairo has resulted in the US temporarily halting talks about a proposed $1 billion in debt relief, top Washington officials told the newspaper.
And there will not be any halt in aid recently approved by Congress. The propaganda is that future aid may be suspended, but Congress has already said as much pending a number of factors. The bottomline is that the aid money will continue to flow to Egypt.