THE WEEK AHEAD

ISRAEL:

Last week was not good news for Israel and the repercussions will reflect on all of us who look at the Middle East for Oil.

Egypt announcement the checkpoints to Gaza will be opened did not sit well with Israel and this week will give us an indication of how they plan to respond to this announcement.

Most of us realize that talk is often cheap in the Middle East and the talk of Egypt opening these checkpoints and sending ‘security teams’ into Gaza  could be just an extension of this opinion.

Israel still maintains a ‘working’ relationship with the Egyptian Military and until the MB forces the Egyptian Military to change, this relationship will help head off potential flare ups.

SYRIA:

Assad made every bad possible decision he could possibly make last week shy of using his air force to bomb his own cities!

More and more rumors of Iranian intervention are showing up in the open press and blogs.

As I have stated for weeks now, Iran can not afford to have Assad and Syria fall to the MB or any other Sunni movement.

The worse things get in Syria, the more Iran may choose truly desperate options to counter the event.

Look for Syria to continue blaming the March 14^th movement in Lebanon for problems in Syria.

Look for the Sunni of Lebanon to call for Assad to stop pointing his finger at Lebanon and look for them to bring more media attention to the violence in Syria.

Look for the MB to position themselves as the potential leaders of resistance in Syria; an issue that will infuriate the Iranians and Assad.

Egypt:

Egypt pops back on my radar  this week.

The MB is about to decide to shoot for a larger slice of the pie in the next election.

There will be no more talk of ’30 percent’.

The new target will be 50 percent.

That may very well be overlooked by most of the Western world, but it should not be.

50 percent can easily become over 50 percent and over 50 percent is a ‘majority’ elected in an ‘Democratic’ election.

Do you remember the 2006 Hamas election results?

Bad news  for the West and Israel.

It’s May and the temperatures are going to go way up in the Middle East.

Hot days turn into violent nights!