Israel warns US: Alienating Egyptian army could risk peace talks
By JPOST.COM STAFF
Daily Beast quotes US senator as saying Obama administration has decided to temporarily suspend military aid to Egypt.
Israel has urged the US to back the Egyptian
military, saying losing Egypt to Islamists could pose a risk the
Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
According
to an Israeli official quoted by the paper, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have
traditionally played an important role in providing the Palestinians
the support to stay in the negotiations and to make concessions, and
without them there is a chance the talks will fail.
The
paper also reported on a parallel effort by Israel, Saudi Arabia and
the United Arab Emirates to influence the US into backing the Egyptian
military.
According to the report, Israel and the US’s Gulf allies
are urging the Obama administration to encourage the Egyptian military
to confront rather than reconcile with the Muslim Brotherhood.
Israel
is interested in an Egyptian government that will aggressively fight
the Islamists in the Sinai Peninsula and protect the border, the report
said.The paper quotes an Israeli official as calling anti-Muslim Brotherhood nations “the axis of reason.”
The
head of the Israeli-Palestinian Center for Research and Information,
Gershon Baskin, is quoted by the paper as saying Israel’s leaders view
Islamist president Mohamed Morsi’s overthrow as “an opportune time to
give a real blow to political Islam throughout the region and get the
more sensible people back in power.”
Despite that, Israel remains
wary of the Egyptian military, fearing the army’s crackdown on Muslim
Brotherhood supporters could spark an Islamist insurgency that could
erode Israeli security, the Journal reported.
As a result, Israel has been pushing the US not to cut its military aid to Egypt, the Journal
reported, arguing that would jeopardize counterterrorism cooperation in
Sinai and the 1979 Israeli-Egyptian Camp David peace accord.
The
Egyptian military on July 3 overthrew Morsi, who emerged from Egypt´s
Muslim Brotherhood movement to become the country´s first freely elected
president last year after the February 2011 fall of long-time
authoritarian ruler Hosni Mubarak.
The United States has refused to call Morsi´s ouster a military coup and it has never called for him to be reinstated.
Nor has done much to curb the extensive military and economic aid that Cairo receives from Washington.
On July 24, Obama decided to suspend the delivery of four F-16 fighters to Egypt and on August 15 he canceled a regular military exercise with the Egyptian army.
However, he has largely left the aid intact. In recent years, it has run at roughly $1.3 billion in military assistance and about $250 million in economic aid annually.
Because of the across-the-board US government spending cuts, US aid to Egypt in the current fiscal year to September 30 will be slightly lower, amounting to about $1.23 billion for the military and $241 million in economic aid.
The media was filled with reports on Monday that the US was either mulling, or already decided, to suspend its military aid to Egypt.
American website the Daily Beast quoted the office of US Senator Patrick Leahy as saying the Obama administration has decided in private to temporarily suspend military aid to Egypt, despite deciding not to publicly condemn the military´s overthrow of Morsi as a coup.
According to the report, the Obama administration decided behind the scenes to temporarily suspend the disbursement of direct military aid, the delivery of weapons and some form of economic aid, while it reviews its relations with the new Egyptian government.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki, however, denied a similar New York Times report on Monday that the department had put a hold on its funding for economic programs that directly involve the Egyptian government.
Psaki told reporters the State Department was reviewing the economic aid to see how much, if any, might be curtailed as a result of Morsi´s ouster and the subsequent violence in Egypt, but stressed that no decisions had been made.
She said this might apply to less than half of the $241 million but was unable to provide a specific amount.
Under US law, economic aid that goes to non-governmental groups as well as to government programs that promote free and fair elections, health, the environment, democracy, rule of law, and good governance are exempt from such a cut-off, Psaki said.
Economic programs that do not cover these areas may be affected, she said.
"We are reviewing each of those programs on a case-by-case basis to identify whether we have authority to continue providing those funds or should seek to modify our activities to ensure that our actions are consistent with the law," she said.
Psaki also said the Obama administration could choose to cut some of the $1.23 billion in military aid this year.The United States has refused to call Morsi´s ouster a military coup and it has never called for him to be reinstated.
Nor has done much to curb the extensive military and economic aid that Cairo receives from Washington.
On July 24, Obama decided to suspend the delivery of four F-16 fighters to Egypt and on August 15 he canceled a regular military exercise with the Egyptian army.
However, he has largely left the aid intact. In recent years, it has run at roughly $1.3 billion in military assistance and about $250 million in economic aid annually.
Because of the across-the-board US government spending cuts, US aid to Egypt in the current fiscal year to September 30 will be slightly lower, amounting to about $1.23 billion for the military and $241 million in economic aid.
The media was filled with reports on Monday that the US was either mulling, or already decided, to suspend its military aid to Egypt.
American website the Daily Beast quoted the office of US Senator Patrick Leahy as saying the Obama administration has decided in private to temporarily suspend military aid to Egypt, despite deciding not to publicly condemn the military´s overthrow of Morsi as a coup.
According to the report, the Obama administration decided behind the scenes to temporarily suspend the disbursement of direct military aid, the delivery of weapons and some form of economic aid, while it reviews its relations with the new Egyptian government.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki, however, denied a similar New York Times report on Monday that the department had put a hold on its funding for economic programs that directly involve the Egyptian government.
Psaki told reporters the State Department was reviewing the economic aid to see how much, if any, might be curtailed as a result of Morsi´s ouster and the subsequent violence in Egypt, but stressed that no decisions had been made.
She said this might apply to less than half of the $241 million but was unable to provide a specific amount.
Under US law, economic aid that goes to non-governmental groups as well as to government programs that promote free and fair elections, health, the environment, democracy, rule of law, and good governance are exempt from such a cut-off, Psaki said.
Economic programs that do not cover these areas may be affected, she said.
"We are reviewing each of those programs on a case-by-case basis to identify whether we have authority to continue providing those funds or should seek to modify our activities to ensure that our actions are consistent with the law," she said.
Reuters contributed to this report.
No comments:
Post a Comment