Free Republic

The first woman elected to head an Egyptian political party expressed doubt over the country’s transition to democracy on Monday, criticizing the interim authorities’ increasing intolerance of dissent. Hala Shukrallah, a 59-year-old Coptic Christian, condemned the security crackdown that has resulted in mass detentions and trials in the months since the military overthrew the Islamist president last July. […] Hundreds of Islamists have been killed and thousands detained. But by the end of last year and with the issuance of a draconian protest law, the appetite for dissent decreased and the clampdown widened to include some of the main figures...

Washington believes that Egypt’s latest crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood is a bit too much but won’t take action against the interim government in Cairo, a United States official said Thursday. The official, who was quoted by the Reuters news agency, said the administration believed the Egyptian government was going “way too far” in its current crackdown on the Brotherhood and its supporters. …

An official in Egypt says complaints already have been filed against a popular television satirist, less than 24 hours after returning to air following a coup in the country. Bassem Youssef, often compared to U.S. comedian Jon Stewart, mocked the new pro-military fervor gripping Egypt in his program aired Friday night. …

Newark, New Jersey (My9NJ) - Is 27 the new 18 when it comes to living at your parents' house? According to the US census Bureau, at least 1 in 4 N.J. adults, ages 18-31 live at home and 42% are 24 or older. Experts call it an "epidemic" of millennials leaching off their parents, but does a bad economy and student loan debt crisis justify the situation? A new survey from Coldwell Banker says parents in the Northeast region are more lenient on this than anywhere else in the US on children moving back home. But, according to the survey,...

Speaking in Egypt's embassy in a Mayfair townhouse, Mr Kholy compared the one-year rule of Mr Morsi to the Islamist takeover of the Iranian state after the 1979 revolution and said that, like Nazism, the Muslim Brotherhood ideology sought to dominate Egyptian society. "Morsi was elected president and held office for one year but in that time he tried to make everything Muslim Brotherhood controlled. Egyptian culture over 5,000 years is a mix of religions and civilisations in which the Islamic religion is one ingredient of the Egyptian character," he said. "The Muslim Brotherhood are like a Nazi group that...

•EGYPT VICE PRESIDENT ELBARADEI ANNOUNCES RESIGNATION: AFP •MURSI BACKERS SHOOT, KILL 4 POLICEMEN IN CAIRO STATION: REUTERS More on the resignation of the long-suffering ElBardei: Egypt's interim vice president, Mohamed ElBaradei, resigned on Wednesday after the security forces violently broke up protest camps set up by supporters of the deposed president, Mohamed Mursi.

When Secretary of State John Kerry said the Egyptian military was “restoring democracy” just as Sens. John McCain and and Lindsey Graham were in the country urging cooperation, it undercut the mission, Sen. John McCain said. The two Republican senators were sent to Egypt last week by President Barack Obama. They told the military to release members of the Muslim Brotherhood from jail, set up a dialogue, and move forward with elections. “That wasn’t as impactful as it might have been given the statements and actions by the White House and the secretary of state,” McCain said Thursday on CNN’s...

The Obama administration support for Muslim Brotherhood Islamists in Egypt is driving the powerful military there against the United States and toward Moscow, according to U.S. officials and reports from the region. The pro-Muslim Brotherhood stance is undermining decades of U.S. policy toward the Middle East state and prompting concerns that the United States is about to “lose” Egypt as a strategic partner, said officials familiar with intelligence reports. Disclosure of the concern over the administration’s policy failure in Egypt comes as a security crackdown on pro-Muslim Brotherhood supporters in Cairo resulted in scores killed. “The Obama administration’s blatant Islamist...

"I warn Egypt's military that Egyptians are a great and freedom-seeking nation. Do not suppress them," said Rouhani in a speech in parliament broadcast live on state TV. He condemned what he said was army "brutality."

Sen. Rand Paul is hammering his fellow senators for keeping billions in financial aid flowing to Egypt's military -- even as Cairo's security forces massacre anti-government activists. "This is something that those who voted in Congress are going to have to live with," Paul told The Cable on Thursday. "The question is: How does their conscience feel now as they see photographs of tanks rolling over Egyptian civilians?" As the official Egyptian death toll climbs to 638, the legislation the Kentucky libertarian is referring to was an amendment to suspend aid to Egypt until the country holds free and fair...

Facing condemnation at every hand from the West, Egypt’s military rulers received a powerful shot in the arm from Riyadh Friday, Aug. 16, with an unprecedented public assurance from Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdel Aziz that the kingdom supports Egypt in the fight “against terrorism” – the military rulers’ term for Muslim Brotherhood resistance. In a statement broadcast by official Al-Ekhbariya TV, Abdullah said Egypt’s stability is being targeted by “haters” and warned that anyone that interferes in Egypt’s internal affairs seeks to “waken sedition.” debkafile and DEBKA Weekly have been reporting since last week that Saudi Arabia and the...

Abu Hafs al Maqdisi, the leader of the Gaza-based Jaish al Ummah (Army of the Nation), today called on Egyptians to wage "jihad" against Egyptian army commander General Abdul Fattah el Sisi. Al Maqdisi, who was released from a Hamas prison in December, also called on Egyptians to overthrow "the tyrant" (el Sisi) and establish an Islamic state. In addition, al Maqdisi said he hoped that one of el Sisi's bodyguards would kill him. Al Maqdisi further stated, according to press reports, that although Jaish al Ummah does not currently coordinate with any Salafist groups in Egypt, it is...

Only capable armed forces can check the violent proclivities of Islamic supremacism. As Egypt began to implode, yet again, John Kerry inadvertently stumbled into something a lot closer to the truth than the delusional “Arab Spring” narrative that has guided Obama-administration policy. The secretary of state, tied in knots by congressional foolishness that mandates terminating U.S. aid when a foreign government is ousted by a coup d’état, rationalized that, quite contrary to a coup, the Egyptian military’s ejection of President Mohamed Morsi was an exercise in “restoring democracy.” None of this was quite right, although that is to be expected....

Egyptian presidential advisor Mustafa Hegazy described them as remnants of “religious fascism” that once governed the nation. The police called them infidels as they cleared a mosque Saturday where they were either hiding or shooting, depending on which side you listened to. Newscasters referred to them as armed gunmen. And on the streets of Cairo, in front of the latest clashes, nearby residents used the terms animals, barbarians, and terrorists to describe supporters of ousted Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. It is why so many shrug at word that at least 1,042 people have been killed since June 26, according to...

To add to Stanley’s sage observations (both today and earlier this week), I argue in this weekend’s column that elections are not democracy and, in fact, that popular elections in a sharia culture that inevitably empower Islamic supremacists are innately anti-democratic – which is why our commentariat ought to stop referring to Mohamed Morsi as Egypt’s “democratically elected” president. He is (or was) the popularly-elected in an anti-democratic society.

Former minister Yossi Beilin revealed in a column published in the Israel Hayom daily on Sunday that the Egyptian army rigged the results of last year’s presidential elections, in which Islamist Mohammed Morsi was declared the winner. … The source who asked to remain anonymous told Beilin that former president Hosni Mubarak’s last prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, won the race “by a narrow margin. But the army generals—wanting to ensure that law and order would be upheld following the elections—feared that if Morsi was defeated, the Muslim Brotherhood would refuse to recognize the results and would end up conducting themselves...

Russian President Vladimir Putin called an extraordinary session at the Kremlin Saturday to "discuss the situation in Egypt and take the necessary steps to the put Russian military facilities at the Egyptian military's disposal," said an announcement in Moscow, without elaborating. Putin said further that "Russia will arrange for joint military exercises with the Egyptian army." DEBKAfile: Moscow's steps directly conflict with Western condemnation of the Egyptian military's crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood. They were taken shortly after President Barack Obama cancelled a joint military exercise with Egypt as a mark of US disapproval.

Hamas has finally admitted that it is the Egyptians, and not Israel, who have turned the Gaza Strip into a “big prison.” … Why haven’t the “pro-Palestine” activists been sent to the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing to voice solidarity with the residents of the “big prison”? The answer is obvious: First, the activists’ main goal is to condemn Israel and hold it solely responsible for the miseries of Palestinians. The activists do not care about the Palestinians’ suffering as much as they are interested in advancing their anti-Israel agenda. They devote most of their energies and efforts...

Egyptian police are expected to start taking action early on Monday against supporters of ousted President Mohamed Mursi who are gathered in crowded protest camps in Cairo, security and government sources said, a move which could trigger more bloodshed. The sites are the main flashpoints in the confrontation between the army, which toppled Mursi last month, and supporters who demand his reinstatement. Western and Arab mediators and some senior Egyptian government officials have been trying to persuade the army to avoid using force against the protesters, who at times can number as much as tens of thousands. "State security troops...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Thursday that the Egyptian army, which deposed President Mohammed Morsi, had intervened at the request of millions to protect democracy and had restored it, AFP reported. Kerry made the remarks in a interview in Pakistan, where he earlier congratulated the new government on an historic transition of democratic power in a country long dominated by the military. …