WarSclerotic

Morsy: I will work to expand bilateral tie… JPost – Middle East.

Photo: Suhaib Salem / Reuters

Egyptian President-elect Mohammed Morsy is looking to expand ties with Tehran to create a strategic “balance” in the region, according to an interview with Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency published Monday.

Diplomatic relations between the two countries have been severed for more than 30 years, but both sides have signalled a shift in policy since former president Hosni Mubarak was overthrown last year in a popular uprising.

Fars quoted him as saying he was interested in better relations with Tehran. “This will create a balance of pressure in the region, and this is part of my program.”

Asked to comment on reports that, if elected, his first state visit would be to Iran’s regional arch-rival Saudi Arabia, Morsy said: “I didn’t say such a thing and until now my first international visits following my victory in the elections have not been determined”.

Fars said he was speaking a few hours before the results of the Egyptian election were announced on Sunday.

Morsy’s comments on Iran came just prior to his first speech since his election win, during which he vowed to “preserve international accords and obligations,” in what appeared to be a reference to the peace treaty with Israel.

Morsy attempted to allay fears that he would immediately act to Islamize Egypt, promising to be a president to all Egyptians, “Muslims, Christians, the elderly, children, women, men, farmers, teachers, workers, those who work in the private and public sectors, and the merchants.”

The new Egyptian president thanked the “martyrs” that had lost their lives during the uprising that led to the ouster of former president Hosni Mubarak, saying the he would not have become president without their sacrifice.

Morsy did not call out a challenge to Egypt’s military leaders for their recent attempts to limit presidential powers, instead praising the army and police as “brothers.”

Morsy defeated former Mubarak prime minister and general Ahmed Shafik in a run-off last weekend by a convincing 3.5 percentage points, or nearly 900,000 votes, taking 51.7 percent of the total, officials said. It ended a week of disputes over the count that had frayed nerves.

Morsy succeeds Mubarak, who was pushed aside by his fellow officers 16 months ago to appease the Arab Spring revolution.

The military council which has ruled the biggest Arab nation since then, curbed the powers of the presidency by decree last week, meaning the head of state will have to work closely with the army on a planned democratic constitution.

The generals say they want to hand over to civilian rule but are plainly set on defending their privileges and suspicious of the ability of Egypt’s fragmented, and long oppressed, political movements to establish a stable constitutional democracy.

Obama calls to congratulate Morsy on victory

US President Barack Obama called Morsy on Sunday to congratulate him on his victory. According to a White House statement, Obama underscored that the US will continue to support Egypt’s transition to democracy and stand by the Egyptian people as they fulfill the promise of their revolution. He emphasized his interest in working together with Morsy, on the basis of mutual respect, to advance the many shared interests between Egypt and the United States.

Morsy welcomed Obama’s support and the two leaders affirmed their commitment to advancing the US-Egypt partnership and agreed to stay in close touch in the weeks and months ahead, according to the statement.

Obama also called Shafik, commending him on a well-run campaign, according to the US State Department.

Putin-Netanyahu talks to focus on rising Islamist power: Cairo then Damascus.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Analysis June 25, 2012, 10:23 AM (GMT+02:00)

Russian president Vladimir Putin on short Israel visit

The Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power in Egypt – and soon, possibly, in Syria – will have pushed to the sidelines such obvious topics as Iran and gas when Monday, June 25, Russian President Vladimir Putin on a short visit to Israel meets Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
On this subject at least, the Russian and Israeli leaders will find common ground:  Both are concerned, to put it mildly, by the chain of Muslim Brotherhood governments rolling out along Middle East shores – Libya, last year; Egypt, yesterday; and Syria, tomorrow. In their view, this process is a menace to regional stability which rivals even that of a nuclear-armed Iran.
Putin counts US President Barack Obama’s sponsorship of Muslim Brotherhood power as a strategic threat to Russian national security because of it could be the match which lights the flame of radical Islam in the Caucasus and among the Russian Muslim populations of the Volga River valleys.
As for Netanyahu, his calm-sounding congratulations for the new, democratically-elected Egyptian president, disguise trepidation. After one domino fell in Cairo, he fears another will fall in Damascus leaving Jordan vulnerable to having its king pushed over by the kingdom’s powerful Muslim Brotherhood.

Israel would then be under siege from three Islamist-ruled neighbors – “moderate” in Obama’s eyes, alarmingly “extremist and expansionist” in the view of Putin and Netanyahu.
In contrast to the Israeli prime minister, the Russian president makes no bones about his utter disapproval of the US President’s “pro-Islamic” policies. His blunt words in support of Syria’s Bashar Assad at the G20 in Mexico Sunday, June 18, were meant as a monkey wrench for US plans to continue to install Muslim power in Arab lands.
Not surprisingly, their conversation on the summit sidelines was described as “candid” – a euphemism for “difficult” – and must have raised a stop sign against the “reset” of ties heralded last year by Washington.

The Israeli Prime Minister keeps on smiling to Obama while grinding his teeth over the security avalanche set in motion at Israel’s front and back doors and wracking his brains for a plan of cooperation with Moscow to arrest the slide.
Israel has already had a foretaste of the trouble to come from Cairo. It bounced all the way from Libya’s Islamist regime to land this month with a sinister bang across Egyptian Sinai’s border with southern Israel.

In the past year, since a new regime took power in Tripoli, the strategic peninsula has been transformed into a major smuggling eden for the distribution of contraband arms and infiltrating Islamist terrorists, including Muslim Brotherhood adherents, into the Hamas-ruled the Gaza Strip and onward to other countries in the region.
For Putin the math is simple: If Libyan Islamists can travel 1,360 kilometers to reach Israel’s borders without anyone stopping them, why not 2,558 kilometers to the Russian Caucasian?
Ironically, the victim of the first suicide attack the Libyan terrorists mounted inside Israel from Sinai was an Israeli Muslim from Haifa, Said Fashasha, who died in a bombing-shooting ambush on Route 10 to Eilat Sunday, June 18. On the same day, the “candid” Obama-Putin conversation also took place at Los Cabos.
Now as then, President Obama continues to push the Russian leader to accept the compromise of Syria’s Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa, a Sunni Muslim, replacing Bashar Assad, with Assad’s brother-in-law, deputy chief of staff Gen. Shawqat Asif, serving alongside him. With those chips in place, Washington believes Assad might be persuaded to go into exile in Moscow.
What Putin hears is that Obama is so eager to have a Sunni Muslim installed in Damascus that he is willing to put up with retaining the Assad clan in power, even Gen. Asif, a chief instigator of the regime’s bloody savagery.
So  both Putin and Netanyahu, when they talk in Jerusalem Monday, know they are stumped for a strategy to hold back the Islamist tide washing across this region and potentially farther afield – any more than a diplomatic solution has been found to stall Iran’s nuclear plans.

Three more Syrian pilots defect to Jordan, more expected to follow suit.

Sunday, 24 June 2012

While the crackdown on the Syrian protesters continue, defecting soldiers are increasing by the day. (Reuters)

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Three additional Syrian military pilots have defected to Jordan earlier today; bringing up the total number of defected Syrian pilots to seven, according to Al-Arabiya’s Amman correspondent.

“The three pilots have entered Jordan in an illegal way and they are currently held by the Jordanian security authorities who are taking them through the regular routine procedures” said Al-Arabiya’s Ghassan Abu Louz quoting sources within Syrian opposition.

According Abu Louz, one of the three pilots is a Lieutenant Colonel who managed to bring in his family to Jordan today as well. The other two pilots are both colonels and are said to have also brought in their families from Syria.

Four other Syrian military officials have entered Jordan since last Thursday following the defection of the colonel Hassan Marei Hamada who landed his Meg21 plane inside the Hashemite Kingdom

The Syrian Defense Ministry branded Hamada a “traitor” and said that it was in contact with Jordanian authorities to retrieve the aircraft.

“The pilot is considered a deserter from service and a traitor to his country and his military honor. Contacts are underway with the Jordanian side to make arrangements to return the plane,” a statement by the ministry said.

For his part, Bassam Aldadah, political advisor of the Syrian Free Army, has confirmed the news to Al- Arabiya from the Turkish-Syrian borders saying, “These defecting pilots have followed the hero commander colonel Hamada without their planes” adding that they three additional pilots made into Jordan on foot.

“The three pilots who have broken off from their Deir Al-Zour-based battalions to join the Syrian Free Army” he added.

A commander in the Free Syrian Army confirmed to the Egyptian Al Ahram newspaper that the defecting officer said the numbers of government troops who fled are expected to double.

Russia’s Putin arriving in Israel… JPost – Diplomacy & Politics.

Jerusalem Post – Breaking News.

International – Jeffrey Goldberg – On Iranian Intransigence – The Atlantic.

Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations suggests that unrealistic demands made by Iranian negotiators may be sinking any hope of a compromise on the nuclear issue:

It is traditional Iranian statecraft to give little and hope to get a lot. So Iranians came into these negotiations with some rather extraordinary demands, particularly [that] their right to uranium enrichment be officially recognized–which is impossible, given the fact that the enrichment stands in violation of Security Council resolutions and the International Atomic Energy Agency’s ( IAEA) board of governor’s injunctions. The United States and the other powers just could not get the Iranians to abandon that demand and their demand for substantial sanctions relief in exchange for discussing the disposition of their uranium enriched to 20 percent.

And Takeyh provides a useful reminder that Iran’s intransigence on this issue dates back to 2006:

The United Nations’ six Security Council resolutions have asked Iran to suspend all enrichment and reprocessing activities, have asked Iran to come to terms with the IAEA regarding previous or ongoing weaponization activities, and to clarify all ambiguities regarding its nuclear program. At this point, Iran has not discharged those obligations, [which] go back to 2006. So for some six years, Iran has rebuffed those demands from the international community. In these particular talks that have just taken place, the talks focused more specifically on this 20 percent enrichment. The world powers asked Iran to stop producing 20 percent enriched uranium [which can more easily be converted to weapons grade uranium], to ship out the existing supplies of 20 percent enriched uranium, and to shut down the Fordow underground facility, which is being used to enrich uranium to the 20 percent level. Iran rejected those requests.

So far, the negotiations seems to be going according to a certain plan: Call it “Delay and Enrich.” The Iranians haven’t stopped enriching uranium during these months of negotiations. It would be fair to say, in fact, that the negotiations represent a crucial component of their enrichment strategy.

Netanyahu: We look forward to working with new Egyptian government | The Times of Israel.

( What the &%^ are they supposed to do ? ! – JW )

Foreign Ministry remains tight-lipped over Brotherhood win in Cairo

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (photo credit: Uri Lenz/Flash90)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Sunday night that Israel would respect the democratic process and the results of the vote in Egypt.

Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi was declared a winner of a run-off vote for president of the country Sunday, the first civilian and democratically elected person to hold the title.

Israel had expressed fears that an Egypt ruled by the hard-line Islamist Brotherhood would undo the peace treaty between the countries and lead to frostier relations with Cairo.

Netanyahu’s statement seemed designed to iterate the importance of keeping to the three-decade old peace agreement.

“Israel looks forward to continuing cooperation with the Egyptian government on the basis of the peace treaty between the two countries, which is a joint interest of both peoples and contributes to regional stability,” the statement read.

Sources told Ynet that the Prime Minister’s Office is prepared to send a congratulatory message to Morsi, although exactly if and when a missive will be released has yet to be decided. Netanyahu’s office had ordered Israel’s ministers to remain tight-lipped about the situation in Egypt, the website reported.

Foreign ministry officials said that although the outcome of the election was expected, they intend to wait and see how things develop, and what steps the new leadership takes under president-elect Mohammed Morsi, Ynet news reported..

Kadima MK Otniel Schneller called on Israelis to refrain from premature expressions of condemnation and instead congratulate the Egyptian people for completing the democratic process, ”even if the results are not to the liking of some of us.”

“The first reactions should take into consideration the future relations with Israel’s southern neighbor,” Schneller said. “The Egyptian people made their choice, now honor it.

Opposition head Shelly Yachimovich (Labor) said that Israel must have dialogue with Egypt’s chosen leader, Maariv reported on Sunday.

“Despite the complexities involved we must have a dialogue with whoever is chosen to lead Egypt,” Yachimovich said, adding that since the peace treaty is of the highest strategic importance Israel must do everything it can to maintain normal ties with Egypt.

The Israel Defense Forces said the changing of the guard in Egypt to a more hard-line government would not lead to any operational shifts.

Muslim Brotherhood’s Muhammed Morsi is president of Egypt.

DEBKAfile Special Report June 24, 2012, 6:28 PM (GMT+02:00)

Egypt’s new president Muhammed Morsi

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has achieved the goal set at its foundation 84 years ago. Its candidate Mohammed Morsi was declared Sunday afternoon, June 24, victor of last week’s presidential election runoff with 51.73 percent, beating his rival, Ahmed Shafiq, former prime minister under the ousted Hosni Mubarak. Brotherhood supporters massed in tens of thousands at Tahrir Square set up a great cheer. Before the results were announced, they called for the Supreme Military Council ruling Egypt in the interim to step down and are now preparing to fight the generals to win for their president the sweeping powers assumed by the generals ahead of the election.
Although elected more or less democratically, Morsi and his party are expected to turn the Egyptian revolution into the cornerstone of an Islamic state more closely akin to the Islamic Republic of Iran than the democratic, secular state envisioned by the revolutionaries when they fought for Mubarak’s overthrow.
In time, Israeli will discover its three-decade old peace pact with Egypt is also destined to go by the board as the Islamist majority in parliament gives Egypt a new constitution broadly based on the Sharia.
The military council, though widely charged with usurping power, proved helpless against the Islamic tide which polarized rather than sweeping the country. The close election results showed Egypt to be deeply split into at least two large camps and this bodes ill for its future stability.
The generals will have no choice but to come to terms with the Muslim Brotherhood. But any deal they reach will be short-lived because the Islamists have the legislative power to enact laws for stripping the military elite of its privileges. Some of the generals may choose to retire rather than support the Brotherhood.
The first to read the writing on the wall was Mubarak’s former intelligence chief, Gen. Omar Suleiman, who dropped out of the presidential race at an early stage. The last DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s sources disclosed that Suleiman had boarded a flight to Munich, Germany last Wednesday, June 20. He was quick to foresee that the Muslim Brotherhood, backed by the Obama administration, was heading for rule over Egypt.
Having devoted much of his career to putting Muslim Brotherhood activists behind bars, Suleiman knew that he could expect nothing more under the new regime than the fate of his old boss, Hosni Mubarak, namely, a slow, cruel death in prison.

In another part of Cairo, supporters of Ahmed Shafiq demonstrated waited out the results by protesting against “foreign intervention” in Egypt’s democratic process. They accused the US of tilting the election against their candidate. Disgruntled pro-democracy secular activists stood quietly in Cairo’s emblematic square in mourning for the revolution they lost.

Mohammed Morsi declared Egypt’s first democratic president | The Times of Israel.

(First and last… Iran is the model. – JW )

Muslim Brotherhood candidate takes 51.7 percent of votes to become country’s first leader in post-Mubarak era

Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi was declared the first democratically elected president of Egypt Sunday afternoon, ending months of speculation as to who would replace deposed leader Hosni Mubarak.

The carrying out of free elections in Egypt was a stunning development in a country that had been governed by autocracy until a popular revolution ousted Mubarak in January 2011.

Morsi, who won an earlier round of presidential voting, was declared the winner with 51.7 percent of the vote, compared to 48.3 percent for his opponent Ahmed Shafiq.

Officials said 843,250 votes were declared void.

Some 51% of Egypt’s voting-eligible public cast ballots in the runoff election.

The announcement by election official Farouk Sultan came after a 45-minute delay and a long prologue.

Tahrir Square erupted into loud cheers and mass celebrations as the winner was announced, with thousands of people waving flags, shouting and dancing.

“As Egyptians celebrate their freedom, we pay special tribute to the martyrs of the great Egyptian revolution, their blood didn’t go in vain,” the Brotherhood tweeted shortly after the announcement.

Morsi’s spokesman Ahmed Abdel-Attie said words cannot describe the “joy” in this “historic moment.”

“We got to this moment because of the blood of the martyrs of the revolution,” he said. “Egypt will start a new phase in its history.”

The announcement was the culmination of a tumultuous, 16-month transition that was supposed to bring democratic rule, but was tightly controlled and curtailed by the military rulers who took power from Mubarak.

Field Marshall Hussein Tantawi, who headed the country’s caretaker military junta, congratulated Morsi after the win, according to Egyptian state television.

Throughout the campaign, the Islamist Brotherhood attempted to paint Shafiq, a former prime minister, as the continuation of Mubarak’s regime, which ruled Egypt for 30 years.

Results were originally scheduled to be released on Thursday, but were pushed back as officials said they needed more time to tally the votes.

Both Shafiq and Morsi had previously announced that they had won.

Israel has expressed worries over the future of ties with Egypt should the hard-line Brotherhood take power.

The announcement was preceded by heavy police presence in Cairo and other places to counter possible protests, adding to tension in the country. The crossing between Gaza and Egypt was ordered closed just before the announcement, according to Egyptian daily Al-Ahram.

The announcement of the president was supposed to be the end of Egypt’s post-uprising transition to democracy. However, the military made a series of last minute-moves that stripped the office of president of most of its major powers and kept those powers concentrated in the hands of the military. A court ruling a few days before that dissolved the freely elected parliament that was dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood.

In Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the birthplace of the pro-democracy uprising, a swelling crowd of thousands gathered in sweltering midday heat awaiting the announcement. They were a mix of supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and ultraconservative Islamists known as Salafis along with some of the revolutionary youth groups that drove last year’s uprising. A separate pro-Shafiq rally of some 2,000 protesters gathered in the northern Cairo district of Nasr City.

After nearly an hour of stupefying details of the commission’s work, Mohammad Morsy was announced to be the winner of the presidential election.

Wild celebration/pandemonium has broken out in Tahrir square.

We all were afraid of this happening.  Poor Egypt.  Hello, Arab winter…..

JW