Bands of young Sinai Bedouin have turned their backs on tribal affiliations in and formed lawless bands of jihadis which are highly vulnerably to Iranian and radical Palestinian penetration. Those bands carried out the twin attack on Egyptian and Israel military targets last Sunday.

The Brotherhood is snatching the main cabinet posts including prime minister from President Morsi’s grasp and conniving against him with the Supreme Military Council. The new president is trying to break free of its shackles.

Field Marshal Tantawi and presidential contestant Ahmed Shafiq both made tracks to Riyadh this week for succor and support against the Muslim Brotherhood takeover of power in Cairo. Both were also going against US plans for supporting that takeover.

With no clear winner, Egypt is falling into two ...

General Omar Suleiman was gulled into throwing his hat in the presidential ring by two generals who needed a fig leaf for disqualifying the two Islamist contenders for the presidency.

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.

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.

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 ...

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.

Only four months after Hosni Mubarak's removal, Washington wants to be rid of Egypt's military ruler Field Marshal Tantawi. After agreeing that the September election should be postponed to save the country from the Muslim Brotherhood and perfect the new constitution, the Obama administration is moving close to common ground with Saudi ...

While declaring that they don't aim for power, the Muslim Brotherhood has put up a candidate for the Egyptian presidency. Despite his radical and stormy past, he is being portrayed as a progressive. The generals have countered by approaching Field Marshall Mohamed Tantawi to run against the MB candidate.

The Egyptian prosecutor general's decicion to put deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and his sons on trial -  the former for his life - indicates the powerlessness of the ruling supreme military council in the face of the street. This weakness emboldens the Muslim Brotherhood and opens the door to ...

Washington has excellent relations with the Egyptian military rulers but their control of the country is extremely limited. The soldiers would rather desert than obey orders. The police are off the streets and the civilian government goes its own way.

Following Muammar Qaddafi's military successes Tuesday, Western-backed parties Wednesday, March 9, discreetly solicited him on the Libyan rebels' behalf for diplomatic understandings to stop his forces short of marching on rebel-held Cyrenaica in the east, debkafile's exclusive sources report. In return, the rebels would accept an informal ceasefire and let the oil facilities return to normal. Egypt's Field Marshal Tantawi, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou and Vienna-based diplomats are leading these early exchanges.

Failing European will or capability for military action to halt Libya's civil war and remove Muammar Qaddafi, Washington has approached Egypt to undertake a limited operation. Hesitant at first, the military rulers saw the perils continuing Libyan unrest posed Egypt.

Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak phoned the Egyptian council head, Defense Minister Mohamed Tantawi, Saturday night, Feb. 12, to thank him for transferring 900 men of two 18th Division battalions to Sinai to rein in the lawless rampage raging there. The Council acted within 24 hours of taking the reins of office from Hosni Mubarak. There is some speculation that the army is hiding the deposed president in a base on the Red Sea coast – far from Sharm el-Sheikh.

Friday night, Feb. 11, as Egypt celebrated Hosni Mubarak exit, Israel counted the cost of losing its most important strategic partner in the region. Thirty-two years of peace leave Israel militarily unprepared for the unknown on their 270-kilometer long southern border; no experience of desert combat; an army trained and equipped only for the hostile fronts of Iran, Lebanon's Hizballah and Syria; a dearth of intelligence about the Egyptian army and its commanders, and no clue to the new rulers' intentions.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has sent his defense minister Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi in secret to Washington to ask for US backing for his embattled regime against the street protest movement which gained in violence on its second day, Wednesday, Jan. 26.  debkafile's Washington sources report that in secret meetings, Tantawi warned top US officials that without a crackdown on the protesters, the regime was doomed. The Egyptian army is on emergency standby.