Sons of extremist rabbi say our father prayed for Mubarak acquittal

The sons of the former spiritual leader of the Shas party, late Rabbi Ovadia Yosef have said their father prayed for the acquittal of Hosni Mubarak prior to his death.

The chief Rabbi of Israel’s Sephardic Jews, Yitzhak Yosef, said his father prayed for Mubarak’s acquittal and expressed his and his brother’s happiness with the Egyptian court’s decision in an interview with a local Israeli radio station.

Meanwhile, Zvi Bar’el, the Middle Eastern affairs analyst for Israel’s Haaretz newspaper said that Mubarak’s acquittal will have serious long term implications. He pointed out that the court’s decision to dismiss charges against Mubarak is likely to renew the protests that put him behind bars. Mubarak stepped down from power in February 2011, signalling the triumph of protest movements battling to put an end to the authoritarian regime that began with the military coup of 1952, but was acquitted of various charges on Saturday.

Bar’el pointed out that such an acquittal at “the trial of the century” will most likely feed the sense of frustration in Egypt and renew protests across the country; but that this time the people will not chant “the army and the people stand hand in hand” like they did during the 2011 revolution because the army is now headed by a president who will make sure Tahrir Square remains empty.

Boaz Bismuth, the foreign news editor and senior analyst at Israel Today said the Egyptian judiciary are using this sentence to write the final chapter in the liberal youth revolution, pointing out that that the acquittal is not only for Mubarak but for his entire regime as well.