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The two rallies couldn’t have been more different. Now that the opposition movement is going after Morsy, it has attracted the Ahmed Shafiq/Omar Suleiman/Amr Moussa crowd, people like some members of my family who aren’t necessarily feloul (pro or affiliated with the Mubarak regime) but who have a morbid terror of the Muslim Brotherhood and political Islam generally. I have a pro-revolution aunt who supported Hamdeen Sabbahi in the first round of the presidential elections and then switched to Shafiq in the run-offs when Sabbahi lost. Not all of this group are affluent or from chichi neighborhoods, but the ones that are were prominent on Tuesday, furiously marching from Zamalek in their velour tracksuits and UGG boots and manicured nails, holding forth in Arabic, English and French about the outrage of it all.

People like me who voted for Morsy not out of conviction but to keep out Shafiq are predictably the subjects of considerable vitriol at the moment, perhaps justifiably.

However, for what it’s worth, I think I made the right decision as someone non-partisan who doesn’t have any qualms about aligning myself with people I vaguely disagree with against people I strongly disagree with. I voted exclusively to keep out Shafiq and remain convinced that had he been elected, we would have been shafted good and proper and absolutely nothing would have changed.

Saddled with an estimated $35 billion of external debt, Egypt has been using much needed tax revenue to pay back international creditors.  Egypt recently put in a request for $4.8 billion to the IMF but with massive debt taken out under Hosni Mubarak, further debt on the Egyptian people may do more harm than good.

As the largest debtor nation in the region, instead of piling up more of a debt burden, the nation needs to make already unsustainable debts more manageable – and lending institutions should consider debt relief as a way to free up resources for the new Egypt.

The Egyptian people are being asked to pay back loans that were given to a tyrannical and unrepresentative former leader. While the international community was aware of the corruption, the suppression and the militaristic, strong man rule of law, loans continued to be given to Hosni Mubarak without the true consent of the people who would be shouldering the burden. It is unjust to demand that loans the people never asked for, never had any participation in accepting and rarely benefited from should now become the responsibility of Egypt's citizens. And the IMF piling on more debt will not help.

“Washington must stop subcontracting Syria policy to the Turks, Saudis and Qataris. They are clearly part of the anti-Assad effort, but the United States cannot tolerate Syria becoming a proxy state for yet another regional power,” wrote Danielle Pletka, vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute (Washington Post, July 20).

Pletka was the biggest supporter of Ahmad Chalabi, the once exiled Iraqi, who she once described as “a trusted associate of the Central Intelligence Agency (and) the key player in a unsuccessful coup to overthrow Saddam Hussein” in the 1990s (LA Times, June 4, 2004).

Although the destruction of an Arab country is not a moral issue as far as the neocons are concerned, the chaos and subsequent violence that followed the US war in 2003 made it impossible for warring ‘intellectuals’ to promote their ideas with the same language of old. Some reinvention was now necessary. Discredited organizations were shut down and new ones were hastily founded. One such platform was the Foreign Policy Initiative, which was founded by neoconservatives who cleverly reworded old slogans.

The dictator’s downfall, however, gave union activists more room to operate. Workers have set up over 500 independent syndicates in recent months. The majority have affiliated with two autonomous labour bodies, the Egyptian Federation of Independent Trade Unions (EFITU) led by Abu Eita, and the Egyptian Democratic Labour Congress (EDLC) headed by former steel worker Kamal Abbas.

ETUF is proving to be a multi-headed hydra. The mammoth organisation was weakened by rulings that dissolved its executive board, put its leadership under investigation for corruption, and pulled the plug on 15 million dollars in annual government subsidies. Yet its core remains intact.

Many activists believe Egypt’s two main powers, the military and the Muslim Brotherhood, are trying to rebuild ETUF as a counterweight to newfound syndical liberties. They claim the generals – opposed to organised labour – have sought to contain worker movements by criminalising strikes and preserving Mubarak-era labour laws.

A local court froze the orders late last year. Al-Amur said the court ruled in favour of the villagers because it was clear the state hadn’t worked out where the 500 residents would move once their homes were destroyed. The Israeli government is currently appealing the decision. “They don’t know where exactly they want to move the people,” said al-Amur. “They don’t have a resettling plan, not just for Al-Sira but for all the Bedouin.”

All the Negev Bedouin — 180,000-190,000 people — are Israeli citizens. About half of them live in some 35 unrecognised villages like Al-Sira.

Ismail Abu Saad, a Bedouin academic and professor at Ben-Gurion University, who lives in the recognised town of Lakiya, says Israel’s policy of Bedouin urbanisation has created “third-world enclaves in the middle of an affluent society.

The government may need to clear other hurdles. Egypt turned down a similar loan arrangement with the IMF in June when the ruling generals said they didn’t want to burden future generations with debt. The erosion of reserves since then has made Egypt’s financial needs more acute. Another change, though, is the election of the first post-Mubarak parliament, which will need to approve an IMF loan agreement.

After his meeting with Obasanjo Macky Sall, whose coalition is a member of the M23, and who had been campaigning vigorously and was seen as a very serious contender for the presidency, declared that he did not discuss (let’s rather say that he did not agree with) any scenario of postponement of the election. He thus rejected both propositions (those of Obasanjo and those made by Alioune Tine). Several other presidential candidates expressed similar views, including Wade’s camp.

A new dictatorship, much more violent than the one it displaced, is consolidating its control over the country. This time, it enjoys the express backing of the vast majority of non-Islamist political forces, including self-proclaimed liberal parties. Egypt has now returned to the status quo ante, not of January 24, 2011, but of the dark days of the fifties, when the Free Officers, under the leadership of Gamal Abdel Nasser, consolidated their rule by destroying all opposition, from the Muslim Brotherhood to Egypt’s liberal parties.

And the consequences of this go well beyond targeting Islamist opposition to the coup; both the state-owned and privately-owned pro-military media condemn all opposition, Islamist or non-Islamist, as being secretly part of the Muslim Brotherhood. Therefore designating the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist threatens all opposition to the emerging military-backed order. . .

The notion that elimination of the Muslim Brotherhood would produce a liberal democratic order was wishful thinking. . .

Millions have taken to the streets since January 2011 demanding jobs, income, democratic rights and a shift in the relations between Egypt and Israel that has been frozen since the advent of the Camp David Accords signed in 1979. Egyptian workers and youth have played a pivotal role in these struggles through mass demonstrations, strikes and rebellions. Just recently workers in the utility sector and the arts have staged occupations demanding better wages and conditions of employment.

The Guardian newspaper reported recently that ‘Hundreds of British troops are being prepared to deploy to North Africa to tackle al Qaeda-inspired extremists. Under secret plans being drawn up urgently by top brass, UK soldiers would be sent ‘within months’ to the region to help train the Libyan army.’ (1 July) This plan will involve at least 2,000 Libyan ‘soldiers’ who will be trained in an effort to counter so-called ‘terrorist’ threats in Libya and throughout the region.

However, a number of political questions remain outstanding. Will the FJP and other Islamic parties be allowed full participation in the proposed elections? Also will conditions improve for the Egyptian workers, farmers and youth under the interim governing council? In all likelihood the problems of massive unemployment and poverty will continue with no program aimed at empowering the majority within society.

Immediately after the July 2013 coup, Gomaa jumped into the picture again, eclipsing the current Mufti of Egypt (rumours had it that he opposed the coup) and even the Grand Sheikh of Al Azhar, Ahmad al-Tayyib, who was present at and blessed General Sisi’s announcement of his roadmap, including the immediate suspension of the constitution and the appointment of an interim president. Gomaa had established a reputation as an important scholar of “moderate” Islam, calling for dialogue with other religions, and issuing fatwas that supported the rights of women and minorities. Understandably, he enjoys much popularity among the more “liberal” segments of the Egyptian society and the rest of the Arab and Muslim worlds.  

Apparently appalled by the unexpected release of the video clip, Gomaa was quick in denying that he was talking about the MB or the protesters and asserted that he meant the “terrorists in Sinai and elsewhere”. Hardly anybody took these claims seriously given Gomaa’s frequent references in his speech to President Morsi’s (lack of) legitimacy. In fact, Gomaa has kept a low profile since that incident a few weeks ago, and it is likely that he would not be playing a significant role in Egypt’s future even if the current regime succeeds in holding onto power.

The new Egyptian Constitution (now under preparation by an appointed committee made up of almost exclusively “liberal” figures) will determine the new relationship between the ruling military elite and “official Islam.”