GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: China Rattled by Middle Eastern Events

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Israel National News

25February2011 5:00pmEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Coverage of the tumultuous events in the Middle East in the official Chinese press has gone through a few iterations. At first, the policy was no coverage or at best laconic coverage. Lately, due to internet postings and official nervousness the tone has changed to ' why it can't happen here' and 'why it must not happen here'.

Anonymous groups have posted comments on Chinese dissident websites outside of China calling for a Jasmine Revolution in China. China's web censors, or what is unlovingly referred to as the "Great Chinese firewall," have managed to keep the site off-limits to most of the population, but where there are geeks there is a way. The wannabe Chinese revolutionaries have denounced the trampling of constitutional rights, the corruption and the cronyism endemic in China.

China's leaders were so alarmed that Chinese President Hu Jintao told party leaders that it was necessary to exert greater control over "virtual society" and provide guidance in "healthy directions". (read full report)

"GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is an intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, it's partners or affiliates. All opinions presented are those of the author, and not necessarily those of GCIS or it's partners.

GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: DEBKAfile: US military advisers in Cyrenaica. Qaddafi's loses his air force

 

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

25February2011 1:15pmEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Hundreds of US, British and French military advisers have arrived in Cyrenaica, Libya's eastern breakaway province, DEBKAfile's military sources report exclusively.

This is the first time America and Europe have intervened militarily in any of the popular upheavals rolling through the Middle East since Tunisia's Jasmine Revolution in early January.  The advisers, including intelligence officers, were dropped from warships and missile boats at the coastal towns of Benghazi and Tobruk Thursday Feb. 24, for a threefold mission:

1. To help the revolutionary committees controlling eastern Libyan establish government frameworks for supplying two million inhabitants with basic services and commodities;
2. To organize them into paramilitary units, teach them how to use the weapons they captured from Libyan army facilities, help them restore law and order on the streets and train them to fight Muammar Qaddafi's combat units coming to retake Cyrenaica.
3. The prepare infrastructure for the intake of additional foreign troops. Egyptian units are among those under consideration.

Qaddafi was shaken up badly Friday, Feb. 25, when many of his air force commanders decided to no longer obey his orders or those of his commanders, DEBKAfile's exclusive military sources report. 

This loss deprived him at one stroke of one of the key pillars sustaining his fight for survival against the opposition since Sunday, Feb. 20. It means he is short of an essential resource for recapturing the eastern half of the country where half of Libya's oil wealth and its main oil export terminals are situated.

Friday, NATO Council and the UN Security Council meet in separate emergency sessions to consider ways to halt the bloodletting in Libya and punish its ruler Qaddafi for his violent crackdown of protesters. (read full report)

"GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is an intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, it's partners or affiliates. All opinions presented are those of the author, and not necessarily those of GCIS or it's partners.

GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Wanted: A Grand Strategy for America

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Newsweek

16February2011 11:59amEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: The statesman can only wait and listen until he hears the footsteps of God resounding through events; then he must jump up and grasp the hem of His coat, that is all.” Thus Otto von Bismarck, the great Prussian statesman who united Germany and thereby reshaped Europe’s balance of power nearly a century and a half ago.

Last week, for the second time in his presidency, Barack Obama heard those footsteps, jumped up to grasp a historic opportunity … and missed it completely.

In Bismarck’s case it was not so much God’s coattails he caught as the revolutionary wave of mid-19th-century German nationalism. And he did more than catch it; he managed to surf it in a direction of his own choosing. The wave Obama just missed—again—is the revolutionary wave of Middle Eastern democracy. It has surged through the region twice since he was elected: once in Iran in the summer of 2009, the second time right across North Africa, from Tunisia all the way down the Red Sea to Yemen. But the swell has been biggest in Egypt, the Middle East’s most populous country.

In each case, the president faced stark alternatives. He could try to catch the wave, Bismarck style, by lending his support to the youthful revolutionaries and trying to ride it in a direction advantageous to American interests. Or he could do nothing and let the forces of reaction prevail. In the case of Iran, he did nothing, and the thugs of the Islamic Republic ruthlessly crushed the demonstrations. This time around, in Egypt, it was worse. He did both—some days exhorting Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to leave, other days drawing back and recommending an “orderly transition.”

The result has been a foreign-policy debacle. The president has alienated everybody: not only Mubarak’s cronies in the military, but also the youthful crowds in the streets of Cairo. Whoever ultimately wins, Obama loses. And the alienation doesn’t end there. America’s two closest friends in the region—Israel and Saudi Arabia—are both disgusted. The Saudis, who dread all manifestations of revolution, are appalled at Washington’s failure to resolutely prop up Mubarak. The Israelis, meanwhile, are dismayed by the administration’s apparent cluelessness. (read full report)

 

 

"GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is an intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, it's partners or affiliates. All opinions presented are those of the author, and not necessarily those of GCIS or it's partners.

GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Is the Arab Middle East Really Ready for a True Revolution?

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: News Real Blog

BY PHYLLIS CHESLER

14February2011 10:58amEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Is the Arab Middle East really ready for a true revolution? A genuine uprising in the Muslim world which does not focus on the issue of women’s rights is not much of an uprising and does not bode well for a true democracy, one defined by the rule of law, a constitutional system of checks and balances, a separation of mosque and state, freedom of religion, a free press, universal education, individual human rights and freedom.

Miraculously, amazingly, a Saudi woman or a number of Saudi women have just launched a new and fabulous Facebook page. They call it Saudi Women Revolution. It features a white smurf-like figure joyfully throwing off her chains and has links to the Saudi women’s drive-in and to campaigns against child brides.

They are talking about arranging meetings in Jeddah and Riyadh.

Given what they know can happen to them: divorce, loss of custody, being honor murdered by their families, jail, torture (flogging), and murder (beheading, stoning), I must congratulate them for their awe-inspiring bravery. Alas, we do not have such brave women here.

I will also pray for their safety. (read full report)

"GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is an intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, it's partners or affiliates. All opinions presented are those of the author, and not necessarily those of GCIS or it's partners.

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Prepare for War: Looking at the worst case scenario – a common Jewish trai

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Shalom Life

12February2011 7:09pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Iran – Turkey – Egypt
 
Up until 1979, Israel and Iran had a strong bi-lateral relationship and a strategical cooperation. Then came the Islamic Revolution, a movement which surprised both America and Israel and led to the ousting of pro-Israel Shah and replaced him with the anti-Israel Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini. The outcome of the revolution abruptly wiped out years of positive friendship and strong relations between Israel and Iran and has led to the scenario we face today, an arch-foe with nuclear ambitions and a goal of extermination.
 
Turkey, a once secular state and long considered one of Israel’s best friend in the Middle East, has fallen under similar circumstances. The now dominantly Islamic Muslim government has also changed its attitude towards Israel. It has recently declared that Israel is a threat to the Turkish national security and has started to tighten its relationship with Iran, with whom historically they have had strained relations.
 
The Egyptian-Israeli border has been quiet since 1974. In 1979 Israel and Egypt signed a peace treaty to further government and economic cooperation between the two countries. The Mubarak regime was considered a moderate one in terms of its attitude to the west and Israel, where peace terms were kept and respected. Yesterday, Mubarak finally conceded his presidency, after 30 years in power and 18 days of violent protests, leaving the country under the authority of the Egyptian Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, its military.
 
Despite the recent declaration of the Egyptian military that it will respect all the international agreements that Egypt has signed, it is still unknown whether the future regime will stand behind these agreements, or it will turn hostile towards Israel, as many of its partners have in the past. (read full report)

 

 

"GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is a cooperative intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service and Machaseh Security Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, MSS or it's advertisers or affiliates.

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Ahmadinejad calls for Mideast without Israel and US

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: JPost

11February2011 7:45pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: TEHERAN – Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Egypt's popular uprising shows a new Middle East is emerging, one that will have no signs of Israel and US "interference."

The Iranian president spoke as the country marked the 32nd anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. His remarks came hours after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak refused to step down, angering hundreds of thousands of Egyptians who have been demanding he relinquish his three-decade grip on power.

Ahmadinejad says Egyptians have the right to live in freedom and choose their own government.

Iran crushed opposition protests against Ahmadinejad's disputed 2009 re-election and on Thursday, Iranian opposition leader Mahdi Karroubi was placed under house arrest because of calls for a rally in support of Egyptian protesters. (read full report)

 

 

"GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE" is a cooperative intelligence briefing presented by Griffith Colson Intelligence Service and Machaseh Security Service, and provided to the public for informative purposes only. All subject matter is credited to it's source of origin, and is not intended to represent original content authored by GCIS, MSS or it's advertisers or affiliates.

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Separate whirlwinds demolish two Middle East figures in one day

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

02February2011 12:49pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Close observation of the circumstances surrounding the seven-day popular uprising that ended Hosni Mubarak's 30-year old presidency cannot avoid noticing the skillful choreography which brought it up to a well-judged climax Tuesday night, Feb. 2. In fact, the hands of the United States, Britain and the Egyptian army heads were plain to see at every stage. Their agents pushed the levers for speeding up the street action when it flagged and hit the brakes before it went too far.

Interestingly, the outburst of fury appeared to be leaderless and totally spontaneous, an apparent liability in a popular revolution. In fact it was an asset. Mubarak's dread security forces were bereft of the power to break up the protest movement by the usual means of grabbing the ringleader, figure or group at its head. They were also denied an object of penetration for finding out what the street had in store and when – and getting their blows in first.

Without these levers of control, Mubarak's week-long struggle to keep his head above water was doomed from the start. (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: "Free Egypt" regimes planned alongside March of Millions

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

01February2011 2:56pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Certain opposition groups, backed by retired army and security forces officers are planning to take over a key delta city, proclaim it liberated territory and establish there a "Free Egypt" government, DEBKAfile's Middle East sources report Tuesday, Feb. 1. The masses flooding central Cairo for the March of Millions are marching on the presidential palace in their biggest protest demonstration in eight days. President Hosni Mubarak is working there at present.

Opposition leaders have come to the same conclusion as most Western and Middle East observers that Mubarak; whose effigy hangs high from a noose over Tahrir Square, has no intention of leaving in the foreseeable future and all his maneuvers are a play for time.  (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Tanks, Fighter Jets Enter Cairo

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Israel National News

30January2011 11:07amEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Egypt sent its tanks into Cairo over the weekend and its fighter planes soared through the skies overhead in an effort to persuade protesters to return home.

Military helicopters hovered over the crowds and trucks of soldiers appeared in the central square of the capital where protesters continued to call for the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak.

State media reported that Mubarak held talks with top military commanders earlier in the day, as troops attempted to enforce a 4:00 p.m. curfew in a city of some 18 million people.

Hundreds of Muslim terrorists and thousands of other inmates were freed by armed gangs from jails across the capital just before dawn on Sunday. The former prisoners rushed into the city with guns, sticks and clubs, indiscriminately smashing cars and robbing people. (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Hamas gunmen from Gaza battle Egyptian forces in Sinai

Muslim Brotherhood more active than it appears

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

30January2011 10:50amEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE:  Gunmen of Hamas's armed wing, Ezz e-Din al Qassam, crossed from Gaza into northern Sinai Sunday, Jan. 30 to attack Egyptian forces and push them back. They acted on orders from Hamas' parent organization, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, confirmed by its bosses in Damascus, to open a second, Palestinian front against the Mubarak regime. The Muslim Brotherhood is therefore more active in the uprising than it would appear.

DEBKAfile's military sources report that Hamas gunmen went straight into battle with Egyptian Interior Ministry special forces (CFF) in the southern Egyptian-controlled section of the border town of Rafah and the Sinai port of El Arish. Saturday, Bedouin tribesmen and local Palestinians used the mayhem in Cairo to clash with Egyptian forces at both northern Sinai key points and ransack their gun stores. (read full report)

GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Egyptian authorities order closure of Al-Jazeera offices

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: JPOST

30January2011 10:40amEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE:  Egyptian authorities ordered Al-Jazeera's offices in Cairo shut down on Sunday morning following the network's non-stop coverage of the country's massive protests against the government. The move triggered a sharp response from the Al-Jazeera which released a statement accusing the Egyptian authorities of censorship.

"Al-Jazeera sees this as an act designed to stifle and repress the freedom of reporting by the network and its journalists,” read the statement, adding that the closure was aimed at "silencing the voices of the Egyptian people." (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Israel silently watches the unfolding of two new fronts

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

29January2011 6:12pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: Egypt, one of the only two Arab states to sign peace with Israel, is wobbling dangerously on the brink of revolutionary change with potentially spreading fallout.

This week, Israel was dismayed to find itself looking suddenly at three latently hostile fronts about to spring up around its borders:  Lebanon, which has dropped into the Iranian orbit, followed by Egypt, which is heading for terra incognita, and the Gaza Strip, where the Palestinian Hamas, offshoot of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, has gained altitude as a Middle East player from the rise of its less radical parent.

Indeed Gaza's rulers, who are close to Iran, are puffing themselves up as a bridge between the Shiite Revolution of Iran and the Sunni-led revolution of Egypt. (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING (UPDATED): Egypt's President Names Deputy for 1st Time

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Newsmax / Bloomberg

29January2011 3:52pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE:  CAIRO (AP) — Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak named a vice president Saturday for the first time since coming to power nearly 30 years ago. It was a clear step toward setting up a successor in the midst of the biggest challenge ever to his rule from tens of thousands of anti-government protesters.

Mubarak named his intelligence chief of nearly two decades and close confidant Omar Suleiman, state television reported.

The president had been seen as grooming his son Gamal to succeed him, possibly even as soon as in presidential elections planned for later this year. However, there was significant public opposition to the hereditary succession.

The appointment of Suleiman, 74, answers one of the most intriguing and enduring political questions in Egypt: Who will succeed 82-year-old Mubarak? (read Newsmax report)

According to Bloomberg:

“The president appears to be trying to position the country in a way that if he leaves, the country is in the hands of the military and intelligence,” said Emad Gad, an analyst at the Al Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, a Cairo-based research firm. “He has to leave or the protests won’t stop. But the army will not remove the president.”

Mubarak also named Aviation Minister and former air force commander Ahmed Shafik as prime minister to replace Ahmed Nazif, who resigned today at the 82-year-old president’s request.

Mubarak’s two appointments may not be enough to placate protesters as they put former military officers in charge of the top three jobs in the country. The president was a commander of the air force. Seventy-three people were killed and 1,000 wounded across the country in the past two days, Al Arabiya television reported, citing medical sources.

“The Egyptian government can’t reshuffle the deck and then stand pat,” State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said in a message on Twitter. “President Mubarak’s words pledging reform must be followed by action.” (read Bloomberg report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Egyptian-American leaders call for U.S. support of 'Lotus Revolution'

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: CNN

28January2011 11:20pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: As public protests against the Mubarak regime spread from Cairo to New York City, Egyptian-American activists on Friday called on the Obama adminstration to back the "Lotus Revolution" to oust the authoritarian ruler.

They also called on President Hosni Mubarak's government to end its purported practices of detentions, torture and "extrajudicial killings."

"This day, I assure you, will be mentioned in history as a point of change all over the Middle East, said Mokhtar Kamel. "Gone are the old days where antiquated brutal regimes are controlling the area."

"To those in the United States and in the West who are quoting stability as an excuse for brutality. Guys, this is too late," Kamel said. "You have to change your mentality."
Kamel, vice president of the Coalition of Egyptian Organizations in North America, was one of several Egyptian-American activists to appear at the National Press Club in Washington Friday to talk about the protests. (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Newsmax Source in Cairo: Riots Have Nothing to Do With Religion

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: Newsmax

28January2011 10:58pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: A source on the ground in Cairo who supports the protesters and who joined the rally that triggered a brutal backlash from police Friday tells Newsmax that the uprising in Egypt has no link to Muslim extremism, nor any other religious motivation.

“It has nothing to do with religion, it has nothing to do with the Muslim Brotherhood, there were no religious connotations in this revolt,” says Ahmed, an owner of a high-tech business who has lived his entire life in the Cairo region. “People were just asking for freedom and liberty after 30 years of oppression.”

Newsmax is withholding Ahmed’s full name to avoid any chance of reprisals from his speaking to the media. This morning the government of Egypt shut down all cell phone communications, and about 85 percent of the nation’s Internet traffic, in order to block protesters’ efforts to coordinate their activities. But Ahmed was still able to speak to Newsmax via a landline.

Despite the important role played by Nobel Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei, whose return to Egypt encouraged tens of thousands to pour out into downtown Cairo and Alexandria to protest the 30-year rule of strongman President Hasni Mubarak, Ahmed says the uprising in Egypt is essentially leaderless. (read full report)

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Mubarak hangs on to power as Obama dictates terms. But for how long?

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

28January2011 8:12pmEST

GCIS/MSS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: (exerpt:) DEBKAfile reports that "The coming hours will see how the protest movement responds to Mubarak's decision to hold on to power in defiance of their main rallying cry and how the army conducts itself as thousands of protesters defy the nationwide curfew decree. So far, they have not fired the machine guns on their tanks and the soldiers were welcomed although there were some cases of hostility.

According to some sources, tanks are surrounding the British and US embassies.

After announcing that US aid to Egypt would be reviewed in the light of "unfolding events," Obama laid down five conditions for Mubarak to stay on as president with US support:

1. Egyptian military and security forces must be restrained from violence against civilians. The US would defend the rights to freedom of assembly and speech everywhere.

2. Mubarak must deliver on his pledges of reforms for a better democracy and greater economic opportunities;

3. He must hold a dialogue with the opponents of his regime and abandon the use of force;

4. The shutdown of Internet and other services must be reversed.

Before Obama communicated with Mubarak, his administration was generally seen to have abandoned the Egyptian president as a write-off and thrown its support behind the protesters."

(read full report)

GCIS INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING: Muslim Brotherhood joins Egyptian protesters. Three cities locked down

ISSUED BY: GCIS Communications Command Center

SOURCE: DEBKAfile

28January2011 11:12amEST

GCIS INTELLIGENCE UPDATE: The Mubarak regime was badly shaken Thursday night, Jan. 27, when Egypt's most powerful opposition movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, ordered its teeming membership to join the protest movement raging in Cairo and other cities since Tuesday after Friday (Jan. 28) prayers.

DEBKAfile's Cairo sources report that the capital's poor districts, like Shubra which houses four million inhabitants, were bustling Thursday night with preparations for street action the next day. The question on all lips now is: Can the security forces control the many millions of protesters expected to suddenly pour into city streets across the land as of Friday and defend the regime against them.

The police, almost a million security officers and units of the Interior Ministry's special units, have been on their feet for three days quelling outbreaks. They are exhausted and demoralized. They managed to keep the demonstrations from getting out of hand, but not to suppress them. Now that millions of Muslim Brotherhood loyalists have been told to throw in their lot with the protest movement, the beleaguered 82-year old President Hosni Mubarak can no longer avoid sending the army in to stem the unrest, which looks increasingly like turning into a popular revolution. (read full report)