"Egypt - The Promise of Spring Becomes an Autumn of Anguish"
Sydney M. Williams
“If you want to move people, you look for a point of sensitivity, and in Egypt nothing moves people as much as religion.” Those words of Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian writer and Nobel Prize winner for literature were prescient in terms of Sunday’s clash between Coptic Christians, the Egyptian military and Muslim extremists. Mr. Mahfouz, who died in 2006 at the age of 95, was a devout Muslim who believed in freedom of expression. For example, while he criticized Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses as being insulting to Islam, he defended Mr. Rushdie’s right to publish. For his troubles, Arab extremists, in 1996, attempted to assassinate him by stabbing him in the neck. He survived, but the injuries affected his writings.
While religion may not have been as instrumental as economies and politics as a cause of war, it certainly has played (and is playing) a central role in terrorism that has been sweeping across the Middle East and the globe. We in the West assumed that it was the sole desire for freedom and democracy that drove youthful demonstrators into Cairo’s Tahrir Square last February when, in fact, the protests may have been orchestrated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Stability is a hallmark of tyrants and Hosni Mubarak was no different from others. The army kept the Brotherhood under control and Coptic Christians – about ten percent of Egypt’s population – were provided freedom of worship. It was a situation that suited the West, as its principal manifestation was stability. However, like a covered pot brought to boil, the underlying tensions needed release.
Democracy is difficult in part because success demands compromise and respect – conditions unfamiliar to extremists everywhere. Democracy relies on trust and shared responsibility. No one gets everything they want. Benjamin Franklin spoke of that at the time of the Revolution when he defined democracy: “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.”
Since Mubarak’s ouster, Egypt has been run by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF.) In fact, some would argue that the military has been the mainstay of stability in Egypt for years. The difference is that Hosni Mubarak had the strength and the means to keep warring factions separated. Reva Bhalla of Stratfor wrote yesterday: “What most of the media have failed to discern in covering the Egyptian uprising is the centrality of the military in the conflict.” Many of the military elite shared the goal of dislodging the Egyptian ruler. In Ms. Bhalla’s view, the main purpose of the elections is to provide the impression of transitioning to democracy.
Under Mubarak, according to Ms. Bhalla, “…members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood would shuffle from apartment to apartment in the poorer districts of Cairo trying to dodge arrest while stressing to me in the privacy of their offices that patience was their best weapon against the regime.” During the Mubarak years, Coptic Christians stuck together freely, if nervously, worshipping at their churches. However, in the nine months since the ouster of Mubarak, the military has tried some 12,000 Egyptians in military courts, “more than the authoritarian ruler did in thirty years,” according to Laura Meckler of the Wall Street Journal. Despite the omnipresence of the military, forces opposed to SCAF have become increasingly vocal in their discontent. State-run media has been supporting the interim military dictatorship and, according to Stratfor, appear to have deliberately fomented dissension between Islamic extremists and the Christian community.
Egypt, with 83 million people, is the largest Arab nation in the world; it appears to be disintegrating into anarchical chaos. It remains to be seen as to whether SCAF will permit the start of parliamentary elections last month as promised. Last Sunday, the Maspero Youth Union, an extremist Coptic group, marched on the headquarters of the Egyptian state television. They did so in protest over the burning of a church in Aswan and against the failure of the army to protect Coptic interests. The response was fast and furious. While a lot of misinformation was passed around by Twitter feeds, what we do know is that shots were fired and the army responded with tear gas and the use of armored vehicles. Pictures of armored vehicles charging into protesters at high rates of speed were chilling and reminiscent of those of Nazis moving into Poland in 1939 – a total disregard for human life. Purportedly twenty-six have been killed, including three Egyptian soldiers, but it is hard to believe that that number will not rise.
Totalitarian states that harbor terrorism are dangerous to the world, as we learned on 9/11 and was made clear yesterday when the Justice department foiled an Iranian attempt to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the United States in a Washington restaurant, a location frequented by members of Congress. There is little question that the choice of venue was deliberately aimed at the United States. The United States has long supported repressive regimes in the Mideast, as well as other places, on the basis that stability trumps anarchy. However, as hope coursed through the region on the back of the Arab Spring, expectations for democracy rose. Twitter and YouTube put words and faces to young protesters; those in the West who wanted this to be a grassroots response to tyrannical leaders ignored the role played by those such as the Muslim Brotherhood.
Democracy is the best antidote to terrorism and the desire to export democracy is a noble goal, but its implementation is difficult. It is all well and good for the United States to call for such change and to lend verbal support for those who demand such change. But for democracy to succeed it requires more than just words, as we have learned in Iraq and Afghanistan. The words of Edmund Burke resonate: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
On June 4, 2009, newly elected President Obama spoke at Cairo University. He said: “I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world.” He spoke of how we “share common principles – principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.” But President Bush had made clear in the days after 9/11 that the war against terrorism was not a war on Muslims. Speaking to airline employees at Chicago’s O’Hare airport on September 27, 2001 he said: “Americans understand we fight not a religion; ours is not a campaign against the Muslim faith. Ours is a campaign against evil.” Too many Muslim regimes do not share democracy’s principles of justice and tolerance.
Evil knows no boundaries or religion, and certainly is not limited to Muslims, as we who lived through the times of Hitler and Stalin know full well. However, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is evil incarnate, as his regime’s recent assassination attempt shows. The attempt is also a visible reminder of the consequences of letting Iran develop a nuclear weapon. And the risk that is emerging from the chaos in Egypt is the possibility of either a newly strengthened military, or an empowered Muslim Brotherhood – neither one will advance the demands of pro-democracy forces and both, should Iran get their nuclear weapon, will seek one for Egypt.
It is not so much a “new beginning” we should be seeking, but a reaffirmation of the principles of liberty for which so many have died over the centuries, and which was so well understood by that exemplary Egyptian author, Naguib Mahfouz.
Thought of the Day
“Egypt – The Promise of Spring Becomes an Autumn of Anguish”
October 12, 2011“If you want to move people, you look for a point of sensitivity, and in Egypt nothing moves people as much as religion.” Those words of Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian writer and Nobel Prize winner for literature were prescient in terms of Sunday’s clash between Coptic Christians, the Egyptian military and Muslim extremists. Mr. Mahfouz, who died in 2006 at the age of 95, was a devout Muslim who believed in freedom of expression. For example, while he criticized Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses as being insulting to Islam, he defended Mr. Rushdie’s right to publish. For his troubles, Arab extremists, in 1996, attempted to assassinate him by stabbing him in the neck. He survived, but the injuries affected his writings.
While religion may not have been as instrumental as economies and politics as a cause of war, it certainly has played (and is playing) a central role in terrorism that has been sweeping across the Middle East and the globe. We in the West assumed that it was the sole desire for freedom and democracy that drove youthful demonstrators into Cairo’s Tahrir Square last February when, in fact, the protests may have been orchestrated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Stability is a hallmark of tyrants and Hosni Mubarak was no different from others. The army kept the Brotherhood under control and Coptic Christians – about ten percent of Egypt’s population – were provided freedom of worship. It was a situation that suited the West, as its principal manifestation was stability. However, like a covered pot brought to boil, the underlying tensions needed release.
Democracy is difficult in part because success demands compromise and respect – conditions unfamiliar to extremists everywhere. Democracy relies on trust and shared responsibility. No one gets everything they want. Benjamin Franklin spoke of that at the time of the Revolution when he defined democracy: “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.”
Since Mubarak’s ouster, Egypt has been run by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF.) In fact, some would argue that the military has been the mainstay of stability in Egypt for years. The difference is that Hosni Mubarak had the strength and the means to keep warring factions separated. Reva Bhalla of Stratfor wrote yesterday: “What most of the media have failed to discern in covering the Egyptian uprising is the centrality of the military in the conflict.” Many of the military elite shared the goal of dislodging the Egyptian ruler. In Ms. Bhalla’s view, the main purpose of the elections is to provide the impression of transitioning to democracy.
Under Mubarak, according to Ms. Bhalla, “…members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood would shuffle from apartment to apartment in the poorer districts of Cairo trying to dodge arrest while stressing to me in the privacy of their offices that patience was their best weapon against the regime.” During the Mubarak years, Coptic Christians stuck together freely, if nervously, worshipping at their churches. However, in the nine months since the ouster of Mubarak, the military has tried some 12,000 Egyptians in military courts, “more than the authoritarian ruler did in thirty years,” according to Laura Meckler of the Wall Street Journal. Despite the omnipresence of the military, forces opposed to SCAF have become increasingly vocal in their discontent. State-run media has been supporting the interim military dictatorship and, according to Stratfor, appear to have deliberately fomented dissension between Islamic extremists and the Christian community.
Egypt, with 83 million people, is the largest Arab nation in the world; it appears to be disintegrating into anarchical chaos. It remains to be seen as to whether SCAF will permit the start of parliamentary elections last month as promised. Last Sunday, the Maspero Youth Union, an extremist Coptic group, marched on the headquarters of the Egyptian state television. They did so in protest over the burning of a church in Aswan and against the failure of the army to protect Coptic interests. The response was fast and furious. While a lot of misinformation was passed around by Twitter feeds, what we do know is that shots were fired and the army responded with tear gas and the use of armored vehicles. Pictures of armored vehicles charging into protesters at high rates of speed were chilling and reminiscent of those of Nazis moving into Poland in 1939 – a total disregard for human life. Purportedly twenty-six have been killed, including three Egyptian soldiers, but it is hard to believe that that number will not rise.
Totalitarian states that harbor terrorism are dangerous to the world, as we learned on 9/11 and was made clear yesterday when the Justice department foiled an Iranian attempt to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the United States in a Washington restaurant, a location frequented by members of Congress. There is little question that the choice of venue was deliberately aimed at the United States. The United States has long supported repressive regimes in the Mideast, as well as other places, on the basis that stability trumps anarchy. However, as hope coursed through the region on the back of the Arab Spring, expectations for democracy rose. Twitter and YouTube put words and faces to young protesters; those in the West who wanted this to be a grassroots response to tyrannical leaders ignored the role played by those such as the Muslim Brotherhood.
Democracy is the best antidote to terrorism and the desire to export democracy is a noble goal, but its implementation is difficult. It is all well and good for the United States to call for such change and to lend verbal support for those who demand such change. But for democracy to succeed it requires more than just words, as we have learned in Iraq and Afghanistan. The words of Edmund Burke resonate: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
On June 4, 2009, newly elected President Obama spoke at Cairo University. He said: “I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world.” He spoke of how we “share common principles – principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.” But President Bush had made clear in the days after 9/11 that the war against terrorism was not a war on Muslims. Speaking to airline employees at Chicago’s O’Hare airport on September 27, 2001 he said: “Americans understand we fight not a religion; ours is not a campaign against the Muslim faith. Ours is a campaign against evil.” Too many Muslim regimes do not share democracy’s principles of justice and tolerance.
Evil knows no boundaries or religion, and certainly is not limited to Muslims, as we who lived through the times of Hitler and Stalin know full well. However, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is evil incarnate, as his regime’s recent assassination attempt shows. The attempt is also a visible reminder of the consequences of letting Iran develop a nuclear weapon. And the risk that is emerging from the chaos in Egypt is the possibility of either a newly strengthened military, or an empowered Muslim Brotherhood – neither one will advance the demands of pro-democracy forces and both, should Iran get their nuclear weapon, will seek one for Egypt.
It is not so much a “new beginning” we should be seeking, but a reaffirmation of the principles of liberty for which so many have died over the centuries, and which was so well understood by that exemplary Egyptian author, Naguib Mahfouz.
Labels: TOTD
posted by Thought of the Day @ 5:50 AM
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