The Muslim Brotherhood rather than the old regime may be a better bet for a junta looking to restore stability while retaining control
SCAF
Egypt’s Judges and Generals Dissolve the Parliament: Is the Revolution Now Over?
Confident that raw power and divisions among the opposition preclude any serious challenge, the junta turns the tables on a democratic transition
Egypt’s Revolutionaries Return to Tahrir Square, but Their Protests Are Flailing
Exasperated by their failure to shape events in their country since last year’s ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, thousands of Egyptian revolutionaries were back in Tahrir Square on Tuesday. The trigger for the latest wave of …
Why the U.S. May Be Secretly Cheering a Muslim Brotherhood Run For Egypt’s Presidency
Liberals and secularists are furious at the decision this week by Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood to name Khairat al-Shater as its candidate next month’s presidential election. Even many members and leaders of the Brotherhood itself …
Port Said Stadium Disaster: What’s Behind Egyptian Soccer’s Bloodiest Day?
Bill Shankly, the late legendary manager of Liverpool Football Club, is forever remembered for this dramatic claim: “Football isn’t about life and death. I can assure you it’s much more important than that.” Shankly …
Why Were Six Americans Barred from Leaving Egypt?
Egypt has banned at least six Americans, including the son of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, from leaving the country. It’s the latest in a series of embarrassing blows dealt to the Obama Administration, which is also …
Egypt’s Islamists On the Verge: Will They Make Campaign Rhetoric Reality?
As Egyptians vote this week in the third and final round of elections for the lower house of parliament, the country prepares to usher in its first ever Islamist-led government, and the second Islamist parliament to be elected in …
As Islamists Dominate Egypt’s Election, the Power Struggle with the Military Begins
The Muslim Brotherhood is Egypt’s political mainstream, and its most significant challengers are the more extreme Islamists of the Salafi movement rather than the secular liberal forces that dominate the Tahrir Square protest movement. That appears to be the not-exactly-surprising verdict of the electorate, according to reports from …
Why Egypt’s Election is a Game-Changer — At the Expense of Tahrir Square
The message of the historic Egyptian election, which began Monday with huge crowds turning out to vote in the protest-scarred cities of Cairo and Alexandra, is a simple one: Egypt’s immediate political future will not be written in Tahrir Square, or by the revolutionaries who last week lost 40 of their comrades to violence by the …
Cairo in Turmoil: Obama’s Plan B Stumbles, What’s Plan C?
The reason the Obama Administration has been so reluctant to criticize Egypt’s military junta for its violent handling of the latest round of democracy protests is that the generals have, all along, been Washington’s preferred stewards of post-Mubarak political change. The State Department on Tuesday finally condemned the “excessive …
On Cairo’s Violent Streets, an Untenable Status Quo Meets an Unwritten Future
With reporting by Abigail Hauslohner / Cairo
“Say it, don’t be afraid: the military council has to leave,” chanted some of the tens of thousands of protesters who thronged Cairo’s Tahrir Square Tuesday night. Their slogan was a combative response to the junta’s plan, announced hours earlier in an unprecedented television address …
Tahrir Square Crisis Forces Egypt’s Military to Change its Plans
Tens of thousands of Egyptians are once again filling Cairo’s Tahrir Square in defiance of an authoritarian regime, and paying for their stand in blood and pain as security forces fire tear-gas, rubber bullets and even in some instances live ammunition. But the crowds are no longer chanting “The Army and the people are one hand!” as …
Egypt Bleeds as the Battle over Democracy and Power Escalates
The last time blood flowed so freely in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the battle lines were simple to discern: Last January’s showdown was a classic people vs. the regime battle to oust President Hosni Mubarak, with the Army stepping in at the crucial moment to ease out the strongman. But the ongoing battle for control of the Square that …