It is a significant sign to me that the currently ruling military council in Egypt declined an offer of a new $3 billion American shot in Egypt's arm. Just as it was unwilling to sully the reputation of the Egyptian military by acting to save the Mubarak regime, the supreme command may be declining unsolicited aid from the United States so as not to burden the new elected government with unnecessary carry on baggage from a foreign power... or at least the United States.

Just guessing, the new government of Egypt that will form after elections later this year shall take a rights-based approach to resolving the formation of a Palestinian state that will be quite different to and independent of America's security-based approach.

The record below of links to almost weekly "semi-official" Egyptian government opinion since May of 2007 gives Egyptian perspectives on America's futile quest to give the Israeli government anything it wants and give the Palestinians nothing they deserve while at the same time expecting to enjoy peace at home and abroad. Apparently it all remained "semi-official" because of the former regime's invariable experience with the uselessness of taking a rights-based approach directly and officially to the Yank presidents or congresses.

Typically the Al-Ahram opinions linked below are expressions of the dreariness of what America is doing to sustain Israeli Apartheid, what is wrong with the "new" ideas that come out of Washington, how long it will take them to come to naught, the prediction that the Yanks will, once again, learn nothing, etc. ad nauseum - deadly accurate predictions over many, many years well before May 2007 when I started pasting links to that opinion into this page.

Certainly the Cairo Yank Embassy and State Department in DC had and do now have people reading Al Ahram - Opinion about America. Apparently the only option of the Yank presidents and congresses have had was to ignore such facts and opinion as one could/can find in Al Ahram for fear of what AIPAC (the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee), News Corp and others would do to their careers. Or perhaps they are simply as ignorant, violent and rascist as they look when they potter about during this, America's violent adolescence on the world stage, November 1963 to the present... oblivious to President Eisenhauer's warnings about what he called the American "military-industrial complex".

Senator Kerry was in Pakistan some days ago, chastising Pakistan for its national duplicity with respect to America's war on terror. Unconditional American support of Israeli government Apartheid is without duplicitousness? Saying "Naughty, naughty," doesn't count. One has to do things that matter. Like not voting against UN resolutions that, however mildly, censor Israeli government Apartheid. Senator Kerry and people like him are not welcome in the Middle East. Not when making the shallow, Roadmap to Nowhere sorts of remarks he made in Pakistan. And all we remember of Obama's Nobel Prize winning oration in Cairo... is his premature peace prize and the inconvenience of having had him in town for the day.

Have an occasional look at Israel's Haaretz Daily Newspaper. My opinions are not uncommon among Jewish people in Israel and elsewhere. See also links to Jewish rights-focused peace groups in the column to the right.

So now I retire from trying to matter as I imagine more "semi-official" opinion such as in the links below will soon become quite official, indeed, and less subject to Yank government dismissal.

But The Youth, too, will be dealing not with just racist American presidents and congresses. They will be dealing with large portions of well educated segments of the American population who either 1. believe in their heart of hearts that Jesus will come back if they help Israel steal more land, life and liberty from the Palestinians or 2. believe there is a constellation of intractable problems and, in the meantime, think that they are saving people like Anne Frank or something. I have trouble figuring out what they are thinking. Or if they are actually thinking at all. They seem only to respond to News Corp name-calling while our Yank government just sort of does what it wants... or more precisely, what AIPAC wants. Always and in all ways. Right now they are in the business of supporting the vile desires of certain extremely violent, rascist Russian Jewish fundamentalist emigré Israeli voters who Netanyahu needs to maintain his own power. All supported by News Corp and others who entirely ignore rights issues.

I'm older that Netanyahu and I hope that fat little racist has a stroke like Sharon and that they both wake up ten years from now to find the Apartheid settlements of the West Bank and East Jerusalem removed to the Negev.

US-Egyptian relations on the rocks - James Zogby February 2012
No lessons learned - James Zogby December 2011
Carry on Obama - Deepak Tripathi - November 2011
US-Egyptian relations: Tantrums will happen - Amr Abdel-Ati November 2011
Obama's free fall - Stuart Littlewood September 2011
Collision course with Arab opinion - James Zogby September 2011
Will the US declare independence at the UN? - John Whitbeck September 2011
Ten lessons of 9/11 - Ralph Nader September 2011
The US's defective crystal ball - August 2011
The future is Palestine - Jeremy R. Hammond July 2011
Egypt, America and the future - El Sayed Shalabi July 2011
The Palestinians right to remain and return - Samah Sabawi June 2011
Netanyahu and the Arab Spring - Abdel-Moneim Said June 2012
America's coming Nakba - William Cook June 2011
Obama must not sideline Israeli-Palestinian Peace - James Zogby May 2011
Mubarak's fatal error - Eric Walberg April 2011
Republicans stir a lethal brew - James Zogby April 2011
Politics and nonsense on Egypt - James Zogby February 2011
A roadmap to justice - William Cook January 2011
Will 2011 see the creation of Palestine? - Khaled Amayreh December 2010
Obama surrenders Palestinian rights - Ramzy Baroud November 2010
Obama sells America - Ramzy Baroud October 2010
Obama's indecisiveness defines his presidency - Ramzy Baroud October 2010 Waiting on America - Graham Usher October 2010

Flotilla massacre rocks peace process - Khalid Amayreb June 2010

Having taken a risk on Washington and agreed to talks with Israel, Palestinians are wondering what Obama will do about Israel's murderous aggression

Plans to build yet more illegal settlements in occupied East Jerusalem emerge on the eve of proximity talks

Current US peace proposals are just as alarming to Jordan as would be any regional war

For a large portion of Americans, the balanced facts of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are not known

Build, build, build: as Israel annexes Palestinian property to build yet more illegal settlements it seems no one has the will to stop them

Forget the peace process. Only world public opinion can put an end to Israeli apartheid, just as it did in South Africa

The only beneficiary from the US government returning to the rhetoric of the war on terror is Al-Qaeda

"I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world; one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect," said Obama in Cairo. His deeds since then have reaped the opposite -- mistrust and disrespect.

While the political horizon in 2010 is still open, few are expecting much from America's current president

The peace enemy within - Ramzy Baroud December 2009 Is it too late for Obama? - Hassan Nafaa December 2009 Palestinian Christians urge Israel boycott - December 2009
Al-Qaeda reconsidered - Khalil El-Anani October 2009 Wanted for murder - Dina Ezzat October 2009
Evasive moves - Khaled Amayreh June 2009 Moment of truth - Barack Obama at the table - Nicola Nasser April 2009
New US thinking? - Azmi Bishara March 2009
Will Obama listen? - El-Sayed Amin Shalabi March 2009
Washington continuing discredited policies - Abdus Sattar Ghazali March 2009
Imposing sanctions on Israel - Ezzedine Choukri Fishere February 2009
America's new(?) foreign policy - Muqtedar Khan February 2009
Obama is not going to change the essence of America's Middle East course
- Azmi Bishara February 2009
For Palestinians, so far, the new US president represents no change whatsoever
- Ramzy Baroud January 2009
"The Arabs are trapped between the anvil of Israeli belligerency and the hammer of US indifference to their concerns" - Ayman El-Amir January 2009
Isreal's Gaza myths - Jonathon Cook January 2009
PLO sells out Gaza - Curtis Doebbler January 2009
Accountability and the rule of law in America - James Zogby December 2008
Has the American neo-con riot run its course? - Stuart Reigeluth December 2008
Obama and Israel - Hassan Nafaa November 2008
The Republican campaign seems to be benefiting from, and stoking, religious defamation and hate speech - Abdus Sattar Ghazali October 2008
Open letter to President Obama - August 2008

Bush must twist Israel's arm - April 2008
Opening to Hamas - April 2008
Israel cheerleading genocide - April 2008
Bush not clarifying Lebanon issues - March 2008

Fixing the Gaza crossing (without much American help)

Egyptians' low opinion of the American government - November 2007
Failure of peace talks predicted - October 2007
Israel playing loose with the law  - September 2007
Calling Israel's bluff - September 2007
The misery of the Gaza siege - August 2007
Events in Ramallah -July 2007
Failure of Palestine Embargo - May 2007

Google Earth map of the
Independence Square ("Midan Tahrir") area

The Nile is on the left - the green circle towards the center is "Midan" Tahrir (Independence "Square") - The old Nile Hilton (now The Ritz-Carlton Hotel) is the white rectangular building northwest of Midan Tahrir - the Egyptian Museum is the building north and a bit east across the street from the Ritz-Carlton. The American University in Cairo is the block with green spaces south-southeast of Midan Tahrir - northeast of Midan Tahrir, all roads lead to Midan Talaat Harb (Talaat Harb Square) - shops and street vendors line the streets leading outward from Midan Talaat Harb.

The large building at the center of the three pictures at the top of this page is the slightly curved building with the bright white sidewalks immediately south-southwest of Midan Tahrir and is a major administrative building - one gets one's visas renewed there.

Talaat Harb Street connects Midan Tahrir and Midan Talaat Harb to its northwest and then continues into further shopping streets.

The bridge over the Nile on the road from Midan Tahrir has broad sidewalks which fill with quiet crowds of families and friends who walk the length of it on a hot summer's evening and, less so, through much of the rest of the year as well.

The Cairo Nile tour boats are boarded on the beach straight out from the Midan Tahrir area. Some can be chartered in the evening for a very low cost per person to your group (even six or eight). "Evening" runs to 2am and 4am on hot summer nights as whole families are drawn to the fresh cool air of the Nile's bank where they walk the wide sidewalk.

The Google Earth map to the left captures the area between the new Ritz-Carlton Hotel (the old Hilton) and "Islamic Cairo". The Google Earth map below it is centered on the Citadel area.

In the upper map, the Ritz-Carlton Hotel is the white rectangular building on the east bank of the Nile between the two bridges in the upper left of the picture - Islamic Cairo is the area with numerous blue dots towards the right edge of the picture, just above the picture's center line - the blue dots represent such attractions as the Citadel and the Muhammed Ali Mosque.

Islamic Cairo is ancient Cairo and an area about which Egyptians feel a great deal of pride. They will be a disappointed if you haven't visited the main sights.

The TourEgypt.net web page for Islamic Cairo is very complete and will make it clear to you how much there is to do and see.

The upper picture provides a good view of the walk from the Midan Tahrir area to Islamic Cairo. A beeline takes you through a lot of twists and turns but there are the routes by way of the arch of main avenues to the east-northeast and then southeast or the southern route - southeast and then east-northeast. Better to take a taxi and save your energy for the vast spread of Islamic Cairo itself. Or try walking back to Midan Tahrir from Islamic Cairo if you still have the time and energy. The walk is worth it - once at least - the industry and humanity on the beeline between the two areas is very absorbing.

Everywhere people will tell you, "Welcome to Egypt." And they mean it.

Plan to drink several liters of water if it's a hot summer day. Sit down someplace and drink lots of water if you start feeling disoriented and confused. It will probably be dehydration although it may come on so quickly you may wonder if it is "heat stroke". Dehydration will catch up with you quickly on a hot summer day... and everybody wears long underwear in the winter. Don't be a fool and try to be different. "You'll be sooooorry."