'Just World News' with Helena Cobban

Tactical deployment of Muslim prayer in nonviolence

Yesterday I tweeted (@justworldbooks) about this amazing, 9-minute video clip from the Egyptian paper Al-Masry al-Yawm, which shows the large-scale confrontation across, I think, the broad expanse of Qasr al-Nil bridge on, I think, Saturday. It is shot from high up, and with some amazing lenses that on occasion give amazing close-ups. There are also some shots taken from ground-level, particularly at the end.

Go and look at the whole thing if you possibly can. You see unarmed, unprotected protesters coming from the left-hand side of the bridge, being met by heavily protected Amn al-Merkezi (Central Security) phalanxes coming in from the right. The Amn people are supported by a few of their large, very well-protected (light-armored?) people-carriers, which careen toward the protesters and then slew around in their midst, scattering those they run into (and running right over more than a few) before they bumble back to their own lines.

The 'frontline' on the bridge shifts back and forth throughout the footage. First the protesters have the advantage, then the Amn.

But watch what happens for the half-minute from about 3:40 on. The protesters are right up against the Amn lines, on the 'near" side of the bridge. The Amn bring up a couple of their very powerful water-hose trucks to try to break the protesters' line. The protesters form into tight prayer lines and there, while being repeatedly basted by the ice-cold water from the trucks, they perform an afternoon prayer. One man in a white gellabiyeh has gone out in front of them to lead the prayer.

He-- and all of them-- have the amazing courage of "Tienanmen Square man". But they are not acting individually. They are acting in a very deliberate, corporate, and disciplined manner.

I think I understand what they were doing. Engaging systematically in familiar, small actions can be a great way to calm panic and collect your thoughts. (Ask any woman who's ever done natural childbirth; or the protesters in the U.S.'s own civil rights movement who sang hymns to calm themselves in the face of the attack dogs.) And there is no doubt in my mind but that performing corporate prayer is something these protesters are very familiar with. It does, after all, take quite a bit of practice to know "almost instinctively" how to form up into those lines without pushing or shoving, and while focusing on the rhythms of the prayer actions.

But I think this collective prayer action also had a couple of other effects. It held the line of physical space for the protesters on the bridge. It also, quite likely, served as a simple but powerful reproach to the water-cannon shooters. "Here we are, on this bridge, praying. Are you truly going to continue to blast as with water as if we were dirt?"

Well, I don't pretend to read the minds of the water-cannon shooters. But what was evident, by the end of the clip, was that the protesters had "won" the Battle of of the Bridge and had pushed the Amn people away from it. Using disciplined, nonviolent mass action.

And then what did they do after they had won? You'll have to watch to the end of the clip to see... (Or maybe you can guess.)

Cairo, Washington, etc

Issandr's reporting and analysis, now that he's back in Garden City from his brief stay in Tunis, has been extraordinary. He is The Man!

Earlier today:

We have army and republican guard units in central Cairo, but I am not sure what the current military chain of command is. Last night Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces Sami Enan flew back from Washington, it's not clear whether his role is the same. As expected, coup-proofing measures are in place.

The hyper-caution and concern of the Americans was evident in the statements last night. They are potential kingmakers but appear terrified of acting before having a better understanding of the situation on the ground. I thought Mubarak's speech was in large part directed at them, touching on all State's and White House's talking points: freedom of expression but responsibility not to use violence, making still uncertain concessions. At this point there will be a natural tension among Egyptians between those who are terrified (my middle class Egyptian neighbors are panicking) and those who are angry Mubarak is still there. More protests expected later today, situation may turn violent again. We just don't know at this point, and having just experienced the uncertainty of post-revolutionary moments in Tunisia, I expect the situation and public mood will be extremely volatile, changing hour to hour between the desire to restore order and the realization that they may be tantalizingly close to the regime change they were clamoring for.

Issandr is also completely right to allude to the "class" aspects of the uprising. Egypt has HUGE economic disparities among its citizens-- much greater than Tunisia, Jordan, or any other Arab country, I think. Plus, very deeply entrenched habits of upper-class disdain for working people. In any situation of breakdown of law and order, the long marginalized "mob" always threatens to intervene. I reported on it during the bread riots of January 1977. Some Mubarakist diehards may try to organize strands of the mob to pursue the kind of "delugist" (as in, apres moi le deluge), scorched-earth policy that we saw some of Ben Ali's Repub Guard trying to organize in Tunis. And indeed, Jonathan Wright was reporting from Cairo back on Thursday that the "baltagiyeh" thugs frequently used by the govt in the past to beat up demonstrators were being given some visible support by elements of the security forces in some corners of town.

However, the MB and most of the other political forces seem very aware of the risk of the uprising getting hijacked by a "mob" (organized or spontaneous) in this way; and from the beginning there have been thousands of informal "stewards" of the movement publicly and continuously urging "calm and good morals".

Here was Issandr's report from later today:

A lot of reports of looting and attacks on civilians by mobs. The Carrefour supermarket in Maadi is burning and looters have been shot by the army. Tonight might be dangerous in areas.

Again, that being said, the vast, vast majority of protestors are peaceful people, mostly middle class, and they are showing great solidarity. People are still defending the Egyptian Museum. Volunteers are cleaning the streets and helping fireman. There is a great sense of civic duty out there, and great sadness at the looting and crime (which is being mostly blamed on police and baltaguia).

I concur with Issandr that the spirit of solidarity and camaraderie was extraordinary. People shared everything -- water, cigarettes, onions (for tear gas) and information. Largely there was also an amazing discipline and restraint. Whenever violence against public property looked imminent or people were about to throw rocks, others would chant 'silmiya, silmiya' (peaceful, peaceful) or 'No to violence'. I know there has been some looting here and there but in some eight hours on the street yesterday I saw none, despite ample opportunities. The bravery of those who have been on the frontlines has also been extraordinary and I hope they one day they receive the credit they are due. The youngsters really are a very diverse crowd but yesterday evening, on a street corner in the eery halflight, I overheard a well-informed debate between a group of some seven or eight over who should replace Mubarak. Two of them favoured Mohamed ElBaradei as a transitional leader, but the others were less sympathetic. The most assertive man in the crowd said ElBaradei was part of the establishment and the country needed 'new blood'.

Threat of sabotage & Islamophobia re Egypt

As Pres. mubarak desperately hangs onto his last threads of power, he and the many Egyptian and international forces who have supported him can be expected to engage in damaging sabotage and 'delugeism'-- and of course, also to try to stir up in the west the ever-lurking tides of Islamophobia.

In this regard, we all need to learn a lot, very quickly, about the positions and history of Egypt's large Muslim Brotherhood movement. I don't have normal internet access right now, or else I could delve into the JWN archives here and bring out some of the reporting I've done on the movement. (feel free to do so yourselves.) The MB's own websites, in English and Arabic, would be another obvious resource, though they are largely disabled right now. I did however find this interesting article on the Ikhwanweb site, dating from last summer. It's a discussion of the MB's views on democracy.

More later. I'm writing this on a an iPad. Not easy!

Obama's know-nothings discuss Egypt

Via TPM's intriguing new "Egypt wire", this:

President Obama was reportedly briefed for 40 minutes on the situation in Egypt today. Here, a photo of his meeting with National Security Advisor Tom Donilon; Chief of Staff Bill Daley; Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communication Ben Rhodes; Tony Blinken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President; National Security Council Chief of Staff Denis McDonough; John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism; and Robert Cardillo, Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Intelligence Integration.

So thorough-going has been the witch-hunt that AIPAC and its attack dogs have conducted over the past 25 years against anyone with real Middle East expertise that the U.S. government now contains no-one at the higher (or even mid-career) levels of policymaking who has any in-depth understanding of the region or of the aspirations of its people.

The campaign against anyone with regional expertise-- the so-called "State Department Arabists"-- was launched in the public sphere by the dreadful know-nothing Robert Kaplan, in the 1980s. It got a strong foothold throughout the federal bureaucracy-- and far more broadly than in just the State department-- with the arrival of Pres. Clinton in 1993. Clinton, that is, who brought along as his key advisers on the affairs of the whole region the two long-time pro-Israel activists Dennis Ross and Martin Indyk! Then, of course, under GWB, we had Elliott Abrams and rest of the neocons running regional affairs for the government.

And what was happening inside the State Department during all those years? Only hacks like Jeffrey Feltman or Donald Blome-- the list is endless... -- who could prove their unswerving loyalty to the pro-Israel agenda got promoted or retained. Throughout those 16 years of the Clinton and GWB presidencies, a generation of career diplomats grew up whose main mantra was to do nothing that might question or even upset Israel. (There were, of course, those heroic few who questioned the prevailing, AIPAC-fueled "wisdom" on the advisability of invading Iraq in 2003, who resigned their posts at the time.)

So now, in the Oval Office, we have the blind leading the blind and the blind advising the blind. No Chas Freeman, no Bill Quandt, no Rob Malley... (The list of those excluded on ideological grounds is pretty long, too.) No-one, in short, who can integrate into the advice the President desperately needs to hear any real understanding of how the peoples of the region think and how the regional system actually works. God save us all from their self-inflicted ignorance.

Note on the term 'imperium'

A friend asked why I used that term in my big post yesterday. It was a semi-conscious reference to the (heavily British-dominated) "Anglo-Egyptian Condominum" that controlled the governance of Sudan from 1899 through 1956.

Of course, if you want to look at the many woes assailing the people of Sudan today, you cannot ignore the contribution made by that earlier (and very long-lasting) British imperial intervention in the country's affairs.

Maybe I should have called the Israeli-US order in the area surrounding Israel as a condominium, not an imperium. But in the U.S. today, "condominium" is simply a kind of property-owning and -management relationship that is very common and generally very desirable. So I thought "imperium" carried more of the tone I wanted to give this concept.

Wiklileaks, Egypt

Is here. H/T Adam Horowitz.

I hope some JWN readers have time to peruse and post highlights (with links) in the comments section here? Sadly, I don't. Got a publishing business to run...

Jonathan Wright's great reporting from Cairo

I learned from Issandr that Jonathan Wright, former long-time Reuters newsman now living and working in Cairo as a translator (hey, we former Reuters people end up doing the darnedest things!), has now gotten a return of the journo-adrenalin itch and has started a blog.

Excellent, well-informed stuff.

This, today, on the role of the MB in the protests so far:

From my own experience on the streets (see my earlier reports passim), I believe people are underestimating the level of participation by members of the Brotherhood, though I will readily concede that they have not taken part at full strength and at a level which reflects their demographic weight. There are several possible and obvious reasons for this...

I'm not going to venture a guess at the level of Muslim Brotherhood participation but, judging from my chance encounters with protesters, any assertion that the movement is absent or very thinly represented is probably wishful thinking. By the way, many Brothers are clean-shaven, wear suits and ties and are physically indistinguishable from other Egyptians of the same class.

I ended up in the lanes because riot police were firing tear gas canisters and other unidentified projectiles along 26th July Street, apparently in response to a small group of protesters who were throwing rocks at them. The lanes gave some shelter from the gas. The group of protesters, who numbered no more than 200 (there were other groups elsewhere in the city), were clearly outsiders, wealthier and better educated than the local inhabitants. Their main chants were political - "Al-sha3b yuriid isqaat an-nizaam" (The people ... want .. the overthrow ... of the regime - an echo of the similar chant now current in Tunisia). But what struck me most was the evident solidarity of the local people with the protesters and the possibility that at some point the local people too might might come out on the streets. If that happened, the government would be hard-pressed to disperse them by their current methods. The riot police would be overwhelmed and many of the police conscripts (they come largely from among the poorest of the rural poor) would defect or disperse. Without seeing these slum areas at first hand, it's hard to imagine how many tens of thousands of people live there. The population density is comparable to that in Gamalia on the northeast edge of the old city, where there are up to 80,000 people to the square kilometre. The lanes were teeming like an ants' nest and the mood was electric. I asked a random selection of about 15 people where their sympathies lay - with the government (as they called the riot police) or the shabab (youth, as they called the protesters)? With one exception (a man who said he was neutral), everyone said they wanted President Hosni Mubarak to go. This time only handfuls of them did appear to join in, but I judged they were fairly close to the tipping point.

For the first time ever I noticed some of [the baltagiya] trying on new helmets they had just been issued, and a separate group elsewhere even had riot police shields, though still in plain clothes. The government habitually uses these baltagiya to beat up individually targetted protesters. The logic, I assume, is that if anyone publishes photographs of them in action, then the authorities can dismiss the incident as a brawl between civilians.

Anyway, Jonathan, welcome to the blogosphere!

Update: More Wright, from Tuesday:

The Muslim Brotherhood, which did not fully endorse the protest but allowed young member to go, was in fact very much in evidence and I saw several Brotherhood members acting as 'stewards'. When stone-throwing broke out, a group of Muslim Brothers started chanting 'Silmiya, silmiya" (Keep it peaceful).

Agents provocateurs in Cairo?

Issandr's reporting on this from 1 a.m. Friday Cairo time is very worrying:

I have received eyewitness reports from three people that Central Security Forces (the riot control police) are pulling out of multiple locations in Cairo. Plainclothes security has been seen at various locations pouring gasoline on vehicles and setting them on fire, also trying to burn storefronts in the following Downtown Cairo locations:

* Falaki Square
* Omraneya
* Near the American University in Cairo

Earlier in the day, I received an eyewitness report from a friend in Downtown Cairo (near Champollion Street) that policemen were loading vans with clubs, nails, metal bars and other objects that could be used as weapons by Baltaguiya, the hired thugs sometimes used by police to attack protestors.

Egypt's MB joining protest tomorrow. End of US-Israel imperium in ME?

Today, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt announced their decision to join the mass protest in the country tomorrow. (That's #jan28 in Tweetspeak.) This is huge. The MB is far and away the largest force in Egypt's opposition. It has pursued a determinedly nonviolent path for nearly 30 years now-- though that has not prevented the Mubarak regime from engaging in a sustained campaign of often horrendously abusive repression against its leaders and many of its cadres. The MB's leaders have responded to the repression by sticking to a political course that is very conservative and non-confrontational. Often, in recent years, they have been criticized by members of other movements or even younger members of their own for not joining in or giving any support to the various waves of street protests or labor activity that have erupted around the country.

But now, they are joining in. This could very well mean the end of the Mubarak regime. Which has, of course, been the central pillar of the US-Israeli imperium in the region ever since the 1979 signing of the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.

I do not rule out the possibility that Mubarak and his people may try to cut a last-minute deal with the MB, in a last attempt to avoid the humiliating fate of his Tunisian friend, former Pres. Z. ben Ali. Or, that the MB's leaders may be open to such a deal. Actually, I think the MB would be more open to discussing such a deal than Mubarak would be, to offering it. After all, for the guy who has been Pharaoh of all the Egyptians for 30 years now, and whose family and hangers-on have all profited very nicely thank-you from their control of the country's economy, the idea of cutting a deal with these stern and powerful contenders for power must seem very threatening. Perhaps just flying to Saudi Arabia or Morocco while sending his son to watch over the bank accounts in Zurich would seem more attractive for an old guy now certainly ready to enjoy his "retirement"?

He and his American advisers probably have a few other ideas and/or tricks up their sleeves.

For now, the word from Washington seems-- realistically-- to be one of trying to urge Mubarak's security forces not to use live fire against the protesters. That is certainly very welcome.

I imagine that Mubarak, the Americans, and maybe even the Israelis have networks inside Egyptian society that they might be tempted to activate, to act as agents provocateurs and undertake those kinds of acts that might, in the view of some, "justify" an escalation in the use of force by the Amn al-Merkezi riot police-- or even, the intervention of the army.

It is not entirely clear, though, that in a situation of massive unrest, the regime could rely on the army.

Also, the acts of agents provocateurs can only really be successful in a situation where the opposition is ill-organized and/or lacks discipline. If the MB does bring its heft onto the streets tomorrow, they will bring correspondingly massive amounts of organization and discipline.

* * *

What changes might we see if an MB-dominated or heavily MB-influenced government emerges in Cairo? Would such a government "immediately" revoke the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty of 1979-- a step that has been part of the MB's political program, ever since the program was first promulgated? Not necessarily. But the Cairo government's policy on all (other) matters Palestinian would be very different from today. No longer would it merely act as the cat's-paw of Israel and Washington in repressing Gaza, supporting a broad range of activities to undercut and destroy Hamas, and staying quite silent internationally on Israel's many gross transgressions in the OPTs.

But (gasp!) such a deviation from the US-Israeli line might result-- almost certainly would result-- in the US Congress cutting off the $2.3 billion $1.55 billion in aid that it sends to Egypt every year! Big deal. The vast majority of that aid never benefitted real Egyptians. Instead, it went to prop up the very same security forces whose main purpose has been to oppress them.

* * *

By the way, the MB in Jordan is also calling for its supporters to participate in the popular protests there, after Friday prayers tomorrow. And Mahmoud Abbas is on the ropes. Good luck, Israel's "peace partners" in the region, eh?

* * *

I do not expect the US-Israeli imperium that has held sway over the whole of the Mashreq (Arab east) region-- with the exception of Syria-- for the past 40 years to disappear quickly, easily, or without putting up a fight. But after watching the region fairly closely for all these years I find the hollowness of the imperium now that it is being challenged to be quite notable.

There is an important confluence of events right now:

* The US's so-called "peace process", that has been the cover and excuse for all sorts of misdeeds for most of the past 40 years, has now been revealed as consisting, over the past 15-plus years, only of a US attempt to support Israel in all its ventures, including its colonial aggrandizement and its systematic use of repression in the OPTs, and its recourse to periodic wars of aggression against its neighbors. Ever since the killing of Rabin in 1995 (and perhaps before then) there has been no peace in the peace "process." That has been made clear for all to see.

* The degree of over-reach of the US military both within the Middle East and in Afghanistan has been made clear for all to see, both in the region and beyond it. As I (but woefully few other Americans) argued forcefully back in 2002 and early 2003, Pres. Bush's decision to wilfully and quite unjustifiedly invade Iraq was a "bridge too far" for the country. It brought about a situation in which our country is now financially in a deep, deep hole; in which the credibility of US commitments to international law or values such as respect for national independence and the "consent of the governed" were speedily revealed as hollow; and even the ability of the US "model" to bring about fair and accountable governance was shown to be nonexistent... All this, at the cost of the enormous hardships and cruelty visited upon the Iraqi people.

* And then, finally, there is the "new" media. As I have remarked numerous times before, the development of border-crossing means of direct communication and the inability of the imperial governors to completely monopolize the discourse nationally or internationally means that the 21st century is very different from the heyday of imperialism back in the 19th century.

I think this also needs underlining: the degree to which today, in 2011, the United States is incapable of offering any kind of an attractive "model" to the peoples of the Arab world. For a long time, prior to 1970, the U.S. did offer such a model. It presented itself as-- and was widely seen in the region as-- anti-colonialist, a supporter of national liberation movements, generous, good at solving the problems of socio-economic development, the author of good ideas on tricky issues of political accountability and good governance, an upholder of human rights, etc.

No longer. (See "Iraq", above.)

* * *

Another, albeit minor, aspect of the imperium's current hollowness is the absence from the scene of the third significant Arab pillar of it: Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia's diplomacy has always had an episodic, slightly elusive quality. But at some stages it has played a significant role: in supporting the US war against the Soviets in Afghanistan; in brokering the Taef Agreement for Lebanon in 1989; in spearheading the Arab Peace Peace Plan offer to Israel, of 2002...

Well, that last one got speedily broken off at the knees by the imperium, didn't it?

And now, where are the Saudis? Can the monarch not be persuaded to intervene (somehow!) and deploy some of his billions to try to "save" the Mubarak or Hashemite regimes?

No, for a number of reasons. First, since the king and crown prince have both suddenly run up against the limits of medical and organ-replacement technology, the princes are all in the middle of their own succession struggle. Second, quite a lot of them-- probably, the majority-- are so alienated from Washington by its clear Zionist tilt over recent years that they would not be inclined to help even if there were no succession struggle to attend to. Third-- what plan is it they would be supposed to be supporting, anyway?? There is no discernible plan.

* * *

What happens to Israel if the "shield" that Mubarak, the Jordanian king, and Mahmoud Abbas have all provided to it for so long suddenly disappears?

That is a big question. It is very, very far from being the only big question-- or even, the biggest of the many questions that are out there.

After all, the US's sway over most of the Middle East until now has been a huge factor contributing to the US's worldwide political position. Because of this, the rapid retraction of US power from the Middle East that we will be seeing over the coming two years will certainly have ramifications for US power at the global level.

I shall engage here in three seconds of sympathy for Pres. Obama. I mean, how unfair is it that he gets to be the president who has to preside over a retraction of US power spurred to a large degree by the decision his predecessor made in 2002-03 to launch a war that Obama himself clearly opposed at that time?

On the other hand, Obama did not have to continue and indeed intensify the clear pro-Zionist partisanship that GWB (and before him, Clinton) had manifested-- which is what he did. That was a choice Obama made. He could have made different-- and much, much wiser-- choices on the core issues regarding the Palestine Question. He could have reframed the issue from the beginning as one of fairness, decency, human rights, and international law-- and he could have spoken seriously and directly to the American people, using the unique "bully pulpit" that the presidency provides, about the need for our country to pursue a policy based on these important values. But no. He chose not to do that. Instead, he simply caved to the very short-term, myopic, Rahm Emanuel/Dennis Ross view that he needed above all to appease the always insatiable attack dogs (both Jewish and Christian) of pro-Israeli activism within this country.

So that pro-Zionist partisanship is now majorly helping to drag our country down. So be it. Let all Americans know and understand what is happening, and what gross follies (if not, crimes) have been committed by our leaders in the region, in our name.

* * *

There will be major change in the Middle East. Though the US-Israeli imperium may find a way to survive in the region beyond tomorrow (#jan28), there is no way it can survive in its present form beyond the end of 2012.

And you know what? That will be a good thing for the vast majority of Americans and our country as a whole. After the imperium is brought to an end, it will be a whole lot easier for Americans to have good relations with both Israelis and the peoples of the Arab world-- and they, with us-- than it has been for the past 15 years. Ending the imperium is not a recipe for any kind of "clash of civilizations". It is, rather, an essential prerequisite for being able to build a decent relationship based on fairness, mutual respect, and shared commitment to the values that all of us hold dear.

Arab world waking from 40-year sleep?

The Arab world has been in a state of increasing ossification ever since I started following its affairs closely in 1970. That was the year that King Hussein beat back the Palestinian-radical challenge to his regime in Jordan, and that Egypt's President Jamal Abdel-Nasser died. Also, the year that Hafez al-Asad's relatively conservative "Corrective movement" seized power from its more radical Baathist colleagues in Damascus.

1970 was also the year that-- in line with the plans announced in the wake of the debacle at Suez 14 years earlier-- the British navy finally withdrew from the positions it had long held "East of Suez."

We can therefore say that 1970 was the year the British handed over the baton of "dominant western power" in the Middle East, to Washington. Washington's power became considerably strengthened when Nasser's successor, Anwar al-Sadat, made a strategic shift over from the pro-Soviet to the pro-American camp in 1972. (Kissinger was slow to understand what Sadat was doing. If he had understood, Sadat's attention-grabbing move of undertaking the 1973 war-- with its clearly defined aim of starting peace negotiations with Israel in earnest-- could have been avoided.)

So now, let's go to Liberation Square in downtown Cairo. Right now! With this livestreamed filming of what's happening there.

This has to be a short blog post. But I want to list the many places in the long US-dominated Middle east in which US power is right now eroding:

In Egypt, the long-entrenched, US-backed-to-the-repressive-hilt Mubarak regime is facing one of the most serious challenges yet to its control.

In Tunisia, the long-entrenched, strongly US-backed Ben Ali regime is history, and citizens on the streets and in their gathering places are right now determining how their country will governed in the future.

In Lebanon, Hizbullah and its allies-- who span all the country's different religious groups-- today succeeded in having their candidate, Najib Mikati, named as the next Prime Minister. The pundits at the NYT might huff and puff (and the news editors give massive amounts of space to reporting on how Israel views matters in Lebanon-- much more, I think, than they have ever given to how Lebanese people view matter in Israel!) But this is what has happened. And though notable Israeli securocrat Giora Eiland warned yesterday that "Now all of Lebanon looks like Hizbullah, and could therefore be a legitimate target for Israeli attack"-- Well, Israel and whose political support is going to undertake such an attack? (The ambitious young US military analyst Andrew Exum parroted Eland's argument today. Quite without thinking through the many changes in the M.E. region between Israel's last attack on Lebanon in 2006, and today. Also, back in 2006, did Hizbullah's much greater distance from the halls of power in Beirut's Serail save the country from massive devastation by the Israeli air force? It did not.)

In Palestine, Abu Mazen and his long-entrenched, strongly US-backed "PA" regime are buckling under the facts of its complete failure in its pursuit of diplomacy with Israel and its failure to protect East Jerusalem and other occupied Palestinian land from the depradations of Israel's continuing colonial juggernaut-- as well as under the clear revelation of those facts through the most recent "Palestine Papers" distribution.

In Lebanon, it was the Saudi monarch's stalwart support of Saad Hariri, and his equally stalwart opposition to the government in Damascus, that sustained (financially and in other ways) the whole anti-Syria, anti-Hizbullah, and "March 14" phenomenon from 2004 until the Doha summit in 2008. And this time around, when Hariri desperately sought the support of King Abdullah in New York, instead of giving him what he sought, Abdullah checked out of playing any continuing active role in the negotiations over Lebanon. So when I say Saudi Arabia is the "dog that isn't barking" this is not a comment on the absence of popular protest in Saudi Arabia (which may or may not be happening; but it isn't being reported at this point.) It's a comment on the fact that Saudi diplomacy is playing no discernible role these days in trying to prop up the pro-U.S. order of which it has for so long been a key pillar.

The Saudi princes are, anyway, locked (as Ben Ali, Mubarak, and so many of the Arab world's other fairly ossified, US-backed leaders have been) into the long, slow dance of a succession struggle. Quite likely, as the 40-plus princely lines that descended from King Abdul-Aziz negotiate with each other over how the succession (and all those fabulous bennies from ruling Saudi Arabia!) will be decided once the present, very aged King and Crown Prince both totter from the stage, they have little mental bandwidth to pay much attention to anything else outside Riyadh. But I suspect other factors are at play, too; not least, a deep disgust with the effect that 40 years of U.S. domination of the laughably misnamed "peace process" has now so evidently had on the situation in their beloved Jerusalem, and therefore, a mounting disgust with U.S. diplomacy itself.

Well, I shan't spend too much time here trying to read the motivations of the Saudi princes. Too much of great interest is happening in the Middle East today.

Today!

Of course there is no clear picture of where all the present developments will lead. They may or may not topple additional regimes, in addition to those in Tunis and Beirut. We still have no idea how Israel and a long deeply Israel-influenced regime in Washington will react. With or without Israeli or U.S. intervention, we still have no idea at all of the future directions that any "post-American" regimes in the region may take.

But something big is stirring in the Arab world. Thus far, it has been overwhelmingly peaceable, and overwhelmingly based on mass civilian organizing. Those two features of the movement need to be guarded closely.