Stringer/Egypt / Reuters

Women holding umbrellas stand in line during rain under an election poster by Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood "The Freedom and Justice Party'" outside a polling station as they wait to cast their votes during parliamentary elections in Alexandria on Monday.

CAIRO – The Muslim Brotherhood has already started coloring outside the lines in order to win a majority in Egypt’s parliamentary elections. 

The organization, which gave its political branch the more ambiguous title, The Party of Freedom and Justice (FJP), is expected to win 40 percent of the seats in the lower house of parliament, according to analysts estimates.  Official results from the first round of voting will be announced Thursday.

Based on our own observations at polling stations across Cairo and anecdotal evidence, they seem to have won support at the polls by bending the rules in their favor.

Free food and cheap meat
In Cairo’s Saida Zeinab neighborhood, at one of the busiest polling centers in the city, we saw a party member and two other supporters of an independent candidate passing out leaflets to voters waiting in long lines to cast their ballots – in clear violation of election laws. Soldiers who were on site for crowd control, did nothing to stop them. At the same spot, a tech-savvy FJP member sat on a bench, laptop in hand, to conduct exit polls. At other polling stations, they provided polling information to baffled voters. 
 
In a more economically disadvantaged part of Cairo known as “The Slaughterhouse,” Hanan Nasr, a mother of three, watched FJP members pass out free packages of rice and oil to voters on their way to the polling station – again in contravention of campaign law. They also bused in party members from surrounding neighborhoods.

Voter confusion played into the hands of the FJP. Many voters simply did not know who the candidates were because of the sheer number of mostly unknown candidates (4,000), unknown parties (35 new ones since President Hosni Mubarak fell from power) and a complicated voting system requiring choices of farmer, labor and independent candidates. 

Mohamed Abd El Ghany / Reuters

A woman casts her vote at a polling station during the second day of parliamentary elections in Alexandria, Egypt on Tuesday. Click on the photo to see a complete slideshow of pictures from the Egyptian election.

For those who did not understand the voting system, the FJP had people on hand before the election to explain how to make their ballots count – for FJP candidates.

Although Nasr voted for a liberal party, her son, Ali, opted for the only party he was familiar with, the FJP.  Some FJP members had been signing up voters in Nasr’s neighborhood in the run up to the election and distributed free school supplies. And before the recent Eid al-Adha or Feast of the Sacrifice holiday, the one time of year when everybody in Egypt must have meat to celebrate the holiday, the FJP sold meat at half the market price to Cairo’s many disadvantaged.  
 
Clearly, the FJP struck a chord with voters.  Most of those we spoke to said they were voting FJP because they were well organized, helped the poor, and would uphold religious law. 

“They look to God,” said taxi driver Saad Abdul Aziz, who voted FJP.  “They must be just.”

Mahmud Hams / AFP - Getty Images

Muslim Brotherhood members distribute fliers to voters outside a polling station in the Manial neighbourhood of Cairo on Monday.

Shifting promises
In the wake of the revolution, the FJP initially promised to compete for only 30 percent of parliamentary seats, in order not to frighten civil society and the interim military government.  They gradually upped that figure to 100 percent. 

Likewise, a promise not to field presidential candidates was soon broken.  The FJP had joined a much larger political bloc of secular and religious parties running for president, but the alliance fell apart when the FJP tried to dominate party lists.
 
The official election results will be announced Thursday evening, but the FJP is expected to win big in Egypt’s two largest cities, Cairo and Alexandria. 

Since it’s a parliamentary system, their leaders have already demanded that if their party wins the largest proportion of seats as a party, they should be entitled to form the new government.

In view of the FJP’s track record of broken promises, many wonder what kind of government they would be and whether they will respect their promise to adhere to democratic process and take into account Egypt’s secularists and 10 percent Christian population. 

Mohsin Raza / Reuters

Residents, including shopkeepers and businessmen, hit the ground with their sandals to express their anger while shouting anti-American slogans during a demonstration in Lahore on Thursday.

American gunships launch a strike across the Afghan border into Pakistan, hitting a Pakistani check post and killing 11 soldiers. U.S. officials say the attack was in response to insurgent firing. Pakistan calls the attacks "unprovoked and cowardly."  That was in June of 2008.

Three Pakistani soldiers are killed at their border post as a result of an American helicopter strike. U.S. officials say they were targeting insurgents who were launching mortar rounds into Afghanistan. Pakistan protests by blocking the supply route for U.S. and NATO convoys. That was in September of 2010.

The details of exactly what happened during Saturday's early morning hours in Pakistan's Mohmand tribal agency, on the border with Afghanistan, are still unclear, but the story line is familiar.

This time, U.S. officials say they took fire from across the border in Pakistan and called in air support, reportedly checking with their Pakistani counterparts before authorizing a strike. Pakistani officials say they were never consulted, that their pleas to NATO to stop the attack once it had started were ignored, and responded by again shutting down the supply routes.

One thing that is certainly different this time is the death toll: 24 Pakistani soldiers were killed in this latest incident, including two officers, making it the deadliest incident of its kind since Pakistan and the U.S. declared an alliance in 2001. The higher death toll, according to analysts, means more pressure on Pakistan's military and civilian leaders to react strongly.

There is no debating that U.S.-Pakistan relations have taken a beating over the last year. But have they hit rock bottom? Or is this just the new "all-time low?"

Ispr / AFP - Getty Images

An image released by Pakistan's Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) on Nov. 30, 2011 shows a Pakistani army post reportedly targeted by NATO helicopters resulting in the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers.

Last straw in a tough year
The condemnation from Pakistan over the latest attack has been swift and unrelenting.

Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Pakistan's Army Chief, called the attack "unacceptable." Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said it was "an assault on the sovereignty of Pakistan," and pledged to conduct a complete review of all diplomatic, political, military and intelligence cooperation with the U.S. In addition Pakistan announced it would boycott next month's Bonn Conference on Afghanistan.

Amid the rising anger, Pakistan's military released a set of images Wednesday which it says shows the remote border posts attacked by NATO helicopters and fighter jets on Saturday.

"They're taking a tougher line than they have before," said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a Lahore-based defense analyst. "They're staking out a strong position to demonstrate within a domestic context that they can protect Pakistan's interests."

That, according to Rizvi, is even more important to the government and military establishments now, in a year when they've both lost credibility following a series of humiliating actions by the U.S.

Back in March, U.S. pressure to release CIA contractor Raymond Davis, who shot and killed two Pakistanis, forced Pakistan to take the domestically unpopular action of negotiating his exit in the face of intense public anger.

Then came the unilateral, American operation in May to capture and kill Osama Bin Laden within miles of Pakistan's premier military academy which forced Islamabad to choose between confessing involvement or admitting incompetence.

Former U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen's September accusation that Pakistan's largest intelligence agency uses the militant Haqqani network as a "veritable arm" to launch attacks on U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan left the relationship even further strained, and Pakistan's Army brass feeling "betrayed," according to military sources.

This latest incident, according to multiple Pakistani officials, has forced the country to rethink its engagement with the U.S. "We cannot be just a subject of abuse and attack," said one military official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"Both of these entities – the government and military – have been discredited," said Rizvi. "Within Pakistan they are discredited because of U.S. actions across their borders. Outside, they are discredited because the U.S. is saying they are helping the Taliban."

Public relations problem
But according to some, the government and military's credibility problem may be partly their own making.

"The problem is that there's not really a source of information that's geared to inform," said Dr. Christine Fair, who focuses on South Asian political and military affairs at Georgetown University. "They're geared to massage perceptions of events, and the Pakistani government love taking their citizens for a ride on the victim bus."

A growing sense of anti-Americanism in Pakistan over the last decade has been fanned by a dominant, conservative Islamic, public discourse, said Rizvi – a sentiment the establishment has tapped into from time to time to pursue its own national interests. That's how a discussion about a potential U.S. aid package devolves into talk-show debates about America respecting Pakistan's sovereignty. Or the discovery of al Qaida's leader hiding in Pakistan turns into national outrage that the borders were breached by the U.S.

"In Pakistan, there are only two entities that publicly support good relations with the U.S.: One is the military, the second is the federal government," said Rizvi. "You don't find any other political party or major society group openly supporting the ‘War on Terror’ or relations with the U.S."

What about the billions in U.S. aid?
One question many Americans ask is: “Why do Pakistanis hate us so much if we give them so much money? “
Despite the fact that billions of dollars in U.S. aid and reimbursements have gone to Pakistan in the last decade, anti-U.S. feelings within the population are running higher than ever.

Opposition leader Imran Khan has capitalized on those frustrations, channeling them into a groundswell of political support in recent months and a 68 percent approval rating, according to one recent poll. Separately, a poll conducted exclusively in Pakistan's tribal regions last year found almost 80 percent opposed the “war on terror.” The Pew Research Center's 2010 Global Attitudes project showed a mere 17 percent of all Pakistanis polled held a favorable view of the U.S. and nearly 60 percent described the U.S. as an enemy.
 
American money has been used to fund everything from education projects to agricultural development, but money has been slow to hit the ground and has not been used in ways that directly affect most Pakistanis.

According to the Congressional Research Service, of the $20.7 billion allocated for Pakistan between FY2002 and FY2012, only $6.5 billion was "economic-related." The vast majority, $14.1 billion, was "security-related," and the lion's share of that, $8.8 billion, was military reimbursement for operations supporting the US/NATO mission across the border in Afghanistan, known as "Coalition Support Funds," or CSF.

Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images

Supporters of Pakistani cricketer turned politician Imran Khan's party, the Movement for Justice, shout slogans during a protest in Karachi on Thursday against the cross-border NATO air strike on Pakistani troops.

Rizvi said that most Pakistanis fail to benefit from U.S.-funded projects, and very little is known among the everyday citizenry about just how American money is being used on the ground – a problem, he says, that is one of "public relations."

"Over the last few years, a lot of funding has gone to state educational facilities, to improve facilities, enable professors to go to other countries for conferences, but very few people know that its American money," said Rizvi. "The [Pakistani] government doesn't tell them it’s American money, they create the impression that the government is making this possible for them."

That same "public relations" strategy has meant that the establishment has failed to mobilize domestic support for the war on terror, despite the fact that 30,000 Pakistanis have died in terror-related incidents since 2001. Losses in that war – accidental or deliberate – are therefore met with greater public anger, by a population that believes its military is fighting an American war.

Treading lightly
In the days since the latest tragic border clash, there has been a flurry of high-level efforts made by U.S. diplomatic, military, and intelligence officials to reach out to their Pakistani counterparts.

The U.S. and NATO are using careful language. NATO called the incident "tragic and unintended." A joint statement by the U.S. Departments of Defense and State expressed "deepest condolences" and "sympathies" from Secretaries Leon Panetta and Hillary Clinton. Officials have pledged to fully investigate what actually transpired on the ground. 

Following the incidents in 2008 and 2010, the U.S. and Pakistan found enough common ground to continue working together. The strong language being used and decisions being taken by Pakistani officials suggest it won’t be as easy this time around.

Prime Minister Gilani has already made clear that "business as usual will not be there." But U.S. officials and analysts express confidence that, with enough time and enough concessions, the two sides will ultimately be forced to find a way forward once again.

Pakistan relies on U.S. money and international support to bolster its economy, said Rizvi, and the U.S. relies on Pakistan's cooperation to stabilize Afghanistan.

"They will both realize that they need each other. They will have to tolerate each other," he said.

That may come at a price. Some believe the U.S. will have to take steps to pacify elements that have supported it in the past – issuing a public apology, or agreeing to not publicly rebuke Pakistan any longer, among other possibilities.

Despite ongoing investigations, Georgetown’s Fair believes both sides' dependence on one another means the focus will be on moving forward, not definitively determining the facts.

"There is no answer to this that's going to be helpful," says Fair. "I don't believe we're ever going to get to the bottom of what actually happened."

See a Photo Blog: Pakistan releases first images of border posts attacked by NATO

BEIJING – The wife of Ai Weiwei was questioned by Chinese police for several hours Tuesday in what appears to be a growing campaign against the outspoken artist and activist.

Ai Weiwei dismissed his wife’s police interrogation as a “pressure” tactic. “They are trying to put pressure on me,” Ai told NBC News in a phone interview after his wife was released.

But Ai’s long-running battle with authorities over tax evasion allegations – which critics say were meant to silence the politically outspoken artist—took a dangerous new turn when his wife was taken away by the police for questioning as a “criminal suspect.”

“It’s doesn’t make sense,” Ai said. “They can come to me directly.” He said his wife, Lu Qing, is “not involved” in politics.

Criminal case?
Lu, the legal owner of the cultural company that manages Ai’s art projects, was suddenly taken away Tuesday by four policemen, one of them holding a video camera, and subjected to more than three hours of interrogation.

Initially refusing to go, she was brusquely told she had no choice.  “They were quite rough, they told me [I had no choice] while showing some document saying that I was a ‘criminal suspect,’’’ Lu said as she recounted the story to NBC News in a telephone interview. Her request for a lawyer was refused.

When she asked what crimes she had allegedly committed, they responded, “We cannot tell you now.”

“During the interrogation, I was seated on a chair meant for criminal suspects; they were very impolite,” she said, adding that except for a call from her husband, she was not allowed to contact her lawyer and other friends during the whole proceeding.

The interrogation itself dealt with many issues concerning the company’s operations that she said had already been touched upon in previous investigations.

She said she was asked about her income, but said that she firmly told the police, “No, you have no right to ask that.”

Taiwan connection
As a “criminal suspect,” she was told that she can be summoned again anytime and should not travel or leave Beijing.

Lu said she had been planning to travel to Taipei in early December to attend Ai’s art exhibition
aptly called “Ai Weiwei Absent.” 

The show, which began last month, features 21 works from 1983 to the present. It includes a new installation named “Forever Bicycles” – a 30-foot-high arrangement  of more than 1,000 bicycles that gives the illusion of a moving abstract which art critics say symbolizes China’ social changes.
  
Last Friday, Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou visited the show and called on China to respect human rights and Ai’s freedom of expression, underscoring a major issue of contention with mainland China.

“I think they wanted to prevent me from going to Taipei,” Lu said, adding that authorities might have learned of her plans by monitoring her phone calls.

“It was not just for the art show, I really wanted to visit Taipei because I have not seen Taiwan before,” she said, lamenting the cancellation of the trip.

Widening punishment?
Lu’s temporary detention comes about a week after police also began investigating Ai’s assistant for allegedly spreading pornography online, and some two weeks after Ai deposited $1.4 million with the tax authorities, which were raised from supporters’ donations, to comply with a legal procedure that would enable him to challenge the tax evasion charges.

And on the day she was taken away for questioning, police conducted a probe of the law firm that is representing Ai.

“Two policemen of Fengtai district came to our office yesterday  while I was away and photocopied this year’s accounts, saying they wanted our help in dealing with some cases,” Pu Zhiqiang, Ai’s lawyer,  told NBC News. Pu has previously told the foreign media that he believes the tax evasion case against his client was “politically motivated.”

Asked whether the police raid was related to Ai, he said: “Nobody has said anything.” He added: “To worry is useless, and I am not worried.”  

Liu Xiaoyuan, another lawyer for Ai, told NBC News that he suspects “punishment” for his inability to renew the license for his law office, which has been pending “for exactly five months tomorrow.”

Unable to practice in Beijing, he has temporarily returned to his home province of Jiangxi.

“The authorities concerned have warned me not to talk to the media about Ai’s case but I didn’t stop talking, so I think all this is punishment,” he said in a telephone interview.

Meanwhile, repeated attempts to elicit comments from the police department involved in Lu’s case did not produce any response.

More on Ai Weiwei:
Chinese artist and activist answers readers' questions