On Tuesday the Obama Administration asked Hosni Mubarak to step aside.
On Wednesday they said that transitioning power “now means yesterday.”
On Saturday morning the Obama Administration said Mubarak must stay.
On Saturday evening the Obama Administration said Mubarak should step aside.
On Sunday Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Mubarak must stay in power.
Today the Obama Administration said that political reform will be a gradual process.
Is it any wonder then that the Obama Administration has alienated all sides in Egypt?
An anti-government protester wears a niqab and a headband in the colors of the Egyptian flag at the continuing protest in Tahrir Square in downtown Cairo, Egypt Monday, Feb. 7, 2011. (AP)
In another blow to the Obama Administration, Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman told reporters today that there will be no regime change in Egypt and that Mubarak is not planning on leaving office anytime soon.
Salon reported:
Vice President Omar Suleiman warned Tuesday that “we can’t put up with” continued protests in Tahrir for a long time, saying the crisis must be ended as soon as possible in a sharply worded sign of increasing regime impatience with 16 days of mass demonstrations.
Suleiman said there will be “no ending of the regime” and no immediate departure for President Hosni Mubarak, according to the state news agency MENA, reporting on a meeting between the vice president and the heads of state and independent newspapers.
He told them the regime wants dialogue to resolve protesters’ demands for democratic reform, adding in a veiled warning, “We don’t want to deal with Egyptian society with police tools.”
At one point in the roundtable meeting, Suleiman warned that the alternative to dialogue “is that a coup happens, which would mean uncalculated and hasty steps, including lots of irrationalities. We don’t want to reach that point, to protect Egypt.”
Pressed by the editors to explain the comment, he said he did not mean a military coup but that “a force that is unprepared for rule” could overturn state institutions, said Amr Khafagi, editor-in-chief of the privately-owned Shorouk daily, who attended the briefing. “He doesn’t mean it in the classical way.”
