PJ Crowley, a US State Department official had the balls to go on Al Jazeera the other day and basically defend US support for President Mubarak, the dictator of Egypt, a country which rules its people with an iron fist and receives nearly $1.5 billion from US taxpayers to help finance the police state that keeps the despot and his regime in power.
The Summer of 2010 provided a disturbing example if one was ever needed for Americans to see where their tax money goes. A young man named Khaled Said posted a video online of Egyptian police brutality. Afterwards and while in a café he was physically removed—in front of all there to see it—by police who beat and tortured him to death. You can google what his deformed face looked like after they were done. It’s gruesome.
Now the people of Egypt want the dictator gone and want democracy. The only thing preventing this is US support for the dictator.
Enter Crowley on Al Jazeera.
Here this smug asshole sits and makes excuses for propping up a ruthless dictator while trying to say the US government is for vague political, economic and social reforms. You gotta ask yourself, if you doubt we have a corrupt imperial government, why a State Dept official just can't say, "If Mubarak wont step down and allow a democracy to come into existence then we will cancel the $1.5 billion we give him each year." No, you don’t hear them take a firm stand. What you hear is some tool saying over and over and over, "Egypt is a stabilizing force in the region."
What does that mean? It means the government of Egypt is being bought off so that the US can augment its power in the region via Israel. With Egypt not deterring Israeli aggression and colonialism it is the ability for the US and Israel to go virtually unchecked that is "stability." Stability is not peace, justice and democracy. It's US hegemony. When considering this it makes sense for Crowley to say "Egypst is a stabilizing force in the region."
Back in 1971 Egypt, under President Sadat, offered Israel peace and Israel—like they do with most peace offers—rejected it. Then the 1973 war came and Israel was nearly defeated. Once Egypt proved itself a formidable military foe then it becomes necessary to “make peace,” which in US imperial jargon means paying them off so as to keep them from undermining our interests (another interesting example of this is when the US paid off the Sunni resistance in Iraq). This sellout infuriated Egyptians and many people around the world. They see the crimes being committed against Palestinians and Lebanese and the injustices of Israeli colonialism and are disturbed by it. This is why the attempts by international peace activists who tried to enter Gaza through Egypt were warmly welcomed by the people of Egypt, a matter which I will return to in a second.
When considering how unpopular Israeli colonialism and US imperialism are, the real danger to "stability" is democracy. Which is why the Al Jazeera commentator says to the U.S. Imperialist lackey: "Because democracy would be destabilizing for the region, wouldn't it?" If the people of Egypt could determine their fate the whole US-Israeli game would be over. No more occupation, no more taking Palestinian land. No more Arab dictatorships to provide a brutal buffer between the US and the people of the region.
The domestic police brutality and stifling of democratic self-management shouldn’t be downplayed. It’s not as if their sole intentions are to help Palestinians. It certainly appears that their ultimate goal is liberation from a tyrannical regime. But when that regime falls there isn’t much reason to expect that whatever government takes its place will help enforce the illegal and unjustified blockade of Gaza. When this government goes down the drain it will be a serious blow to US imperialism and Israeli colonialism, not just in Egypt but throughout the region.
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