Egyptian Army Soldiers armed with 7.62mm AK-47 assault rifles practice their beach assault techniques at El Omayed, Egypt.

Times of Israel – Egyptian military leaders have assured the Obama administration that they are not interested in long-term rule following their toppling of President Mohammed Morsi and have appointed a government of civilian technocrats to temporarily run the country in an apparent bid to forestall potential U.S. sanctions, American officials said Wednesday.

U.S. law requires the administration to suspend its $1.5 billion in annual military and economic assistance to Egypt — which is deemed a critical U.S. national security priority — if the ouster is determined to have been a coup d’etat. Under the law, the unconstitutional ouster of a democratically elected government by a country’s armed forces would trigger an aid cutoff. But the administration can take time to make that legal determination, and officials said they believed Egypt’s military was trying to take steps to keep such a finding from being reached.

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