Reuters Via VIN Reports: Egyptian forces have flooded smuggling tunnels under the border with the Palestinian-ruled Gaza Strip in a campaign to shut them down, Egyptian and Palestinian officials said.

The network of tunnels is a vital lifeline for Gaza, bringing in an estimated 30 percent of all goods that reach the enclave and circumventing a blockade imposed by Israel for more than seven years.

Reuters reporters saw one tunnel being used to bring in cement and gravel suddenly fill with water on Sunday, sending workers rushing for safety. Locals said two other tunnels were likewise flooded, with Egyptians deliberately pumping in water.

The Forward Reports: The Simon Wiesenthal Center has called on the  White House to withhold aid to  Egypt over President Mohamed Morsi’s insulting comments about Jews In a statement released on January 15, the anti-Semitism watchdog asked the  government to make a consignment of F-16s and other military hardware bound for  Egypt conditional on Morsi’s promising to curb anti-Semitism in the country.

“America must signal that it will not be business as usual with the  government of the Arab world’s largest and most powerful nation, while they  continue to characterize Jews as ‘descendants of apes and pigs’, ‘war mongers’, and threaten anti-Semitic Jihads,” Rabbis Marvin Hier and Abraham Cooper,  Founder and Dean and Associate Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said in a  statement released January 15. Read more »

The Algemeiner Reports: Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi’s antisemitic proclamations, including that Jews are “the descendants of apes and pigs,” may be coming back to haunt him. The comments, made during two separate 2010 interviews, but just now being brought to light because of access to their English translation, also urge violence against Zionists and refers to Jews as bloodsuckers and warmongers.

At a White House Press briefing Tuesday, Press Secretary Jay Carney condemned the remarks: Read more »

NYT Reports: An Egyptian appeals court on Sunday overturned the life sentence of former President Hosni Mubarak for directing the killing of protesters, a ruling that could prolong a politically fraught legal battle over the fate of Egypt’s deposed autocrat two years after he was ousted.

The court reportedly ordered a new trial. Although expected, the decision may also put the issue of retribution for Mr. Mubarak and his inner circle back in the news just as a campaign begins for new parliamentary elections, which are scheduled for April. The court decision may bolster the prospects of the Islamist party of President Mohamed Morsi, who campaigned for president last year on a pledge to seek a retrial of Mr. Mubarak, capitalizing on anger over the weak conviction shortly after it was released.

AP Via Yahoo Reports: Iran’s foreign minister on Thursday invited Egypt’s president to visit Tehran again, a sign of improved relations between the two nations since an Islamist government took over in Cairo.

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi discussed the Syria crisis with President Mohammed Morsi, who has launched a four-nation initiative to end the civil war that has taken the lives of more than 60,000 people in 22 months. Read more »

The LAT Reports: President Mohamed Morsi replaced Egypt’s finance and interior ministers Sunday in a Cabinet reshuffle aimed at calming growing economic and security pressures over unemployment, poverty and plummeting foreign capital reserves.

The nation’s dire financial predicament — the Egyptian currency has tumbled to new lows against the dollar — is likely to prove Morsi’s biggest challenge, despite its having been overshadowed by political unrest and the passage of an Islamist-backed constitution. The president and his Muslim Brotherhood party have yet to convince foreign investors and working-class Egyptians that they can rescue the economy. Read more »

VOA Reports: Egypt’s upper house of parliament has convened for its first session since President Mohamed Morsi signed a decree putting the controversial new Islamist-backed constitution into effect.

The Shura Council met on Wednesday to swear in 90 new members appointed by Morsi. The council is also expected to begin setting the framework for elections in the lower of house of parliament within the next two months.

Morsi signed the decree late Tuesday, after the election commission said almost 64 percent of voters had backed the constitution in this month’s polling.