Tuesday, February 01, 2011

What Corruption and Force Have Wrought in Egypt

In what are now actions fulfilling prophecy, we wrote years ago that the coming power vacuums around the world created by the fall of American hegemony could be filled by the world’s thugs and goons.   Haha.  My crystal ball. 

There is a distinct possibility that we could see substantial blowback to our corruption and support of brutal and murderous states.  The Shah of Iran, which we have discussed a few times on here, is a prime example of the CIA toppling a democracy in Iran and installing a puppet police state.  But, will those radical elements be able to gain an upper hand or will it be the urge of freedom and opportunity for people who have had all dignity taken from them by the state? 

Chris Hedges takes a look at the much darker possibilities of instability in the Middle East.    There is much truth to what he writes:  

The Muslim world does not see us as we see ourselves. Muslims are aware, while we are not, that we have murdered tens of thousands of Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. (Actually, to correct Chris, the number is in the hundreds of thousands.)  We have terrorized families, villages and nations. We enable and defend the Israeli war crimes carried out against Palestinians and the Lebanese—indeed we give the Israelis the weapons and military aid to carry out the slaughter. We dismiss the thousands of dead as “collateral damage.” And when those who are fighting against occupation kill us or Israelis we condemn them, regardless of context, as terrorists. Our hypocrisy is recognized on the Arab street. Most Arabs see bloody and disturbing images every day from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, images that are censored on our television screens. They have grown sick of us. They have grown sick of the Arab regimes that pay lip service to the suffering of Palestinians but do nothing to intervene. They have grown sick of being ruled by tyrants who are funded and supported by Washington. Arabs understand that we, like the Israelis, primarily speak to the Muslim world in the crude language of power and violence. And because of our entrancement with our own power and ability to project force, we are woefully out of touch.  Israeli and American intelligence services did not foresee the popular uprising in Tunisia or Egypt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi, Israel’s new intelligence chief, told Knesset members last Tuesday that “there is no concern at the moment about the stability of the Egyptian government.” Tuesday, it turned out, was the day hundreds of thousands of Egyptians poured into the streets to begin their nationwide protests.

posted by TimingLogic at 10:44 AM