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A February 20 protest has been planned to restore "the dignity of the Moroccan people and for democratic and constitutional reform and the dissolution of parliament." One of Morocco’s leading Islamist movements, Justice and Charity, which has an estimated 200,000 members and is banned from politics but tolerated, has called for “urgent democratic change.” It’s website states “It is unjust that the country’s riches should be monopolised by a minority.”

Abdesslam Yassine, leader of Justice and Charity does not challenge the monarchy itself, but refuses to recognise Mohammed’s religious title of Commander of the Faithful. He was put under house arrest for several years under King Hassan, but King Mohammed VI lifted the restriction shortly after coming to power in 1999. Morocco is a constitutional monarchy with an elected parliament, but the constitution allows the king to dissolve the legislature, impose a state of emergency and have a key say on the appointment of sensitive government portfolios, including the prime minister. Justice and Charity would like to replace the constitution with "a democratic one to mark a break with all aspects of autocracy ... and monopolisation of authority and national wealth and preserves the human dignity of the Moroccan citizen". “It’s an Islamism that is anti-establishment that is pushing for peaceful change,” said Islam expert Mohamed Darif of Justice and Charity. “It doesn’t talk about abolishing the monarchy.”

Egypt's Supreme Military Council has had only three public meetings in it's history. The first one was in 1967, the second was in 1973 and the third took place today. In it they announced that they had convened the meeting in response to the current political turmoil and that they would continue to convene such meetings. It is most significant that Mubarak didn't chair the meeting as he normally would have. Instead the meeting was chaired by Defense Minister Mohamed Tantawi. The statement says

"Based on the responsibility of the armed forces and its commitment to protect the people and its keenness to protect the nation... and in support of the legitimate demands of the people [the army] will continue meeting on a continuous basis to examine measures to be taken to protect the nation and its gains and the ambitions of the great Egyptian people,"

Mubarak has stepped down as Commander-in-Chief of the Army!

Cables released by WikiLeaks on Syria show a State Department eager to repair relations with Syria, which were in extreme ruin when the Bush Administration left power. They show the US government was eager to double their efforts at targeting Syria’s interest in developing nuclear capabilities.

The cable 09DAMASCUS142 from February 19, 2009, shows US officials wanted to find a way to break through Syrian media, which is tightly controlled by the government, and get its own propaganda into the country so Syrians could hear what the US considered to be the truth on US-Syria relations.

Officials were concerned that “savvy journalists” had become “adept at self-censorship.” And, thus, the truth about Syria’s nuclear activities was not being reported:

(update below)

HBGary Federal, provider of classified cybersecurity services to the Department of Defense, Intelligence Community and other US government agencies, has opted over the past months to go to war with the group of WikiLeaks supporters known as Anonymous. The Tech Herald reported today on HBGary Federal and two other data intelligence firms “strategic plan” for an attack against WikiLeaks.

The company is considered to be “a leading provider of best-in-class threat intelligence solutions for government agencies and Fortune 500 organizations.” It provides "enhanced threat intelligence" so "the federal government can better protect our national cyber infrastructure."

In Libya, the Revolution (Al-Thawra) refers not to the protests happening today, but to the revolution over 41 years ago which installed Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution Muammar al-Gaddafi in power. The National Conference for the Libyan Opposition (NCLO) and Libyan activists are calling for a Libyan Day of Rage on February 17 against the abuses of 'the Revolution'. The NCLO has called for mass protests both in and outside of Libya to fall on the anniversary of the February 17, 2006 mass demonstrations in Benghazi against Gaddafi and his regime, which resulted in the deaths of dozens of protestors and the injury of many more.

Gaddafi issued the first official response in private meetings over the last few days with Libyan political activists, journalists, and media figures. He issued severe warnings that they and their professions would be held responsible should they participate in any way in "disturbing the peace or creating chaos" in Libya. WL Central coverage of recent protests told of the fears which were sparked in Gaddafi by the Tunisian revolution. Gaddafi has spoken out against the revolution in Tunisia, and blamed the internet and Al Jazeera news for spreading 'lies' against former Tunisian president Ben Ali. He has also defended Egyptian president Mubarak, saying that the Mubarak family, estimated to be worth US$70 billion, is poor and cannot afford their clothes. He said that Libya is providing the Mubarak family with financial support and accused Israeli intelligence of instigating the Egyptian revolution.

WikiLeaks released the following statement in response to excerpts from a book that were leaked to Cryptome.org on Wednesday. The response from WikiLeaks spokesperson Kristinn Hrafnsson was posted at Forbes.

WikiLeaks has been taking legal action against former employee Daniel Domscheit-Berg who was suspended from the organisation in September. The reasons for these actions will gradually become clear, but some are hinted at by extracts from Domscheit-Berg's book.

The Telegraph: Suleiman told Israel he would 'cleanse' Sinai of arms runners to Gaza

"Omar Suleiman, the new vice-president of Egypt, told the Israelis he wanted to start “cleansing the Sinai” of Palestinian arms smugglers, according to leaked cables."

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The Telegraph: Egyptian 'torturers' trained by FBI

"The US provided officers from the Egyptian secret police with training at the FBI, despite allegations that they routinely tortured detainees and suppressed political opposition."

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The Telegraph: Mohamed ElBaradei was 'too soft on Tehran’

"The United States and Israel warned that Mohamed ElBaradei, a key leader of the Egyptian opposition, was soft on Iran and was becoming “part of the problem” in the Middle East, according to leaked diplomatic cables."

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The Telegraph: Hosni Mubarak told US not to topple Saddam Hussein

"Hosni Mubarak told Dick Cheney, the former US vice-president, “three or four times” not to depose Saddam Hussein, according to leaked cables."

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El País: Frei, un perdedor con cara de perdedor (Frei, a loser with the face of a loser)

News broke last night on February 8 as a court unsealed three motions filed on behalf of Icelandic parliamentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) last month. The motions were filed in response to the U.S. government’s targeting of Twitter accounts as part of an investigation related to WikiLeaks.

Additionally, it was reported that a grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia will be held on February 15 on whether there is legal justification for the Justice Department to request Twitter account details and whether the Justice Department order for Twitter turn over account information should be kept under seal.

Federal prosecutors are and have been seeking to obtain information on Icelandic parliamentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir, Dutch hacker and entrepreneur Roy Gonggrijp and US computer programmer and known WikiLeaks volunteer Jacob Appelbaum as well as “subscriber account information” for Bradley Manning, who has been charged with leaking classified information, and WikiLeaks leader Julian Assange.

More Egyptians than ever turned out demand an end to the Mubarak regime today, putting to rest speculation that the protest movement was running out of steam. Thousands of new faces were to be seen among the protesters that turned out for massive Tuesday demonstrations in Cairo, Alexandria and many other Egyptian cities. Many observers said the crowds in Tahrir (Liberation) Square in Cairo were even larger than they were for last Friday's protests. And they turned out not only in Liberation Square but in other areas of Cairo and all over Egypt. Hundreds of thousands of Egyptians gathered again in Alexandria and thousands protested outside the parliament building a short distance from Tahrir.

Vice President Omar Soleiman warned ominously that his government "can't put up with continued protests" and then added emphatically that there would be no resignation of Mubarak and "no ending of the regime." For three decades the Egyptian people lived in fear of the Mubarak regime and especially the police state apparatus that [EGIS] Egyptian General Intelligence Service Chief Omar Soleiman constructed and then headed. Now the fear is gone. So the struggle between a growing number of Egyptian people and the Mubarak regime settles into a siege on this the 16th continuous day of demonstrations with protesters still holding Liberation Square.

The Witness Statement of Bjorn Hurtig, Swedish counsel for the defense of Julian Assange - Summary

The original statement is available here, and the supporting documents are here, here, and here. In this document, Mr Hurtig describes the case against Mr Assange to the London defense team as one of the weakest he has ever seen in his entire fifteen year career. In this document London defense Mark Stephens asserts that the Swedish prosecutor sought not just to have Mr Assange imprisoned while under investigation, but also placed in solitary confinement. The key points of Mr Assange's skeleton argument were summarized here.

Mr Hurtig states that the manner in which Ms Ny (the Swedish Prosecutor) has handled Mr Assange's case is not in compliance with the concept of a fair trial.

Mr Assange will most certainly be brought to trial behind closed doors, initially and in the Court of Appeal. Mr Assange, who has endured an avalanche of bad publicity, will be heard with no witnesses to view the weaknesses of the case and thus no opportunity to clear his name. Prosecution witnesses will not be refuted by any new witnesses coming forward, because no one will hear their testimony.

The trial will be heard by a judge and three laypersons who are appointed by, and often members of, a political party.

The trial may be affected by media prejudice caused by the unfair conduct of police and prosecutors. Before the complainants were properly interviewed, and thus before an investigation ought to have begun, a prosecutor told the Expressen newspaper that Mr Assange was being investigated for rape, a serious breach of Swedish anonymity law. Despite this breach, the prosecutor has not been disciplined and the Justice Ombudsman has refused to accept a complaint made against her.

The Telegraph: No 10 urged commander to play down Afghanistan failures

"A senior adviser to Gordon Brown put pressure on the commander of Nato forces in Afghanistan to play down the “bleak and deteriorating” situation to reduce criticism of his government, leaked documents disclose."

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The Guardian: Saudi Arabia cannot pump enough oil to keep a lid on prices

"US diplomat convinced by Saudi expert that reserves of world's biggest oil exporter have been overstated by nearly 40%.

The US fears that Saudi Arabia, the world's largest crude oil exporter, may not have enough reserves to prevent oil prices escalating, confidential cables from its embassy in Riyadh show."

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El País: EE UU, preocupado por la corrupción oficial en Argentina (The United States worry about the official corruption in Argentina)

"El fenómeno de la corrupción oficial en Argentina preocupa a Estados Unidos, cuya embajada en Buenos Aires envió al Departamento de Estado más de cien despachos confidenciales, a lo largo de varios años, alertando sobre la fragilidad del sistema judicial en el país sudamericano y, consecuentemente, sobre la impunidad de quienes delinquen. (The phenomenon of the official corruption in Argentina worries the United States, whose embassy in Buenos Aires sent to the State Department more than a hundred confidential cables, through several years, warning about the fragility of the judicial system in the South American country and, consequently, about the impunity of those who break the law.)"

Los cables del Departamento de Estado de EEUU siguen haciéndose públicos cada día, tanto en la página central de Wikileaks como en sus miles de ‘espejos’ diseminados por la red. Es una certeza que la revelación del funcionamiento íntimo de los gobiernos corruptos de Túnez y Egipto han inspirado las transiciones democráticas que se están intentando en estos momentos. Los ciudadanos de ambos países han reaccionado al ver de manera directa y cándida las negociaciones a puerta cerrada y la corrupción opresiva de su clase política, que los reprime para satisfacer sus intereses y los de sus aliados.

En el caso particular de Egipto el escenario al que se ha llegado es en extremo complejo, algo causado mayoritariamente por ser este un país intermediario en las relaciones entre Israel y Palestina, y de manera más general en todo Oriente Medio. Ya en un cable del año 2007 (07CAIRO1417) el embajador de EEUU en Cairo dice que "la sucesión presidencial es el elefante en la habitación de la política egipcia. A pesar de los incesantes rumores nadie en todo Egipto tiene la certeza de quien va a sustituir a Mubarak, ni tampoco como esa sucesión se va a llevar a cabo”. Estos problemas son los propios de un régimen opresivo, que tiene que ejercer sus intereses en contra de la voluntad de sus ciudadanos; algo que, por su parte, el propio gobierno admite, como nos muestra otro cable de 2009 (09CAIRO1468) en el que el ex ministro Dessouki reconoce que las elecciones de 2011 representarían de manera casi segura un problema de seguridad, que, sin embargo, podría ser aplacado ya que “la sublevación no es parte del espíritu egipcio”.

Ya no queda ninguna duda de que Wikileaks está siendo atacada: amenazas directas desde el Pentágono; llamamientos al ataque militar por parte de la vieja derecha neo-conservadora, – que incluye un intento de juzgarla como espía usando una vieja ley de 1917 ; los sonados boicots de Paypal, Moneybookers, Amazon y ahora incluso Apple; la reticencia del gobierno Australiano para defender a su ciudadano (Julian Assange), el rechazo de su residencia en Suecia sin explicación alguna por parte de las autoridades, y la lista crece.

Syria is reportedly set to unblock facebook, youtube and twitter today. Syria’s state-owned fixed line operator ISP, the Syrian Telecommunications Establishment (STE) requested its licensed distributors to permit access. Syrian censorship of the internet has been seen as among the worst in the world, and it has targeted social media in particular. The relaxing of access appears to be a part of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's commitment to progress and communication with the Syrian people.

As reviewed earlier on WL Central, that commitment has been primarily verbal in a country that has a long way to go to meet standards requested by such authorities as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Committee to Protect Journalists. Syria escaped a scheduled protest on February 5 through a combination of suppression, threats and bribes to the Syrian people, and it was hoped at that point that the promised reforms would be substantial enough to reward the Syrian people's restraint. In a country with a reported 10,000 political prisoners, where bloggers are routinely jailed, tortured, and 'disappeared', more substantial reforms are required.

Congressional delegation meeting in June 2008 detailed in cable

A recently released cable describes three congressional delegation meetings with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman and Foreign Minister Aboul Gheit. The congressional delegation present at the meetings included Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Rep. Thad McCotter (R-MI), Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R-TX), Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-MO), Rep. Al Green (D-TX), and professional staff members David Adams, Jamie McCormick and Howard Diamond.

The meetings described in 08CAIRO1416, on CODEL Ackerman (“congressional delegation”) posted by Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten focused on Israeli-Palestinian developments (the building of a “calming period”), Egypt’s regional relations, and human rights criticisms of Egypt.

Cable 08TELAVIV1984, released by Wikileaks today, is headlined at Uruknet "New Wikileaks cable shows 2008 war on Gaza was unprovoked: Israel knew Hamas was enforcing ceasefire" referring to the 2008 massacre that resulted in approximately 1,400 Palestinians killed in 22 days, an operation in which Israeli soldiers had orders to "cleanse" entire neighbourhoods, orders which they carried out. That is evident in the first part of the cable, where MOD Arab Affairs Adviser David Hacham, says Suleiman was keeping the pressure on Hamas, but the Israelis were frustrated at Hamas' 'stalling tactics' - Hamas was demanding Egyptian guarantees that Israel would not attack Gaza once Shalit was released. Regarding the Tahdiya, Hacham said Barak stressed that while it was not permanent, for the time being it was holding. There have been a number of violations of the ceasefire on the Gaza side, but Palestinian factions other than Hamas were responsible. Hacham said the Israelis assess that Hamas is making a serious effort to convince the other factions not to launch rockets or mortars.

The cable also returns to Egypt's anti-smuggling efforts, enforced by Israel and the US, and this time Israel has "decided to praise Egypt's performance publicly both in genuine acknowledgement of some improvements in destroying tunnels and in order to show the Egyptians that Israel was capable of praising as well as criticizing them. In private, however, Barak also pushed the Egyptians to do more, particularly in terms of stopping the smuggling well before the arms reach the Gaza border."

Today, Wikileaks released two more cables detailing Israeli pressure on the residents of Gaza Strip. As reported by WL Central here, the closure of tunnels bringing basic supplies into the Gaza Strip from Egypt have caused an urgent humanitarian crises for the people of Gaza. But US state cables show Israel pressuring the US to link aid to Egypt with the complete closure of those tunnels and the prevention of any supplies reaching Gaza through Egypt. Egypt's new vice president's involvement is also discussed.

In November of 2007, Israel Security Agency (ISA) Director Yuval Diskin met with US officials to discuss the 'problem' of supplies moving from Egypt to the Gaza Strip. In 07TELAVIV3258 Diskin outlines "a growing crisis in Israeli-Egyptian relations over smuggling across the Gaza border". Diskin told the US representatives that the ISA had, on several occasions, provided Omar Suleiman, Chief of Egyptian Intelligence Services, with detailed intelligence on the names of smugglers. In 2005, Diskin said he met personally with Suleiman in Egypt, at which time Suleiman promised personally to take responsibility for "cleansing the Sinai." Despite these promises, and Israeli offers to initiate joint operations, Diskin said Egypt has not acted to eliminate the smuggling networks. In Diskin's view, there is a core policy problem, in that the Egyptians view themselves as the primary mediator between the Israelis and Palestinians, and are careful not to alienate either side. "This is not possible with Hamas in Gaza," insisted Diskin.

Algerian municipal government authorities announced Monday that they had banned an opposition rally calling for an end to Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's rule. WL Central reported on the planned rally and the unrest in Algeria here. The authorities said the protest could be held in an indoor venue instead of being a march, but the opposition Rally for Culture and Democracy (RCD) said it would defy the order and go ahead with the march.

Today sixteen people were injured, including eleven police, during a violent protest in Skikda, eastern Algeria. Protesters succeeded in closing the National Road No. 3, the link between the major cities east of Algeria (the provinces of Constantine and Annaba) in the face of traffic for several hours by stones and barricades. They also set fire to rubber wheels in protest of a lack of clean water and social problems in their village. The violence began when the police attempted to clear the road.

Zohra Drif Bitat, a vice-president of Algeria's upper house of parliament who was appointed by Bouteflika, has strongly criticized the government, saying it had been unable to translate the country's huge energy wealth into a better life for the average citizen. "Are we going to continue to tackle our problems with the same actors who have failed? Don't we need new blood? I hope and expect a radical change in the mode of governance," she said on state radio.

For many in Tahrir Square, his presence was why they had come out February 8. Ghonim, who was released on February 7 by authorities, played a key role in organization demonstrations against the regime before being arrested in late January.

He was seized in the Egyptian capital when he was with tens of thousands of protesters in the Square. Al Jazeera reported Ghonim was "picked up by three plainclothes men on the street, pushed into a car and taken off for interrogation by state security members."

Ghonim has tried to minimize his role in the revolution. He said after his release, "Please don't make me a hero. I'm not a hero. I have been asleep for 12 days." 

The Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten has published a set of cables that shed light on Omar Suleiman’s willingness to serve the interests of Israel. The man recently appointed as vice-president of Egypt, according to a cable from 2005, was willing to help former head of security in the Israeli Defense Ministry Amos Gilad by guaranteeing there would be no democratic elections in Gaza in 2006. He was also willing to help Israel better manage the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt.

Cables released also reveal that a key motive for opposing Hamas was a fear that the Muslim Brotherhood would be emboldened. 05TELAVIV5864 details a meeting that Gilad wanted kept secret. Gilad talked about his fear of the Palestinian uprising movement Hamas, which was expected to get a large amount of the vote in the democratic elections in January 2006. Gilad was afraid that Hamas would win the election and that a Hamas win would "destroy everything."