Egypt: did Morsi lose the support of the Army for his plans to attack Syria and Ethiopia?

That's what Press TV and some other media say, echoing an analysis issued first by the Washington Post.

The combination of Morsi’s aggressive designs against Syria, together with some trial balloons from presidential circles about a possible conflict with Ethiopia, plus the massive anti-Morsi demonstrations organized by the National Salvation Front and the Tamarod movement, convinced military leaders that the incompetent and erratic Morsi, who had destroyed his own popularity by selling out to the demands of the International Monetary Fund last November, represented an intolerable risk for Egypt.

According to the Washington Post, the dissatisfaction of the Egyptian military with Morsi “peaked in June, when Morsi stood by twice as officials around him called for Egyptian aggression against Ethiopia and Syria, threatening to suck Egypt into conflicts that it could ill afford, former military officials said.” 

Regarding Ethiopia:

In the spring of this year, tensions rose between Egypt and Ethiopia when the government in Addis Ababa announced its intention to build a dam on the Blue Nile, prompting concerns by some in Egypt about future water supplies downstream. On June 2, with Morsi in attendance, Islamist politicians recklessly discussed how to sabotage the dam by funding Ethiopian rebel groups, followed by an attack by the Egyptian air force. Unknown to the participants, this incendiary discussion was broadcast on live television. Many were long to see that Morsi did not repudiate these proposals for naked aggression, but instead later commented that “all options are open.” 

Of course these would be at most just elements of a more complex scenario in which the disgraced President threw himself, his movement and all Egypt by repeatedly bowing to Washington, Tel Aviv and the IMF.

Egypt: the plans of the military are bourgeois, not democratic

According to the transition plan designed by the military, before any elections take place the current provisional government (or a committee named by it) will design a new constitution on which the citizens will only be able to say yes or no. That's not democratic: there will be no new constituent assembly and the current islamist constitution will only be amended, retaining elements like the officialdom of Sunni Islam and the Sharia as inspiration for the law.

The government is already full of imperial puppets like Mohamed El-Baradei and neoliberal economist Hazem El-Beblawi, supporter of the cut of subsidies to basic food and oil. This non-democratic government is, in the analysis of the Revolutionary Communist Grouping (ACR) of Chile, a "Bonapartist" regime determined to keep the cooperation with the Zionist colonial enclave and to carry on a deeply anti-social economic policy.

All this shows that the military intervention, far from being the culmination of the Egyptian Revolution is still a mere incident in a clearly unfinished process because all those were exactly the reasons that brought millions to the streets to oppose Morsi and Mubarak before him. As soon as the anti-social neoliberal policies manifest in full, the streets of Egypt will be boiling again most probably. These people will solve nothing, their only advantage being the lack of a class movement worth that name among Egyptians.

Source: Webguerrillero[es].

Egypt: the "coup" is product of the popular revolution, not the other way around

image from WG

Let my stand on this matter be absolutely clear: regardless of whatever contacts and interactions between the actors involved, when millions walk out persistently in demand of change it cannot be caused by any single nor composite socio-political force but it responds to the real demands, anger and outrage of the People. In Egypt as in Turkey, Brazil or anywhere else.

Another thing is where the processes triggered by such a human tsunami leads to. Probably nowhere without a socialist alternative that can fulfill the popular demands of "bread, freedom and social justice", and this alternative seems so far not in the menu. 

But in any case:

1. Morsi was ruling almost illegally: when the Supreme Court annulled the Parliamentary and Constitutional Assembly elections (on quite good grounds), he did not obey and call new elections, obviously fearing that their pool position advantage (tolerated by Mubarak, sponsored by Saudi Arabia) had been already very eroded.
2. Critically, Morsi was ruling illegitimately, just as Rajoy does in Spain or Erdogan in Turkey. When you do not have the backing of a clear majority anymore, you must put your power at the disposition of the People, calling new elections. It is not and never will be legitimate to stay in power when popular support wanes in such dramatic manner. No matter what laws and constitutions say, they should say otherwise. 
3. Morsi has been an obedient puppet of the USA and its main regional allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia. Against the clear will of the Egyptian People he did not even open the border with Gaza in order to alleviate the Zionist siege and he has played always in favor of the Capitalist system of exploitation and therefore has not been able or even willing to solve the dire problems of the Egyptians, which cannot be solved in a Capitalist frame, be it fundamentalist or secular, authoritarian or pseudo-democratic. 
4. The Egyptian Army is highly dependent on US subsidies, being (with Israel and Colombia) one of the top beneficiaries of US military aid. The reason is obvious: the canals (Suez Canal in this case), as well as Egypt being a major regional power, at least potentially. Therefore we should not expect it to bite the hand that feeds them: their main interest is the stability within the Western-Capitalist imperial order, as that is what their master commands. Therefore their intervention is clearly intended to canalize the protests to a stable outcome and nothing else. 
5. Similarly the Muslim Brotherhood is highly dependent on financing by Saudi Arabia and other Arab tyrannies and therefore they will negotiate their place in the new system, knowing that they still have many supporters which will grant them a place under the sun in the new parliament and maybe government. If they do otherwise they will surely fragment and become quite irrelevant. 

The only one who is not dependent on foreign subsidies is the Egyptian Working People. Their demands are clear: bread, freedom and social justice. Will they be met by the new government? I doubt it but only time will tell.

Honduras: large demonstrations in the 4th anniversary of the coup - many murdered this week

The FNRP marched in large numbers through the streets of the Central American country in repulse of the coup staged four years ago against President Zelaya with obvious support of the USA and the "libertarian" (fascist ultra-capitalist) mafias of The Empire. 

The party sponsored by the FNRP, LIBRE, is set to win the announced November elections if there is no vote rigging, followed by the maverick "Anti-Corruption Party" of S. Nasralla. The coup-sponsoring "traditional" parties ("National" and "Liberal") are set to become third and fourth forces respectively.

Source: LINyM[es] (includes many more images).


At least 8 murdered on Wednesday alone

Three members of LIBRE were shot dead in Juticapa, Olancho, (Silvia Aguiriano, Teresa Matute and an unnamed bodyguard). The attack was blamed on the narco mafia gang of Lucio Rivera by Aguriano's husband.

Denis del Cid Oliva, a trader from Francisco Morazán, was also shot dead earlier in the day.

Early in the day, in San Pedro Sula, a van was found with four corpses inside, apparently all them young people who were tied and put in plastic bags.

Source: Webguerrillero[es].

Venezuela: clash between conspirators at the heart of the bourgeois opposition

A tapped conversation between MUD deputy María Corina Machado and a close friend, the historian Germán Carrera Damas, illustrates how leading sectors of the opposition are conspiring with the USA to precipitate a crisis leading to a coup or civil war.

The tape, made public by the ruling party PSUV in TV, shows that Machado feels displaced within the MUD by Secretary General R.G. Aveledo and that there are some serious differences between both about the international and national strategy to follow, including it seems the strategy of de-stablization of Venezuela a so called "coup" or "self-coup". The particulars are not too clear so judge yourselves but my impression is that Aveledo wants to trigger a crisis and promote a coup, while Machado, while very extremist herself, seems more interested in diplomatically isolating Venezuela instead. But it's hard to discern the details. Judge yourselves because I have transcribed all the relevant discussion (essentially a nervous monologue by Machado) below:

Translation:

MCM: I am seeing that of Henrique Capriles, who has taken some firm stands but who when retracted on that Wednesday 17 gave us a horrible signal. If you say that you were robbed the election, then you are elect president, right?

GCD: Right.

MCM: If you are elect president...

GCD: ... either you act as such or you are admitting that yours has been, don't know, a fall a...

MCM: No, and then another thing: the reaction of Guillermo Aveledo to the meeting of Jaua and [US Senator John] Kerry seems to me so terrible. Let's see: which was the answer? "It is marvelous that relations are reestablished because we want Venezuela to have relations with all countries"...

GCD: No, please, not that.

MCM: But didn't you see what he declared?

GCD: I saw it, I saw it, I saw it. I was almost crying. I said: well, this people...

MCM: Also more untimely it could not have been. I feel outrage also because I should have gone earlier to the Department of State, I should... you know? We should have done other things. One has to meet with the key actors, bringing them key information, let the Congress react! So it can be that here it's happening what is happening in Venezuela and the people doesn't know because the Department of State don't think this is severe. Or because it does not have the slightest idea of what to do with Chávez and Chavismo. They are very scared: they fear that I go and meet with the Department of State, with the senators, or with people who may have influence, and set up a radical line, as they describe me: "non-dialogging confrontations" (nervous laugh) "not electoral"...

GCD: Great, right?

MCM: How? Now, I learned that Ramón Guillermo Aveledo has told... Yes, sir, Ramón Guillermo Aveledo has told the Department of State that the only way to exit this is to provoke and deepen a crisis. A coup d'etat or a self-coup because... Or a process of screwing and domestication in which a system of total social control is generated.

GCD: He's putting himself under the shadow of the Empire, isn't he? ... Ramón Guillermo?

MCM: Yes, sir. And not just Ramón Guillermo but the group which surrounds Capriles asked him... Then I tell you, doc, it is very hard. Because I for example went to Washington and Ramón Guillermo goes next week. And he decided to go after a conversation with me because, what's the matter?, he doesn't want me to be in charge of the international area, and he said already at the Board that a requirement, an element... a honor point for him to preserve, for him to be the Secretary General of the MUD is that the coordination of everything international remains in his hands. So he wants both hats, just as you hear it: they want to kick me out!

GCD: But that's disrespectful!

MCM: No, no, disrespectful! And then look: I think that there have been many achievements in these times but you have to acknowledge that these achievements of today are product of the work done before... and that the context changed. I... don't know, yes... surely the context changed. That's what we have, what he says, the things he says. I listened to him and I said... I didn't imagine the meanness and pettiness in a man whom I have respected so much always, didn't I? This...

GCD: Listen: this you're telling me I have got stuck inside.

MCM: It gave me...

GCD: He gave me that impression as well.

MCM: ... there's people who say he's a misogynist, I wish he was misogynist, I wish he was misogynist!  But I believe it is worse than that: he has a strategy different to what I represent. He thinks it is dangerous to have me as a free electron, legitimated, saying what I want and also saying that in the name of the Board of Unity. Because we have to raise the political cost to these vagabonds, beginning by the Gringos and following by the Colombians and the Brazilians. Well, those got the record prize, I mean the Nobel, the Oscar.

GCD: But you have to bite your tongue, hear?

MCM: No, I know, but I have so much inside that I am relieving with you. Now, what I do with Ramón Guillermo?

GCD: Dribble him, as they do in football.

MCM: I think I could gain some time but I don't see... I mean: advancing my stuff... but I don't see easy that I could keep a whole parallel structure and that Ramón Guillermo approves it. Because he sees me with... That is... Because he has a huge blackmail capability. Look, doc, one last thing: with the military issue and what we commented of the coup that already happened...

GCD: Yes.

MCM: Do you think that I should insist on that matter?

GCD: I think so.

MCM: I have an email... you, I have to open for you a hotmail. A hotmail is a safe mail, very safe, encrypted. It is very easy to open and there we could send each other safe information.

GCD: Ah, good, I'd like that very much.

MCM: The last thing I want is someone watching me sending that mail.

GCD: Why?

MCM: Because I don't want to appear as if I would be undermining, conspiring against Henrique. I don't want.

GCD: Against what regime?

MCM: Against Henrique Capriles!

GCD: Ah, against Henrique.

MCM: But in any case I am conspiring with you...

GCD: You don't know how good it feels seeing you, doc, truly...

MCM: I see that at least I'm being useful to you to sort up your thoughts (laughs). 

Venezuela: bourgeois opposition bought 18 war aircraft in USA

This is absolutely irregular and, if confirmed, it means a declaration of civil war.

According to José Vicente Rangel (former Vice-President of Venezuela and a journalist by profession, pictured), the bourgeois opposition of Venezuela purchased nothing less than 18 war aircraft in the USA, which are to be stationed in a Colombian base.

In his weekly TV program José Vicente Hoy, Rangel declared that the purchase was signed in San Antonio, Texas, in a meeting between opposition leaders and members of the US military-industrial complex. 

The new rebel 'air force' would be located at a Colombian air base with the coordinates P 11° 25′ 31”, M 72° 7′ 46”. P and M surely stand for parallel and meridian, in Colombia meaning N and W respectively, what means a location in the Guajira Peninsula, North of Maracaibo, just a few kilometers away from the Venezuelan border (→ map).

The rebellious purchase is meant to be effective by November this year and may signal the beginning of an armed rebellion of some sort.  

The veteran journalist did not reveal the source of his information but asked the security agencies to check the veracity of it.

Rangel also mentioned that the travels and expenses of the bourgeois opposition coalition MUD are financed by the US Congress via the National Democratic Foundation. 

Sources[es]: TeleSur, Tercera Información, El Diario.