“It’s amazing. These 15-year-old kids are doing such a much better job than our traffic police.” — former diplomat in Cairo, Egypt.
Eric mentioned this weekend with regard to Egypt’s natal chart that the placement of Mercury and the Moon in mutual reception indicated that Egypt’s armed forces likely play “any role that is convenient at the moment.” At this particular moment, the popular movement is looking pretty strong against Mubarak’s government — and the people do not fear the military; this potentially gives the people a strong ally in the changes they are pushing for.
In fact, when the police were ordered to retreat Friday and the military sent in, protesters welcomed the soldiers — cheering and climbing atop the tanks to pray.
Democracy Now! senior producer Sharif Abdel Kouddous, who is in Cairo, grew up in Egypt and has traveled back many times since moving to the U.S. — but says the Egypt he returned to late last week was a changed country, never to be the same regardless of how things progress. With regard to the reception of the military by the people of Cairo, he remarked today that “what’s important to understand is that, you know, over the past decades, three decades, the state, the security forces and the police have been brutalizing, have been torturing the Egyptian people, have been wrongly imprisoning them, have been corrupt. But the army has not done this. The army has not had an interaction with the civilian population since the 1973 war with Israel. And so, people trust the army.”
Of course, the people are also perfectly aware of who has outfitted the Egyptian police and army. The tanks are either American-made or American-designed and built in Egypt by agreement. Kouddous describes protesters coming up to him with spent teargas canisters, pointing to the “Made in the U.S.A.” label. They are not protesting the U.S., but rather pointing out that they know how close the two governments are, and desire to choose for themselves what the new government will look like — regardless of how it does or does not fit the agenda of American politicians and companies.
But perhaps most encouraging is the description Kouddous gives of the overwhelming sense of community springing up among the protesters, who span classes, religions and ages: