![\"Egypt\"](\"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/egypt-protest-e1372743934564.jpg\")
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The\u00a0NY Times reveals<\/a>\u00a0that among the parties urging Egypt\u2019s military leaders to stand fast against both the Muslim Brotherhood and western interlocutors attempting to negotiate a way out of the impasse in Cairo, were Israel and Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n Both have a common interest: they hate Islamists and see them as among the greatest threats to their regimes. That\u2019s why both lobbied President Obama hard not to end the U.S.\u2019 $1.3 billion in military aid to Egypt or to take further harsh action in response to the massacres that have left at least 1,000 dead in the past week and thousands more injured.<\/p>\n My Israeli source tells me that the phones lines between Jerusalem and Cairo were humming:<\/p>\n The Israelis, whose military had close ties to General Sisi from his former post as head of military intelligence, were supporting the takeover as well. Western diplomats say that General Sisi and his circle appeared to be in heavy communication with Israeli colleagues, and the diplomats believed the Israelis were also undercutting the Western message by reassuring the Egyptians not to worry about American threats to cut off aid.<\/p>\n Israeli officials deny having reassured Egypt about the aid, but acknowledge having lobbied Washington to protect it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Contacts with the Egyptian junta leaders was likely conducted by Amos Gilad, one of Bibi Netanyahu\u2019s trusted national security advisors and a former IDF intelligence officer. Though I don\u2019t know what Gilad told them, it\u2019s likely he told them to hang tough; to rid Egypt once and for all of the Islamist threat. After all, that\u2019s the theme song of all Israeli military interventions in places like Lebanon or Gaza: we need to invade these places to rid them of the threat of radical Islam with its permanent holy war against Jews and western values. It\u2019s heady advice to hear from Israelis who, after all, are known for twisting U.S. presidents around their little fingers. One couldn\u2019t fault el-Sisi if he was persuaded that he could work the mojo with Washington as well.<\/p>\n The Israelis told the Egyptians not to worry about western blandishments or threats. They said that westerners don\u2019t understand this region. They don\u2019t live here. They don\u2019t understand these wild-eyed terrorists ready to die for their religion. When all is said and done, the westerners always cave because they need us more than we need them. That\u2019s likely the siren song sung by Israelis to their Egyptian counterparts.<\/p>\n Patrick Smith, writing in Salon, raised some even more troubling questions on this subject:<\/p>\n More pressing has been Israel\u2019s intolerance of an Islamic party \u2014 Morsi\u2019s Muslim Brotherhood \u2014 in power next door. It is apparent, if not quite evident, that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted Morsi\u2019s head before he agreed to any talks with the Palestinians. He assented to new talks within days of the Egyptian coup, it is worth noting. The dreaded question here is whether U.S. support for Israel effectively precludes political advances in the Arab world. One fears the answer, but it is vital now to pose the problem.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But it wasn\u2019t only Israelis who were doing the singing: Aipac, which usually sticks to its single-issue focus on Israel, weighed in as well:<\/p>\n When Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, proposed an amendment halting military aid to Egypt, the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee sent a letter to senators on July 31 opposing it, saying it \u201ccould increase instability in Egypt and undermine important U.S. interests and negatively impact our Israeli ally.\u201d Statements from influential lawmakers echoed the letter, and the Senate defeated the measure, 86 to 13, later that day.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Supporting<\/em>\u00a0the dictators will\u00a0add<\/em>\u00a0to instability in Egypt. But Aipac doesn\u2019t care about Egypt. The generals could mow down ten or hundred thousand and the Israel lobby wouldn\u2019t even blink. But Aipac believes Israel needs a bulwark against the scourge of Islamism. The Brotherhood, as far as Israel is concerned, is the unknown. What Israel never likes is the unknown. It prefers a status quo in which its citizens remain prey to ongoing hostilities and violence, over an unknown set of territorial compromises and the ongoing waves of Arab populism represented by the Arab Spring.<\/p>\n Israel has thrown in with the worst and most brutal of the Arab world: the generals, the fat cat Saudi sheikhs, and autocratic kings. The Old Guard which maintains its hold on power through brutality, violence, and corruption. Unfortunately, this allows the world to say that Israel itself and its values are those of the corrupt strongmen it supports.<\/p>\n\n