Egypt is going through what may be the most serious crisis since the overthrow of the Mubarak regime. At its heart is the decision by its Muslim Brotherhood-aligned president, Mohammed Morsi, to issue a decree that shelters his actions from judicial review, effectively giving him more power than his predecessor had. Denounced as a latter-day […]
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The 193-nation U.N. General Assembly on Thursday overwhelmingly approved the de facto recognition of the sovereign state of Palestine after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on the world body to issue its long overdue “birth certificate.” The U.N. victory for the Palestinians was a diplomatic setback for the United States and Israel, which were joined […]
Tens of thousands of Egyptians rallied on Tuesday against President Mohamed Mursi in one of the biggest outpourings of protest since Hosni Mubarak‘s overthrow, accusing the Islamist leader of seeking to impose a new era of autocracy. Police fired tear gas at stone-throwing youths in streets near the main protest in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, heart […]
Political turmoil in Egypt entered its fourth day Monday, after President Mohammed Morsi’s surprise power-grabbing decree galvanized the opposition and set off rounds of street violence, at a time when the nation needs unity to make difficult economic decisions. Egypt’s economy was already in trouble, with foreign reserves having fallen 40 percent since the uprising […]
The diplomatic activities under the current Gaza cease-fire will test whether a quintet of leaders — each with his own domestic critics — can find a peaceful rather than a military solution to solve the Palestinian situation. The cease-fire language was direct but ambiguous: “Israel should stop all hostilities in the Gaza Strip by land, sea […]
Over the decades Turkey has dictated its Middle Eastern relations based on opportunities presented by shifts in the regional balance of power. In the early 1990s up until around 2006, Turkey was finely enmeshed in Western sentiments and policies. But beginning in 2006 it recognized a leadership vacuum in the Middle East and began attempting […]
Egypt’s president decreed his decisions are above review and ordered the retrial of former regime officials ahead of a planned mass protest against the Islamist-led government today in Cairo. Mohamed Mursi’s decisions, which included firing the prosecutor-general and protecting a disputed constitutional committee from legal challenges, come after four days of violent demonstrations in the […]
Mediating the Gaza truce was a bravura diplomatic performance by Egypt’s new President Mohamed Mursi, jacking up his personal stature and reassuring an anxious Washington that the architecture of Middle East peace can survive the Arab Spring. For nearly two years, Washington has fretted over what would happen in a major showdown between Israel and the Palestinians […]
