UPDATE ON EGYPTIAN MUSEUM LOOTING
Well, it's now "official" according to the following article; Egypt's National Museum was apparently looted by its own security guards:
Fears grow for the safety of Egypt\'s ancient treasures.
This lies in the background of President Mubarak's appointment of Egypt's antiquities Tsar, Zahi Hawass, to a cabinet level post. Given Hawass' own background and connections to the western elites, this is not a surprising move, but it is one that subtly implies that elite's interest in Egyptian antiquities.
The specter of the National Museum's own security guards being involved in its looting raises the disturbing parallel to the Baghdad Museum looting in the wake of the American and British invasion of Iraq. When that story was first broken by the German media, it was reported that American troops were seen entering and leaving the museum. Later, the US Marine colonel who was appointed to recover the stolen art works, indicated that it was his suspicion that the Iraqi museum looting was "an inside job" as well.
This led to a round of speculation on the internet as to who was responsible, and yours truly joined in on the speculations. Typically, the speculation in the main ran to the view that the "omnicompetent, omniscient, and omnipotent" Anglo-American elite had staged the looting. I wasn't so sure, and pointed out other possibilities originating in Paris and Berlin.
With the Egyptian lootings, things are a bit different. For one thing, no one has invaded Egypt, so it becomes more difficult to discern any hidden players, if indeed any were actually involved. However, Mubarak's appointment of Hawass to a cabinet level position during the crisis is indicator enough that there is a hidden influence originating with the western elite, and elite no doubt concerned to protect Egypt's antiquities, and rightly so.
But that appointment itself suggests in turn, that if there is a hidden hand or hands in the museum lootings in Egypt, that three possibilities arise: (1) the elite appointed Hawass to cover their own tracks and possible involvement in the lootings, or (2) that someone else entirely was involved, and Hawass' appointment pre-signals an effort to find the culprits and recover the missing items, or (3) both the western elites and someone else were involved, in which case Hawass' appointment signals the desire to cover-up their own involvement, recover the other missing items, and fasten the blame on someone else.
Of course, all this right now is pure speculation, but the fact that Egypt now joins Iraq in having its priceless antiquities looted to my mind raises the possibility that we're looking at hidden hands once again. All it would take, at this juncture, to convince me that we're looking at an "antiquities war", with some hidden group or groups running around the world and stealing (i.e., collecting) antiquities, would be if similar occurrences suddenly started to happen in, say, Iran, or India, or Indochina, or South America... If that were to happen, we're no longer looking at coincidence, in my opinion, but something else.
And while we're talking about this, such a scenario of "antiquities collecting" fits a well-known historical pattern, one established very firmly by - you guessed it - the Nazis and their nutty "ancestral research bureau," the Ahnenerbe.
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Fascinating that several old Egyptian obelisks were taken from Egypt and taken to elite religious sites such as the Vatican, etc. Were there artifacts in the museum that were valued for their religious significance? That maybe some of the elite? (luciferians) would like to have possession of? Some of these artifacts go way back in history to Egypt’s heyday. Maybe the same kind of connection to the looting of the Baghdad museum.
Follow the money..
http://projectcamelotproductions.com/interviews/egyptian_stolen_treasures/egyptian_stolen_treasures.html
Well the crimes are that there was so many projects headed by the antiquities authority costing billions of pounds (1-usd = 6-pounds) that turn out were fictitious in nature and never existed, and currently the antiquities authority’s current bank balance is zero, they’ve stolen all the antiquities money, and it used to be one of the richest ministries of the state, that’s just one part.
Wjat does everyone make of this? Maybe the thefts were by
moslems who despised the idolatry of ages past and its
preservation in a museum, maybe it was someone hoping
to sell them, who found he couldn’t do so without legal risk?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/17/arts/design/17arts-STOLENEGYPTI_BRF.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
Stolen Egyptian Statute Is Found in Garbage
By KATE TAYLOR; Compiled by DAVE ITZKOFF
Published: February 17, 2011
Zahi Hawass, the Egyptian antiquities minister, said on Wednesday that a statue of the pharaoh Akhenaten holding an offering table, left, one of the most valuable objects revealed earlier this week to have been stolen from the Egyptian Museum, had been found. In an interview, Mr. Hawass also defended himself against charges that he did not report the missing objects promptly. In the days after the museum was broken into on Jan. 28, Mr. Hawass claimed that, while 70 artifacts had been damaged, none had been stolen. Last Sunday he said that, in fact, 18 objects were missing from the museum. Two of the other objects, a heart scarab and a funerary statuette, as well as the goddess from a statue of a goddess carrying Tutankhamen, were found earlier this week. The Akhenaten statue was found in the garbage near Tahrir Square, Mr. Hawass said, by a boy whose uncle was a professor at the University of Cairo. “His uncle called me today, and I sent some of the police and archaeologists, and they found it is the statue of Akhenaten,” Mr. Hawass said. “We are going to look inside all the garbage that they collected from Tahrir Square to find the rest of the objects.”
Buried at the end of an otherwise innocuous MSNBC article about the museum looting was this jawdropper:
Looters sought gold and ‘red mercury’
Hawass said the looters were looking for gold and a fictitious substance called “red mercury” that, according to local lore, can be found in the throats of ancient mummies. Some people think it has magical powers and can be used to summon spirits.
“They live thinking about it. They could kill each other to get it,” Hawass said. “When I enter any place in Egypt, people ask me all the time about this.”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41511863/ns/technology_and_science-science/
Now this is getting really unnerving.
I think the reason they made that rule, was because of
national pride issues, they didn’t want the privately
owned relics to be sold out of the country. Not control
freaking in itself.
This type of behavior would not have happened, to the extent it did, had the laws making it illegal for private ownership of antiquities not been enacted some years back. When you make laws such as that it means everything is located in some BigGov wearhouse with precious little security, ready for theives.
Governments have no real love for their holdings beyond some political concerns. Collectors generally take great care of and research the collectables they own, Many important historical discoveries have been made by collectors who have researched their hobby. Protecting “national treasures” IS NOT something that should be left to BigGov.
Or what about an Albert Pike style global revolution….just throwing it out there
http://abouttheend.wordpress.com/2010/09/21/current-islamic-agitation-and-albert-pikes-plan-for-wwiii/
Current Islamic agitation and Albert Pike’s plan for WWIII
Par Eli Amenudzie
All of this agitation recently is all by design; the mosque at ground zero, the Koran burning, and many other issues that are dividing the country (USA) and inciting anger. We are on the edge of WWIII, it’s right around the corner. This was all planned ahead of time years ago. Read this letter that the highly regarded 33rd degree freemason Albert Pike wrote predicting all of these events:
Albert Pike received a vision, which he described in a letter that he wrote to Mazzini, dated August 15, 1871. This letter graphically outlined plans for three world wars that were seen as necessary to bring about the One World Order, and we can marvel at how accurately it has predicted events that have already taken place. Look at the accuracy of the first two predictions written in 1871:
« The First World War must be brought about in order to permit the Illuminati to overthrow the power of the Czars in Russia and of making that country a fortress of atheistic …Communism. The divergences caused by the « agentur » (agents) of the Illuminati between the British and Germanic Empires will be used to foment this war. At the end of the war, Communism will be built and used in order to destroy the other governments and in order to weaken the religions. » 2
« The Second World War must be fomented by taking advantage of the differences between the Fascists and the political Zionists. This war must be brought about so that Nazism is destroyed and that the political Zionism be strong enough to institute a sovereign state of Israel in Palestine. During the Second World War, International Communism must become strong enough in order to balance Christendom, which would be then restrained and held in check until the time when we would need it for the final social cataclysm. » 3
« The Third World War must be fomented by taking advantage of the differences caused by the « agentur » of the « Illuminati » between the political Zionists and the leaders of Islamic World. The war must be conducted in such a way that Islam (the Moslem Arabic World) and political Zionism (the State of Israel) mutually destroy each other. Meanwhile the other nations, once more divided on this issue will be constrained to fight to the point of complete physical, moral, spiritual and economical exhaustion…We shall unleash the Nihilists and the atheists, and we shall provoke a formidable social cataclysm which in all its horror will show clearly to the nations the effect of absolute atheism,…savagery and of the most bloody turmoil. Nihilist: a person who believes human existence has no objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. Then everywhere, the citizens, obliged to defend themselves against the world minority of revolutionaries, will exterminate those destroyers of civilization, and the multitude, disillusioned with Christianity, who…will from that moment be without compass or direction,…will receive the true light through the universal manifestation of the pure doctrine of Lucifer, brought finally out in the public view. This manifestation will result from the general reactionary
movement which will follow the destruction of Christianity and atheism, both conquered and exterminated at the same time. »
Since the terrorist attacks of Sept 11, 2001, world events, and in particular in the Middle East, show a growing unrest and instability between Modern Zionism and the Arabic World. This is completely in line with the call for a Third World War to be fought between the two, and their allies on both sides. This Third World War is still to come, and recent events show us that it is not far off.
http://www.threeworldwars.com/albert-pike2.htm
An Interesting article by Dave Emory regarding the background:
Intro duc tion: In the wake of the Tunisian upris ing and atten dant down fall of pres i dent Ben Ali, pop ulist demonstra tions and upris ings have man i fested them selves in many Arab coun tries. This and future pro grams exam ine this phe nom e non in con junc tion with the actions of the Wik iLeaks milieu and the omi nous pres ence in Swe den of for mer Bush pres i den tial adviser Karl Rove.
Trig gered, in part, by Wik iLeaks dis clo sures and sup plemented by online attacks by the Anony mous milieu, those demon stra tions and, in the case of Egypt, pop u lar upris ings may well have been part of an oper a tion involv ing resid ual ele ments of the George W. Bush admin is tra tion within the State Depart ment, intel li gence com mu nity and polit i cal establishment.
Assange as a mem ber of “The Family”?
As will be set forth in FTR #735 and sub se quent pro grams, we may be see ing the Obama admin is tration being used to real ize the goals of the Bush administration/transnational cor po rate com mu nity, at the same time as the Democ rats will be blamed for “los ing the Mid dle East.”
Fol low ing what some ana lysts have termed “the Wik iLeaks” rev o lu tion in Tunisia, ana lyst Robert Spencer noted the wide spread approval of the Tunisian upris ing by Jihadist/Muslim Brotherhood-linked ele ments through out the Mid dle East. Hail ing the Tunisian revolt as a “Jihad,” they see it as open ing up the Mid dle East ern polit i cal land scape to the ascen sion of fun da men tal ist elements.
Although reas sur ing com ments about Egypt ian civil soci ety are abun dant in the media, avail able evi dence sug gests that the Mus lim Broth er hood will be assum ing a large role in the upcom ing Egypt ian gov ern ment. The Obama admin is tra tion appears to be posi tion ing itself in such a way as to work with a Brotherhood-inclusive gov ern ment in that country.
In Tunisia, the Islamist leader has returned to the coun try, with opin ion divided about whether his party can assume a theocratic pre em i nence over the rest of Tunisian civil society.
Pro gram High lights Include: An Islamist sui cide bomb attack in Swe den, con ve niently timed to rein force the polit i cal agenda of the Swe den Democ rats; review of the financ ing of the Swe den Democ rats by fas cist financier Carl Lund strom, who has also under writ ten much of the Pirate Bay oper a tions, them selves closely inter twined with Wik iLeaks; review of the pro-Islamist sen ti ments of GOP big wigs Karl Rove and Grover Norquist; review of the pro-Muslim Broth er hood sen ti ment in the trans-national cor po rate community.
1. The bulk of the State Depart ment cables being accessed in the news media have come from Barack Obama’s State Department and have proved embar rass ing to the Obama admin is tra tion. It devel ops that Karl Rove is hold ing forth in Swe den, acting as an adviser to the Swedish Prime Min is ter. Media spec u la tion has cen tered on the pos si bil ity that Rove may be aid ing in Assange’s pros e cu tion. Is Rove actu ally pre sid ing over Wik iLeaks’ oper a tions in Swe den? Is the Wik iLeaks’ leak ing of State Depart ment cables part of a Rove-directed covert operation?
. . . For at least 10 years, Rove has been con nected to Swedish Prime Min is ter Fredrik. More recently, Fredrik, who is known as “the Ronald Rea gan of Europe,” has con tracted Rove to help with his 2010 re-election campaign.
Rove was said to have fled to Swe den dur ing the pros e cu tion of for mer Alabama Demo c ra tic Gov. Don Siegel man, who believes his pros e cu tion to have been polit i cally motivated.
“Clearly, it appears that [Rove], who claims to be of Swedish descent, feels a kin ship to Swe den . . . and he has taken advan tage of it sev eral times,” the source added.
Shuler’s source spec u lated that Rove could be try ing to pro tect the Bush legacy from doc u ments that Wik iLeaks may have. “The very guy who has released the doc u ments that dam age the Bushes the most is also the guy that the Bush’s num ber one oper a tive can con trol by being the Swedish prime minister’s brain and intel li gence and eco nomic advisor.” . . .
“Rove’s Hand Seen in Julian Assange’s Pros e cu tion, Sources Allege” by David Edwards; The Raw Story; 12/20/2010.
2a. The sub ti tle comes from the recent Tunisian coup, that was inspired by Wik iLeaks’ release of a cable that was crit i cal of the regime of Ben Ali.
The man now pres i dent, Mohamed Ghan nouchi was pro filed in Jan u ary 2006 in a secret US cable in 2006, recently released by Wik ileaks. “A tech no crat and econ o mist, Ghan nouchi has served as prime min is ter since 1999. Is rumored to have told many he wishes to leave the gov ern ment but has not had the oppor tu nity. Length of his ser vice as PM also sug gests Ben Ali [pres i dent until res igna tion] does not view him as a threat and he is unlikely to be viewed as a qual i fied suc ces sor. However, aver age Tunisians gen er ally view him with respect and he is well-liked in com par i son to other GOT and RCD [rul ing party] offi cials.” Then US ambas sador William Hud son said: “Given the fact Ben Ali has a dic ta to r ial hold, it is hard to believe he’ll vol un tar ily step down.” Even so, “the mere fact an increas ing num ber of Tunisians are talk ing about the end of the Ben Ali era is remarkable.”
Pub li ca tion of Wik iLeaks sourced pri vate US com ments on the cor rup tion and nepo tism of a hated “scle rotic” regime is said to have helped cre ate Tunisia’s protest, and gen er ated talk by US com menta tors of a “Wik ileaks revolution”.
“Tunisia: The Wik iLeaks Con nec tion” by Ian Black; The Guardian; 1/15/2011.
2b. It turns out the the Anony mous milieu (described in FTR #732) launched attacks against Tunisian gov ern ment sites.
Sites belong ing to the Min istry of Indus try and the Tunisian Stock Exchange were amongst seven tar geted by the Anony mous group since Monday.
Other sites have been defaced for what the group calls “an out ra geous level of cen sor ship” in the country. . . .
“Anony mous Activists Tar get Tunisian Gov ern ment Sites”; BBC News; 1/4/2011.
3a. Ini tial reports on the coup described a pos si ble role played by for eign ers with blond hair and blue eyes, some car ry ing Swedish and some car ry ing Ger man passports.
. . . Police said they had caught two men with Swedish pass ports after one of the shoot ing inci dents, and state tele vi sion quoted a secu rity source as say ing four peo ple car ry ing Ger man pass ports had been detained in the same incident.
How ever, the Swedish news agency TT said the men were part of a Swedish group vis it ing Tunisia to hunt wild boar who had been attacked by a mob. . . .
“Tunisia Forces Fight Pres i den tial Guards” by Tarek Amara and Chris t ian Lowe; yahoo.com; 1/16/2011.
3b. Interestingly–and per haps significantly–an ear lier, [now] cached ver sion of the story had a sig nif i cant detail, which was scrubbed from later ver sions of the story. In this con text, it is impor tant to remem ber that there are ongo ing oper a tional links between Swedish and Ger man neo-Nazis. In FTR #734, we exam ine the pos si bil ity that the coup will ulti mately ben e fit the Mus lim Brotherhood.
Police said they had caught two men with Swedish pass ports after one of the shoot ing inci dents, and state tele vi sion quoted a secu rity source as say ing four peo ple car ry ing Ger man pass ports had been detained in the same incident.
It showed what it said were the detained for eign ers, with blond hair and fair com plex ions, being guarded by armed police, and said the arms they were car ry ing included auto matic weapons. [Ital ics are mine–D.E.]
How ever, the Swedish news agency TT said the men were part of a Swedish group vis it ing Tunisia to hunt wild boar who had been attacked by a mob. . . .
“Tunisia Forces Fight Pres i den tial Guards” by Tarek Amara and Chris t ian Lowe; yahoo.com; 1/16/2011.
4a. Con ser v a tive ana lyst Robert Spencer noted that the upsurge in demo c ra tic sen ti ment fol low ing the Tunisian upris ing might lead to the empow er ment of the Mus lim Brotherhood.
When Tunisian Pres i dent Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was top pled from power and fled to Saudi Ara bia on Fri day, The Wash ing ton Post’s Jen nifer Rubin hailed this “Jas mine Rev o lu tion” as a “remark able event: a pop u lar, sec u lar revolt in a Mus lim coun try” that “poses an oppor tu nity and a risk for the U.S.” Mona Elta hawy, also writ ing in the Post, explained that “a 29-day pop u lar upris ing against unem ploy ment, police bru tal ity and the regime’s cor rup tion” brought down Ben Ali. But there are numer ous indi ca tions that there were other sources of dis sat is fac tion in Tunisia with Ben Ali — includ ing the rel a tively sec u lar char ac ter of the gov ern ment. Pro-Sharia Islamic suprema cist forces are poised to take advantage.
The pop u lar per cep tion is that Ben Ali was brought down by the will of the peo ple. The French govern ment declared that Tunisians, by top pling Ben Ali, had “expressed their demo c ra tic will.” Ger man Chan cel lor Angela Merkel expressed her sup port for “real democ racy” in the North African nation, adding in a mes sage to offi cials of the new Tunisian gov ern ment: “I appeal to you to use this deep break in Tunisia’s his tory as a new departure.”
A fac tory worker in Carthage had sim i lar high hopes: “This is like the French Rev o lu tion,” he said enthu si as ti cally. “It’s the end of an era. I’m hop ing there is real change. We can’t con tinue like this.” Polit i cal ana lyst Ahmed Lashin declared: “The Arabs have been repressed for too long. They are eager for change and are on the verge of explosion.”
But what kind of change? What kind of Reign of Ter ror might come in the wake of this new French Rev o lu tion? Rached Ghan nouchi, the London-based leader of the banned Tunisian pro-Sharia party, the Tunisian Renais sance Party (Hizb al-Nahdah), was quick to dub the Tunisian upris ing an “intifada” and to claim it as a vic tory for Islam. “The Tunisian intifada,” he exulted, “has suc ceeded in col laps ing the dictatorship.”
Pro-Sharia MPs in Kuwait applauded “the courage of the Tunisian peo ple,” and Abdel malek Der oukdal, a leader of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, hailed the rev o lu tion as a jihad and expressed sol idar ity with the Tunisians. In Gaza, the jihadist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad were both thrilled at events in Tunisia. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri hailed the vic tory for democ racy, and Gaza For eign Min is ter Fathi Ham mad empha sized that “we are with the Tunisians in choos ing their leaders, no mat ter what sac ri fices it takes.”
Islamic Jihad praised the Tunisian peo ple for lib er at ing them selves “through blood, sac ri fices and the expres sion of free will,” adding omi nously that the top pling of Ben Ali was “a mes sage to Arab and Islamic coun tries to pay atten tion to the aspi ra tions of their peo ple that are reject ing hege mony and tyranny before it is too late.”
Islamic Jihad held a rally in Gaza City, fea tur ing hun dreds of jihadists wav ing Tunisian flags festooned with the words “Revenge against tyranny.” Islamic Jihad spokesman Dawud She hab sounded a drea rily famil iar note in accus ing the Ben Ali regime of main tain ing “sus pi cious ties” with Israel.
Mean while, a PLO fac tion warned Tunisians about “waves of polit i cal Islam” that could fol low Ben Ali’s top pling, and urged them to “cut the road to polit i cal Islam and its mis lead ing slo gans to avoid a repeat of the Gaza Strip expe ri ence in Tunisia” — refer ring to the seizure of power in Gaza by the Islamic suprema cists of Hamas.
The great unac knowl edged truth about Tunisia and the rest of the Islamic world is that Islamic jihadists and pro-Sharia forces, far from being the “tiny minor ity of extrem ists” of media myth, actu ally enjoy broad pop u lar sup port. Any gen uine demo c ra tic upris ing is likely to install them in power. That’s why jihadists are hail ing events in Tunisia, and why all lovers of free dom should view those events with extreme reserve — for a Sharia gov ern ment in Tunisia is unlikely to be any kind of friend to the United States, and if the “Jas mine Rev o lu tion” does indeed spread and other Arab and Mus lim dic ta tors are top pled, an already hos tile anti-American envi ron ment could become much, much worse.
The events in Tunisia also show yet again the cry ing need for real is tic analy sis in Wash ing ton of the jihad threat, rather than the fantasy-based analy sis that pre vails there now. But that is even less likely than the flow er ing of a plu ral is tic, sec u lar democ racy in Tunisia.
“A Jihad in Tunisia” by Robert Spencer; Human Events; 1/18/2011.
4b. The Tunisian Islamist leader has returned from exile in the wake of the WikiLeaks/Jasmine Revolution.
The leader of a banned Tunisian Islamist move ment said on Sat ur day he would return in the next few days from exile in Lon don after Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, who ran the coun try for 23 years, was forced out.
Tunisian author i ties out lawed the Ennahda, or Renais sance, move ment in the early 1990s after accus ing it of a vio lent plot to over throw sec u lar rule. But the move ment said it is non-violent and the vic tim of gov ern ment repres sion.
“I am going to go back very soon,” Rached Ghan nouchi told Reuters in an tele phone inter view. “I haven’t decided when yet, but pos si bly in the days to come.” . . .
. . . Tunisia has had a strong sec u lar tra di tion since its inde pen dence from France in 1956 and Islamist politi cians have a much lower pro file than in nearby coun tries such as Alge ria or Egypt.
There is some back ing for mod er ate Islamist groups in Tunisia, but it is not clear how much because sup port ers hid their sym pa thies to avoid arrest. . . .
“Tunisia Islamist Leader to Return from Exile” [Reuters]; msnbc.com; 1/16/2011.
4c. Despite reas sur ing state ments con cern ing Tunisia’s sec u lar tra di tion, many observers feel that the Islamists will assume power there, eventually.
There was also a loom ing wild card: the revival of the banned Islamist party. The gov ern ment said that for now it would con tinue to block the return of the party’s exiled founder, while he repeated that his party espouses a mod er ate pluralism.
Many Tunisians said they were wait ing — some hope fully, some anx iously — to see what kind of rebirth the once-flourishing but long-outlawed Islamist polit i cal party might have. In a radio interview, Prime Min is ter Ghan nouchi said that the exiled leader, Rached Ghan nouchi — no rela tion — would be banned from the coun try until the gov ern ment passed an amnesty law lift ing a con vic tion he was given in absen tia under the Ben Ali government.
The exiled leader, mean while, made clear that his party envi sioned a soci ety far more lib eral and open than Iran or Saudi Ara bia. In an inter view with The Finan cial Times, Rached Ghan nouchi said his party had signed a shared state ment of prin ci ples with the other Tunisian oppo si tion groups that included free dom of expres sion, free dom of asso ci a tion and women’s rights.
It remained unclear how much sup port he com mands in the coun try. Some argued that Tunisian soci ety today was too res olutely sec u lar for the Islamists to find much sup port, after two decades of efforts by Mr. Ben Ali’s vast secret police to elim i nate the party and crip ple it.
“They have peo ple who are 50 years old or 60 years old, but they don’t have any body under 40 because of the repres sion,” said Ahmed Bouazzi, an exec u tive com mit tee mem ber of the largest oppo si tion group, the Pro gres sive Demo c ra tic Party.
Oth ers, how ever, argued that the reli gious con vic tions of Tunisians would assure the Islamic par ties a strong base of sup port, espe cially away from the more cos mopoli tan coasts. “Look, they will be eas ily the most pop u lar party,” said one ana lyst who opposes the Islamists, speak ing on the con dition of anonymity to avoid anger ing fam ily and friends. “No one can say any thing against any thing that is Islamic.” . . .
“More Offi cials Quit in Tunisia Amid Protests” by David D. Kirk patrick and Kareem Fahim; The New York Times; 1/19/2011.
5a. A Wik iLeaks leak indi cated that ele ments of the State Depart ment under George W. Bush were tak ing note of sen ti ment for remov ing Mubarak. This may have actu ally led to a slow-motion desta bi liza tion of Mubarak’s regime.
For the last three years, the US gov ern ment secretly pro vided aid to the lead ers behind this week’s social upris ing in Egypt aimed to top ple the gov ern ment of Pres i dent Hosni Mubarak, accord ing to a leaked diplo matic cable.
One of the young Egypt ian lead ers who attended a sum mit for activists in New York with the help of the US embassy in Cairo was detained when he returned to Egypt, the memo released by Wik ileaks said.
The Daily Tele graph reported Fri day that it and the secrets out let were both hid ing the iden tity of this young Egypt ian leader. He was arrested in con nec tion with this week’s demonstrations.
The leaked doc u ment indi cates that the US gov ern ment was pub licly sup port ing Mubarak’s gov ernment while pri vately back ing oppo si tion groups. . . .
“US Secretly Backed Egypt ian Protest Lead ers” by Nathan Diebenow; The Raw Story; 1/28/2011.
5b. More detail on the U.S. back ing of the pro test ers, from the Tele graph arti cle cited in the above story:
The Amer i can Embassy in Cairo helped a young dis si dent attend a US-sponsored sum mit for activists in New York, while work ing to keep his iden tity secret from Egypt ian state police.
On his return to Cairo in Decem ber 2008, the activist told US diplo mats that an alliance of oppo sition groups had drawn up a plan to over throw Pres i dent Hosni Mubarak and install a demo c ra tic govern ment in 2011.
The secret doc u ment in full
He has already been arrested by Egypt ian secu rity in con nec tion with the demon stra tions and his iden tity is being pro tected by The Daily Tele graph.
The cri sis in Egypt fol lows the top pling of Tunisian pres i dent Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali, who fled the coun try after wide spread protests forced him from office. . . .
“Egypt Protests: America’s Secret Back ing for Rebel Lead ers Behind Upris ing” By Tim Ross, Matthew Moore and Steven Swinford; Daily Tele graph; 1/28/2011.
5c. The Anony mous group has also under taken to attack Egypt ian gov ern ment sites.
The group Anony mous, known for stag ing web attacks on Pay Pal and Mas ter Card in sup port of Wikileaks, has called for vol un teers to stage a dis trib uted denial of ser vice (DDoS) attack against web sites run by the Egypt ian government.
The group’s Face book page, called “Oper a tion Egypt” car ries mes sages about the Egypt ian protests, and also a pic ture of a recruit ing poster with an IRC chan nel as well as a “care pack age” to download. The rest of the page has news and updates from Egypt ian and for eign sources. . . .
“Anony mous Asks for DDOS Attacks on Key Egypt ian Sites” by Jesse Emspak; Inter na tional Busi ness Times; 1/26/2011.
5d. The Mus lim Broth er hood has indeed been posi tion ing itself to par tic i pate in the polit i cal process.
. . . ElBa radei, the for mer head of the U.N. nuclear watch dog agency, has gained a fol low ing among young sec u lar democ racy activists with his grass roots orga niz ing. But some demon stra tors dis miss him as an expa tri ate long removed from Egypt’s problems.
“Many peo ple feel he loves prizes and trav el ing abroad,” said Muham mad Munir, 27. “He’s not really one of the people.”
The out lawed Mus lim Broth er hood, which wants to estab lish an Islamist state in Egypt, has made some state ments that it was will ing to let ElBa radei act as point man for the move ment. But it also appeared to be mov ing for a more promi nent role after lying low when the protests first erupted.
On Sun day evening, the pres ence of overtly pious Mus lims in the square was con spic u ous, sug gesting a sig nif i cant Broth er hood rep re sen ta tion. Hun dreds per formed the sun set prayers. Veiled women prayed sep a rately.
A senior Broth er hood leader, Essam el-Erian, told The Asso ci ated Press he was head ing to Tahrir Square to meet with other oppo si tion lead ers. El-Erian told an Egypt ian TV station that the Broth er hood is ready to con tact the army for a dia logue, call ing the mil i tary “the pro tec tor of the nation.“
Clin ton sug gested there were U.S. con cerns over the pos si bil ity of the Broth er hood seiz ing direc tion of the move ment. She warned against a takeover resem bling the one in Iran, with a “small group that doesn’t rep re sent the full diver sity of Egypt ian soci ety” seiz ing con trol and impos ing its ide o log ical beliefs. . . .
. . . Egypt ian secu rity offi cials said armed men fired at guards in overnight bat tles that lasted hours at the four pris ons — includ ing one north west of Cairo that held hun dreds of mil i tants. The pris on ers escaped after start ing fires and clash ing with guards.
Those who fled included 34 mem bers of the Mus lim Broth er hood, whose lawyer, Abdel-Monaem Abdel-Maqsoud, told the AP they were among scores rounded up by author i ties ahead of Friday’s large demon stra tions. The escapees included at least seven senior mem bers of the group.
State TV later reported that 2,000 escaped inmates were recaptured. . . .
“Egypt ian Reform Leader Calls on Mubarak to Resign” by Hamza Hen dawi and Mag gie Michael [AP]; Seat tle Times; 1/30/2011.
5e. The Broth er hood called for the dis so lu tion of the Egypt ian parliament.
Egypt’s largest oppo si tion move ment demanded Wednes day that Pres i dent Hosni Mubark dis solve the newly elected par lia ment and hold new elec tions, in a move that appeared to be an attempt to cap i tal ize on the hopes for change sparked by Tunisia’s pop u lar uprising.
The Mus lim Broth er hood also called for an end to Egypt’s 30-year-old emer gency law that bans politi cal ral lies, and demanded sweep ing con sti tu tional amend ments to allow free and fair pres i den tial elections.
The Brotherhood’s list of griev ances is not new, but the demands appeared to be aimed at seiz ing on the momen tum trig gered by the revolt in Tunisia that top pled the country’s author i tar ian pres i dent and gal va nized oppo si tion move ments through out the Arab world.
“The events in Tunisia are a cor ner stone for the rest of the peo ple of the Arab and Islamic world,” the Broth er hood said in a state ment posted on its web site. “It is a mes sage to all the despotic leaders and the cor rupt regimes that they are not safe and they are liv ing on the tip of a vol cano of people’s anger and God’s wrath.” . . .
“Egypt’s Mus lim Broth er hood: Dis solve Par lia ment” [AP]; The Jerusalem Post; 1/19/2011.
5f. The Obama administration’s State Depart ment is posi tion ing the U.S. to coop er ate with the Brotherhood.
As it braces for the like li hood of a new ruler in Egypt, the U.S. gov ern ment is rapidly reassess ing its ten u ous rela tion ship with the Mus lim Broth er hood, an oppo si tion move ment whose fun da men tal ist ide ol ogy has long been a source of dis trust in Washington.
Although the group has played a sec ondary role in the swelling protests that are threat en ing to topple Pres i dent Hosni Mubarak, U.S. offi cials have acknowl edged the polit i cal real ity that the Mus lim Broth er hood is poised to assume at least a share of power should Egypt hold free and fair elec tions in the com ing months.
On Mon day, in what ana lysts said was a clear ref er ence to the Broth er hood, the White House said a new gov ern ment in Egypt should “include a whole host of impor tant non-secular actors.”
The move drew the skep ti cism of some U.S. offi cials who have argued that the White House should embrace oppo si tion groups that are more likely to sup port a demo c ra tic gov ern ment in Egypt, rather than one ded i cated to the estab lish ment of reli gious law.
It also marked a change from pre vi ous days, when Sec re tary of State Hillary Rod ham Clin ton and other offi cials expressed con cern that the upris ing in Egypt could shift power to an Islamist gov ernment much like the one in Iran, where ayatollah-led fac tions elbowed aside other groups to seize con trol of the coun try in 1979.
Offi cially, the U.S. gov ern ment has long shunned the Mus lim Broth er hood because of doubts about its stated com mit ment to non-violence and demo c ra tic prin ci ples. For years, how ever, U.S. offi cials have engaged in back-channel talks with Egypt ian mem bers of the move ment in recog ni tion of its sub stan tial pop u lar support.
The unof fi cial con tacts have taken place spo rad i cally since the 1990s but became more fre quent after mem bers of the Broth er hood were elected to the Egypt ian Par lia ment in 2005. After ward, U.S. diplo mats and law mak ers held sev eral meet ings with Broth er hood lead ers, includ ing at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo. . . .
“U.S. Reex am ing Its Rela tion ship with Mus lim Broth er hood Oppo si tion Group” by Craig Whit lock; The Wash ing ton Post; 2/3/2011.
6. In a slight digres sion from the topic of Wik iLeaks and Karl Rove, the dis cus sion high lights the fact that Sweden’s Swe den Democ rats (the Swedish equiv a lent of the British fas cist group the BNP ben e fit ted from an Islamist ter ror attack in this precise time period.
The bombs had barely exploded in Stockholm’s bustling shop ping dis trict before mem bers of the far-right, Islam-bashing Swe den Democ rats rushed to their blogs and Twit ter feeds. “Told you so,” said one. “Finally” tweeted another.
The gov ern ment and just about every edi to r ial page has warned against blam ing Sweden’s grow ing Mus lim minor ity for the Dec. 11 sui cide attack car ried out by an Iraqi-born Swede, who appears to have been rad i cal ized in Britain.
But the far-right fringe is doing just that in another chal lenge to Sweden’s famed tol er ance, already frayed in recent months by the Swe den Democ rats’ entry into Par lia ment and a ser ial gunman’s sniper attacks against peo ple with dark skin.
Author i ties say there’s a risk that even more extreme groups, long mar gin al ized in Swe den, will use the oppor tu nity to advance their positions.
“The biggest worry isn’t that the Mus lim com mu nity will become rad i cal ized but what this means for the view of Mus lims in Swe den,” said Erik Aker lund, police chief in Rinkeby, an immi grant sub urb of Stock holm nick named “Lit tle Mogadishu” because of its large Somali community.
While inves ti gat ing the attack, the Swedish secu rity ser vice is also keep ing an eye on any poten tial reac tion from right-wing extrem ists, said Anders Thorn berg, the agency’s direc tor of oper a tions. Those groups have kept a low pro file since a series of attacks on immi grants and left-wing activists in the 1980s and ‘90s.
The sui cide bomber, Taimour Abdul wa hab, killed him self and injured two peo ple when some of the explo sives he was wear ing exploded among pan icked Christ mas shop pers in down town Stockholm. . . .
“Sui cide Bomb ing Stirs Sweden’s Far-Right” by Karl Rit ter [AP]; The Huff in g ton Post; 12/16/2010.
Dr. Farrell: Also last week it appears that the fighting along the Cambodian-Thai border has intensified and there was this story about the Hindus’ asking the UN to take control of the Preah Vihear temple complex … a Google News search shows quite a few German language newspapers covering the story in case you want to check it out:
http://www.sify.com/news/hindus-want-disputed-thai-cambodia-hindu-shiva-temple-be-transferred-to-un-control-news-international-lcgnufjddgc.html
I don’t mean to come off as hostile, but why wouldn’t the powers that be already have had access to whatever may lie in the museum? Why steal them now?
In my opinion, the loss of antiquities is a future operation. My suspicion is that Hawass has been sitting on a few “big scores” including work by Patrik Geryl, Andrew Collins, and Robert Temple. Google the “Day of Rage” to find uprising from the Weatherman Bill Ayres to the future events throughout the Mid-East including Yemen where recent discoveries suggest the Ark of the Covenant will be found.
(4) True or coverup ?
The Gift Shop
Hawass has stated in the past few days that he thanks God that the looters were idiots that they mistook the Museum’s gift shop for the museum itself.
The people entered the gift shop and stole all the jewellery and escaped; they thought the shop was the museum, thank God!
Dr Hawass’ website
“I’m glad that those people were idiots. They looted the museum shop. Thank God they thought that the museum shop was the museum.”
This is such a nonsensical explanation as to be tragic…
Tells me that Hawass had a hand in the looting.
This article definitely puts the lie to Hawass’ statement.
By Rossella Lorenzi
Discovery Channel
The mummies, who lost their heads as yet another casualty of Egypt’s political chaos, are unknown ancient Egyptians, officials told Discovery News. Prior to the uprisings that spread across the Arab nation, they had been used to test the CT scan machine in the museum.
Vandalized a week ago at Cairo’s Egyptian Museum, where thieves looking for antiquities broke 70 objects, the mummies have become the symbol of the world’s concern for ancient Egyptian cultural heritage.
The shocking image of their heads lying on the floor of the Egyptian Museum with broken bones scattered all around have been haunting Egyptologists and mummy experts for a week.
Despite close examinations of the released pictures, extensive archival research and opinion exchange on social networks, no expert has been able to identify them.
“It’s starting to take on the hallmarks of a TV drama like ‘Bones’ or ‘CSI.’ Just who were the two mummies?” Kate Phizackerley, who runs “Egyptological Looting Database 2011,” asked in her blog.
Fear that royal mummies could have been damaged arose with the first news reports of the break-in, which mentioned looters ripping off the heads of two Pharaonic mummies.
Indeed, a gilded, open-work cartonnage case belonging to Tjuya, shown on the museum floor in dramatic footage from Al Jazeera, prompted speculation that the damaged mummies were Yuya and Tjuya, which recent DNA tests identified as King Tut’s great-grandparents.
“We all feared they could be Yuya and Thuya, but the pictures proved they weren’t,” Phizackerley said.
Further information from Zahi Hawass, newly appointed minister of antiquities, did not help solve the mystery.
In an interview with the New York Times on Tuesday, Hawass said that the thieves took two skulls from a research lab before being stopped as they tried to leave the museum.
Wafaa El Saddik, former director of the Egyptian Museum, confirmed to Discovery News that the mummies had been in a research lab.
“These mummies were kept in a special room at the west side of the museum and they were in the university clinic for some research. They are unknown persons,” El Saddik, who led the museum until a month ago, told Discovery News.
The new information makes it even harder to guess who the mummies might be.
“They might never have been in display,” Phizackerley said.
Researchers were particularly intrigued by one mummy, whose ripped-off head was photographed amid bones scattered across the floor.
“The bones in the picture apparently do not belong to the heads. Quite certainly we are talking of non-royal mummies,” Swiss anatomist and paleopathologist Frank Rühli, told Discovery News.
Egyptologist and anthropologist Jasmine Day from Perth, Australia, agrees: “Many of the royal mummies have distinct facial features and even intact hair. The damaged mummies and bones appear to have been knocked accidentally — or tossed vindictively — off a table or shelf in the darkened storeroom.”
Salima Ikram, professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, confirmed that the mummies were stored in a lab.
“These were Late Period fragmentary mummies that were used to test the CT machine and were stored near the machine. When the people who attacked the museum went in, in the area of the giftshop, they also breached the room in which the test mummy fragments were kept,” Ikram, a leading expert on animal mummies, told Discovery News.
Speculation that at least one head had been torn from a complete and well- preserved body came from a picture found online by Mercedes González, director of the Instituto de Estudios Científicos en Momias in Madrid.
The photo completely matched the image of the damaged mummy.
According to the Chilean journal Conozca Más, which published the picture of the complete mummy in 1993, the mummified body was displayed at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, and then withdrawn.
“By the shape of the forehead and jaw, I believe this is the mummy of a teenage woman. It is interesting that the body has no abdominal incision for evisceration,” González told Discovery News.
She agrees with Rühli, head of the Swiss Mummy Project at the University of Zurich, that the bones scattered around the mummified head do not belong to the individual.
“They appear to correspond to an adult. There is no soft tissue on them, while the mummy featured bones which were covered by skin in very good condition,” González said.
Regarding the other head, shown on Hawass’ website, González believes it belongs to an adult male.
“The nostrils are dilated, due to plugs of linen employed during the embalming, while the white spots may be fungi. This might indicate that the mummy was stored somewhere out of sight,” González said.
According to the researcher, the well cut neck might indicate that the head was already loose, torn from its body long ago. Indeed, that was a typical practice of the 19th century.
“It is tragic to see Egyptian mummies treated once more in the cavalier and cruel fashion in which tens of thousands of their fellows were once treated by ancient Egyptian tomb robbers and Victorian souvenir hunters,” Day, the author of “The Mummy’s Curse: Mummymania in the English-Speaking World,” said.
“I never thought I would witness such things in my lifetime,” Day said.
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Yeah I tend to agree with the hidden hands at play, and I was thinking along these lines the day before the looting happened. Too bad this whole thing completely kills my travel to Egypt and Giza this summer.
I just traveled to Egypt last summer! I am so glad I got to visit before all this happened. Do we know what items exactly were stolen from the museum?
Hidden hands you say?
http://www.businessinsider.com/senior-us-marine-says-multiple-platoons-are-headed-to-egypt-2011-2