Does the Saudi regime (the mastermind of the counter-revolution) think it’s a beacon of freedom, democracy, human rights, and religious tolerance to offer such words? I mean, it’s an utter joke for the Saudi authorities, the most brutal and sectarian regime in the Middle East, to condemn church burnings in Egypt when it is guilty of razing Shi’i mosques to the ground in Bahrain.
AlMasry AlYoum: The government of Saudi Arabia on Monday condemned the sectarian violence that took place in Imbaba on Saturday evening. The violence led to the death of 12 people and the injury of about 250 others.
In a statement following the Saudi cabinet’s weekly session, which is chaired by King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, the Saudi Minister of Culture and Information Abdul Aziz Khoja said, “The cabinet condemns the burning of churches and the sectarian violence in the district of Imbaba in Egypt.â€
Did you know GCC invited Jordan and Morroco to join the Persian Gulf security group? This is the beginning of a Sunni bloc against Iran on the one hand. On the other, there are attempts to weaken Iran’s position in the region as arms and fighters flow to Syria. Maleki announced he will hold talks with Parliament to see if US presence would be extended in “new” deal.
Dan Cooper
People in the U.S. and around the world have broad sympathy for the popular demonstrations taking place in the Middle East. All the uprisings, however, are not necessarily the same.
Protests against Western client regimes, such as those in Egypt and Tunisia that have so severely squeezed the workers, have the potential to liberate the people from crushing poverty and repression. However, the situations in Libya and Syria are somewhat different.
http://www.workers.org/2011/world/syria_0519/
These governments, though certainly flawed, have been targets of U.S. destabilization efforts for decades because they have taken positions independent from Washington. The Western powers, led by the U.S., are trying to take advantage of the wave of protests in the region to intervene in Libya and Syria in order to make these countries captives of Western colonialism and reduce the workers there to day laborers for imperialism.
Contrast this to Bahrain and Yemen, both ruled by U.S. client regimes long alienated from the workers who live and work there. These regimes have fired upon, arrested and tortured demonstrators. Yet neither country has been declared a no-fly zone, and neither government has been the object of sanctions. In Libya, however, the West’s “humanitarian intervention†to “protect civilians†has meant six weeks of bombing that has destroyed much of the country’s civilian infrastructure.
Now the same Western powers bombing Libya are threatening Syria, the sole remaining independent secular state in the Arab world. Both the U.S. and the Economic Union have imposed sanctions on Syrian government officials. Why?
For one thing, Washington is trying to break up the strategic progressive alliance between Syria and Iran. It is also trying to stop the crucial support Syria gives to Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas on the West Bank. To do this, U.S. finance capital seeks to destabilize Syria, destroy its sovereignty and bring it back into the imperialist orbit.