Glick - Lessons from the embassy takeover

Caroline Glick
carolineglick.com
13 September '11

http://www.carolineglick.com/e/2011/09/lessons-from-the-embassy-takeo.php

We are able to consider the lessons of the weekend's mob assault on the Israeli embassy in Cairo because the six Israeli security officers who were on the brink of being slaughtered were rescued at the last moment and spirited out of the country. If the Egyptian commandos hadn't arrived on the scene at the last moment, the situation would have been too explosive for a sober-minded assessment of the rapidly deteriorating situation with our neighbor to the south.

Any assessment of the weekend's events must begin by recounting a few key aspects of the assault. First, this was the second mob attack on the embassy in so many weeks. During the first assault, an Egyptian rioter scaled the 20-story building where the embassy is housed, tore down the Israeli flag, and threw it to the frenzied mob below which swiftly burned it. Rather than being arrested for the crime of assaulting a foreign embassy, the rioter was embraced as a hero by Egypt's military regime. The governor of Giza awarded him an apartment and a job.

Second, for six hours after the assault on the embassy began on Friday evening, Israel's leaders tried desperately to contact the leaders of the Egyptian military junta to request their intercession on behalf of the trapped security officers.

Field Marshal Muhammad Tantawi refused to speak with either Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu or Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

Third, Egyptians authorities refused to intervene to save the lives of the Israeli security officers until after the Americans intervened directly on their behalf.

That is, Israel's entreaties, and Egypt's international legal obligations were insufficient to move the Egyptian authorities to act to save the embassy personnel from the mob. Only the apparent threat of direct US action against Egypt convinced them to act.

The behavior of the Egyptian mob and military junta alike served as a wake-up call for two key constituencies.

Hornik - Israeli-Egyptian Peace: The Beginning of the End

P. David Hornik
frontpagemag.com
12 September '11



http://frontpagemag.com/2011/09/12/israeli-egyptian-peace-the-beginning-of-the-end/



From Friday evening to early Saturday morning the equivalent of a high-jinks, nail-biting rescue movie occurred at the Israeli embassy in Cairo. As far as the endangered individuals were concerned, it even had a happy ending. Nothing else about it inspires much cheer, though.

It started (timeline here) at about 5 p.m. on Friday when about five thousand Egyptian protesters who had been at legendary Tahrir Square—from which not long ago Thomas Friedman was extolling the “democracy youth” and saying “Israel was not part of this story at all”—made their way to the nearby Israeli embassy “armed with clubs, hammers, axes and explosives.” The “youth” started cursing Israel and demanding that its ambassador and other diplomatic staff be expelled.

Over the next few hours they hammered down a concrete wall surrounding the embassy, overran the building (the Israeli offices were on the 16th-19th stories), smashed windows, set fires, spray-painted anti-Israeli graffiti, looted the embassy’s archive, and—in a reprise of an earlier such exploit on August 20—tore down and burned the Israeli flag. (You can see some of it here, including Egyptian security forces standing around doing nothing.)

By that time Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, and security chiefs were watching these proceedings live in Jerusalem on the embassy’s security cameras. They gave an evacuation order, and by 9:30 almost the entire staff of the embassy were taken to the airport in Cairo—all except six Israeli security guards who remained in one room of the building, locked behind reinforced doors.

As their lives appeared increasingly in danger while the mob kept roiling inside and outside the building, by 11 p.m. Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak contacted President Barack Obama and other U.S. officials about the crisis, as well as Egyptian officials.

Somewhat later, “according to “Arabic-language media,” says Israel Hayom’s timeline,

officials in Jerusalem begin frenzied attempts to establish contact with senior military leaders in Cairo, explaining to them that embassy workers are inside the building and that their lives are in danger. According to Al-Jazeera [confirmed by Israeli sources as well], Field Marshal Mohamed Tantawi, who heads Egypt’s Supreme Military Council, refuses to accept Netanyahu and Barak’s calls. (emphasis added)

CAMERA - Robert Mackey MisLedes Again

TS
CAMERA/Snapshots
11 September '11

http://blog.camera.org/archives/2011/09/robert_mackey_misledes_again.html

Regarding the attack this weekend on the Israeli embassy in Cairo, the New York Times' Robert Mackey blogs on The Lede:

The wall [surrounding the embassy] was constructed recently by Egyptian authorities following protests calling for the expulsion of Israel’s ambassador over the killing of Egyptian security officers by Israeli forces last month. The officers were killed as Israel hunted for militants who carried out deadly attacks near the border between the two countries in the Sinai desert. (Emphasis added)

That's an odd way of describing an attack on Israeli civilians and soldiers within Israeli territory, close to the border with Egypt.

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Shine - It's time to sober up

Chaim Shine
Israel Hayom
12 September '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=473

The Egyptian mobs' vandalism of the Israeli Embassy in Cairo has proven once again, for those who still need proof, that the innocent belief in democracy's triumph over malicious regimes is an illusion. Western countries have been in thrall to the concept that the West would prevail in a clash of civilizations, with democracy and the free market system embraced by nations in the near and far east. But it's becoming clear that this vision was a naive belief bordering on a mystical fairy tale.

The latest revolutions in Arab countries created a momentary optical illusion, a veritable desert mirage. A spectacle befitting the fanciful tales of Lawrence of Arabia. U.S. President Barack Obama and his advisors gazed with longing at the fulfillment of their Messianic vision of freedom and liberty, which could justify the heavy American losses in Iraq and Afghanistan: A new world order led by the U.S. that would make everyone forget the economic distress at home as the system of capitalist extremism falls apart.

The leaders of the Western world quickly realized that democracy is not a given. It requires deep cultural preparation to be fully implemented. Criminologists will tell you that a convict released from jail after serving a long sentence will experience far worse culture shock than when he entered jail. It nearly impossible to turn slaves into free people overnight. It requires a national and cultural adjustment period. Even the wise Jewish nation was forced to wander the desert for 40 years before it could leave behind their slave ways and habits. They required years of preparation before they could enter the promised land.

The "biggest winner" of the U.S.'s sobering realization is Syrian dictator Assad. There isn't a single NATO member who dares use force against him, because the alternative to established leadership has made itself apparent in Libya and Egypt. They prefer a single Assad over five tribes that are themselves ruled by Al-Qaida and its ilk.

Rubin - Once More Into the Swamp: The Attack on Israel’s Embassy Opens A New Era in Middle East History

Barry Rubin
crethiplethi.com
11 September '11



http://www.crethiplethi.com/once-more-into-the-swamp-the-attack-on-israels-embassy-opens-a-new-era-in-middle-east-history/israel/2011/

The attack and looting of Israel’s embassy in Cairo is an event as significant as the seizure of the U.S. embassy in Iran, in 1979, and the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001.

The first event signaled a change in Iran and the rise of a powerful revolutionary Islamist movement. The results have included an increase in anti-Western politics in the Middle East, an upsurge in terrorism, and three wars in the Persian Gulf (Iran-Iraq, 1980-1988; Kuwait, 1990-1991; Iraq, 2003).

The second event brought the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq; a major upsurge in terrorism, and big advances for revolutionary Islamism despite the later defeats suffered by al-Qaida itself.

And now the third event, which many will see as far less significant. But it isn’t. While ground center for the first two were, respectively, Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan, this one strikes at the core area of the Arabic-speaking world and the Arab-Israeli issue.

What the attack on the Israeli embassy signifies can be divided into Egyptian and wider implications. Concerning Egypt, the era of Egypt-Israeli peace is over. Egypt will be a hostile country to Israel and the government will make no attempt to stop hysterical incitement and hatred. It is more likely to stop cross-border attacks from Egyptian territory and try to avoid direct war.

Yet even those limits are misleading. Mubarak’s Egypt was aligned — though not allied — with Israel and the United States. Post-Mubarak Egypt is allied with the Muslim Brotherhood, even if that group isn’t in power, and Hamas. It will not cooperate with the United States. The cornerstone, the lynch-pin, the most powerful country, of the Arab world has gone over to the other side.

Within Egypt itself, the riot and the military junta’s permissiveness toward it is a big step toward ending any hope of democracy or moderation within Egypt itself. Recognizing the power of the mob and the potency of its ideas — kill the Jews, wipe Israel off the map, down with America, war, jihad, total victory, a million martyrs! — the military junta stood aside and let the crowd rampage. Egypt’s international image and legitimate commitments are of no consequence in the face of this tidal wave of insane, suicidal hatred.

Fresnozionism - Explaining Arab rage

Fresnozionism.org
11 September '11

http://fresnozionism.org/2011/09/explaining-arab-rage/




To find something to illustrate this post, I googled ‘Egyptian antisemitic cartoons’. I got 152,000 images. I picked one that was colorful, though not as bloody as most of them.

If you were to ask an Egyptian why a slavering mob tore down a concrete wall and furiously hammered on an inner door (video here) just a few feet from six trapped Israeli security guards in order to try to tear them to pieces, they would likely say that they were furious over the death of several Egyptians during the recent terrorist attack near Eilat, and angry about Israel’s ‘treatment of Palestinians’.

Never mind that a) several of the terrorists were Egyptian citizens, b) seven Israeli Jews died in the attack which was launched from Egyptian soil, and c) it’s quite likely that one of the Israeli casualties, police counterterrorism officer Pascal Avrahami, was murdered by Egyptian soldiers or police. Oh, and never mind that the ‘treatment of Palestinians’ is a direct result of about 100 years of murder and terrorism directed at Jews and Israelis by Palestinian Arabs.

The guards were armed and probably would have killed dozens before being overwhelmed. Then Egypt would have demanded an apology.

Nothing affected me personally more than this story, here in the words of PM Netanyahu:

During this long night, we were required to make many difficult decisions. I would like to share with you one conversation from this night. On the line was Yonatan, the security officer of the Embassy. He and his men, six in number, were trapped in the Embassy building. The mob entered the building and entered the office. Only one door separated between the mob and Yonatan and his friends. He sounded perfectly calm to me, and on the other hand understood the situation in which he and his colleagues found themselves.

During the ongoing event, he requested from the security officer in the Foreign Ministry one thing: If something happens to me, he said, my parents should be notified face to face, and not by telephone. I got on the phone line and I said to him, “Yonatan, be strong. I promise you that the State of Israel will do everything in its power and will use all possible resources in the world in order to rescue you and your friends unharmed and whole from this situation.”

And thank God this morning they all landed in Israel. A short while ago I spoke with Yonatan and his mother. They sounded wonderful.

There is more than one story of what happened to Jews who were not so lucky. There was the lynching of the two reserve soldiers who accidentally drove into Ramallah (video here), and countless attempted murders in which Jewish Israelis were stoned or stabbed (horrifying video here).

Tobin - Egypt’s Rulers Are Letting the Mob Rule

Jonathan S. Tobin
Commentary/Contentions
10 September '11



http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/09/09/egypt-israel-embassy/#more-767350

Last month, the men who scaled the building housing the Israeli embassy in Cairo become national heroes in Egypt for tearing down the blue and white flag that flew over the site. Today (Friday/Shabbat), another mob stormed the site, tearing down the security wall erected to protect the diplomatic enclave. These demonstrations are indications not only of the hatred for any symbol of Israel in Egypt but the way in which the military government is allowing them to grow in scale.

While this may be defended as the regime merely allowing the mobs to vent their spleens in a harmless manner, the escalation of the violence may not be so easy to control.

For decades, the Mubarak regime kept the peace with Israel but allowed the Egyptian media to broadcast blatantly anti-Semitic propaganda in order to give Islamists and other critics of the government an outlet to vent their frustration. That created an unhealthy disconnect between policy and public opinion that took a cold peace and transformed it into one verging on open hostility after the fall of the dictator.

Egypt’s military knows very well the price of abandoning the peace with Israel would be disastrous. It would not only put their untested forces in harm’s way, but also take away the government’s pipeline of U.S. aid that the military prizes. They may believe allowing Islamist and nationalist agitators to besiege Israel’s embassy gives these haters a meaningless victory without doing any real damage to the country’s strategic needs. But as Mubarak learned to his cost, Cairo mobs sometimes take on a life of their own. Fueled by the hate that is part of the country’s popular culture, the impulse to demonize Israel and Jews can’t be quarantined. If left unchallenged, it will only grow and lead to worse things than a torn flag or a demolished security wall.

Egypt’s leaders need to counteract this trend before it gets even further out of control. And they need to be told bluntly by Washington that if they don’t, the flow of baksheesh into their coffers will soon end.

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Levick - Guardian report legitimizes mob attack on Israeli embassy in Egypt, which forced frantic evacuation of embassy staff

Adam Levick
CiF Watch
10 September '11




The facts of what occurred in Cairo today are not in dispute. The Israeli ambassador to Egypt, his family, staff, and their families, were frantically evacuated by the Egyptian military after a large mob, numbering in the thousands, stormed the embassy in an attempt to tear down the compound’s security wall and break into the building.

After demonstrators penetrated the tower block housing the mission, some of the six-member staff on overnight security detail reportedly phoned Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to explain that they feared for their lives and asked him to pass farewells to their families.

After appeals by Netanyahu to Cairo’s interim military rulers and the Obama administration, Egyptian security forces extracted the guards before dawn. Another Netanyahu aide said the Israelis’ heads were covered to throw off the crowds.

Israel had earlier sent a military plane to evacuate its ambassador, Yitzhak Levanon, and about 80 staff and families. A second aircraft brought the six guards “safe and sound” to Israel, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.

However, the manner in which the Guardian covered the incident speaks volumes about their seeming inability to frame any violence perpetrated against Israelis as anything other than an understandable response to Israeli villainy.

Their report, Israel evacuates ambassador to Egypt after embassy attack, David Batty, Guardian, Sept. 10 contextualized the violence by describing, as the source of mob anger, the six Egyptian security personnel killed in the crossfire which occurred as Israeli forces pursued the gunmen involved in the Aug. 18th terrorist attack near Eilat.

Batty failed to note that eight Israelis, including six civilians, were killed (and 40 injured) in the series of coordinated attacks launched from Gaza via the Sinai Peninsula.

Indeed, reports by both the IDF and the Egyptian army following the incident suggest that the IDF did everything in its power to prevent Egyptian troops from getting hurt during their pursuit of the terrorists. The IDF also found that at least three of the terrorists were Egyptian citizens.

(Read full "Guardian report legitimizes mob attack on Israeli embassy in Egypt")


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