It is a welcome development, but just the first step if Egypt is to be returned to stability.
The Obama administration has badly misread Egyptian politics, culture and history in its dealings with the most populous Arab state, and the stakes could not be higher for stability in the Middle East. A recent London Center mission to Egypt provided a close-up view of a nation still reeling from two revolutions in three years and now facing the largest militant Islamist insurgency in its history.
One need only look at the iconic Pyramid of Giza to see the effects: As many as 15 million Egyptians used to be employed in the tourism sector, but on the day of our recent visit, just 20 other brave souls defied travel advisories to touch and see one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. One major travel carrier told me his company’s gross sales are down from $10 million to less than $300,000.
It is an environment rich for exploitation by extremists. Young people represent fully a quarter of Egypt’s population, and more than half of them are impoverished, with unemployment for those under 30 in Egypt at 25 percent.
But in Washington, the Obama administration has long seemed content to nurture hope advanced by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that some “moderate” wing of the Muslim Brotherhood will still somehow restore stability. Washington remains agog over the events in Tahrir Square three years ago, when a “Twitter revolution” brought an end to the decades-long presidency of Hosni Mubarak. The jubilation of those first heady days of the so-called Arab Spring, however, was short-lived.
Once the military restored order and elections were scheduled, just one entity – the Muslim Brotherhood – was poised to mobilize in advance of the vote. While much of the Western media hailed Mohammed Morsi as the first democratically elected president in Egypt’s history, the rest of us gritted our teeth.
It took little time for the Muslim Brotherhood to launch its drive for the Islamization of Egypt. At home, Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood and the clerics advanced an ever more repressive and authoritarian program. Internationally, he voted to abrogate the peace treaty with Israel (*) and visited Iran in the hope of fomenting a terrorist state within the Sinai.
By June of the following year, at least 14 million Egyptians took to the streets to demand Morsi’s resignation. When the Egyptian army was called to quell the uprising, Morsi’s handpicked army chief, General Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, refused to fire on fellow Egyptians.
Although Washington viewed the events as a coup d’etat, what really happened was what the French call a cri de coeur – a “cry from the heart” – as Egyptians from every walk of life rose as one to say Morsi must go.
In the aftermath, el-Sissi has become a national hero. In country where military life is a staple of state affairs and there is scarcely an Egyptian family that does not have someone serving now or in the past, el-Sissi appears to be the one individual capable of unifying the nation and guiding it through the crisis.
Over the course of two hours of meetings with him, I found el-Sissi to be both intelligent and articulate as he offered a penetrating analysis of Egyptian, regional and world politics. It soon became apparent to me why, as a devout Muslim, he has nevertheless inspired the genuine affection and confidence of Egyptians from every religious tradition and walk of life.
Yet in Washington, el-Sissi is still seen as a usurper of Egypt’s grand democratic experiment, and it remains to be seen whether the Obama administration’s approval of the sale of 10 Apache helicopters signals a more realistic assessment of the interim Egyptian government and the challenges before it.
Once elections are held and el-Sissi likely assumes the presidency, it will be incumbent on Congress to approve $1.5 billion in promised military assistance that Washington suspended in the wake of last June’s revolution.
The aid is desperately needed if Egypt is to avoid creation in the Sinai of a well-armed regional center of terror in North Africa. But for it to happen, the Obama administration will have to take a more sensible view of the events in Egypt over the past three years.
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Hebert London is president of the London Center for Policy Research and co-author of the recently released book “The Sunni Vanguard: Can Egypt, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia Survive the New Middle East?“ http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2014/05/07/us-should-recognize-general-el-sissi-as-key-to-egypts-stability
(*) Editor’s note : This information appears unfounded
The Photo: el-Sissi, left, has inspired genuine affection in his people.