WarSclerotic

At least one killed as anti-Mursi protests flare outside Cairo’s presidential palace.

Wednesday, 05 December 2012

Demonstrators run away from tear gas outside the Egyptian Presidential Palace’s main gate during a demonstration on Tuesday. (AFP)

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Amid reported White House pressure, bid to shut PLO’s Washington office fails in Senate | The Times of Israel.

( While the scandalously anti-Israel, leftist J Street  is claiming credit for protecting Abbas, it seems clear that t was our good friend, Obama, once again “having Israel’s back.”   – JW )

Right-wing ZOA praises senators for trying to pass a series of hard-hitting punishments for Abbas’s UN ‘Palestine’ victory; left-wing J Street chalks up initiative’s failure to mass email campaign

The United States Capitol, Washington, DC (photo credit: CC BY-SA Dougtone, Flickr)

NEW YORK — A series of hard-hitting amendments that would have severely penalized the Palestinian Authority, along with several states and international bodies, for the successful bid last week to upgrade the PA’s status to a “nonmember observer state” at the UN failed to pass in the Senate Tuesday. One of the defeated amendments would have closed down the PLO’s office in Washington.

The amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act, the Pentagon budget bill, were removed before a voice vote that approved over 120 other amendments on Tuesday night.

The amendments, numbers 3139, 3203 and 3254, would have cut US funding for the PA and UN bodies that granted the PA the status change voted on last Thursday, by 50 percent; slashed 20% of US foreign assistance to the 139 countries that voted for the status change; shut the Palestine Liberation Organization office in Washington; ended all US assistance to the Palestinian Authority if it sought to drag Israel before the International Criminal Court; and canceled all US funding for the United Nations if the world body instituted any additional status change for Palestine before the signing of a comprehensive peace agreement with Israel.

“Granting United Nations membership to the Palestinian Authority is a nightmare in the making for the peace process and future relations between the Congress and UN,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina and sponsor of amendment 3202 that would have defunded the PA if it goes to the ICC.

“Granting a form of member-status to the Palestinians goes around the only viable way to negotiate a two-state solution — that’s between the parties themselves. I fear the Palestinian Authority will now be able to use the United Nations as a political club against Israel,” Graham added.

Other sponsors of the amendments included Republicans John Barrasso (Wyoming) and Jim Inhofe (Oklahoma), and Democrats Robert Menendez (New Jersey) and Chuck Schumer (New York).

According to Capitol Hill observers familiar with the amendments, they were removed due to pressure from the White House. While the Obama administration actively opposed PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s UN General Assembly move — which saw a vote of 138-9 last Thursday in favor of upgrading “Palestine” to a nonmember observer state — it was concerned that the proposed amendments would limit its options when dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian issue going forward.

“Any administration will oppose amendments that will limit their prerogatives,” said a senior pro-Israel Capitol Hill source, noting however, that the amendments were not necessarily dead.

“Any reports of its ultimate demise are premature,” the source quipped about the Graham amendment. “It can be attached to another piece of legislation down the road. Senate amendments can resurrect themselves in other forms.”

Groups on both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian issue have weighed in.

“Thanks to your outstanding efforts, the US Senate did NOT include a measure to expel the Palestinian diplomatic mission from the United States in the defense authorization bill which was passed a few minutes ago,” read a J Street letter to supporters Tuesday night.

A J Street campaign against the amendment generated 14,250 emails and 950 calls to Senate offices, the group said, “urging [senators] to oppose this and other attempts to punish the Palestinians for their approach to the United Nations by ejecting their official mission from our country.”

The group added: “This is a critical victory for the prospects for peace.”

In a statement Wednesday morning, the right-wing Zionist Organization of America said, “With its latest negation of Oslo and circumvention of negotiations, the PA should be subject to the sternest possible penalties in terms of U.S. funding and diplomatic support. We praise Senators Graham, Schumer, Barrasso and Menendez for taking a very important step in this direction.”

The NDAA may yet face a presidential veto for a range of other issues, including language related to a more aggressive US stance on Syria, new sanctions on Iran’s energy sector that are opposed by the White House, and amendments dealing with detainees in the war on terror.

Violent clashes erupt in Egypt despite proposal to end crisis – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

Pro-Mohammed Morsi Islamists fight protesters outside the president’s palace; three members of Morsi’s advisory team resign over crisis.

Protesters opposed to Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi evacuate and injured fellow protester during clashes between Islamists and their rivals in front of the president palace, in Cairo, Dec. 5, 2012 Photo by AP

By Zvi Bar’el | Dec.05,2012 | 8:41 PM | 1

Islamists fought protesters outside the Egyptian president’s palace on Wednesday, while inside the building his deputy proposed a way to end a crisis over a draft constitution that has split the most populous Arab nation.

Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil called on Wednesday for calm in Cairo. In a statement, he urged calm around the presidential palace – to “give the opportunity for the efforts being made now to begin a national dialogue.”

Stones and petrol bombs flew between opposition protesters and supporters of President Mohammed Morsi who had flocked to the palace in response to a call from the Muslim Brotherhood.

Two Islamists were hit in the legs by what their friends said were bullets fired during the clashes in streets around the compound in northern Cairo. One of them was bleeding heavily.

A leftist group said Islamists had cut the ear off one of its members, inflicting serious head wounds on him.

Riot police began to deploy between the two sides to try to end the violence which flared after dark despite an attempt by Vice President Mahmoud Mekky to calm the political crisis.

He said amendments to disputed articles in the draft constitution could be agreed with the opposition. A written agreement could then be submitted to the next parliament, to be elected after a referendum on the constitution on December 15.

“There must be consensus,” he told a news conference, saying opposition demands must be respected to overcome the crisis.

Three members of Morsi’s advisory team have resigned over the crisis ignited by a decree that expanded his powers, presidential sources said on Wednesday.

Seif Abdel Fattah, Ayman al-Sayyad and Amr al-Leithy all tendered their resignations, bringing to six the number of presidential staff who have quit in the row over the decree.

Opposition leader Amr Moussa, a former foreign minister and secretary-general of the Arab League, said Morsi should make a formal offer for dialogue if his opponents were to consider seriously Mekky’s ideas for a way out of the political impasse.

“We are ready when there is something formal, something expressed in definite terms, we will not ignore it,” Moussa told Reuters during talks with other opposition figures.

Opposition leaders have previously urged Morsi to retract a decree widening his powers, defer the plebiscite and agree to revise the constitution, but have not echoed calls from street protesters for his overthrow and the “downfall of the regime”.

Morsi had returned to work at his compound a day after it came under siege from protesters furious at his assumption of extraordinary powers via an edict on Nov. 22.

The president, narrowly elected by popular vote in June, said he acted to stop courts still full of judges appointed by ousted strongman Hosni Mubarak from derailing a constitution meant to complete a political transition in Egypt, long an ally of Washington and signatory to a 1979 peace deal with Israel.

Rival groups skirmished earlier outside the presidential palace on Wednesday. Islamist supporters of Morsi tore down tents erected by leftist foes, who had begun a sit-in there.

“They hit us and destroyed our tents. Are you happy, Morsi? Aren’t we Egyptians too?” asked protester Haitham Ahmed.

Mohamed Mohy, a pro-Morsi demonstrator who was filming the scene, said: “We are here to support our president and his decisions and save our country from traitors and agents.”

Facing the gravest crisis of his six-month-old tenure, Morsi has shown no sign of buckling, confident that Islamists can win the referendum and a parliamentary election to follow.

Many Egyptians yearn for an end to political upheaval that has scared off investors and tourists, damaging the economy.

Mekky said street mobilization by both sides posed a “real danger” to Egypt. “If we do not put a stop to this phenomenon right away … where are we headed? We must calm down.”

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton weighed into Egypt’s political debate, saying dialogue was urgently needed on the new constitution, which should “respect the rights of all citizens”.

Clinton and Morsi worked together last month to broker a truce between Israel and Hamas Islamists in the Gaza Strip.

“It needs to be a two-way dialogue … among Egyptians themselves about the constitutional process and the substance of the constitution,” Clinton told a news conference in Brussels.

Washington is worried about rising Islamist power in Egypt, a staunch U.S. security partner under Mubarak.

The Muslim Brotherhood had summoned supporters to an open-ended demonstration at the presidential palace, a day after about 10,000 opposition protesters had encircled it for what organizers dubbed a “last warning” to Morsi.

“The people want the downfall of the regime,” they chanted, roaring the signature slogan of last year’s anti-Mubarak revolt.

Officials said 35 protesters and 40 police were wounded.

The “last warning” may turn out to be one of the last gasps for a disparate opposition that has little chance of scuttling next week’s vote on a constitution drawn up over six months and swiftly approved by an Islamist-dominated assembly.

State institutions, with the partial exception of the judiciary, have mostly fallen in behind Morsi.

The army, the muscle behind all previous Egyptian presidents in the republic’s six-decade history, has gone back to barracks, having apparently lost its appetite to intervene in politics.

In a bold move, Morsi sacked Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the Mubarak-era army commander and defence minister, in August and removed the sweeping powers that the military council, which took over after Mubarak fell, had grabbed two months earlier.

The liberals, leftists, Christians, ex-Mubarak followers and others opposed to Morsi have yet to generate a mass movement or a grassroots political base to challenge the Brotherhood.

Investors have seized on hopes that Egypt’s turbulent transition, which has buffeted the economy for two years, may soon head for calmer waters, sending stocks 1.6 percent higher after a 3.5 percent rally on Tuesday.

Egypt has turned to the IMF for a $4.8 billion loan to help it out of a crisis that has depleted its foreign currency reserves. The government said on Wednesday the process was on track and its request would go to the IMF board as expected.

The board is due to review the facility on December 19.

US, allies said to be prepared to ‘rapidly’ intervene if Assad utilizes chemical weapons | The Times of Israel.

Potential coalition partners include the UK, Turkey and even Israel; King Abdullah II says Jordan will not be a party to military intervention in Syria

Two F-16 Royal Jordanian Air Force jets (photo credit: CC BY-SA 3.0, by Caycee Cook, US Air Force, Wikimedia Commons)

The US, along with several key allies, is prepared to launch a military intervention in Syria should the Assad government resort to using its chemical weapons against the rebels, the London Times reported on Wednesday.

A military source told the Times that US forces could be ready “rapidly, within days,” if Syrian chemical weapons were activated, and implied that the necessary forces were already in the region.

“It won’t require major movement to make action happen. The muscle is already there to be flexed,” the source said. “It’s premature to say what could happen if a decision is made to intervene. That hasn’t taken shape, we’ve not reached that kind of decision. There are a lot of options, but it [military action] could be launched rapidly, within days.”

An American-led intervention could involve US European allies like the UK, the paper said.

Countries which border Syria such as Jordan, Turkey and even Israel could also be included in a US-led military coalition, Maariv reported on Wednesday morning.

However, King Abdullah II said that Jordan “will not be party to any military intervention in Syria, which is contrary to our position, principles and national interests.”

Speaking with state-sponsored newspaper al-Rai on Wednesday, the King added that Jordan would “defend our homeland” if the kingdom faced danger.

The fate of Syria’s chemical weapon stockpiles, believed to be the third-largest in the world, is emerging as a key international issue as the civil war continues to generate chaos.

Israel is particularly concerned that Syrian chemical and biological weapons could fall into the hands of terrorists and be used against Israel.

“Together with the international community, we are closely monitoring developments in Syria regarding its stores of chemical weapons… Such weapons must not be used and must not reach terrorist elements,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday at a forum in Jerusalem.

On Monday US President Barack Obama warned Syria that “the world is watching” and that “the use of chemical weapons is and would be totally unacceptable.” He said it would be a “tragic mistake” if Bashar Assad’s government were to use them, and warned him that if he does so, “there will be consequences and you will be held accountable.”

On Tuesday, NATO foreign ministers green-lighted a plan to install Patriot air defense batteries along the southern Turkish border as a defense measure against possible missile or chemical attacks from Syria. The defensive missile system is expected to be in place within the next several weeks.

Turkey, which has seen several fatal instances of spillover fighting along its 911-kilometer border with Syria, has been a NATO member since the 1950s. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on Tuesday that “we stand with Turkey” and warned against any attacks on the NATO member.

He said he would expect “an immediate reaction from the international community” if chemical weapons were to be used by Syria, a possibility he called “completely unacceptable.”

Ilan Ben Zion contributed to this report.

Final Countdown – By Micah Zenko | Foreign Policy.

Did the United States just set a March deadline for war with Iran?

BY MICAH ZENKO | DECEMBER 4, 2012

If you have followed the covert and diplomatic efforts to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon over the past five years, you know that new or noteworthy movements from Tehran, Tel Aviv, or Washington are few and far between. Iran makes fantastic claims about advances in its civilian nuclear program, many of which are subsequently confirmed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); Israel threatens to attack Iran in a thinly veiled effort to impel the P5+1 negotiating group (China, Russia, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, and Germany) to increase economic and diplomatic sanctions; and American officials repeatedly pledge to prevent a nuclear Iran, while the U.S. military gradually strengthens its capabilities in theater and deepens its cooperation with Gulf states in order to contain Iran.

Underpinning this rhetorical bluster is the recognition that negotiations to compel Iran to cooperate with the IAEA — to demonstrate that the Iranian civilian nuclear program does not have possible military dimensions, forbidden by the NPT Safeguards Agreement signed by Iran in 1974 — are not sustainable. Experts predict that the nuclear dispute between the P5+1 (predominantly the United States) and Iran will ultimately be resolved — either through negotiations or the use of force. Some (including yours truly) have speculated this resolution will come this year, or the following year, or the year after that. During a press conference on Thursday, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak acknowledged this enduring forecasting problem: “I think that it will happen during 2013, but I thought that it will happen during 2012, and saw what happened — and 2011.”

Last week, however, the United States made a significant shift in its strategy. This move, if it plays out, could finally result in the long-rumored and much-debated military attack on Iran’s known nuclear sites. In a prepared statement to the agency’s Board of Governors, Robert A. Wood, chargé d’affaires to the IAEA, said:

Iran cannot be allowed to indefinitely ignore its obligations by attempting to make negotiation of a structured approach on PMD [possible military dimensions] an endless process. Iran must act now, in substance…. If by March Iran has not begun substantive cooperation with the IAEA, the United States will work with other Board members to pursue appropriate Board action, and would urge the Board to consider reporting this lack of progress to the UN Security Council.

Later that day, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was asked about Wood’s mention of a March deadline. Her reply contained several interesting points:

What was meant about the March reference was either about the IAEA and its continuing work or the fact that we finished our election and now would be a good time to test the proposition that there can be some good-faith serious negotiations before the Iranians get into their elections, which are going to heat up probably around the March period, heading toward a June election.

It’s a difficult matter to predict, because it really depends upon how serious the Iranians are about making a decision that removes the possibility of their being able to acquire a nuclear weapon or the components of one that can be in effect on a shelf somewhere and still serve as a basis for intimidation…We’ll see in the next few months whether there’s a chance for any kind of a serious negotiation.

Here, Clinton implies that the reason to “test” Iran now is not because of progress toward alleged weaponization, but because there is a window for negotiations, after the U.S. election and before the Iranian election. It is interesting that the Obama administration deemed it wrong to “test” Iran during the heat of the U.S. presidential elections but thinks it plausible that, during similar electoral uncertainty, Iranian leaders will reach a broad strategic agreement limiting the country’s uranium-enrichment program.

Then, Clinton introduces a vague new goal for negotiations. Until now, Obama administration officials have repeated three claims about U.S. intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program.

First, Iran has not decided to pursue a nuclear weapon. In February 2011, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified, “We continue to assess Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons.” But, he added, “We do not know…if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.” The following February, Clapper stated, “We don’t believe they’ve actually made the decision to go ahead with a nuclear weapon.”

Second, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will make the final decision. As Clapper phrased it: “The decision would be made by the Supreme Leader himself, and he would base that on a cost-benefit analysis in terms of — I don’t think you want a nuclear weapon at any price.”

Third, because Iran’s nuclear program is an intelligence collection priority, U.S. officials would know when the Supreme Leader made this decision and what sort of evidence would reveal his intentions. Clapper: “[A] clear indicator would be enrichment of uranium to a 90 percent level.” The declared nuclear sites where such enrichment occurs are subject to IAEA physical inventory verifications, which track progress in Iran’s low-enriched uranium stockpiles and are published in quarterly reports.

Why did the Obama administration decide to set this new March deadline? Perhaps, like the Bush administration, it has simply become tired of confronting Iran. Here, the Bush administration’s approach to Iraq is worth recalling. In a recent Foreign Policy piece reviewing U.S. policy options toward Iran, Steven Hadley, deputy national security adviser during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, wrote:

The U.S. military action [in Iraq] was not, as many suggest, either a war of choice or a war of preemption. It was, rather, a war of last resort. After 12 years of diplomacy, 17 U.N. Security Council resolutions, increasingly targeted economic sanctions, multiple international inspection efforts, no-fly zones over both northern and southern Iraq, the selective use of U.S. military force in 1998, and Saddam Hussein’s rejection of a final opportunity to leave Iraq and avoid war, the United States and the international community were out of options.

It is difficult to understand why the Bush administration decided to abandon a successful containment strategy of Iraq that cost $14.5 billion a year and no loss of life, for another that will ultimately cost over $3 trillion and the lives of 4,422 U.S. troops. Undertaking a war of choice without definitive evidence of an active chemical or biological weapons program — let alone a nuclear program — or threats to the U.S. homeland was an enormous strategic miscalculation with dire consequences.

The confrontation with Iran over its nuclear program dates back to August 2002, when it was first revealed that Iran had begun a covert uranium-enrichment program in the late 1980s. Since then, the IAEA has repeatedly stated what its Director General Yukio Amano declared last week: “Iran is not providing the necessary cooperation to enable us to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities.”

At some point in February or early March of 2013, there will be two significant events relating to a potential countdown to an attack on Iran. Clapper will testify before the House and Senate as part of his annual threat briefings, and the IAEA will release its next quarterly report. Unless there is new intelligence, it is likely that Clapper will maintain his assessment that the Supreme Leader has not made the decision to pursue a bomb — meaning to enrich enough uranium to bomb-grade level that can be formed into sphere that could be compressed into a critical mass.  Meanwhile, absent breakthrough in the P5+1 negotiations or a decision by Tehran that unprecedented transparency with the IAEA will make things better, Amano will again report that there is inadequate cooperation.

In that case, the IAEA Board of Governors could refer Iran to the UN Security Council, which might pass a more robust version of Resolution 1929, which imposed sanctions. But then what?  If the Supreme Leader does not make a decision to pursue a bomb (which the United States claims it would detect), and if Iran does not produce sufficient highly-enriched uranium for a bomb at a declared site (which the IAEA would detect), then what would trigger an attack by the United States and/or Israel? What would the “redline” be?

The answer depends greatly on whether the timeline to attack Iran is based on Israel’s national interest and its military capabilities, or those of the United States. Israeli officials have stated at various times that redlines should be “clear” (without providing clarity) and that they “should be made, but not publicly.” One also said, “I don’t want to set redlines or deadlines for myself.” Since November 2011, Israeli officials have also warned about a “zone of immunity,” which Barak has described as “not where the Iranians decide to break out of the non-proliferation treaty and move toward a nuclear device or weapon, but at the place where the dispersal, protection and survivability efforts will cross a point that would make a physical strike impractical.”

It is unclear how dispersed, protected, or survivable Iran’s nuclear program would have to be, but Secretary Clinton’s warning of “components…on a shelf somewhere” could indicate that the Obama administration is moving toward the zone of immunity logic. But what are these components, how many would be required to assume “weaponization,” and how would this new intelligence be presented as a justification for war? In addition, it is tough to make the case for going to war with Iran because it refused to concentrate its nuclear sites (that are under IAEA safeguards) in above-ground facilities that can be easily bombed.

Previously, U.S. officials have been less eager than the Israelis to define a specific redline, largely because the two countries have different perceptions of the Iranian threat and vastly different military capabilities. Setting a March deadline provides some certainty and perhaps coercive leverage to compel Iran to cooperate with the IAEA. But declaring deadlines also places U.S. “credibility” on the line, generating momentum to use force even if there is no new actionable intelligence that Iran has decided to pursue a nuclear weapon. Based on what we know right now, that would be a strategic miscalculation.

Israel Hayom | More than 100,000 Egyptians protest outside Morsi’s office.

More than 100,000 Egyptians protested outside the presidential palace in Cairo on Tuesday, fueling tensions over Islamist leader Mohammed Morsi’s seizure of nearly unrestricted powers and the adoption by his allies of a controversial draft constitution.

The outpouring of anger across the Egyptian capital, the Mediterranean port of Alexandria and a string of other cities pointed to a prolonged standoff between the president and a newly united opposition.

Morsi’s opponents, long fractured by bickering and competing egos, have been re-energized since he announced decrees last month that place him above oversight of any kind, including by the courts, and provide immunity to two key bodies dominated by his allies: The 100-member panel drafting the constitution and parliament’s upper chamber.

The decrees have led to charges that Morsi’s powers turned him into a “new pharaoh.”

The large turnout in Tuesday’s protests — dubbed “The Last Warning” by organizers — signaled sustained momentum for the opposition, which brought out at least 200,000 protesters to Cairo’s Tahrir Square a week ago and a comparable number on Friday to demand that Morsi rescind the decrees.

The huge scale of the protests have dealt a blow to the legitimacy of the new constitution, which Morsi’s opponents contend allows religious authorities too much influence over legislation, threatens to restrict freedom of expression and opens the door to Islamist control over day-to-day life.

What the revived opposition has yet to make clear is what it will do next: campaign for a “no” vote on the draft constitution in a nationwide referendum set for Dec. 15, or call on Egyptians to boycott the vote.

Already, the country’s powerful judges have said they will not take on their customary role of overseeing the vote, thus robbing it of much of its legitimacy.

Morsi was in the presidential palace conducting business as usual as the protesters gathered outside. He left for home through a back door as the crowds continued to swell, according to a presidential official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The official said Morsi left on the advice of security officials to head off “possible dangers” and to calm the protesters. Morsi’s spokesman, however, said the president left the palace at the end of his normal work day, through the door he routinely uses.

The protest was peaceful except for a brief outburst when police used tear gas to prevent demonstrators from removing a barricade topped with barbed wire and converging on the palace.

Soon after, with the president gone, the police abandoned their lines and the protesters surged ahead to reach the palace walls. But there were no attempts to storm the palace, guarded inside by the army’s Republican Guard.

Protesters also commandeered two police vans, climbing atop the armored vehicles to jubilantly wave Egypt’s red, white and black flag and chant against Morsi. The protesters later mingled freely with the black-clad riot police, as more and more people flocked to the area to join the demonstration.

The protesters covered most of the palace walls with anti-Morsi graffiti and waved giant banners carrying images of revolutionaries killed in earlier protests. “Down with the regime” and “No to Morsi,” they wrote on the walls.

“He isn’t the president of all Egyptians, only of the Muslim Brotherhood,” said protester Mariam Metwally, a postgraduate student of international law. “We don’t feel like he is our president.”

A giant poster emblazoned with an image of Morsi wearing a Pharaonic crown was hoisted between two street light posts outside the presidential palace. “Down with the president. No to the constitution,” it declared.

“The scene at Itihadiya palace is a stab at the president’s legitimacy and his constitutional declaration,” opposition leader Hamdeen Sabahi told a private TV network. “The scene sends a message to the president that he is running out of time.”

The massive gathering was reminiscent of the one outside the palace on Feb. 11, 2011 — the day authoritarian president Hosni Mubarak stepped down in the face of an 18-day uprising that ended his 29-year regime.

Shouts of “Erhal! Erhal!” — Arabic for “Leave! Leave!” — and “The people want to topple the regime!” rose up from the crowd, the same chants used against Mubarak. This time, though, they were directed at his successor, Egypt’s first democratically elected president.

“The same way we brought down Mubarak in 18 days, we can bring down Morsi in less,” Ziad Oleimi, a prominent rights activist, told the crowds using a loudspeaker.

In Alexandria, some 10,000 opponents of Morsi gathered in the center of the country’s second-largest metropolis, chanting slogans against the leader and his Islamic fundamentalist group, the Muslim Brotherhood.

The protests fueled Egypt’s worst political crisis since Mubarak’s ouster, with the country clearly divided into two camps: Morsi, his Muslim Brotherhood and their ultraconservative Islamist allies, versus an opposition made up of youth groups, liberal parties and large sectors of the public.

Tens of thousands also gathered in Cairo’s downtown Tahrir Square, miles away from the palace, to join several hundred who have been camping out there for nearly two weeks. There were other large protests around the city.

Smaller protests by Morsi opponents were staged in the Islamist stronghold of Assiut, as well as in Suez, Luxor, Aswan, Damanhour and the industrial city of Mahallah, north of Cairo.

“Freedom or we die,” chanted a crowd of several hundred outside a mosque in Cairo’s Abbasiyah district. “Mohammed Morsi, illegitimate! Brotherhood, illegitimate!” they yelled.

Earlier Tuesday, several hundred protesters also gathered outside Morsi’s residence in an upscale suburb. “Down with the sons of dogs. We are the power and we are the people,” they chanted.

Morsi, who narrowly won the presidency in a June election, appeared to be in no mood for compromise.

A statement by his office said he met Tuesday with his deputy, his prime minister and several top Cabinet members to discuss preparations for the referendum. The statement suggested business as usual at the palace, despite the mass rally outside its doors.

Asked why Morsi did not address the crowds, Muslim Brotherhood spokesman Mahmoud Ghozlan said the protesters were “rude” and included “thugs and drug addicts.”

The Islamists responded to the mass opposition protests last week by sending hundreds of thousands of supporters into Cairo’s twin city of Giza on Saturday and across much of the country. Thousands also besieged Egypt’s highest court, the Supreme Constitutional Court.

The court had been widely expected to declare illegitimate the constitutional assembly that passed the draft charter and to disband parliament’s upper house, the Shura Council. Instead, the judges went on strike after they found their building under siege by protesters.

Morsi’s Nov. 22 decrees were followed last week by the constitutional panel rushing through the draft constitution in a marathon, all-night session without the participation of liberal and Christian members. Only four women, all Islamists, attended the session.

The charter has been criticized for not protecting the rights of women and minority groups, and many journalists see it as restricting freedom of expression. Critics also say it empowers Islamic religious clerics by giving them a say over legislation, while some articles were seen as tailored to get rid of the Islamists’ enemies

Israel Hayom | Assad’s tenuous grip on WMDs.

Dr. Danny Shoham

Israel Hayom | For Israel, double trouble in Syrian WMDs, jihadis on border.

Video: Doomsday for Iran? US Tests EMP Bomb – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

( This has been what I have been saying for the last 3 years.  Do you really think Israel doesn’t have something equivalent? – JW )

Boeing has successful tested an electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) missile that turns “science fiction into science fact” and could be the doomsday weapon against Iran, but media have largely ignored the development.

The U.S. Air Force and Boeing demonstrated the device more than two months ago over a military site in the Utah desert, reported the VR-Zone technology website.

Boeing did not keep the test a secret, but most mainstream media and technology sites overlooked the report.

The test was codenamed CHAMP — Counter-Electronics High Power Advanced Missile Project and was the first time a real EMP missile has been tested with positive real world results.

One of the most startling developments in the research and test is that the missile system does not use any explosives, thereby limiting damage to its intended goal of directing microwave energy that can cause instant blackouts.

Keith Coleman, who serves as Boeing’s CHAMP program manager in their Phantom Works division, stated that video camera showed “images of numerous desktop computers running, and then suddenly all of them go out quickly followed by the camera going to black,” VR-Zone reported.

“We hit every target we wanted to…  Today we made science fiction, science fact,” said Coleman.

An Arutz Sheva opinion article in August mentioned Israel’s possible use of an EMP bomb against Iran. The report triggered a chain reaction, allegedly influencing U.S. intelligence sources who have since been quoted in several publications with doubtful assumptions that the article reflected Israel government thinking.

The London Times subsequently reported that an EMP bomb could cripple Iran by shutting down its electronics and sending the Islamic Republic “back to the Stone Age.”

EMP causes non-lethal gamma energy to react with the magnetic field and produces a powerful electromagnetic shock wave that can destroy electronic devices, especially those used in Iran’s nuclear plants.

The shock wave would knock out Iran’s power grid and communications systems for transport and financial services, leading to economic collapse.

USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier arrives off Syrian shore.

( Luis may indeed have been correct.  This actually looks like the US is serious… – JW )

DEBKAfile Special Report December 5, 2012, 4:20 PM (GMT+02:00)

The USS Eisenhower in a lightning storm

The USS Eisenhower Strike Group transited the Suez Canal from the Persian Gulf Saturday, Dec. 1, sailing up to the Syrian coast Tuesday in a heavy storm, with 8 fighter bomber squadrons of Air Wing Seven on its decks and 8,000 sailors, airmen and Marines.
The USS Eisenhower group joins the USS Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group which carries 2,500 Marines.

Facing Syria now are 10,000 US fighting men, 70 fighter-bombers and at least 17 warships, including the three Iwo Jima amphibious craft, a guided missile cruiser and 10 destroyers and frigates. Four of these vessels are armed with Aegis missile interceptors.
This mighty US armada brings immense pressure to bear on the beleaguered Assad regime after it survived an almost two-year buffeting by an armed uprising. Its presence indicates that the United States now stands ready for direct military intervention in the Syrian conflict when the weather permits.
Left behind in the Persian Gulf is just one US aircraft carrier, the USS Stennis and its strike group.

Welcoming NATO’s decision Tuesday, Dec. 4, to deploy Patriot missile batteries in Turkey, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Wednesday: “The protection from NATO will be three dimensional; one is the short-range Patriots, the second is the middle-range Terminal High Altitude Air Defense [THAD] system and the last is the AEGIS system, which counters missiles that can reach outside the atmosphere.”
debkafile’s military sources: While the Patriot is land-based and will be deployed on the Turkish-Syrian border, the THAD and the Aegis have just reached the Syrian coast aboard the USS Eisenhower strike group.
“With this integrated system,” said Davutoglu, Turkey will have maximum protection.”

He added: “The Syrian regime has 700 missiles,” and their location, storage method and holders are no secret to Ankara. This was the first time Ankara had made threats to destroy Syrian missiles, including any carrying chemical warheads.