Well, the world media once again shows its glaring incompetence by jumping onto the most important story of the last several years, a month late. This is why the internet is my news source. A lot has happened today. It's like five in the morning in Egypt right now, but this video is from Egypt's "yesterday."
The protests continued well into the night. I think they might still be going on, but if not, they've only died down within last couple hours. Yemen, Algeria, Albania, and Jordon have all joined Egypt and Tunisia in revolt. In Algeria alone, at least eight people set themselves on fire, A a pro-democratic tidal wave is going on in the Arab world, and nothing is going to stop it. It's safe to say that the Egyptian government right now is on the brink of collapse. The president's wife has fled the country, as well as much of the wealthy and upper class on their private jets. Reports were saying that some police were refusing to fire tear gas at the protesters. The headquarters of the ruling party has been burned down. At least five people were killed. The president said that the government is being disbanded, and a new one will be established tomorrow. He's still the president. He's reshuffled the cabinet to appease his people before, and reforms never happened. The protesters aren't going away.
The military was called out around midnight I think (Egypt time), but instead of fighting against the protesters, they decided to protect them. From what I've been hearing, the Egyptian people have a tremendous amount of respect for their military, and they were looking forward to the armed forces being called out to the streets. It's the police that the government tightly controls. And the people certainly had reason to be happy about the army's arrival: after all these reports of police beatings and shootings, it's been confirmed that the military and the police have been shooting at each other. When I was watching the live feed of Al Jazeera English earlier, I saw protesters cheering as military vehicles were driving by. A lot of people are on edge about what's going to happen tomorrow if the protesters have to stand up against a military that does not want to stand against them either. Or they may not stand against each other at all.
In an utterly beautiful display of restraint and sanity among all the chaos, a large group of protesters at one point lined up outside the national museum--which houses relics thousands of years old--to protect it from being looted. The military took over for them after their arrival. I WANT PICTURES.
Egypt is one of America's most important allies. It's also rated as one of least democratic governments in the world. In a disgusting and embarrassing display of hypocrisy, the western world - a world founded on freedom and liberty - refuses to take sides when a people are fighting and dying for human rights. Nearly every comment from every government I've heard today is "well we like the protesters, but we also like the government, tee hee!" We give $1.5 billion dollars to the Egyptian government every year. Here's a tear gas can with "Made in U.S.A." printed on it.
Egypt shut down the entire internet yesterday. Nobody can make cell phone calls either. People are being shot. Joe Biden said yesterday that President Mubarak is not a dictator, and he should not step down.
President Obama spoke about today's events, and gave a slightly saner analysis than Joe Biden. He spoke with Mubarak shortly after his announcement about disbanding the government, and urged him to lift the restraints on the internet and cell phone use. He said that reforms are necessary, and that he is willing to work with both the Egyptian government and the Egyptian people in order to achieve them. I don't really know why he's willing to work with a government that shoots its people in the streets.
An Egyptian blogger made it quite clear that the west needs to stay the fuck out of this:
"We don't expect anything from Obama, whom we regard as a great hypocrite. But we hope and expect the American people – trade unions, professors' associations, student unions, activist groups, to come out in support of us. What we want for the US government is to completely get out of the picture. We don't want any sort of backing; just cut aid to Mubarak immediately and withdraw backing from him, withdraw from all Middle Eastern bases, and stop supporting the state of Israel. Ultimately, Mubarak will do whatever he has to do to protect himself. He will suddenly adopt the most anti-US rhetoric if he thought that would help him save his skin. At the end of the day he's committed to his own interests, and if he thinks the US won't support him, he'll turn somewhere else. The reality is that any really clean government that comes to power in the region will come into open conflict with the US because it will call for radical redistribution of wealth and ending support for Israel or other dictatorships. So we don't expect any help from America, just to leave us alone."
Nobel laureate Mohammed Elbaradei, an Egyptian opposition leader who joined in the protests in Cairo, said this:
"The Egyptian people will take care of themselves. The Egyptian people will be the ones who will make the change. We are not waiting for help or assistance from the outside world, but what I expect from the outside world is to practice what you preach, is to defend the rights of the Egyptian to their universal values."
I'm very worried about what could be the political outcome of all this. One of the reasons why the American revolution was so successful was because we were completely isolated from the rest of the world. The founders made it quite clear after they won that they wanted nothing to do with the massive clusterfuck that was European politics. In contrast, look at the French revolution. The French revolted only a few years after we did. What happened? Being in such close proximity to all the European powers, the vultures immediately swooped in and tried to take advantage of the huge gaping hole in the power structure of Europe. You had all these political shifts in France going back and forth, and thousands of people were needlessly executed. Then Napoleon assumed control, and depending on which historian you ask, he either marched through Europe in a bloody trail of conquest, or gloriously defended the interests of the French people from the prying monarchical clutches of the rest of Europe. Outside influences fuck revolutions, and they are going to happen in the Middle East very soon.
And already we're seeing Iran shove its fucking nose into this. Iranian newspapers closely tied to the government are coming out strongly in support of the protesters. There's the very real possibility of the Muslim Brotherhood moving in and taking over. There are two ways this could realistically tip: either in the direction of a democratic tidal wave, or a new Islamist Empire, circa the 7th and 8th centuries. Judging by the fact that these protesters are asking for more civil rights, I'm hopeful that they're not going to fall for bullshit anymore.
It's a little hard to believe that a single man sparked all of this. This is all happening because of Tunisia.
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