The Leftist/Marxist/Islamist Alliance Aligns against Jerusalem

Exclusive: The Leftist/Marxist/Islamist Alliance Aligns against Jerusalem (Part Three of Four)

Author: David J. Jonsson
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: October 22, 2007

Rumors about Hosni Mubarak’s health swirl while a multitude of dangerous forces are afoot in Egypt, sure to greatly impact the Middle East negotiations in Annapolis. FSM Contributing Editor David Jonsson outlines three issues to be debated, as well as the hotly-contested Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

The Leftist/Marxist/Islamist Alliance Aligns against Jerusalem

(Part Three of Four)

By David J. Jonsson

The Impact of U.S. Support of Democracy in the Middle East

The United States sees itself as a beacon for democratic values, but Iranian and Arab reformers say its policies in the Middle East too frequently belie its ideals, making U.S. support for their cause a damaging liability. Repressive governments in the region, whether close allies or sworn foes of the United States, often exploit anti-American sentiment to accuse homegrown liberals of being stooges peddling a U.S.-Israeli agenda. Islamist movements do the same.

The relationship of the United States with Ethiopia represents a case in point as Barney Jopson reports in the Financial Times of October 10: Dismissive Ethiopia tests US indulgence.

“Following the attacks of September 11 2001, the administration of President George W. Bush forged an anti-terror pact with Addis Ababa. It was predicated on Ethiopia’s formidable military and intelligence capabilities and its position as a Christian-led country surrounded by Muslim and Arab states.”

“But the relationship has begun to resemble many of Washington’s alliances with troublesome client regimes, based mostly on geopolitical interest. Ethiopia, which received $283m (£139m, $200m) of military and humanitarian aid from Washington this year, looks increasingly like Pakistan or Egypt: an awkward bedfellow that the U.S. has to support for security goals but one that pursues its own, sometimes brutal, agenda regardless of American pressure.”

“When the US objects to Ethiopian policies – such as a crackdown on political opponents that killed scores of people in 2005 and a scorched-earth campaign against separatist insurgents this year – it is ignored. When America gives implicit acquiescence – as it did over the Christmas invasion of Somalia and Ethiopia’s bitter border dispute with Eritrea – the US goes through the motions of diplomatic pressure and claims to have been rebuffed.

But the wisdom of the alliance is now under scrutiny, particularly since the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed a bill last week that would force Ethiopia to improve democracy and human rights or risk losing substantial aid.

Events in Turkey are also very disturbing. Turkey is one of the allies of the U.S. and NATO. Incirlik air base in southern Turkey is a major cargo hub for U.S. and allied military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Turkey's Mediterranean port of Iskenderun is also used to ferry goods to American troops. Earlier this week a court in Istanbul has found two Turkish-Armenian journalists guilty of "insulting Turkishness" for reprinting an interview that referred to the mass killing of Ottoman Armenians by Turks in 1915 as genocide. The ruling came one day after the Foreign Affairs Committee of the US Congress approved a resolution that recognizes the killings as genocide, infuriating Ankara, which denies any such thing.

Rebels from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), fighting for an independent homeland in southeastern Turkey, said on Friday they are moving back into Turkey from northern Iraq.

The rebels also warned in a statement that they will target Turkey's ruling AK Party and main opposition CHP.

The announcement comes as Turkey's government prepares to seek permission from parliament to carry out a cross-border offensive against an estimated 3,000 rebels it says are based in northern Iraq.

Turkey, the United States and the European Union consider the PKK a terrorist organization.

Iran sees this situation as an opportunity to further strengthen its regional position and has teamed up with Turkey to assist in removing a force of 5000 PUK soldiers from the area where Iran abuts Iraq in the Qandil Mountains. According to several news and intelligence sources they already have positioned troops some 7-8 km inside Iraq and have begun shelling the mountain hideouts. The situation for Turkey offers some big incentives. Not only do they get help in spanking the PUK, but have made it known that they have their eye on Kirkuk, an Iraqi city in the area that produces 40% of Iraq's oil output, and that Turkey had made claim to before.

For its part Iran also sees a chance grab a chunk of Northern Iraq for itself. In addition Iran wants to destroy forward intelligence positions the Israelis may have secretly placed among the Kurds to help them receive the earliest possible warning of an Iranian attack on Israel.

Knocking out these posts would give the Iranians two significant victories against the Israelis within the span of just a few months, the war in Lebanon being the other. The loss of this intelligence would no doubt reduce the possibility for a successful US-Israeli attack against Iran, too. Russian and Iranian intelligence experts are both predicting such an attack before the end of 2006.

Many observers believe it's already too late to stop the Turkey-Iran initiative. The question is whether it will blossom into yet another Mid-East war pitting the US, Iraq, and Israel against Iran, Turkey, and possibly Syria.

Students of prophecy should follow these developments closely. Turkey is felt by most to be a modern component along with Armenia of the Beth Togarmah mentioned in Ezekiel 38:6. Beth means house in Hebrew. Togarmah was a son of Gomer. The Armenians of today call themselves the House of Togarmah. The Turks (but not the Kurds, who are the ancient Medes of Media-Persia fame) are also included.

As long as Turkey is aligned with the west Ezekiel 38 can't happen. Bringing Turkey into the Moslem alliance against Israel would remove one more roadblock to its fulfillment.

Egyptian Support for Democracy?

The Egyptian government supports the evolution of democracy in Egypt in its rhetoric but continues to quash it in practice, reported a Freedom House study released on October 1. The narrative and scores from Countries at the Crossroads 2007 for Egypt are available online in English and Arabic.

“The pattern of events in Egypt over the past two years indicates an effort on the part of the government not only to retreat from promised reforms, but to further impose a repressive system,” said Thomas O. Melia, deputy executive director of Freedom House. “Given Egypt’s substantial influence on the rest of the region, the failure of President Mubarak to implement meaningful reforms in terms of its citizens’ political and civil liberties is particularly disappointing.”

The freedom of political parties and independent NGOs is becoming increasingly restricted, and the right to assembly is regularly violated, despite the Egyptian constitution’s recognition of this right. Security forces frequently crack down on opposition demonstrations, and arrest and even torture of participants is common.

A Dilemma is Faced by Supporters of Freedom

A serious dilemma arises because the last remaining opposition party in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood after imprisoning or prodding into exile Egypt’s leading secular opposition activists. This has resulted in the government using detentions and legal changes to neutralize the country's last surviving major political movement, the Muslim Brotherhood. The result is the support of the Muslim Brotherhood by the activist NGOs.

"Tyranny has reached unprecedented limits from any previous regime," said Mohammed Mahdi Akef, the supreme guide, or highest leader, of the Brotherhood, which the government has outlawed for decades but allowed to operate within narrow limits. "This is insane tyranny."

As Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld wrote for the American Thinker on April 20, 2000 in the article The Muslim Brotherhood's Duping of America: “Neither the State Department nor the White House commented after U.S. House Majority Leader Stanley Hoyer met in Egypt with the Muslim Brotherhood's parliamentarian leader, Mohammed Saad el-Katatni. Hoyer and el-Katani discussed recent developments in the Middle East, and the "Brotherhood's vision."

This meeting took place just one day after the conclusion of the Muslim Brotherhood 5th Cairo Conference: The International Campaign Against US & Zionist Occupation, in which delegations from Hizbollah and Hamas took part. The participants cheered as Muslim Brotherhood General Guide Muhammad Mahdi 'Akef declared, "the devil Bush and his allies were now the ones sowing terror and aggression.

As the SocialistWorkeronline describes the conference in the article: Activists to meet at 5th Cairo Conference: “Egyptian opposition activists are calling on anti-war groups and unions to send delegates to the 5th Cairo Conference, 29 March-1 April, 2007. Over the last five years the Cairo Conference has brought together delegates from the international anti-war movement, trade unions, radical parties and the national liberation movements. It has defined the debate on resistance in the heart of the Arab world.” For more information go to Stop the War Coalition Online

Egyptian officials point to the group's high level of organization and violent past, and insist it remains the most dangerous force in Egypt. "The Muslim Brotherhood represents the framework for future violence," said Mohamed Abdel-Fattah Omar, a lawmaker from the ruling party and a former head of the state security apparatus.

In August and September, police raided the homes and meetings of Brotherhood leaders, putting behind bars five of the 12 officials in the group's decision-making guidance council. Two have since been released for health reasons.

Despite the ban, the Brotherhood has provided clinics, youth camps and other services that have won the organization support among the poor and provided a civic model for the armed Islamic movements Hezbollah and Hamas. The Brotherhood draws support among Egypt's middle class through its strong presence in technical and professional unions.

The government is also writing its crackdown into law. Constitutional changes pushed through by the government after the Brotherhood's strong showing in 2005 shut out its members in upper house elections this June. Next year, the government promises to present a new anti-terrorism code that the Brotherhood expects to be used for further crackdowns against it.

Egyptians cite U.S. pressure in 2005 as the stimulus for a short-lived flourishing of democratic opposition. That year, President Bush challenged Egypt in his State of the Union address "to show the way toward democracy in the Middle East." Since making peace with Israel in 1979, Egypt has been the No. 2 recipient of U.S. foreign aid.

Mubarak allowed other candidates to challenge his 2005 reelection bid. Egypt's fragmented secular opposition groups made tentative alliances with one another, and with the Brotherhood.

By 2006, with Hamas's victory in Palestinian elections leading U.S. officials to have second thoughts about democracy in the Middle East, and the U.S. military presence in Iraq growing ever more troubled, American priorities in the Middle East shifted again, from promoting democracy to maintaining allies.

Egypt is a police-and army-dominated modern Arab security state achieving brisk economic reforms, high growth rates, and massive job expansion in a manner that other Arab countries can only envy, however these are without attempting any serious political reform. This has occurred, as we continue to grapple with the enigma of an entire region of nearly 300 million Arabs who have not been able to achieve or sustain a single breakthrough to credible democracy.

Impact of the Possible Fall of the Mubarak Government

There is no apparent chain of command or democratic institutions that would facilitate the transfer of power to the next president and hence the possible fall of the Mubarak government could send shock waves throughout the globe; Commentators suggest unnerving scenarios such as would an ambitious general stage another coup or even would Egypt witness another Khomeini-style revolution?

On the world arena, nothing is more disturbing to political analysts, policymakers and stockowners in the U.S. and Western capitals than waking up one day to the breaking news coming from the Middle East that one of the long assumed allies has been toppled. The fall could be by a coup or a popular uprising of angry masses creating chaos, panic and uncertainty in international markets.

The U.S. Supports Egypt as an Ally

Egypt, as a currently secular Islamic country is looked upon as a key ally of the U.S and West against radical Islam. Egypt and Jordan are the only countries having signed “peace accords” with Israel. Egypt plays an important role in the potential negotiations on the Israel-Palestine process. The U.S. currently provides extensive military aid to Israel and Egypt and is currently planning to provide additional weapon systems to Egypt. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Egypt for talks with President Hosni Mubarak on October 16 as a part of a Middle East tour that will include the Palestinian territories, Israel and Jordan ahead of a peace summit in the United States next month.

The U.S. is Providing Additional Weapons to Egypt

The Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress earlier this month of a possible Foreign Military Sale to Egypt of STINGER Block 1 Missiles as well as associated equipment and services. "Egypt will use the STINGER missiles to upgrade its air defense capability" - that's air defense for mobile forces. That Egypt keeps practicing moving those mobile forces towards Israel's border is apparently not a concern. This proposed sale ostensibly will contribute to the foreign policy and national security of the United States by helping to improve the security of a friendly country that has been and continues to be an important force for political stability and economic progress in the Middle East.

Door is Open for Revolution in Egypt

The current situation in Egypt is setting the stage for a revolution, coup, and even potentially the full takeover of the government by the fundamentalist Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.

The Mubarak’s regime has grown very unpopular and detested by many if not most Egyptians. The disparities between the super-poor and the super-rich are widening everyday. Prices of basic food items and commodities are skyrocketing. This situation manifested itself in an angry, restless, anxious and irrational behavior that reflected on Egyptian society witnessing a high wave of violent crimes: such as rape, murder of spouses, parents and children, a high rate of divorce, drug use, white collar crimes, road rage, embezzlement, military service desertion, domestic violence and countless other crimes.

The large population of young educated, jobless, unmarried youth is alienated and getting more frustrated and angry everyday and provide the fodder for revolution.

The Significance of the US-hosted Middle East summit in Annapolis

The summit is expected to be held in Annapolis in November. The sides have begun work on a joint statement to be presented at the conference's opening. The events in Egypt will have a major impact on the newly reinitiated Middle East negotiations.

The key question is where exactly the parties are determined to set their so-called "red lines," their nonnegotiable bedrock stands, on the three fundamental final-status issues expected to be under discussion:

· The territorial issue (the borders between Israel and a future Palestinian state, and the impact this will have on West Bank settlements);

· The status of Jerusalem, including those holy places on and adjacent to the Temple Mount; and

· The so-called "right of return" for Palestinian "refugees" (the term itself is debatable) living outside Israel and the Palestinian areas.

Indeed, if anyone drew a red line over Jerusalem in 2000, it was Yasser Arafat, who adamantly refused even to consider a compromise on the Old City and its Temple Mount, most notoriously denying the Jewish historical connection to the site and rejecting a Clinton proposal that Israel enjoy a bare-minimum symbolic sovereignty "underneath" the Mount.

The Temple Mount

The status and impact is most pronounced on the issue to be addressed at the Summit is the future of the Temple Mount. This issue has an impact on Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The Temple Mount also known as the Noble Sanctuary is a religious site in the Old City of Jerusalem.

The Temple Mount is the holiest site for Judaism. The Jewish Temple in Jerusalem stood there: the First Temple (built c. 967 BCE, destroyed c. 586 BCE by the Babylonians), and the Second Temple (rebuilt c. 516 BCE, destroyed in the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE). According to a commonly held belief in Judaism, it is to be the site of the final Third Temple, to be rebuilt with the coming of the Jewish Messiah.

Among the Christian events occurring at the Second Temple during the life of Jesus are those recorded in Mark 12:41 – Mark 13:9

And he sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the multitude putting money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. And a poor widow came, and put in two copper coins, which make a penny. And he called his disciples to him, and said to them, "Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For they all contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living." MK: 1241-44 (RSV)

And as he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher, what wonderful stones and what wonderful buildings!" And Jesus said to him, "Do you see these great buildings? There will not be left here one stone upon another, that will not be thrown down." And as he sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him privately, "Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign when these things are all to be accomplished?" And Jesus began to say to them, "Take heed that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name, saying, 'I am he!' and they will lead many astray. And when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places, there will be famines; this is but the beginning of the birth-pangs. "But take heed to yourselves; for they will deliver you up to councils; and you will be beaten in synagogues; and you will stand before governors and kings for my sake, to bear testimony before them. Mark 13:1-9 (RSV)

This is a significant passage as in 70 C.E. the Temple was destroyed. Jesus went on to prophesy of events to occur.

Known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, it is also the site of two major Muslim religious shrines, the Dome of the Rock (built c. 690) and Al-Aqsa Mosque (built c. 710).

The Temple Mount is traditionally regarded by Muslims as the third most important Islamic holy site, after Mecca and Medina. The primary reason for its importance is the Muslim belief that in 621, Muhammad arrived there after a miraculous nocturnal journey aboard the winged steed named Buraq, to take a brief tour of heaven with the Archangel Gabriel. This happened according to the Qur’an during Muhammad's time in Mecca, years before Muslims conquered Jerusalem (638).

It is one of the most contested religious sites in the world. Under the Jordanian rule of Eastern Jerusalem between 1948 and 1967, Jews were forbidden from entering the Old City. Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority claim sovereignty over the site, which remains a key issue in the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Israeli government has granted management of the site to a Muslim Council (Waqf).

Islam maintains that there never was any such thing as the Holy Temple standing on the Temple Mount. For years a concentrated effort was made to obliterate any vestige of evidence from the site.

There is much more at stake here than simply the destruction of precious remnants of the Holy Temple. It has become clear that the abandonment of the Temple Mount to total Muslim control has been promised by Israel and is guaranteed to figure prominently in any eventual treaty or agreement which may be occur during or following the Annapolis Summit.

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FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor David J. Jonsson is the author of Clash of Ideologies —The Making of the Christian and Islamic Worlds, Xulon Press 2005. His new book: Islamic Economics and the Final Jihad: The Muslim Brotherhood to the Leftist/Marxist - Islamist Alliance (Salem Communications (May 30, 2006 and can be reached at: djonsson2000@yahoo.co.uk

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