Last Update: Sunday, 7 July 2013 KSA 14:04 - GMT 11:04
ElBaradei calls on inclusion of Brotherhood in Egypt transition
Last Update: Sunday, 7 July 2013 KSA 11:04 - GMT 08:04
Is he or isn’t he? ElBaradei appointment as Egypt’s PM thrown into doubt
http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/07/05/is-obama-back-elbaradei/
Is Obama Backing ElBaradei?
by FRANKLIN LAMB
Beirut
According to well-connected Washington sources, one being a Congressional staffer whose job description includes following political events in Egypt, it did not take Mohamed Mustafa ElBaradei, the Sharia legal scholar, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, and for 12 years the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) (1997-2009), very long at all to contact the Washington, DC law firm of Patton Boggs on 7/2/13. That is once it became evident that Egyptian President Mohamad Morsi might well be ousted by Egypt’s Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF). The next day, ElBaradei’s representatives reportedly also made contact with the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations which claims to represent the 52 largest US based largest Jewish groups.
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ElBaradei’s campaign, as reported in the 4/4/13 edition of the New York Times also worked hard to convince the White House of what he called the necessity of forcibly ousting President Morsi, presenting several arguments that included documentation that Morsi had bungled the country’s transition to an inclusive democracy and wasted a year without following thru on any of his pledges or addressing the problems of:
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(Note: NYT 4/04/13 reference is not linked. Friedman’s 4/09/13 column: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/10/opinion/friedman-the-arab-quarter-century.html)
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Morsi Spurned Deals, Seeing Military as Tamed
EXCERPTS
The foreign minister said he was acting as an emissary of Washington, the advisers said, and he asked if Mr. Morsi would accept the appointment of a new prime minister and cabinet, one that would take over all legislative powers and replace his chosen provincial governors.
(snip)
His top foreign policy adviser, Essam el-Haddad, then left the room to call the United States ambassador, Anne W. Patterson, to say that Mr. Morsi refused. When he returned, he said he had spoken to Susan E. Rice, the national security adviser, and that the military takeover was about to begin, senior aides said.
“Mother just told us that we will stop playing in one hour,” an aide texted an associate, playing on a sarcastic Egyptian expression for the country’s Western patron, “Mother America.”
(snip)
Mr. Morsi’s advisers had meetings with Ms. Patterson and her deputy as well as a phone call with Ms. Rice, the national security adviser. Mr. Morsi’s advisers argued that ousting the president would be “a long term disaster” for Egypt and the Arab world because people would “lose faith in democracy.” They said it would set off an explosion in the streets that they could not control.
And they argued that the United States was implicated: “Nobody who knows Egypt is going to believe a coup could go forward without a green light from the Americans.”
Speaking of the Washington, DC law firm of Patton Boggs - Chevron in their offensive against the Ecuador (Texaco) pollution case is causing Patton Boggs about $450 million in pain. WSJ article - There may be some payback to the Washington elites after all.