Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Egypt's Black Bloc Blacked Out!

What’s this?  The New York Times today ran an extensive story about the new group on the protest scene in Egypt called The Black Bloc, (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/world/middleeast/egypt-protests.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0&partner=rss&emc=rss&src=ig) while RT and France 24 both ignore the anarchist group that claims to have 20,000 members and is causing the military to warn that the country risks disintegrating.

Digging into on-line news outlets, I found that the BBC did a lengthy story on the Black Bloc last Sunday January 28, (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-21228852), but appears to have dropped the story since.

Cautious observers will claim that it is too soon to pronounce this an important development, but my sense of ‘the gist’ tells me that the appearance of a Muslim anarchist group marks a watershed. It is one more indication that we are witnessing a worldwide cultural conflict between vulgar consu-merism on one hand and aspirations for a better life that includes a higher moral plane. In Egypt that moral plane is embodied by Islam, but its foundation is the same as that espoused by Black Bloc movements worldwide, whose public face, by the way, is called Anonymous.

In a few days the reason for the news blackout that does not follow the usual international dichotomy should become clear.  My first guess is that the U.S. is probably pulling many strings in the largest Muslim country in the Middle East which is also Israel’s neighbor.

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