Turkish Pres Gül warns of dark Middle Ages in Muslim world.

Turkish Pres Gül warns of dark Middle Ages in Muslim world.(TZ).

President Abdullah Gül warned the Muslim world on Friday of the possibility of facing the darkness of the Middle Ages as Europe once did if interest-based beliefs are combined with sectarian identity politics following the Arab Spring. 

“Will a renaissance that enjoys peace and prosperity or a regional era of recession in which people will be subjected to new troubles as a result of regional rivalries start at the end of this process in the 21st century?” the president asked the audience while delivering the keynote speech at the fourth İstanbul Forum organized by the Center for Strategic Communication (STRATİM).

According to the Gül, no country, society or sect will benefit from such an era, as he called the intra-civilizational clash a “disaster scenario” which would be worse than a clash of civilizations.

Gül said there is no dilemma between Islam and democracy and a pluralist rule, in which all faiths and cultures can find space for themselves, appeals to everyone. However, he said, “In no country was there a transition to a pluralist democracy overnight,” as he added that a process to establish democracy in any given society is necessary.

President Gül also referred to his landmark speech at the ministers of foreign affairs meeting of the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in 2003, well before the people's movements in the Arab world were ignited, in which he called on the Arab world to put its house in order. “I had directed attention to the need for change in the region in my 2003 speech,” he noted. 

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Erdoğan said during a TV program on Thursday that Syria is heading towards a sectarian war. Stating that he has received new intelligence on Thursday, Erdoğan said members of a “different sect” are ferried to Syria by planes to fight there. “These are warriors and are involved in the war in Syria. We are facing such a danger,” Erdoğan commented.

As far as Egypt is concerned, Gül said the responsibility of building the future of Egypt lies on the shoulders of all Egyptian people. “We want Egypt to return to democracy as soon as possible and accelerate its economic development before it exhausts its own energy,” the president said. According to him, it is not only the Arab world but also the whole region and the international community who will be hurt by instability in Egypt.Hmmmm.....Damn they could have fooled me, i thought ssome parts never left the dark ages.Read the full story here.

Video - Saudi Prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal: The Arab Spring Is 'Arab Destruction', No Regime Is Immune to It; MB Smell Spreads in Saudi Arabia; Iran Cannot Be Trusted

HT: Memri.

"The Marinating Dead" Making Wine from Dead Bodies - Libyan Arab Spring 101.

   

                                           Warning contains extremely graphic images.                                                                            

"The Marinating Dead" Making Wine from Dead Bodies - Libyan Arab Spring 101.(SalemNews).Wish you would tell us more on the subject of making wine from the bodies of the dead and even the living, how could this happen? Is it fit for human consumption?

Real Syria Updates

(TRIPOLI) - After the devil’s Arab Spring has succeeded in turning Libya into a totally failed state, the west’s mainstream media dropped it from its interests and concentrating on Syria, the country that stands an obstacle in their queue of countries to be ‘democratized’ into failed states.

Here’s a shocking side of the ‘democracy’ the Arab Spring brought to Libya, remember where Libya is? It’s an oil rich country north of Africa that the west intervened by itself to ‘protect’ its people from themselves, now they’re so protected with the Public Leashing of sinners and to further ‘respect’ humanity in this country they’re making use of the living and the dead as well.

An interview with a Human Rights activist, the Head of the International Association for Democracy in Libya and a representative of the Libyan Tribal Social Council.

Question: Human Rights activist and the Head of the International Association for Democracy in Libya, welcome Fatima Abo Anniran. There’s a chilling story on socials websites of boiling dead bodies to make wine. Can you please enlighten us on the subject?

Fatima: This is just a tiny infraction, compared with daily human rights abuses, of both the living and the dead. The entire world had witnessed the desecration of graves, maiming of dead bodies. This is what’s happening from the start of the crisis in Libya. Of what had happened since the “liberation” of Libya, this doesn’t surprise me.

Question: Wish you would tell us more on the subject of making wine from the bodies of the dead and even the living, how could this happen? Is it fit for human consumption?

Fatima: Since the end of last week, Thursday to be exact, Libya had been witnessing a humanitarian crisis, genocide of Libyan youth. Hospitals are crowded with victims of poisoning caused by locally made wine, toxic materials were added to it by mistake.
Or this is what we’ve heard at the start until we saw the video that had spread on social websites, and then we understood what really had happened. “Libyan authorities” had officially declared hundreds of cases. We know for sure that they exceeded 1,100 cases, as for deaths, there are more than 100. Officially over fifty were declared. There are sever kidney failure cases, some of which were sent to Tunisia then returned to Libya cause medically they can’t be helped.

The Libyan street is at a boiling stage, all is kept under wrap by the media, hysterical mothers are knocking on all doors. I wish to talk of the hallucinatory drugs shipment that was confiscated and acknowledged officially by the Libyan authorities. It was aboard an Emirati airplane, from UAE. They said that there was another shipment as well which is over 50, which had changed course. There seems to be a plan to exterminate the Libyan youth. As for the video, it doesn’t surprise me, we have documented cases and medical reports of totally barbecued bodies, many of the detainees have been boiled.

Question: As a human rights activist, and as a chairman for the World Gathering for Free and Democratic Libya, what have you done, or what will you do? We know that the Libyans are a quite conservative nation, doesn’t drink, authorities say that they’re following Islam traditions, how could this happen? People are drinking alcohol, how is it distributed or sold? Who allows this? How are the hallucinatory drugs coming, this is so strange?

Fatima: the Libyan people had been conservative, in their social, religious or even political system, and I’ll say it straight, the moderate. I won’t deny there are exceptions, but it stays so, not a generality. As for whom you described as Islam abided authorities, it’s not right. They claim to be Muslims, but since the start of the “Libyan Revolution” there had been Fatwas allowing the consumption of alcohol and hallucinatory drugs. They even allowed the raping of women who according to their beliefs are war trophies. This is what we saw, what all the Libyans saw, what the media had tried to keep under taps. Who are pretending to be Muslims are themselves allowing the murder of fellow Muslims.

Question: Where are the Human Rights Organizations from this? Where is UNHRC from this? Where is Human Rights Watch who was so fiercely concerned for Libyans at the start of the crisis? Have you tried to contact them? Are you addressing NGOs?

Fatima: I am addressing them now through your forum. I ask the whole world who seemed to have cared a lot concerning Libya. Where is the UN, or its Security Council who have claimed they’ll spare nothing to protect Libyans’ human rights. What’s happening now is a first in the Libyan or human history, allowing of the consumption of human meat even through wine. This is what’s happening daily and all are silent. Whole cities had been exterminated, wars were launched on cities inside the state, slaughtering of kids in cold blood, while the whole world watches. The “Libyan government” or the General National Congress has tens of thousands of detainees. I hold them responsible, because to the world they claim to be an authority, or a Libyan government.

What you saw in this video is endangering every detainee they have; they’ve raped hundreds of Libyan women. Libyan prisons aren’t void of women, even though there are no policewomen, or female security personnel. There are gangs who are raping women, who are breaking into homes and taking women at the dead of the night. Some women had been missing without any word on their destiny for over a year.

We call upon the world, where are you from what’s happening in Libya, where’s the humanity from this, where are the human rights? Care for a Sip of a Libyan Made Wine?Source: SalemNews.

Sequester? What sequester? The Easter bunny comes early this year. Obama offers Palestinians $500 million and Jordan $200 million.

Sequester? What sequester? The Easter bunny comes early this year. Obama offers Palestinians $500 million and Jordan $200 million.(TheHill).

In a meeting with a group of Arab Americans this week, U.S. President Barack Obama revealed that he will not push the Israelis and Palestinians toward restarting negotiations or outline a new peace initiative during his upcoming visit to the region, but he will take with him a cash infusion of $500 million – which Congress will soon release – of much needed financial aid to the Palestinian Authority. 

President Obama said Friday he would work with Congress to provide Jordan an additional $200 million in aid this year, as the country struggles to cope with nearly half a million refugees who have fled the civil war in neighboring Syria.
King Abdullah II in Amman, Obama pledged to continue supporting Jordan and efforts to broker peace in Syria. He also predicted the number of refugees could double within the year, at a cost of $1.1 billion — a serious imposition on a country that economists say could have an unemployment rate of almost 30 percent. Nevertheless, Abdullah pledged to continue accepting refugees. "How are you going to turn back women, children or the wounded? This is just something we can’t do … that is a challenge that we just can't turn our backs on," he said. 
The president also warned that there was potential that a post-Assad Syria could become a breeding ground for other extremist groups, saying a chief challenge of the ongoing conflict was developing a stable government for the country post-Assad. "I am very concerned about Syria becoming an enclave for extremism, because extremists thrive in crisis. They thrive in failed states. They thrive in chaos," Obama said.Hmmmm.....Talking about 'extremists' New "Syrian PM" Yet Another 'Obama Approved' Muslim Brotherhood Extremist.Read the full story here.

Are You Serious, Mr. President?

Are You Serious, Mr. President?(Asharq).By Tariq Alhomayed.Over the course of two separate interviews, the US President responded to criticisms that America has failed to intervene in the Syrian crisis in the appropriate manner over the past two years. He said that he is still working hard to assess whether military intervention in Syria will help to resolve the bloody conflict or whether it will only serve to make things worse!
Of course, this is not what was stunning in Obama’s statements, for every country—even a superpower—has the right to assess their interests. Rather what was shocking and frightening was Obama asking, in an interview with New Republic magazine, “How do I weigh tens of thousands who’ve been killed in Syria versus the tens of thousands who are currently being killed in the Congo?” This is not all; in another interview with 60 Minutes on CBS television, Obama angrily added, “We do nobody a service when we leap before we look, when we . . . take on things without having thought through all of the consequences.”
As we said, the issue is not the US President’s right to take his nation’s interests into account or not, for we are all aware that the US is not a charity. Rather, the issue is this logic of justification, for with all due respect to the Congo and its people: Is this country like Syria? In assessing the age of the Syrian revolution, and the death of 60,000 people, does this represent “leaping without looking?” This is truly puzzling.
For what Obama is not aware of is that the humanitarian crisis in Syria will lead to security, political, and sectarian crises that are far more complex than expected. It is clear that the US president’s problem, as shown by these statements, lies in his basic understanding of the region.
What Obama is not aware of is that ignoring what is happening in Syria at present will necessitate his country spending the next 30 years confronting the crisis there. This will be far worse than what is happening in Afghanistan, which the US ignored since the 1980s, forcing it to confront the crisis that subsequently arose there today.
The other problem is that the US president does not understand the danger represented by the Bashar al-Assad regime, and that its downfall will remove the greatest obstacle to regional peace and stability.
Therefore, one can only say: Are you serious, Mr. President? Obama’s logic is frightening, and his understanding of the region terrifying and in doubt, particularly as he is the man who saw a revolution in Bahrain and pushed Mubarak to step down while today he is saying that he is working hard to assess the situation in Syria!
Even more frustrating: Where are the region’s intellectuals and statesmen? Where is the diplomatic effort in Washington? Obama’s statements indicate that he has either not heard serious assessments regarding the Syrian crisis, or that he does not want to hear them; either is dangerous.Hmmmm......Obama: "All the Choices We've Made Have Been the Right Ones"Read the full story here.

Video - Ezra Levant: "West duped by the Arab Spring."

Ezra Levant sheds light on US President Obama's foreign policy failures in the Middle East and his questionable entrance into Libya

Hamas Political Leader Mash'al Says Only “Jihad And The Rifle” Will Restore The Homeland.

Hamas Political Leader Mash'al Says Only “Jihad And The Rifle” Will Restore The Homeland.(Memri).In his speech, Mash'al praised Egyptian President Muhammad Mursi and the new Egyptian regime, and stressed that the Arab ummah, and especially the Palestinians, need an Egypt that once again embraces all the problems of the Arab peoples, chiefly the Palestinian cause. He said: "Egypt's swift momentum is not just an Egyptian need, but a Palestinian, Arab, and Islamic one [as well]. Egypt needs to awaken quickly, and to get through the transitional period."

Calling on Egypt to unite and act with all its might – "Islamists, liberals, pan-Arabists, Muslims and Christians, women and men."
He then called on Egypt to show tolerance in the internal camp, to administer its policy harmoniously and with the involvement of all elements, and to protect its security, to recover economically, and to develop technology so that it could stand at the forefront of superpowers, as it had in the past.
Stressing that Egypt is the leader of the Arab world, and that it would continue to play that role,
Mash'al added: "The land of Palestine will only be restored by an Egyptian leadership that can bear responsibility, by means of an awakening in all areas... If Egypt disappears, the entire Arab ummah disappears, and the Arabs and Muslims are defeated in all areas. Egypt once again adopts all the problems of the Arab peoples, particularly the Palestinian cause."

Mash'al said, "The victory of October 6 [1973] is not just Egypt's victory, but vengeance [against Israel] for the sake of the Palestinian people and the Arabs. It is [also] a message of humiliation to the Zionist entity, which must know that when Egypt prepares for conflict, it is not defeated by any aggressor. The Zionist entity must know that Egypt has returned, and everyone must know that the Zionists are the enemies of Allah and of Muhammad, Jesus, Moses, and Abraham – the enemies of the Prophets, of the Messengers, of values, and of morality."

Reiterating his support for the Arab Spring, Mash'al said: "Hamas recognizes the value of Arab peoples, and it has no other way than to support the rights of the peoples and their aspiration for freedom and honor... Hamas has memory, values, and morality, and therefore it does not forget those who assisted it and who continue to do so. The movement will not strike a bargain over the blood of the ummah and of Arab peoples... The best defense, and the strength of [our] foreign policy, which is based on conflict (with Israel), is manifested in our support for the resistance and by granting rights to the people. Today is the day of the Arab Spring. There is no turning back. Democracy is our right, and resistance is our duty."
Mash'al went on to warn that Israel intends to create a new reality in Jerusalem, and that therefore, "following the [Arab] Spring, we [Arabs] must prepare for the project of liberating Jerusalem – and the Palestinian role [in this] is no substitute for the Arab role."
He called for ending negotiations with Israel: "The time has come to overturn the negotiating table on those who wished to enslave us."
He then called on the Palestinian leadership and all its factions to begin the major step of ending division and completing the national reconciliation, adding: "Resistance, not negotiation, is the path to the restoration of rights. Nothing will restore the homeland but jihad, the rifle, and self-sacrifice."Read the full story here.

Video - Ezra Levant : "Arab Spring Faces A Frost."

"Obama Talk" - "Egypt not an ally of US, but not an enemy."

"Obama Talk" - "Egypt not an ally of US, but not an enemy."(NBC).LAS VEGAS – President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that while he does not believe Egypt is an ally of the United States, he also doesn't consider the country an enemy. “I think that we are going to have to see how they respond to this incident,” Obama said in an interview with Telemundo anchor José Diaz-Balart, host of Noticiero Telemundo. He was referring to Tuesday’s protests in Egypt, during which demonstrators, angered by a movie trailer parodying Prophet Muhammad, breached the U.S. Embassy in Cairo. In the Telemundo interview Wednesday night, Obama also discussed the ambush on the U.S. Consulate in Libya, calling the deaths of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans in Libya "heartbreaking" and repeated his call to bring those responsible to justice.
 But when asked by Diaz-Balart whether it was time to "reconsider foreign aid" to Egypt and Libya, Obama said the U.S. “doesn't have an option of withdrawing from the world ... we're the one indispensable nation."
"Libya ... is a government that is very friendly towards us,” Obama continued. “The vast majority of Libyans welcomed the United States' involvement. They understand that it's because of us that they got rid of a dictator who had crushed their spirits for 40 years." Hmmmm......."Remember The Libyan Embassador Nov 2012"Read the full story here

US ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff were killed in a rocket attack Tuesday night that targeted his car.

US ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff were killed in a rocket attack Tuesday night that targeted his car.(ET).BEIRUT: The US ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff were killed in a rocket attack on Tuesday night that targeted his car in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, a Libyan official said on Wednesday. “The American ambassador and three staff members were killed when gunmen fired rockets at them,” the official in Benghazi told Reuters. Asked about the deaths, a US Embassy employee in Tripoli said: “We have no information regarding this.” The employee said the embassy could confirm the death of one person. The Libyan official said the US ambassador had been on his way to a safer venue after protesters attacked the US Consulate in Benghazi and opened fire, killing a staff member, in protest at a US film that they deemed blasphemous to the Prophet Mohammad. The official said the ambassador and three other staff were killed when gunmen fired rockets at his car. He said the US Embassy had sent a military plane to transport the bodies to Tripoli to fly them to the United States. Gunmen assaulted the Benghazi compound on Tuesday evening, clashing with Libyan security forces, who withdrew under heavy fire. The attackers fired at the buildings while others threw handmade bombs into the compound, setting off small explosions. Small fires were burning around the compound. The assault followed a protest in neighbouring Egypt where demonstrators scaled the walls of the US embassy, tore down the American flag and burned it during a protest over the same film which they said insulted the Prophet Mohammad.Hmmmm......."Arab Spring".Read the full story here, more here.

The Arab Spring has transformed into the Kurdish Spring

The Arab Spring has transformed into the Kurdish Spring.(HD).By Ertuğrul Özkök.Our Foreign Minister is reported to be “looking for a place for Bashar al-Assad.” You know what, while he is looking for a place, let us, ourselves, look for a new place for Turkey. We may or may not support our country’s Syrian policy. That does not matter in the least. We are all aware of the picture in front us, aren’t we?
We have a 1,200 km long Kurdish border.
ONE: Only one week ago, we had a 400-kilometer “Kurdish border.” Now, 800 kilometers have been added to this. Friends, this is the new geopolitical reality that has been drawn by “our strategic depth”: As of today, we have a 1,200 kilometer long Kurdish border. We could not manage 400 km, could we manage 1,200 km?
TWO: We should consider this. We could not manage a 400 kilometer Kurdish border. How are we going to manage 1,200 kilometers? We are awaiting an “in depth” response to that. Arabs are fighting, Kurds are winning.
THREE: Are you aware, the “Arab Spring” that we fervently support has completely transformed into a “Kurdish Spring”? There is a strange situation both in Iraq and in Syria: Arabs are fighting each other, people are dying. The Kurds are taking one more step on their path to an independent state. Besides, they are able to achieve this without firing one bullet, without losing one soul. Here you go, this is true strategic depth.Read the full story here.

Video - Saudi riot police fire live rounds on Shiite protesters in Qatif

Video - Saudi riot police fire live rounds on Shiite protesters in Qatif.(RT).Several demonstrators have been wounded in Saudi Arabia’s eastern district of Qatif after security forces opened fire on protesters. Officers fired live rounds at demonstrators who carried posters of those injured and arrested earlier this month. Spokesmen for the Saudi Interior Ministry said several people were burning tires during the protests, and several arrests were made. Among those arrested today was Mohammed al-Shakhuri, who is on a list of the country’s 23 most-wanted people, Al-Manar News reported. Witnesses said Shakhuri was taken to a military hospital with bullet wounds in his back and neck. “There were no casualties,” the Interior Ministry said in a statement. Clashes between police and protesters have increased in recent days, following the deaths of two protesters earlier this month.Political analyst Dr. Mohsen Saleh explains that the protests are taking place in the country’s major oil-producing region, where, at the same time, the poorest people live. “The eastern part in Saudi Arabia has been agonizing for a long time, for centuries…They have been deprived of their basic rights,” he told RT. “When the peaceful [protests] started in Bahrain, the Saudis thought [the same may happen in their country] – and they were right in thinking so, because they are discriminating against an essential part of their people in the east. “And it’s an irony that all kinds of [carbohydrates – oil] and gas are produced there. [And still], these people are the poorest in their country. That’s why the [Saudi rulers] fear that the agony of these people might be a mark of a great revolution in Saudi Arabia. And that’s what the United States and the Saudis are really afraid of,” he concluded. The latest events in Saudi Arabia follow the eight latest arrests that were made Thursday in the United Arab Emirates, where the government announced an investigation into groups plotting crimes against the state.Read the full story here.

Video - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Interview on Fox News.

HT: IsraelMatzav.

Parallel Betrayals: Iranian Revolution and Arab Spring.

                                     Iran - Protests in Herat and Mazar-e Sharif

Parallel Betrayals: Iranian Revolution and Arab Spring.(MEForum).By Raymond Ibrahim. FrontPageMagazine.com.June 18, 2012.

Many are the lessons to be learned between the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the current revolutions of the Arab world.
Consider the issue of the hijab, the female "veil"—the proliferation of which, according to one former Islamist and associate of al-Qaeda's Ayman Zawahiri, is associated with a Muslim society's downward spiral into oppression and terror.
Prior to Egypt's presidential elections, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate, Muhammad Morsi, assured the nation's liberals and secularists that, as president, he would certainly not enforce the hijab: "Many people are speaking nonsense, saying that I will impose the hijab against the will of the people; no one is going to force anyone to wear a specific uniform."
These are famous words, spoken almost verbatim some 33 years earlier, in Iran, at the time of the 1979 revolution. In fact, during the early days of the revolution, Ayatollah Mahmud Taleghani, a popular mullah, to reassure the secularists who participated in the overthrow of the Shah that an Islamic government would certainly not interfere with their freedoms, declared in the March 11, 1979 edition of Iran's newspaper, Ettela'at, that "The hijab will not be a matter of coercion."
The rest is history. Within months of the founding of the Islamic Republic, the 1967 Family Protection Law was repealed, female government workers were made to wear the hijab, women were barred from becoming judges, sex-segregation laws were promulgated, the marriage age for girls was dropped to 13, and married women were barred from attending regular schools. Today, Iranian women are regularly beaten if they are not dressed in appropriate hijab.
The parallels between Iran and Egypt do not end there. While today it is standard to think of the 1979 Iranian revolution as a purely Islamic affair, in fact, many of the revolutionaries were secular, liberal, Marxist, non-Muslim, etc. The one goal that glued them altogether was the desire to overthrow the autocratic Shah. Many of these Iranians did not want an Islamic government, certainly not a theocracy. And indeed, not just the Ayatollah Taleghani, but the Ayatollah Khomeini himself played down Sharia's draconian role to mobilize all these divergent segments of society—until he was fully entrenched in power, that is.
In short, the Iranian Revolution began as a heterodox affair, with different revolutionary factions and different ideological agendas, but it ended with the rise of a totalitarian Islamic republic.
Sound familiar? This is precisely what is happening today in Egypt, where the one unifying goal of the revolution was the overthrow of the Mubarak regime; where many Egyptians are secularist, liberal, Christian, etc., and certainly do not want an Islamic government; and where the Islamists, like the Muslim Brotherhood, are busy reassuring everyone that all their freedoms will be preserved.
Based on the Iranian model and the ongoing "Arab Spring," two lessons emerge as to how Islamists manage to consolidate power:
1) through outright lies and false promises, justified through Islamic doctrines like taqiyya and tawriya; and
2) through gradual implementation. This is how the mullahs achieved power in Iran, and this is how the Muslim Brotherhood—which is on record saying that its gradual, long-term goal is "mastership of the world"—is working to achieve power in Egypt, seen as the first domino on the road to caliphate.
Speaking of gradualism, here is a telling anecdote from Egypt: back in 1953, when the Muslim Brotherhood's leader asked President Gamel Abdel Nasser to enforce the hijab on women—in 1953 hardly any Egyptian women wore it—his suggestion was met with laughter and ridicule. Half a century later, the hijab is commonplace in Egypt.
Thus history prepares to repeat itself, even as the world prepares to act surprised—all in accord with that age-old adage, "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." One may forgive those Iranians and others who fell for the lies of the Islamists during the 1979 revolution: there were no similar large scale precedents to learn from, certainly not from the modern era; the world was just beginning to confront political Islam.
Today, however, as Islamists exploit democracy to empower Sharia—and after more than three decades' worth of Islamist lies, betrayals, and broken promises, all justified by Islamic doctrines—for anyone to still take them at their word, well, that is a big "shame on you."

Raymond Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

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Video - Jonathan Halevi Joins Ezra Levant to discuss islam's global design.

"Arab Spring" - Sexual violence against Egypt women protesters an ongoing 'plague'.

"Arab Spring" - Sexual violence against Egypt women protesters an ongoing 'plague'.(BM).Cairo: Sexual violence against women is becoming routine during violent clashes in Egypt, activists said this week, accusing the ruling military junta’s troops and prison authorities of assaulting numerous women during the latest crackdown on pro-democracy protesters earlier this month. The activists have stated publicly that they were abused, intimidated and assaulted while under military detention. The charges added new tension to Egypt’s presidential election campaign, just two weeks before the voting. More than a dozen women were among more than 300 protesters detained following a protest outside the Defense Ministry in Cairo last weekend. In charges that recalled the “virginity tests” last year, rights activist Aida Seif al-Dawla said that female prison guards sexually assaulted some women by inspecting their vaginas under the pretext of searching for drugs. She told the Associated Press that “this is a sexual assault,” activist Seif al-Dawla said. “The women are injured, physically and emotionally.” One of the women arrested and detained by the military, told Bikyamasr.com on condition of anonymity that she is still “in shock” at what happened to her and other girls. “The prison guards and doctors made us strip and they were touching our bodies and our private places as if they controlled us,” she said. “It was horrific and I don’t know what to do now because I can’t tell my family or they will punish me,” she added. Another activist detained, Aya Kamel, went public with her story, telling the parliament’s human rights committee that she was abused during her detention. She told the committee that one soldier hit her with a club on the head, knocking her unconscious for a few seconds, while another tried to remove her head veil, which many conservative Muslim women in Egypt wear. At one military facility, Kamal said soldiers celebrated the arrival of detainees. “They insulted us girls, they opened the windows and tried to reach out to touch our bodies and harass us. We were threatened with sexual assault, and we were threatened that if any one of us opened her mouth, she would be thrown to the soldiers outside, and she knows what would happen to her,” she told the committee. A total of 15 women were detained on May 6 in the forced eviction of the sit-in near the ministry of defense, and military prosecutor ordered 14 of them to be held for 15 days pending investigation. Activists report that around 300 people, including 17 journalists were detained.Hmmmm....... Luckily Obama helped chasing that 'evil dictator' Mubarak.Read the full story here.

Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood rise from the ashes as dominant force in the opposition.

Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood rise from the ashes as dominant force in the opposition.(VOC).By Khaled Yacoub Oweis.At a meeting of Syria’s opposition, Muslim Brotherhood officials gather round Marxists colleagues, nudging them to produce policy statements for the Syrian National Council, the main political group challenging President Bashar al-Assad. With many living in the West, and some ditching their trademark beards, it is hard to differentiate Brotherhood from leftists. But there is little dispute about who calls the shots. From annihilation at home 30 years ago when they challenged the iron-fisted rule of Hafez al-Assad, the Brotherhood has recovered to become the dominant force of the exile opposition in the 14-month-old revolt against his son Bashar.
Careful not to undermine the council’s disparate supporters, the Brotherhood has played down its growing influence within the Syrian National Council (SNC), whose public face is the secular Paris-based professor Bourhan Ghalioun. “We chose this face, accepted by the West and by the inside. We don’t want the regime to take advantage if an Islamist becomes the Syrian National Council’s head,” former Brotherhood leader Ali Sadreddine al-Bayanouni told supporters in a video. The footage is now being circulated by Brotherhood opponents, seeking to highlight its undeclared power. “We nominated Ghalioun as a front for national action. We are not moving now as Muslim Brotherhood but as part of a front that includes all currents,” said Bayanouni. The Syrian Brotherhood is a branch of the Sunni Muslim movement founded in Egypt in the 1920s. It was a minor political player before a 1963 Baath Party coup but its support grew under the authoritarian 30-year rule of Hafez al-Assad, as his minority Alawite community dominated the majority Sunni country.
Mindful of international fears of Islamists taking power, and of the worries of Syria’s ethnic and religious minorities, the Syrian Brotherhood portrays itself as espousing a moderate, Turkish-style Islamist agenda. It unveiled a manifesto last month that did not mention the word Islam and contained pledges to respect individual rights. With backing from Ankara, and following the political ascendancy of the Brotherhood in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya since Arab Spring revolts broke out two years ago, the group is poised to be at the top of any new governing system in Syria. Extending the loose Brotherhood umbrella to Syria will raise pressure on the U.S.-backed Hashemite monarchy in Jordan, where the local Brotherhood has been sidelined by laws that favor tribal politicians allied with the security apparatus. Iraq’s Shi’ite rulers could also find they have a hardline Sunni government as their neighbor, and Lebanon’s Shi’ite guerrilla group Hezbollah would lose its main Arab backer. Working quietly, the Brotherhood has been financing Free Syrian Army defectors based in Turkey and channeling money and supplies to Syria, reviving their base among small Sunni farmers and middle class Syrians, opposition sources say. “We bicker while the Brotherhood works,” said Fawaz al-Tello, a veteran opposition figure who is a pious Muslim while being on the liberal end of the Syrian political spectrum. “They have gained control of the SNC’s aid division and the military bureau, its only important components,” said Tello, a former political prisoner who fled Syria four months ago. “But they still have to work more do to get support on the inside. Lots of clerics, activists and rebels do not want to be linked to them.” Tello, however, acknowledged that the Brotherhood has clawed back influence inside Syria, especially in the cities of Homs and Hama and the rural province of Idlib on the border with Turkey, hotbeds of the revolt against Assad. This is no small feat after three decades in the political wilderness. Unlike Arab rulers who tried to co-opt the movement by granting it limited operation, the Assads excluded it and all other opposition from the political system. Bashar’s father Hafez al-Assad’s forces killed, tortured and imprisoned tens of thousands of people after leftists and Islamists began challenging his rule in the 1970s. The Brotherhood took the brunt of the repression, and a 1980 decree singled out membership as punishable by death. Mulhem Droubi, educated in Canada and one of a younger generation of Brotherhood leaders, said the group is not primarily concerned with political prominence. “We are a party that presents moderate solutions. We are not extremists, neither to the left nor to the right and our program is the most accepted by the Syrian street,” he said. “We are working for the downfall of Bashar al-Assad and not to find a popular base. We leave competition for the future in a free Syria,” the softly spoken Droubi told Reuters. Droubi, however, acknowledged that the road to democracy will be even more bloody, adding that the Brotherhood began supporting armed resistance in earnest a month ago. The issue sharply divided the group in the 1980s, when it took up arms against the president. Assad’s forces killed nearly 20,000 people when they overran the city of Hama in 1982, where the Brotherhood’s armed division made it last stand. Droubi said there is no dispute now about the need for armed resistance, alongside street protests against Assad. “Too many of our people have been killed. Too many have been raped,” Droubi said, adding that Brotherhood was committed to a setting up a multi-party democracy if Assad is toppled. 
Droubi pointed to a political program unveiled by the Brotherhood last month in Istanbul, which committed to multi-party democracy in a future Syria. It said a new constitution would be reached through consensus and guarantee fair representation for diverse ethnicities and religious groups. “Our proposals are more advanced than the Brotherhood in other countries,” he said.
Bassam Ishaq, a Christian opposition figure who has worked with the Brotherhood within the SNC, said the manifesto bore the marks of the Brotherhood’s pragmatism. “If they get a chance to seize power by themselves they will do it, but they realize that it will be difficult in country where 30 percent of the population are ethnic or religious minorities,” said Ishaq. “The street has lost faith in leftist politicians. After the repression in the 1980s, the leftists dispersed. The Brotherhood kept together and rebuilt while in exile, aided by donations from wealthy Syrians in and support in the Gulf,” he added. In a demonstration of their financial muscle, Brotherhood operatives were dispatched last month with suitcases of cash to a dusty camp for Free Syrian Army defectors in a Turkish region bordering Syria near Antakya. Sources in the camp said the Brotherhood was supporting Colonel Riad al-Asaad, one of the first prominent defectors last year, now at odds with more senior officers who deserted later. Colonel Asaad now sports a Brotherhood-style beard. Street activists who have had little to do with the Brotherhood are also being lured by promises of instant support for the revolt. “I approached them and they instantly gave me 2,000 euros when I asked for help…and I am not even Ikhwan (Brotherhood),” said veteran activist Othman al-Bidewi, who regularly travels between Syria and the border region in Turkey to drum up support for street demonstrations against Assad in Idlib province. “The Brotherhood wants to restore its political base. It is their right,” he added.Hmmmm........."Obama: "All the Choices We've Made Have Been the Right Ones"........for the Muslim Brotherhood?Read the full story here.

Egypt - 220 detained in Abbassiya, including 14 female protesters, 18 journalists assaulted, injured or arrested in Cairo, including one female Belgian photojournalist.

                   Abbassiya demonstration, May 4, 2012 – photo Amanda Mustard for Bikya Masr


Egypt - 220 detained in Abbassiya, including 14 female protesters, 18 journalists assaulted, injured or arrested in Cairo, including one female Belgian photojournalist.(BM).The Egyptian military arrested around 220 people, including journalists and media persons, following the forced evacuation of the Abbassiya sit-in on Friday. Among the detained are 14 women and 8 journalists, reported the Legal Front to Defend Egypt’s protesters. The non-profit legal front reported that the military prosecutor investigating the detainees harassed lawyers and refused to let them enter the prosecutor’s office initially. They asked for “special permission” to give legal assistance to the arrested protesters. One woman lawyer said she was told, “women are not allowed in the prosecutor office after 5 pm.” 14 out of the 15 women arrested were handed 15 days in prison pending investigation. The women were taken to the Qantarah female detention on Saturday. At least 18 journalists have been assaulted, injured, or arrested in the past three days while covering clashes between protesters and thugs and uniformed military personnel in front of the defense ministry in the neighborhood of Abbassiya in Cairo. The report comes from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). “Authorities cannot stand by while journalists are being beaten–at times so viciously that their lives are put at risk,” said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa program coordinator. “We call on the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to identify the attackers and bring them to justice immediately, as well as to release journalists in custody. Journalists must be allowed to carry out their work without threat of physical assault or arrest.” Intense clashes in front of the defense ministry between protesters on the one hand and armed thugs and uniformed military personnel on the other began on Wednesday with at least 11 people killed and hundreds injured, according to news reports. The demonstrations began as a sit-in protesting the exclusion of presidential candidate, Abu Ismail, a hard-line Salafist. Other groups soon joined. The protests were largely in response to the deaths in Wednesday’s clashes, news reports said. The military stepped in today to clear protesters out of Abbassiya Square; the demonstrators were met not only by uniformed personnel but also unidentified thugs with guns and batons, firing birdshot, live ammunition and assaulting hundreds of people. Mohamed Raafat was the most badly injured.
A reporter for the news website Masrawy, he was beaten and pelted with birdshot by three unidentified armed men who noticed him filming them as they were assaulting protesters on Wednesday in Abbassiya, his employer reported. The three men confiscated his camera and continued to beat the journalist for one hour, Raafat said in a phone interview from his hospital bed on privately owned satellite broadcaster ONTV. Rafaat was severely beaten, as shown in several graphic photographs of him published on Masrawy’s website after his assault. Raafat sustained multiple injuries to his head, back, face, and the rest of his body, he said. The journalist was taken to the hospital and received 25 stitches in his head, he saidin the interview.
Today, Abd al-Rahman Yousef, a photographer for the independent news site Hoqook, was taking pictures of the clashes when an unidentified man approached him with a knife and cut part of his ear off, his employer reported. Yousef has been unable to reach a hospital due to the military surrounding the square and preventing anyone from getting out, the report said. Ahmed Ramadan and Islam Abu al-Ezz, both working for the independent daily Al-Badil, were arrested today while covering the clashes in Abbassiya, according to the newspaper. The two journalists were assaulted and captured by unidentified thugs and handed over to the military, the report said. The two journalists were taken in a military vehicle to the military prosecutor’s office, the newspaper’s editor-in-chief, Khaled el-Balshy, posted on his Twitter account. A crew of seven cameramen and correspondents from the satellite broadcaster Misr25 — Ahmed Lotfy, Hassan Khodry, Ahmed Fadl, Musaab Hamid, Ahmed Abd al-Alim, Mohamed Rabie, and Mohamed Amin — was arrested today while covering the clashes, the broadcaster reported on the air. Abd al-Alim told Misr25 that he and about 70 other people who were being transported in a vehicle by security forces were being viciously beaten, the broadcaster said.
Virgine Nyugen, a Belgian photojournalist for the English-language daily Egypt Independent, was injured in the face while covering clashes in Abbassiya today and taken to Ein Shams hospital for treatment, according to news reports. Military forces entered the hospital and arrested her and took her to a state security office, multiple local journalists reported from their Twitter accounts. She was questioned briefly and released three hours later, according to the same sources. Mohamed al-Shami, a journalist from the Arabic-language sister publication Al-Masry Al-Youm, was also arrested, Abeer Saadi, an Egyptian Journalists Syndicate board member, told Al-Badil. Abd al-Rahman Musharaf, a reporter for Egypt’s newest daily, Al-Watan, was arrested and beaten today by military police while covering the clashes in Abbassiya and remains in custody, his employer reported. Three other Al-Watan journalists covering the clashes — Mohamed Kamel, Ahmed Abdu, and Ahmed Bahnasi — were rushed to the hospital suffering the effects of tear gas, the newspaper reported.Read the full story here and here.

Video - Future for the Arab Revolution - Democracy, Civil State or Khilafah (Islamic State)? [Documentary]

 In this 16 min documentary, we take a look at what some Muslim groups demand, such as Muslim Brotherhood and some Salafiyya scholars from Saudi Arabia and their stance before and after the revolution in Egypt. We then take a look at an Islamic group which has sided with the Ummah and the protesters since the beginning and their activities.

Abbas may lose his Jordanian citizenship, New York Times silent.

Abbas may lose his Jordanian citizenship, New York Times silent.(CriticalAnalyst).The NYTimes acknowledges that Jordanians will lose their citizenship because their country wants their identity to be Palestinian, but there is a bigger story simmering. Could the Abu Mazen be losing his citizenship?(EOZ) From JPost: In a surprise move, Jordan has decided to revoke the Jordanian citizenship of Palestinian Authority and PLO officials, sources in Amman disclosed Wednesday. The sources said that the decision would also affect the leaders of the PA, who would be granted temporary Jordanian passports to facilitate their travel. The move coincides with a new electoral law in Jordan that seeks to limit Palestinian representation in parliament. The latest steps are seen in the context of Jordan's 1988 decision to sever all legal and administrative ties with the West Bank, except for Jordanian sponsorship of the Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem. The late King Hussein then justified the move by arguing that it was intended to help the Palestinians establish their own independent state. The Jordanians have defended the decision to strip Palestinians of their Jordanian citizenship by explaining that it is aimed at "preserving the Palestinians' national identity and paving the way for their return to Palestine." It's not known at this stage if PA President Mahmoud Abbas would be stripped of his Jordanian citizenship, the sources told the Saudi newspaper Al-Madina.
(Some Palestinian Jordanians Lose Citizenship - NYTimes) In a report titled “Stateless Again,” issued last month, Human Rights Watch said that 2,700 people in Jordan lost their citizenship from 2004 to 2008, and that at least another 200,000 remained vulnerable, largely those who moved abroad at some point in search of work.... “It is no secret that some elements in Israel would like to see the Palestinian areas without the people,” said Nabil Sharif, Jordan’s minister of state and a government spokesman. “We do not want to be party to this.” Critics and human rights advocates, however, see a different motivation. They said the Jordanian government acted to preserve its own interest, trying to appease non-Palestinian Jordanians concerned about the growing economic and political influence of citizens of Palestinian descent, a charge Mr. Sharif denied. They say it also appears that Jordan is frightened by talk of declaring Jordan a Palestinian homeland as an alternative to a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza. Palestinian citizens who left the area after 1967 and before 1988 could lose their citizenship after three years, but then they had an additional three years to claim it.so what is the truth? One thing is clear... the people is not the highest consideration in Jordan. The principle of killing Jews for Jihad takes priority over the welfare of human beings.Read the full story here.