Cairo Blast at Khan al-Khalili
The analysis of the bombing of a tourist area of Cairo, which killed 4 and wounded 18 on Thursday given by the Egyptian social scientists interviewed by China’s Xinhuanet seems to me quite sophisticated. They pointed to increased wealth stratification (social contradictions) in Egypt– where the poor have stayed poor and the rich have gotten a bit better off during the past 25 years. They also pointed to the destabilizing effect on the region of the Iraq War and other American policies.
The bombing was likey the work of Ayman al-Zawahiri’s al-Jihad al-Islami, which
is part of al-Qaeda. That Bush wimped out on destroying Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri and instead poured $300 billion into the Iraq quagmire has left the jihadis free to plot and act. Egypt gets billions of dollars every year in revenue from tourism, which helps prop up the Egyptian government. The al-Jihad al-Islami wants to overthrow the Egyptian government, so it is trying to deprive it of the tourist revenue. The tactic works, but it has the disadvantage of making all the other Egyptians, who depend on the tourist revenue, angry at the jihadis and unwilling to support them politically.