A.Loewenstein Online Newsletter

…A senior Republican member of Congress who has access to intelligence reports said U.S. spy agencies have seen recent indications that other Middle East leaders were dismayed by the United States’ treatment of Mubarak.
“The other countries are mad as hell, and they’re mad as hell at us,” said the lawmaker, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the matter candidly.

A CIA chief who publicly predicts the departure of Hosni Mubarak on the basis of “press reports”, and a White House that reacted in “disbelief” on Thursday to the Egyptian President’s decision to stay on – only to watch on television the next day as his vice-president announced that Mr Mubarak had indeed left office and the military was taking charge.
Nothing could more vividly underline what is self-evidently true but what both admirers and detractors of the US find hard to admit: that the world’s superpower has been a powerless spectator at the greatest and most momentous popular uprising in the modern history of the Middle East.
From the outset the US has been reacting to events – and not very consistently, first supporting Mr. Mubarak, then urging his swift departure, then calling for and orderly transition, before finally throwing its weight unequivocally behind the pro-democracy movement. Only at the end, it seems, was President Obama in the know, having been informed in advance yesterday morning that the Egyptian leader of 30 years was going.
In fact, by luck or judgement, the crisis has worked out more or less the way Washington probably wanted: the end of the ancien regime (or so it would seem today, for this Egyptian drama has repeatedly defied predictions) and the assumption of power by the military, with which the US has longstanding and close ties, and of which it is a key supplier.

CLASSIFIED BY: Margaret Scobey, Ambassador; REASON: 1.4(B), (D)
¶1. Key Points:
– (C) In meetings January 13-14, A/S Posner told activists and opposition politicians that the U.S. is seeking ways to advance human rights and political participation over the coming 12-18 months.
– (C) Activists urged the U.S. to end a “double standard” on Israeli human rights violations, close Guantanamo and speak out
against GOE repression.
– (C) Opposition political leaders agreed that prospects for
significant political reform are slim while President Mubarak
remains in office. Most expected Mubarak to be a candidate in
2011, and predicted the military would play a role in succession to
ensure stability.
– (C) Former Presidential candidate Ayman Nour urged A/S Posner to
press the GOE to stop interfering with opposition political activity, and to allow him to work and travel.
¶2. (C) A/S Posner told activists the U.S. is interested in how to advance human rights in Egypt over the next 12-18 months to improve people’s lives. He said the U.S. would pursue a traditional human rights agenda to address police brutality, restrictions on NGOs, freedom of expression and assembly problems, sectarian tensions, and the State of Emergency. Posner noted that the U.S. is engaged on the coming Egyptian elections, and is working on issues of observation, participation and training. Posner said that the UN Human Rights Council focuses disproportionately on Israel. He described the Goldstone Report as flawed for not being able to include the Israeli government position, and called for Israeli and Palestinian domestic investigations into human rights violations during the Gaza war.

I don’t know whether President Mubarak was hated personally as much as the regime was despised.

This week, Jenin’s wonderland was to be found in Egypt. Residents of the refugee camp closely followed events in the land of the Nile, in a mood of melancholy jealousy. Each night they crowded into homes to watch television and see what was going on in Cairo. But no winds of change are blowing in the West Bank. No solidarity demonstration was staged; not a single poster of support was to be seen on the streets. The pining for freedom is to be found only in the Jenin theater.
Camp residents saw what just a few days of popular protest can do – topple a tyrannical regime that has been in power for decades. Yet here in the camp, a struggle that has lasted decades, a mass, armed and sometimes violent campaign for freedom, has changed nothing. All is despair. At the end of last week, the IDF once again invaded the camp and in the dark of night whisked four young men from their beds. Nobody in the camp knew why this happened, or where the men were taken. That’s just the way the world turns

The age of political reason is returning to the Arab world. The people are fed up of being colonised and bullied. Meanwhile, the political temperature is rising in Jordan, Algeria and Yemen.