Quote Originally Posted by Cole View Post
Allegations. Can you prove there were not Hezbollah agents or Muslim brotherhood instigators?
Actually yes. It took me a while, but I even found an online report of the same event on the website of The Guardian:

Specifically:
8.03pm GMT: Ahdaf Soueif emails from Cairo:

A good friend just saw 8 to 12 people being dragged out of No 1 Souq el-Tawfikiyyah St and bundled into a civilian micro-bus while a military police vehicle waited nearby. The people were being beaten and the street had been told they were "Iranian and Hamas agents come to destabilise Egypt" so the street was chanting against them.

No 1 Souq el-Tawfikiyyah St is the home of the offices of The Hisham Mubarak Legal Aid Centre, The Centre for Social and Economic Rights and The 6th April Youth.

The Hisham Mubarak centre is a partner of Oxfam International, which has put out a statement:

The offices of two Egyptian human rights organisations in Cairo supported by Oxfam in Cairo have been attacked today and several staff members arrested by the Military Police.

The offices of Hisham Mubarak Law Center and the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights were raided at 14:30 and eight people were arrested including both directors, Ahmed Seif, director of the Hisham Mubarak Law Center and Khaled Ali, director of the Center for Economic and Social Rights.

They have been taken to an unknown location in Cairo.

Catherine Essoyan, Oxfam Regional Manager for the Middle East and Maghreb:

"We are extremely worried about the fate of these human rights defenders who have been providing critical legal aid and support to their people over the past days of protest. We deplore this assault against Egyptian civil society organisations dedicated to promoting respect for the rule of law. We call for the safe and immediate release of those detained."
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I read that many folks with closely cropped beards (supposedly characteristic of that group) were up front throwing rocks.
Frankly speaking: are there Islamist extremists on the streets of Egypt, participating in the protests? Yes, no doubt, there are.

Do they or other Islamist extremists work behind the scenes, seeking a way to take advantage of this crisis? Yes, no doubt, they do.

This is as indisputable as that the sun is going up in (what we call) the East, and down in the West.

But... how many of them are out there, how influential they really are, what are they able of really doing, what are they eventually going to do, and - first and foremost - are they going to prove capable of taking over entire Egypt once this brawl is over...?

Well, sorry, but the matter of fact is: nobody can say for sure. Means: we don't know.

The reason we don't know is that there is a brutal dictatorship in Egypt, controlling the media and feeding us "news" at its own discretion. Between these news is the idea that the Brotherhood is ah so powerful, that without this dictatorship in place we all - but Israel as first - are in jeopardy of being blown away. And, this stance of that dictatorship is supported by all the possible talkingheads between Tel Aviv and Washington DC.

So, we have a guess, but don't really know whether this is going to happen.

As a "convinced and practicing pluralist", I simply can't find this satisfactory. That's why my standpoint is: when you're in doubt and have no clue what to do, stick to the two most basic rules. The Rule No.1. says: personal freedoms, pluralism and democracy first. And the Rule No.2 says: if in doubt, see rule No.1.

Not sure $20 bucks is much motivation to get beat up...unless your job is at risk and you are broke because the banks are closed, and you feel like kicking troublemaker booty anyway. Just can't picture guys paying tens of thousands of thugs and nobody saw it.
Again: there is no trace of evidence for "spontaneous" pro-Mubarak demonstrations.

That aside, well, the Ministry of Interior pays some 390.000 of thugs of the Central Security Force alone (the black-clad Father Mubarak's "Basiji" we've seen in the first days of the unrest), plus another 60.000 of the National Guard (responsible for the protection of the royal palace, between others) - and thus there is plenty of choice. That aside, in a country where average monthly income ranges between US$ 100 and 150, 20 bucks is "plenty of money" (oh, and I do recall several inmates on deathrow in various US prisons, sitting there for murdering people for less than 20 bucks).

Or a series of overzealous officials screwed up trying to please the boss (or hang onto their job) and now find themselves under house arrest.
I doubt this. Available indications point at the fact that all that is currently undertaken by Mubarak is nothing else but his regime launching it's efforts to do "yesterday" (to paraphraze Robin Gibbs) what it planned to do in period September-November this year any way.

The current flow of Mubarak's (re)actions actually follows much of what's been anticipated already since years. The only difference is that it became easier to expose his lies. When Mubarak fired the old government and appointed Soleiman as VP, he did not do something that was "new", or "unexpected", and even less so did he do that in reaction to the protests. He did something that has been expected since years. See Egypt's Next Strongman as example.

When, in the interview with Amanpour/ABC, aired yesterday, he stated he's "fed up" with politics and power, he was lying: back in 1981, immediately after climbing to power, Mubarak explained he's going to run for only one term (sorry, no citate here; there was no internet in 1981). So, another lie.

Finally, if this report - Mubarak's Last Gasps - is to be trusted, there are no "overzealous officers", but the Mubarak's clique (including his new Minister of Interior, Gen Waqdy) acts at least in agreement with him, if not on his own orders.