by Khaled Abu Toameh, Hudson NY
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The deterioration in relations between Israel and Egypt should serve as a sad reminder to all that the new generation in the Arab world is not marching toward moderation, particularly when it comes to making peace with Israel or even recognizing its right to exist.
Those who had hoped that the pro-democracy revolution that toppled the regime of Hosni Mubarak would not affect relations between Egypt and Israel now need to realize that they were wrong..
In the post-Mubarak era, many Egyptians who helped bring down the regime are also strongly opposed to maintaining the peace treaty with Israel.
Egypt’s new rulers know exactly what their people think about the peace treaty with Israel. The Supreme Military Council, the de facto government in Egypt, does not dare go against the will of the Tahrir Square demonstrators.
If the demonstrators want Mubarak and his sons thrown into prison, the military rulers will comply. And if the demonstrators want Egypt to stop selling natural gas to Israel, there is no doubt that the military council will have to do something about it.
The Egyptian authorities already announced this week that they would review gas deals with Israel.
Egypt’s new rulers are clearly afraid of the young protesters in Tahrir Square, especially when it comes to dealing with Israel. Perhaps that explains why an Egyptian military court has just sentenced 25-year-old “pro-Israel” Egyptian blogger Maikel Nabil to three years in prison.
That also explains why Egyptian soldiers ran away when hundreds of “pro-democracy” demonstrators attacked the Israeli embassy in Cairo a few days ago and set fire to an Israeli flag. The soldiers had been assigned to guard the embassy, but “disappeared” as soon as the protesters showed up.
But it is not only the gas deals that worry the ostensibly moderate Facebook generation in Egypt. They do not want to see the Israeli embassy reopened. Nor do they want to see Israeli diplomats returning to Cairo.
Instead, the Egyptians want their government to lift the blockade on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. The Facebook and Twitter demonstrators would rather see a Hamas ambassador sitting in the Israeli embassy in Cairo.
Even before Mubarak was forced to step down in February, there were signs that the anti-government demonstrators in Cairo’s Tahrir Square were also strongly opposed to any forms of relations with Israel.
Back then, eyewitnesses reported that some of the demonstrators had burned Israeli and American flags and chanted slogans against Israel and the US. The anti-Israel and anti-US protests received little coverage, if at all, in the Western media.
Alarmed by the protests, Israel ordered its diplomats and their families to leave Cairo and the embassy was closed. To avoid “provoking” the pro-democracy Facebook generation in Egypt, Israel even removed its flag from the embassy building.
Moreover, given the fact that the tone in the Egyptian media remains extremely anti-Israel, it is hard to see how the peace treaty between Israel and Egypt would survive. The deterioration in relations between Israel and Egypt should serve as a sad reminder to all that the new generation in the Arab world is not marching toward moderation, particularly when it comes to making peace with Israel or even recognizing its right to exist.
Use Google: There are too many sources to post.
What are the sources for Egyptians readying to turn against Israel? The Google young man who played a large role in the demonstrations was interviewed on CNN last week and said he thought the revolution was on the right track to make the reformations they demand, and I have never read anything that included Egypt turning against Israel. I would guess that Egypt’s military is still in close contact with the U.S., and the U.S. continues to give them aid, and as long as that is so, they will not attack Israel. But is the Muslim Brotherhood up to mischief?
In Muslim societies it seems when there is a change in leadership, especially in the Caliphate, the rules of the old ruler go down the drain. I hope most Egyptians know today that is a poor unsuccessful way of running a country and will opt for modern reforms.
Dayenu, Coming Home – The Fountainheads Passover Song
Google Exodus
Passover in Kibbutz Naan – Dayenu
Pesach: Divrei Torah (Kahane)
“And Pharaoh called to Moses, saying: Go and worship the L-rd. Only your sheep and cattle will remain – your children will also go with you. And Moses said: You will also give us offerings and sacrifices for the L-rd our G-d, and our flocks will go with us…” (Shmot 10:24-26)
The ninth plague-darkness – has struck Egypt with a vengeance and Pharaoh breaks. Step by step he has retreated and after the eighth plague – locusts – he was prepared to allow the Jews to leave except for their children. Now he surrenders almost entirely as he agrees that all the Jews can leave. He only asks one thing, one compromise, one small victory for himself, that the Jewish cattle remain behind.
Consider; the Jews have been slaves for 210 years. They have lived in misery and persecution. They suffered decrees such as the one casting their male children into the sea. They cried out unto the L-rd for freedom and salvation. Now, apparently the great moment has arrived! Pharaoh agrees that they shall go free! What does it matter that he asks for their cattle? Give it to him! The main thing is peace and salvation and we are willing to give up cattle for peace!
But Moses knows that this is not the purpose of the freedom of the Jewish people and of the story of the slavery and exodus. He is not prepared to compromise one inch because he knows what the purpose of G-d is. When Moses first entered the presence of Pharaoh and said: “The L-rd, G-d of the Hebrews, has said: Let my people go!” Pharaoh contemptuously answered: “Who is the L-rd? I know not the L-rd and will not let Israel go!” Here is where the battle was joined. Here is the purpose and aim of creation – to have the world recognize the dominion and kingship of the L-rd being challenged. Pharaoh must be made to recognize and totally acknowledge the sovereignty of the L-rd over him and his people. He cannot make compromises; he cannot strike bargains. He must submit totally!
“And I shall be glorified through (the defeat of) Pharaoh and his army and Egypt shall know that I am the L-rd.” Only the total defeat of the wicked can raise and honor the name of the L-rd, says the Biblical commentator Rashi. This is why there will be no compromise with Pharaoh. He must totally submit, he must totally surrender.
And even when he apparently does this, after the plague of the first born, when he runs to Moses and says: “Get out, take your flocks with you, just leave and ask the L-rd to bless me!” Moses refuses and in the words of the Mechilta; “And he called unto Moses and Aaron in the middle of the night and said: get up and leave! Said Moses unto him: No, we have been ordered not to leave our houses until morning. What are we, thieves that we should slink out in the night? No, we will leave only in the morning with an upraised arm before the eyes of all the Egyptians!”
Not one inch of retreat here. The lesson of the L-rd being the Omnipotent, king of the universe must be seen and acknowledged.
The lesson is an eternal one and must be learned in our time, too. The question of peace in the Middle East is a question of the Arabs and the world acknowledging the total sovereignty of the Allmighty. There can be no compromise on this. It is only a peace that comes with Arabs submitting to the yoke of the heavenly kingdom that will be a permanent one and the Jew who gives up part of his land as a compromise, violates the entire purpose of the rise of the Jewish State and the demand of the All Mighty that the nations acknowledge Him as King. There can be no retreat from land because that is in essence a retreat also from the Kingship of the L-rd.
I will cut through all the crap and get right to the point here.
The only thing about the Israel-Egypt relationship in which I am more than remotely interested is the opportunity for Israel to re-conquer the Sinai peninsula at least as far as Mitla Pass; to be followed this time by instantaneous annexation of that land to the State of Israel, with a policy to be adopted and followed to actually plant a Jewish population throughout that territory.
That — nothing but that — has been on my mind since the smiling but execrable James Earl Carter twisted the all-too-apparently weak arms of Menachem Begin to get Israel to destroy Yamit and a chain of smaller settlements in order to justify a faked peace treaty with whom? The US State Department and a foreign dictator who, 32 years later, would be unceremoniously kicked out of power by one of his country’s all too ordinary street mobs.
So I really don’t give a damn about hearing or reading about this or that meaningless development in Cairo or Washington. I want the Sinai taken back for the long-term future of the Jewish nation. That and only that is all I care about in connection with Egypt. Which means that I certainly hope that war comes again. Because Israel must expand its size or die.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
That wonderful peace treaty between Israel and Egypt was a joke. It enabled Egypt to get billions in money and military equipment from us, kept Israel meek and passive in the face of Egyptian hostility and blatant disregard of its obligations under the treaty. In return Israel got bupkis. Sure there was no further war between the two countries but that was because Mubarak had the good sense not to start one.
“One firm lesson of history is that the west will even more gladly abandon Jewish Israel in the same way they have already abandoned the christians in palestine, Egypt, Lebanon, and Iraq.”
Ouch, that hurts. You are 100% correct. Genocide of Christians in the south of Sudan and no-one seemingly cares. Dubya did nothing even though he knew all about it.
FOUR QUESTIONS
Will the Egyptian Military Rulers abrogate the Camp David Accords ‘outright’ or “de facto?”
What Type of ‘Kabuki’ dance will the Egyptian government perform in order to continue to receive U.S. military and financial?
How will Israel respond to a ‘re-militarization’ of the Sinai – not by conventional forces,but by terrorists of all stripes?
How will the U.S. – under the Obama regime – deal with Egypt as she blatantly and arrogantly ‘trashes’ the Camp David Accords?
Jeff
Still don’t understand why Begin handed the Sinai over in the first place. You fight 4 defensive wars, lose thousands of dead and then you reward them. Who does that?
Exodus
yeziat mitzryim in a small video
Best Passover Video: Crash Course on Passover 2011 🙂
Soros is a vile nefarious character who has many iron in play but he is still small potatoes compared with Goldman the oil companies, the Saudis and the Military Industrial Complex.
Sec Gates was the one who created Al Queda armed and supported them against the Russkies and now is doing the same thing in Yemen and Libya. This has nothing to do with Soros. These guys were playing their dual game long before Obama came on the scene.
Jewish Israel and the new Egypt:
1. The current Egyptian muslim “arabs” originated from native Egyptian orthodox coptic christians who converted to islam. (Before muhammad, Egypt was 99% orthodox christian, and is now >90% muslim).
2. It appears that the current Egyptian “arabs” are fairly unified with few tribal divisions.
3. As a result of islamic culture, most are dirt-poor and illiterate with no hope of improvement (where would you rather build a factory today: China or Egypt?)
4. The Egyptian Army is made up of these poor “arabs”. They refused to fight in support of Mubarak against their own people.
5. The post-Mubarak Egypt will be controlled by an army sympathetic to islam, working with the Muslim Brotherhood (a situation somewhat like Turkey.)
6. The “peace” with Jewish Israel will go from “cold” to “deep-freeze” (like with Syria now).
7. Muslim Egypt will stop selling natural gas to Jewish Israel.
8. Egypt will not send tanks into the Sinai, since the days of massive tank battles have basically ended.
9. Jewish Israel should blow open the border fence which supposedly separates Gaza from Egypt, and allow Egypt to annex Gaza in some form.
10. Egyptians, Gazans, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and Gaza’s Hamas are all essentially the same people. If Egypt takes responsibility for Gaza, the situation for Jewish Israel will not be any worse, and might be better.
11. Ultimately, Gaza should be annexed by Egypt, and west bank Palestinians should be given Jordanian citizenship.
12. And pity the poor Egyptian Coptic Christians (as many as eight million people), who would not submit to islamic pressure to convert. They are now screwed more than ever: even more marginalized and oppressed by Egyptian muslims, and totally sold out and abandoned by their “fellow christians” in the west.
13. One firm lesson of history is that the west will even more gladly abandon Jewish Israel in the same way they have already abandoned the christians in palestine, Egypt, Lebanon, and Iraq.
The westernized kids in the middle east who marched for freedom and moderninity don’t have an ice cubes chance in hell to prevail. The dark forces there include Islamism, Obama/Soros revolution, and oligarchy. Islamism is supported by the majority of muslims, Muslim brotherhood and iran because the koran says so. The M.O. of the Soros organization is to stir up revolution and then buy the countries capital assets for pennies on the dollar. The people of the M.E. can count themselves lucky if their societies go back to oligarchy and avoid a major islamic war against israel. The U.S. needs to end the Obama/Soros administration; it is bad people masquerading as good doers.
I see no reason why Israel should not forcibly retake the Sinai.