Omar Suleiman’s retirement from Egypt’s presidential race leaves the stage open to the Muslim Brotherhood and possible one other Islamist contender. Frontrunner Khairat El-Shater is offering his Salafist rivals perks for standing down. The Egyptian street will pick the winner.

Former Egyptian intelligence strongman Gen. Omar Suleiman’s decision Thursday, April 5 to drop out of the race for president in the June election shocked Washington and Jerusalem and dashed their hopes of a figure capable of challenging Khairat El-Shater and halting or at least offsetting the Muslim Brotherhood’s monopoly of power in post-Mubarak Egypt. The Supreme Military Council ruling Egypt was told that Islamist power had become unstoppable after starting to penetrate the young army elite taking over in July, debkafile reports.

Egypt’s military rulers have been whittling down the Muslim-Brotherhood-dominated parliament’s powers and begun backing its secular, pro-democracy, liberal opponents who plan to revive Tahrir protests.

Israel Thursday night, March 15, gave Egypt and Hamas two days to halt the five-day missile offensive from Gaza or expect IDF action against the shooters. debkafile reports that the missile operation has been taken over by a small group of Salafi Palestinians linked to al Qaeda. And Hamas leader Mahmoud A-Zahar is currently visiting Tehran and being urged by his Iranian hosts to block a ceasefire so as draw the Israeli military into a messy showdown with the Salafis.

Six mortar rounds exploded on empty ground in the Eshkol farm district abutting on the Gaza Strip shortly before Tuesday March 13 noon, less than 12 hours after Cairo announced a ceasefire. debkafile reports Palestinian organizations, including Hamas, are resolved to keep up a low level of fire on Israeli civilian locations so as to establish their prerogative for shooting at will regardless of any ceasefire deals. Israel is apt to accept this arrangement to avoid a head-on clash.

The masters of Egyptian intelligence, who are still in power, disguised their anti-US sentiments as long as Hosni Mubarak was president. Today, they prefer to deal with the Islamists who expect to win power in Cairo and are ready to ditch Egypt's ties with America.

Egypt's immediate future is up in the air over unanswerable questions about its form of government, the nature of its leadership and the lack of clarity about its new constitution. The country is meanwhile on the brink of economic collapse.

The military rulers of Egypt are upending President Barack Obama's plans for Egypt by bringing forward the handover of power to the Muslim parliamentary majority - without providing for the framing of a democratic constitution and the election of a moderate president. To save the day, Washington hopes to handpick an acceptable ...

Egypt's military rulers have their hands too full with the breakdown of order in Egypt's cities to attend to the rising Islamist power in parliament. In any case, we reveal that while the Muslim Brotherhood won the election, the liberal bloc came second – not the Salafis and Mubarak ...

The Egyptian military council quelled this week's riots against its rule by drawing the mainstream political parties and presidential contenders into its corner and away from the protesters by the threat of postponing the general elections they are pinning their hopes on.

The protests in Cairo and other Egyptian cities do not count as the country's second revolution this year. The angry masses battling police in Cairo's Tahrir Square and the centers of Alexandria, Ismailia and Port Said for four days are not backed by any serious political entity, including the Muslim Brotherhood, which Tuesday, Nov. 22 threw in their lot with the military council. So will the protesters be satisfied with Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi's promise of a presidential election in mid-2012? Not so far.

The posters appearing in Cairo and Alexandria promoting the Supreme Council head Muhammad Tantawi indicate that the generals have not intention of relinquishing the rule of Egypt to a civilian government and will run their own candidates for the presidency.

After thriving away from politics under Hosni Mubarak and shunning Tahrir Square, Egypt's Salafis have set up parties to run for parliamentary elections in November and turning to street violence.

The United States launches a large-scale strategic airlift exercise over the Middle East Monday, Oct. 21. Tuesday, the day of the Israel-Hamas prisoner exchange for Gilad Shalit, the giant transports carrying command and combat units will practice swift emergency landings in Israel and Saudi Arabia. The US, Israeli, Egyptian and Saudi armies are on high military preparedness amid warnings of terrorist attacks to disrupt the prisoner exchange and avenge US charges of an Iran-instigated plot to murder the Saudi ambassador.

The Israel-Hamas prisoner swap for Gilad Shalit and the exposure of the plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador opened two new US fronts against Iran: The relocation of Hamas HQ from Damascus to Cairo which deprived Iran and Syria of their Palestinian lever and a pretext for the Saudis ...

The Obama administration has never wavered from its ambition to see the Muslim Brotherhood in government in Egypt or its policy of linking Egypt's destiny with a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  It hopes to discourage the burgeoning Muslim Brotherhood from casting its fate with Tehran on the grounds that Iran has no influence on Israel whereas American leverage on Jerusalem is substantial.

Thursday, Oct. 13 Cairo took two steps inimical to Israel. Egyptian Air Force Chief Gen. Reda Hafiz said: "Sinai is our land and we do not need permission to increase our forces on our land" in direct contravention of the 1979 peace treaty signed with Israel which demilitarized Sinai by common consent.  Then, without waiting for the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit's release from captivity, Cairo let the first Damascus- based Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzuk settle down in Cairo.

The claim Friday by Field Marshall Mohamed Tantawi, head of the military junta ruling Egypt, of "complete security on the Sinai Peninsula" was belied Monday, Oct. 10, by the Israeli Counterterrorism Bureau's warning against travel to Sinai for Sukkot. As Cairo lets Sinai security go by the board, the Netanyahu government leans over backwards to pretend business with Egypt is back to normal – even after armed Bedouin cut the trade route between Egypt and Israel through Sinai three weeks ago.

To punish the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas for submitting his application for UN membership in defiance of President Barack Obama's strong objections, Washington leaned on Jordan's King Abdullah II to allow a visit by Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal to discuss his political bureau's transfer from Damascus to Amman. Saudi Arabia helped persuade him. Obama was telling Abbas thereby that if Hamas should moderate its extremism, his role as sole Palestinian spokesman would face serious competition.

Al Jazeera's Qatari owner Emir Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani takes charge of editorial policy based on the vagaries of the Arab Revolt. He sacked two top editors and placed a safe family member at the top of the station's management.