• Egypt's ousted Mubarak back in court over murder of protesters in Arab Spring

    AFP - Getty Images

    An image grab taken from Egyptian state TV shows ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak sitting behind bars during his retrial at the Police Academy in Cairo on Saturday.

    By Alexander Dziadosz and Yasmine Saleh, Reuters

    CAIRO -- Former president Hosni Mubarak was back in court on Saturday for a retrial on charges of complicity in the murder of protesters, reopening a case that has shown the difficulty of transitional justice in post-revolutionary Egypt.

    Mubarak and his former interior minister, Habib el-Adli, were convicted and sentenced to life in prison last June for failing to stop the killing during the 2011 uprising that swept him from power.

    The retrial was ordered after a court in January accepted appeals from the prosecution and the defense.

    Mubarak, 85, sat upright on a hospital gurney as he was wheeled into a cage where the defendants appear. Dressed in white prison uniforms, his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, stood alongside him. They face charges of corruption.

    Wearing dark, aviator sunglasses, the deposed autocrat raised his arm to confirm his presence as Judge Ahmed al-Rasheedy read a list of the accused. "Present," said Mubarak. He waved his arm in denial when asked by the judge for his response to the charges read out by the prosecution.

    The session was broadcast live on state television.

    Held at a police academy on the outskirts of Cairo under tight security, the retrial had been due to begin last month but was aborted when the previous judge recused himself.

    Mubarak is being held at Tora Prison on the outskirts of Cairo. He remains in jail despite release orders because he faces charges in a separate corruption case.

    Mubarak, Adli and four of his former top aides are accused of involvement in the killing of more than 800 protesters who died in the 18-day uprising. Two other Interior Ministry officials face lesser charges.

    First ruler toppled in Arab Spring
    Mubarak's imprisonment last June was a historic moment -- he was the first ruler toppled by the Arab Spring revolts to stand trial in person.

    Slideshow: Egypt's revolution and the fall of Mubarak

    Ahmed Youssef / EPA

    Eighteen days of popular protest culminated in the downfall of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak on Feb. 11, 2011.

    Launch slideshow

    But the case exposed the difficulties of attaining justice in a country whose judiciary and security forces are still largely controlled by figures appointed during his era.

    The prosecution had complained that the Interior Ministry had failed to cooperate in providing evidence.

    Adli's four aides were exonerated due to the weakness of the evidence, and the judge convicted Mubarak and Adli on the grounds of their failure to stop the killing, rather than actually ordering it.

    Outside the court, a small group of protesters gathered under a baking sun held aloft banners demanding justice.

    "Your mother misses you, Ahmed," read one banner, referring to a demonstrator killed in 2011. A rival group of a dozen Mubarak loyalists held aloft pictures of the former president dressed in military uniform and business suits.

    Many Egyptians have been frustrated by the failure of courts to bring officials to account for the violence during the uprising and for what they see as decades of corruption and police abuses preceding it.

    On Wednesday, an appeals court refused the prosecution's appeal of a verdict that exonerated two dozen defendants over an incident during the revolt in which men on camels and horses attacked protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square.

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    Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

  • Judge withdraws in retrial of Egypt's Mubarak, causing delays

    Tarek El Gabbas / AP

    Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, second right, waves at his supporters, at a hearing in Cairo, Egypt, Saturday, April 13, 2013.

    By Yasmine Saleh and Maggie Fick, Reuters

    The retrial of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was aborted on Saturday when the presiding judge withdrew from the case and referred it to another court, causing an indefinite delay that sparked anger in the courtroom.


    Lawyers said that while the transfer would give prosecutors more time to draw on new evidence in an unpublished fact-finding commission's report into the repression, it could delay the case by months, increasing the risk that Mubarak, 84, may never be finally convicted and sentenced.

    "Egypt cannot close the door on the former regime until there is justice for the martyrs of our revolution," said Mohamed Rashwan, a prosecution attorney and member of the Egyptian Lawyers' Union, which had petitioned to have the judge removed from the case. Two years had passed since Mubarak's fall and justice was taking too long, Rashwan said.

    "The people demand the execution of Mubarak!" frustrated relatives of demonstrators killed in the 2011 uprising that overthrew him chanted in court after presiding Judge Mustafa Hassan Abdullah announced the decision at the opening session.

    Outside the heavily guarded compound, pro-Mubarak demonstrators outnumbered opponents. The two small groups were kept well apart by a police cordon and there were no incidents.

    Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for almost 30 years before being toppled by 18 days of Arab Spring pro-democracy unrest, waved and smiled to supporters from the defendants' cage in the courtroom before the brief hearing began.

    He was flown by helicopter from a military hospital where he has been detained to the police academy used as a courthouse, and wheeled from an ambulance into the building lying on a hospital trolley wearing a white tracksuit.

    Mubarak, former interior minister Habib al-Adli and four top aides face a retrial for complicity in the murder of more than 800 protesters after the highest appeals court accepted appeals by both the defense and the prosecution in January. Two other senior interior ministry officials face lesser charges.

    The presiding judge was appointed under Mubarak and so were most of the current judiciary, a factor that has complicated transitional justice in Egypt. The judge said he had decided to refer the case to the Cairo appeals court as he felt "unease" in reviewing the case. He did not explain his decision further.

    He had previously acquitted top former Mubarak era officials of orchestrating violence when thugs riding camels attacked pro-democracy activists in Cairo's central Tahrir Square.

    "We ask for the harshest possible sentence on Mubarak due to the cruel crimes he committed against the protesters, but we are happy with the judge's decision to withdraw as we had worries about him given his ruling (on) the camel attack case," said Mohamed Abdel Wahab, a lawyer for the victims. His comment reflected a widespread mixture of relief and frustration.

    COMPETING DEMONSTRATIONS

    It was the first time Mubarak, who wore gold-rimmed aviator sunglasses in court, had been seen in public since he and Adli were convicted last June on grounds of failing to stop the killing, rather than actually ordering it.

    Mubarak's two sons, Alaa and Gamal, were also in court to be retried on separate charges of financial corruption.

    Propped up on a gurney in a cage with the other defendants, he looked fitter and more relaxed than on previous appearances in the dock, holding animated conversations with his son Gamal, and occasionally smiling and waving to people in the courtroom.

    Judge Mahmoud el-Hafnawy of the prosecutor general's office ordered an urgent medical report on the former president to determine whether he was now fit enough to be sent to prison.

    Prosecutors accuse Mubarak of giving orders to Adli to open fire with live ammunition against protesters to suppress demonstrations across the Arab world's most populous country.

    Mubarak and his interior minister were sentenced to life imprisonment at their first trial but the appeals court upheld complaints stemming from the weakness of the evidence offered by the prosecution.

    Outside the court, pro-Mubarak demonstrators chanted "thirty years without destruction!" in reference to accusations that the Muslim Brotherhood movement which won free elections after his ouster are destroying the country.

    "Look at the country now," said a supporter who gave his name as Ibrahim. "We are going bankrupt. The whole country is suffering from this economic crisis, from this lack of security."

    Across the square, relatives of victims of Mubarak's security forces held posters of young men killed in the revolt.

    Mahmoud Saleh, whose son Mostafa was killed during revolution, said: "He who kills must be killed. This is what we want from the trial."

    Mubarak became the first ruler toppled by the Arab Spring uprisings to stand trial in person. That irked Gulf Arab rulers in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, of whom the former air force commander had been a loyal ally for decades.

    But the case has also exposed the difficulties of justice in a country where the judiciary and security forces are still largely run by men whose positions date to the Mubarak era.

    The prosecution complained that the interior ministry had failed to cooperate in providing evidence, leading to the acquittal of six senior ministry officials tried with Mubarak.

    Mohamed Gomaa, 50, an IT specialist whose son Hussein, 23, was killed in the uprising, said: "Major reforms are needed in the entire justice system. Until then, we can only hope to God for a fair trial for Mubarak. I have no confidence in the judiciary."

    Amr Abdallah Dalsh / Reuters

    A protester against former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak holds dolls depicting Mubarak and his sons Alaa and Gamal, and former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly being hung.

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    Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

  • Italian coast guard rescues 500 migrants from five small boats

    By Naomi O'Leary, Reuters

    ROME -- The Italian coast guard rescued almost 500 migrants crammed into five small inflatable boats off the Sicilian coast in the Mediterranean Sea after receiving distress calls overnight, the coast guard said on Thursday.

    Coast guard spokesman Marco di Milla said the migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa, included some pregnant women and several people in need of hospital treatment.

    "They were in inflatable boats of a maximum of 10 meters [33 feet] long, which can carry about 10 people safely. Instead, these boats were carrying up to 100 people," di Milla told Reuters. He said the boats had likely started their journey in the North African state of Libya.

    Most of the migrants were taken to Lampedusa, a tiny island south of Sicily that receives thousands of immigrants each year.

    Improved spring weather conditions have increased the numbers trying to make the treacherous journey across the Mediterranean, but thousands have died due to shipwrecks, harsh conditions and a lack of food and water.

    An estimated 1,500 migrants lost their lives in the Mediterranean in 2011, many of them trying to escape the turmoil caused by the Arab Spring uprisings in North Africa, according to Human Rights Watch. It estimated the death toll in 2012 at more than 300.

    Related:

    Activists: women violated in cradle of Arab Spring

    Egyptians fear wave of vigilantism

    PhotoBlog: Libyans put aside woes to celebrate

     

    Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

  • Egypt's Sharm el-Sheikh lures tourists with sun, sand and cheap deals

    Yasmina Muslemany/ NBC News

    Mother and children take a stroll on Sharm El Sheikh's sandy beach.

    By Charlene Gubash, Producer, NBC News

    SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt – While Islamists and liberals struggle for Egypt’s post-revolution identity in Cairo, Sharm el-Sheikh, the crown jewel of the country’s Red Sea resort towns, might as well be a world away.

    Before the revolution, the Sinai Peninsula was one of Egypt’s biggest tourism draws, but businesses have suffered as tourists have stayed away while the country has been perceived as unstable and unsafe.

    That is slowly changing due to alluring vacation packages, offering much cheaper rates than those before the ouster of former President Hosni Mubarak.

    Now, sun seekers are slowly returning to Sharm’s soft sand beaches, where women often sunbathe topless while sipping on icy cocktails.  

    Front row beach chairs were hard to come by during a recent holiday weekend with hotels at full occupancy.  

    Cheap ticket to paradise
    Flying in, the purplish ridges of the Sinai Mountains give way to sandy beaches and the shimmering turquoise sea dotted with coral reefs.  

    Sharm was, and remains, a Mecca for divers and snorkelers. It has stunningly colored coral reefs teeming with 1,200 species of marine life, a protected marine park and world renowned dive sites.  

    Sharm’s peaceful Naama Bay was a typically international scene over a recent weekend. Friends and families chatted away in Russian, Italian, German, melodic Lebanese Arabic and English as children played in the sea and bikini-clad women strolled along the beach. 

    “We were looking for a holiday, not too far away, with guaranteed weather. We have been sitting at the pool and the beach, doing yoga and Pilates, and snorkeling,” said Debby Ramdeo, a Londoner who was sharing a lounge chair with her mother. 

    Yasmina Muslemany/NBC News

    Hotel recreation staff lead tourists in an aerobics class on Naama Bay beach in the South Sinai resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh.

    She and her parents paid $922 each for a 10-day vacation, including airfare, hotel and meals.  

    “The weather is fantastic!” smiled Ramdeo. “In the U.K., it's just 36 degrees Fahrenheit.”

    Sarah Binns, a 32-year-old training manager from Brighton, England also came for the sun. 

    “It is the closest place we can go at this time of year that is hot,” said Binns, sun bathing next to her friend. “I was here four years ago and it’s pretty much the same,” she added. 

    Binns and her friend Kathleen Gann, a 28-year-old retailer also from the U.K., chose Sharm over Dubai because of the cost and the variety of activities ranging from camel riding to parasailing over the bay. They each paid $900 for one week, including airfare and a Marriott hotel stay with meals included.

    Gann, who was on her fourth visit to Sharm, said she felt safe because the U.K. had lifted an earlier advisory against tourism to the South Sinai. “It’s good value for money over Dubai,” she said.  

    One of the few veiled women on the beach, Nadia Hassan, played backgammon with her mother in the shade of an umbrella. 

    Hassan, a 36-year-old Jordanian housewife, lives in Cairo. She fled the pollution, pressure and politics of the capital for the beach.  

    “It’s relaxing. Everything in Sharm is good. Everybody is free to look the way they want and act the way they want. People are kind, friendly and welcoming.”

    Yasmina Muslemany/NBC News

    Trainer gives children an introductory dive lesson in Naama Bay in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh.

    Business improving
    At Camel Dive, one of the town’s oldest dive centers and hotels, things are looking up. Marketing manager Clare Mucklow, 40, noted slow but steady improvement. 

    “On a peak holiday, we can fill the resort. We haven’t had to change our prices and we are, normally, 60 to 70 percent full,” said Mucklow.   

    “The type of guests has changed. We still have repeat guests who have gone diving in Sharm before, but we have lost people who are coming to learn diving.” He blamed reports in the European media for driving away first-time visitors.

    Mahmoud Bassiouny, the front desk manager at the popular Movenpick Jollie-Ville Resort, said, “It’s not the same as before [the revolution].” But he added the hotel was running at 80 percent occupancy.

    Gangnam style
    As night fell on a recent evening, tourists drifted onto the faux cobbled streets of Naama Bay. Small restaurants beckoned at every turn with glassed cases displaying the catch of the day on ice. 

    Nightclubs jockeyed for customers with different attractions: men in long white gowns doing poor impressions of the “Gangnam Style” dance, whirling dervishes twirling to Arabic music and fire dancers juggling flames scarily close to awe-struck patrons.  

    While Egyptians continue to do battle in Cairo over the shape of the country’s future, Sharm, an oasis of fun, acceptance and beauty, carries on.

    Related:

    Egypt branded more dangerous for tourists than Yemen

  • Women violated in the cradle of Egypt's revolution, activists say

    Hania Moheeb, an Egyptian journalist assaulted in Cairo's iconic Tahrir Square, says attacks aimed at shaming women into silence will not succeed. By NBC News' Susan Kroll and Tracy Jarrett.

    By Susan Kroll and Marian Smith, NBC News

    Cairo's Tahrir Square, once the staging ground for the massive uprising that ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, is quickly becoming notorious for something very different: an organized campaign of sexual assaults, activists say.

    The past year has seen an increase in attacks against women at demonstrations, but recently they have been particularly rampant – and, according to witnesses and activists, they have been following similar patterns.

    On the two-year anniversary of the revolution on Jan. 25, at least 19 women were sexually assaulted in and around Tahrir Square in one night, some with knives, activists said. Dozens more cases have been reported in the two months since.

    “The message to women is, ‘You should stay at home, you should stop protesting, you should feel stigmatized,’” said Hania Moheeb, an Egyptian journalist who was herself assaulted in the square that night.

    Moheeb, who writes for two English-language magazines and for a documentary program on Nile TV International, recently met female activists from around the Middle East at a conference in New York on women’s rights since the Arab Spring uprising. She described that at one point that night, she was certain she would die.

    Moheeb, 42, was trying to pass through the square when two men grabbed her from a group of women who had formed a circle around her, apparently to protect her.

    “In a few seconds, tens of hands were all over my body, under my clothes, ripping … off my clothes and violating each inch of my body,” she said.

    The men were “continuously giving the impression that they were helping out while they were the same perpetrators and attackers,” she added.

    They dragged her to the outer edges of the square where another group of men came forward, saying they would help and take her to an ambulance, Moheeb said. But they stopped her as she tried to pull her clothes back on, carrying her half-naked to the ambulance.

    “What I know for a fact is that my body was being violated up until the last second before I was put in the ambulance,” she said.

    Over the days following her attack, Moheeb heard from other women who were also assaulted on the same night, at the same place and in the same way – using the same techniques down to the very last detail.

    Some activists believe it is an organized tactic aimed at silencing opponents of the Egyptian government, but there has been no evidence to prove that is the case, Moheeb said. No single group has been charged in connection with the assaults as of yet.

    Nonetheless, Moheeb fears there will be retribution for her telling her story and worries for her husband and parents. Although she is pursuing justice through the courts, she says she holds out very little hope that anything will be done.

    “The justice I need,” Moheeb said, “is the justice [for] the Egyptian people. The success of the revolution will be success for them.”

    Related:

    Violence, protesters return to Tahrir Square

    Egypt branded more dangerous for tourists than Yemen

    Sex mobs target Egypt's women

  • Israel becomes a fortress nation as it walls itself off from the Arab Spring

    The renewed war in Iraq combined with Hamas' rise in Gaza, the Muslim Brotherhood running Egypt and the conflict in Syria, the region surrounding Israel is in turmoil. In response, Israel is erecting a 150-mile fence along the border with Egypt and another one along the Syrian border. NBC's Richard Engel reports.

    By Richard Engel, Correspondent, NBC News

    TEL AVIV — On a wide beach in Tel Aviv, I recently watched two Israeli men — wearing tight neon bathing suits that would make many Americans blush — play a game of paddle ball. They impressively smashed their serves and volleys with decisive forehands and backhands and dove in the sand to make saves.

    A few feet away, a couple of young women in skimpy bikinis with tattoos on their ankles and shoulders stretched into yoga positions in the shade of a wooden gazebo.

    You can buy ice cream and cold beer on the beach and nobody seems to litter.

    If Tel Aviv’s beachfront sounds like a island of paradise in the midst of the turbulent Middle East — that’s because it is. And Israeli officials intend to keep it that way.

    While the chaos unleashed by the Arab Spring continues to reverberate across the region, Israel, a small country the size of New Jersey, has been busily building about 500 miles of fence, walls and barricades to keep the surrounding Arab world out.

    Keeping a lid on Gaza
    Just 45 miles south of the paddle ball players in neon, Hamas runs the Gaza Strip, the narrow Palestinian territory squeezed between Egypt and Israel. 

    Senior U.S. officials say President Barack Obama is trying to stay out of the Sunni-Shiite conflicts gripping the region, and shore up America's increasingly nervous friends there. NBC News' Richard Engel reports.

    Hamas is a Palestinian political party with an aggressive militant wing. At its rallies, Hamas supporters routinely chant that one day they will destroy Israel and that Palestinians will return to their homes where Jews now live. Hamas has long been Israel's enemy, but in the wake of the Arab Spring, the group is empowered like never before.

    Just last November, Hamas and Israel fought a brief war. Hamas launched rockets at southern Israel, and for the first time in the group’s history, at Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Many of the rockets were shot down by Israel’s U.S.-funded Iron Dome missile defense system.

    Behind the headlines, away from the conflict with the Palestinians, life in Israel is a vibrant mix of cosmopolitan and coast, Jews and Arabs. NBC's Martin Fletcher looks at life from inside Israel.   

    More than 150 Palestinians and at least six Israelis were killed in the fighting. But Hamas walked away with significant political recognition. 

    Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi sent his prime minister to Gaza during the fighting to show solidarity with Hamas. That would never have happened under former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. 

    Mubarak didn’t trust Hamas and kept them weak. In fact, during the previous, and far more severe, Gaza-Israel war in early 2009, Mubarak effectively helped Israel target Hamas by cutting off its border, denying escape and resupply routes. 

    Nir Elias / Reuters, file

    Israeli soldiers watch as an Iron Dome launcher fires an interceptor rocket near the southern city of Beersheba on November 17, 2012 .

    But ever since the Arab Spring reset the Middle East and unleashed anti-Israel passions that Arab strongmen — like Mubarak — once kept at bay, Israel feels threatened. And they are fortifying their defenses.

    Gaza tunnel
    Now getting in and out of the Gaza Strip is increasingly difficult and bizarre.   

    When you exit Israel, you must first pass through a series of metal detectors and X-ray machines, before entering a long Israeli-controlled tunnel.

    The tunnel is above ground, fenced in on both sides, and with a wire roof. It runs along the ground like a metal snake. It's about 20 feet wide and stretches for about a mile with a dog-leg turn in the middle. There are cement blocks in the tunnel so you can’t drive a car through it. You have to walk, dragging your bags. It feels like you’re passing through a wormhole from a beach community into a prison. 

    Making the tunnel stranger still is its quiet loneliness. There aren’t any Israeli guards or officers in the tunnel. As you walk with your bags, every few hundred yards you come to a closed gate. A camera and microphone over the gate turn on as you approach. You call out to an unseen guard that you’d like to advance and, if he approves, the gate clicks open and you move to the next barrier.

    Egypt fence
    Beyond Gaza, about 100 miles to the southeast of the gazebos shading women on Tel Aviv’s beach, is Israel’s border with Egypt. For decades, the border was protected naturally by the bare and jagged Sinai Mountains and the open desert.  

    Moshe Milner / Israeli government via EPA, file

    A photograph supplied by the Israeli Government Press Office in January 2013 shows a panoramic view of some of the border fence Israel has completed separating Israel from Egypt.

    But now with Mubarak gone, a metal snake is going up along the Egyptian border, too.  

    Israel is building a 150 mile fence along the Egyptian border. It’s nearly finished — with only 6.2 miles left to go.

    The fence has two layers, is 20 feet high and is topped with razor wire. It also plunges several feet under the sand, so you can’t dig underneath it. Israel clearly doesn’t feel the mountains and desert offer enough protection anymore.

    The Wall
    Back on the beach in Tel Aviv, few people talk about their increasingly hostile neighbors in Gaza and Egypt, or the fences that keep them out. But other barriers are even closer.

    Marko Djurica / Reuters, file

    A Palestinian rides a bicycle past a mural on the controversial Israeli barrier depicting the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, at Qalandiya checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah on November 26, 2012.

    Just 40 miles east of Tel Aviv, a giant wall cuts off the West Bank — the landlocked Palestinian territory surrounded on three sides by Israel, and one side by Jordan. Palestinians call it the "apartheid wall" because it keeps them penned in. Israel built the wall during a spate of Hamas suicide attacks and since its construction the number of bombings in Israel has plummeted.

    Keeping Syria out, too
    About 100 miles north of the Tel Aviv, a new fence is going up along the border with Syria. Only about 10 miles of that barrier, which looks just like the one with Egypt, is finished. The rest is going up fast.

    As I walked along the new fence with Syria with our cameraman and producer a few days ago, we were stopped by a group of Israeli border guards who politely told us to leave. 

    Atef Safadi / EPA

    Israeli employees work on the new border fence at the Israeli-Syrian border, south of the Golan Heights, in Israel, on March 8, 2013.

    The border guards, based on a hill overlooking the fence, told me they had seen fighting between Syrian government troops and rebels just a few hundred yards away from their base. The chief of staff of the Israeli military said at a conference this month that he believes it’s only a matter of time before armed factions in Syria turn their attention to Israel.

    "We see terror organizations that are increasingly gaining footholds in the territory and they are fighting against Assad. Guess what? We’ll be next in line," said Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz.

    'Fear index' down
    As Israel waits for the political storm in the Arab world to pass, it has become a fortress nation, what some experts call a "garrison state." 

    Perhaps it’s human nature, but living in a bubble has some advantages. Fences and walls can be effective and even soothing, at least for those who build them.

    Slideshow: Israel and Gaza: 8 days of violence

    Oliver Weiken / EPA

    Israel's military said it had accomplished its objectives while Hamas claimed victory after the two sides exchanged deadly airstrikes and rocket attacks for over a week.

    Launch slideshow

    A study by Haifa University’s National Security Center published this month in the Israel newspaper Haaretz said Israelis have never felt more secure in their borders. The so-called annual "fear index” is at an all-time low. 

    "People in Israel are simply optimistic. As a result of a hundred years of Zionism that met with difficult challenges, the public's conceptions are that we have overcome that, and that we will overcome it in the future," Prof. Gabriel Ben-Dor, the director of the study, told Haaretz.

    But there’s twist. Israel’s Arab citizens, who may be more in touch with the profound changes in the region that they watch unfolding on Arabic-language television, were far less convinced about Israel’s security than Jewish respondents to the survey.

    "It is possible the Arab population is seriously and intensively following what is happening across the border, and they judge the situation differently," said Ben-Dor.

    The Israeli military is certainly aware that things have changed for Israel.

    But that apparently hasn’t sunk in for most Israelis, or, just like people on the beaches of Tel Aviv, perhaps they don’t want to think about it.

    Related:

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    Rough ride ahead for Obama as Palestinians, Israelis lukewarm over visit

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  • Young jobless man sets himself alight in Tunisia

    By Tarek Amara, Reuters

    GRAPHIC WARNING : This story contains a graphic image that some viewers may find disturbing.

    TUNIS, Tunisia — A jobless young man set himself on fire in the center of Tunis on Tuesday in a gesture recalling the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, whose death ignited a revolt in Tunisia that echoed across the Arab world.

    Security forces and bystanders tried to extinguish the flames before the man was rushed to a hospital, witnesses said.

    "He is in very critical condition," a medical source in Mourouj hospital said, giving no further details.


    The incident occurred hours before Prime Minister-designate Ali Larayedh was due to seek a confidence vote for his new Islamist-led government from the National Constituent Assembly.

    The man burned himself outside the municipal theater in the capital's main Habib Bourguiba Avenue, the focus for protests that toppled President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali two years ago.

    An Interior Ministry official did not name the man, but said he was aged 27, hailed from the northwestern city of Jandouba and had been looking for a job for a long time.

    Tunisia's unemployment rate stands at about 17 percent, with graduates forming a large proportion of the jobless total.

    Several Tunisians have set themselves ablaze in the past two years in protests emulating that of Bouazizi, a street vendor who torched himself on Dec. 17, 2010, in the town of Sidi Bouzid after a policewoman confiscated his fruit cart.

    A young Tunisian man who set himself on fire is transported to an ambulance in the capital, Tunis, on Tuesday.

    Bouazizi's death sparked protests that ended with Ben Ali's overthrow and inspired rebellions elsewhere in the Middle East that collectively became known as the Arab Spring.

    The economic and social problems that fueled Tunisia's uprising have yet to be solved in a country now deeply polarized between Islamists and their opponents.

    The last government, led by Hamadi Jebali, collapsed after the premier's own moderate Islamist Ennahda party rejected his plan for a technocrat cabinet to lead Tunisia into elections.

    Related:

    Tunisian PM resigns amid growing political crisis

    Mother of fruit vendor who sparked Arab Spring arrested

     

    Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

  • Former Egypt dictator Mubarak faces April re-trial

    By Ayman Mohyeldin, Correspondent, NBC News

    Secretary of State John Kerry is in Cairo, Egypt to meet with government and opposition leaders as well as business and civil rights leaders while on a nine-day trip overseas. NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.

    CAIRO - The re-trial of former Egypt’s former president Hosni Mubarak, who was deposed in the Arab Spring revolution of 2011, will begin Apr. 13, it was announced Sunday.

    Mubarak’s former interior minister and six other former government officials will also face re-trial on the same date, Egypt's Appeals Court said.

    The announcement came as Secretary of State John Kerry was due to meet Egypt's new president, Mohamed Morsi, and senior figures in Cairo as part of his first foreign trip.

    Some critics say the U.S. is not changing its policy in Egypt, choosing to back Islamists instead of democracy and human rights. NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.

    Mubarak, 84, was jailed for life last year for his role in the death of protesters killed by security forces who were trying to thwart the revolution.

    Earlier this year, a court granted Mubarak and his co-accused a re-trial.

    The former western-backed leader was ousted in February 2011 after three decades in power.

    He has been living in a military prison after being taken ill during his first trial. 

    Related:

    Kerry urges Egyptian economic reform on Cairo trip


     

  • Tunisia PM dissolves government amid anger over assassination

    Fethi Belaid / AFP - Getty Images

    A protester jumps after police fired tear gas during a rally in Tunisia, Wednesday.

    By Alastair Jamieson, Staff writer, NBC News

    Tunisia plunged deeper into crisis Thursday after the prime minister’s attempt to restore order on the streets by dissolving the government was rejected by his own party, according to reports.

    Hamdi Jebali announced late Wednesday that an interim cabinet of technocrats would replace the Islamist-led coalition – an attempt to calm angry public protests in the wake of the assassination of opposition leader Chokri Belaid.

    But the leader of Jebali’s own party on Thursday rejected that move, Al-Jazeera and Reuters reported,  raising the prospect of a power struggle just as authorities were struggling to contain the biggest street protests since the 2011 Arab Spring.

    "The prime minister did not ask the opinion of his party," said Abdelhamid Jelassi, vice-president of the Islamist Ennahda party, according to Reuters. "We in Ennahda believe Tunisia needs a political government now. We will continue discussions with others parties about forming a coalition government."

    Political analyst Salem Labyed told Reuters the opposition appeared to want to leverage the crisis to its own advantage and that prolonged political uncertainty could kindle more unrest.

    "It seems that the opposition wants to secure the maximum possible political gains ..., but the fear is that the country's crisis will deepen if things remain unclear at the political level.

    "That could increase the anger of supporters of the secular opposition, which may go back to the streets again," he said.

    The fatal shooting of Belaid, who was killed outside his own home early on Wednesday, sparked angry protests.

    In the capital Tunis, an estimated 20,000 protesters massed outside the Interior Ministry, while in Sidi Bouzid -- cradle of the Arab Spring revolution -- there were clashes with police.

    Reuters

    Demonstrators burn documents of the Ennahda party, outside the party's headquarters, Wednesday.

    Al Jazeera's Ahmed Janabi in Tunis reported violent clashes between Belaid's supporters and police along the main Habib Borguiba Avenue, with the police using tear gas and batons. 

    Four opposition groups that are part of Belaid's Popular Front coalition announced that they would withdraw from the county’s national assembly, France24 reported.

    Tunisians rose up against long-time leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali after vegetable seller Mohamed Bouazizi set fire to himself in Sidi Bouzid in late 2010.

    Tunisia -- the first Arab country to oust its leader and hold free elections -- had made a relatively smooth transition to democracy. However, it has recently been plagued by economic hardship and the threat from al-Qaida-linked militants.

     

  • 'Great anger' rises in Tunisia after slaying of opposition leader

    Zoubeir Souissi / Reuters

    A forensic inspector looks at the car of opposition politician Chokri Belaid, who was shot dead outside his home in Tunis on Wednesday.

    By Alastair Jamieson and John Newland, NBC News

    Updated at 12:08 p.m. ET: Tens of thousands of Tunisians took to the streets Wednesday to protest the apparent assassination of secular opposition leader Chokri Belaid, witnesses and local media reported.

    Belaid, a staunch opponent of the moderate Islamist-led government, died after he was shot in the head and chest outside his home in Tunis.

    The Interior Ministry said a man fired at Belaid then jumped onto a waiting motorcycle, which sped away.

    Unrest built throughout the day, with the secular opposition Popular Front and it allied opposition members eventually saying they would pull out of the assembly that is acting as Tunisia's parliament and is charged with writing a constitution. The Popular Front also called for a general strike.

    Fethi Belaid / AFP - Getty Images, file

    Tunisian politician Chokri Belaid, seen in this file image, was assassinated early Wednesday.

    Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali described the killing as a “political assassination” and a blow to the country’s 2011 Arab Spring revolution, Reuters reported. “By killing him they wanted to silence his voice," Jebali said.

    The victim’s brother blamed the killing on the ruling party, Ennahda, of which Jebali is a member. The party's headquarters was later set on fire.

    "I accuse [Ennahda leader] Rached Ghannouchi of assassinating my brother," Abdelmajid Belaid told AFP. "My brother was assassinated. I am desperate and depressed."

    France24 reporter David Thomson posted a picture on Twitter of Belaid's angry wife clutching bloodstained clothing.

    The ruling party, however, vehemently denied involvement.

    "Ennahda is completely innocent of the assassination of Belaid. … Is it possible that the ruling party could carry out this assassination when it would (only) disrupt investment and tourism?" party President Rached Gannouchi told Reuters in an interview. 

    "Tunisia today is in the biggest political stalemate since the revolution. We should be quiet and not fall into a spiral of violence. We need unity more than ever," he added.

    Images posted on Twitter by English-language news source Tunisia Live showed angry crowds facing riot police on the streets of Tunis on Wednesday.

    Witnesses told Reuters that thousands of protesters had gathered there and in Sidi Bouzid, cradle of the Arab Spring uprisings.

    Protesters were "burning tires and throwing stones at the police," said Mehdi Horchani, a Sidi Bouzid resident. "There is great anger."

    Police responded by firing shots in the air and using teargas, both in Sidi Bouzid and in Tunis, where an estimated 20,000 protesters had massed outside the Interior Ministry.

    Authorities scattered the Tunis protesters as an ambulance carrying Belaid's body approached, Reuters reported. 

    Tunisians rose up against long-time leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali after vegetable seller Mohamed Bouazizi set fire to himself in Sidi Bouzid in late 2010.

    President Moncef Marzouki cut short a visit to France to return to Tunisia following Wednesday’s killing, according Tim Marshall, diplomatic editor of U.K. news channel Sky News.

    Tunisia -- the first Arab country to oust its leader and hold free elections -- had made a relatively smooth transition to democracy.

    However, it has recently been plagued by economic hardship and the threat from al-Qaida-linked militants.

    Reuters contributed to this report.

  • Court orders retrial of former Egypt dictator Mubarak

    © Stringer Egypt / Reuters / Reuters

    Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak inside a cage in a courtroom in Cairo during his 2012 trial.

    By Magdy Youssef and Alastair Jamieson, NBC News

    Former dictator Hosni Mubarak has won an appeal against his conviction for killing protesters during the Arab Spring uprising and will face a retrial.

    A court in Cairo accepted an appeal by the ousted president and his former interior minister, Habib al-Adli, who were sentenced to life in prison last year over the 2011 killings.

    "The retrial will be based on the same evidence used in the previous trial. No new evidence will be added to the case," Mohamed Abdel Razek, one of Mubarak's lawyers, told Reuters.

    Related: Egyptians warn Morsi is no friend to the United States

    The court has also ordered a retrial of al-Adli's aides.

    Mubarak, who is 84 and in poor health, was not in court but supporters there cheered the verdict, Al Jazeera reported.

    "Wake up, wake up, Egyptians…Egypt has been sold under the name of religion," shouted one man in Arabic, referring to the country’s new ruler, Islamic Brotherhood figurehead Mohammed Morsi.

    Mubarak’s sentencing in June 2012 was cheered by crowds, but later in the year there was dismay that his increasing ill-health could allow him to avoid serving his 25-year sentence in prison.

     

  • Egypt constitution approved by voters, parties say

    Nasser Nasser / AP

    An Egyptian election worker shows his colleagues an invalid ballot.

    By NBC News staff and wire reports

    CAIRO - A constitution drafted by an Islamist-dominated assembly was approved by a majority of Egyptians in a referendum, rival camps said on Sunday.

    The Muslim Brotherhood, which propelled President Mohamed Mursi to power in a June election, said 64 percent of voters backed the charter after two rounds of voting that ended with a final ballot on Saturday. It cited an unofficial tally.

    An opposition official also told Reuters their unofficial count showed the result was a "yes" vote.

    Official results are not expected until Monday. If the outcome is confirmed, a parliamentary election will follow in about two months.

    Mursi's Islamist backers say the constitution is vital for the transition to democracy, nearly two years after the overthrow of autocrat Hosni Mubarak in an uprising. It will provide stability needed to help a fragile economy, they say.

    But the opposition accuses Mursi of pushing through a text that favors Islamists and ignores the rights of Christians, who make up about 10 percent of the population, as well as women. They say it is a recipe for further unrest.

    "According to our calculations, the final result of the second round is 71 percent voting 'yes' and the overall result (of the two rounds) is 63.8 percent," a Brotherhood official, who was in an operations room monitoring the vote, told Reuters.

    His figures were confirmed by a statement issued shortly afterwards by the group and broadcast on its television channel.

    Regional news channel Al Jazeera also reported that early indications suggest the draft constitution will be approved.

    "It appears at the moment that in the region of 68 per cent of voters have approved the draft constitution, some 32 percent have voted against," said reporter Mike Hanna in Cairo.

    The Brotherhood and its party, as well as members of the opposition, had representatives monitoring polling stations and the vote count across the country.

    The opposition said voting in both rounds was marred by abuses and had called for a re-run after the first stage. However, an official said the overall vote favored the charter.

    "They (Islamists) are ruling the country, running the vote and influencing the people, so what else could we expect," the senior official from the main opposition coalition, the National Salvation Front, told Reuters.

    Opponents of Egypt President Morsi say he's betraying the revolution, but his supporters say he wants to guarantee human rights with a controversial referendum on a new constitution. NBC's John Ray went onto the streets of Cairo to hear from both sides of the deepening divide.

    The vote was split over two days as many judges had refused to supervise the ballot.

    "I'm voting 'no' because Egypt can't be ruled by one faction," said Karim Nahas, 35, a stockbroker, heading to a polling station in Giza, in greater Cairo, in the last round.

    At another polling station, some voters said they were more interested in ending Egypt's long period of political instability than in the Islamist aspects of the charter.

    Related content:
    At polling stations, strong sentiments for and against 
    Analysis: Egypt is rapidly approaching its own 'cliff'
    Christians, liberals left out as Islamists back Egypt's draft constitution

    "We have to extend our hands to Mursi to help fix the country," said Hisham Kamal, an accountant.

    The build-up to the vote witnessed deadly protests, sparked by Mursi's decision to award himself extra powers in a decree on November 22 and then to fast-track the constitution to a vote.

    Hours before polls closed, Vice President Mahmoud Mekky announced his resignation. He said he wanted to quit last month but stayed on to help Mursi tackle the crisis that blew up when the Islamist leader assumed wide powers.

    Mekky, a prominent judge who said he was uncomfortable in politics, disclosed earlier he had not been informed of Mursi's power grab. The timing of his resignation appeared linked to the lack of a vice-presidential post under the draft constitution.

    The new basic law sets a limit of two four-year presidential terms. It says the principles of Islamist sharia law remain the main source of legislation but adds an article to explain this. It also says Islamic authorities will be consulted on sharia - a source of concern to Christians and others.

    In the first round of voting last week, the district covering most of Cairo voted "no," which opponents said showed the depth of division.

    "I see more unrest," said Ahmed Said, head of the liberal Free Egyptians Party and a member of the National Salvation Front, an opposition coalition formed after Mursi expanded his powers on November 22 and then pushed the constitution to a vote.

    At least eight people were killed in protests outside the presidential palace in Cairo this month. Islamists and rivals clashed in Alexandria, the second-biggest city, on the eves of both voting days.

    Reuters contributed to this report

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