Ever since the overthrow of Egypt’s elected president, the U.S. administration has tried to avoid the word “coup.” Hard to do that now, but it’s still trying.
Pity the poor dictators! What’s a dedicated bunch of military plotters to do when they learn the elected leader they overthrew may have to go free because they put him in the wrong kind of jail?

If you’re among the conspirators who ousted Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi in 2013, it seems you initiate a flurry of meetings and phone calls and soon reach a solution that relies on forgery and, to make sure a replacement jail looks authentic, construction of a “torture area” inside it.

“Forgery, we do all the time,” brags one member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces. “We are very good at it.” He might have said the same about torture.

What neither he nor his colleagues realized, however, is that their words were secretly recorded, and eventually tapes of these alleged conversations would be released to the outside world.

One hundred years ago last week, on Christmas Eve, 1914, German and British soldiers emerged from the horrors of World War One trench warfare to greet each other, exchange food and gifts, and to wish each other a Merry Christmas. What we remember now as the “Christmas Truce” began with soldiers singing Christmas carols together from in the trenches. Eventually the two sides climbed out of the trenches and met in person. In the course of this two day truce, which lasted until December 26, 1914, the two sides also exchanged prisoners, buried their dead, and even played soccer with each other.

How amazing to think that the celebration of the birth of the Prince of Peace could bring a brief pause in one of the most destructive wars in history. How sad that it was not to last.