As an outsider looking in at the situation in Egypt it is very confusing. I am going to explore my thoughts via this piece. It would be appreciated if anyone who had thoughts on this would comment. It just seems like awful conflict with both sides wrong.First allow me to admit that most of my news comes from NPR. While many folks rant about NPR’s “Liberal” slant I find it one of the few news sources without a large bias. So many of the news sources of our time are more opinion than news and/or have a definite bias. Since I almost never watch TV news, my other source of news is the Internet, so much of which must be taken with a grain of salt. I do tend to browse the more liberal news/opinion sites. To counterbalance this I do browse the BBC site almost daily to get a point of view from outside the United States. On very rare occasions I will look at Al Jazeera site. Like most folks I am stuck in my bias silo, but I do attempt to make the occasional foray into other arenas of thought.
I have a love/hate relationship with my country. An area that bothers me most is our foreign policy. As a young person I had this vision of the United States as a bright beacon of democracy providing an example of how things should be to the rest of the world. I had some illusion of our foreign policy being as an evangelical mission to democratize the world. That was not surprising given my Southern Baptist upbringing. Now I see our foreign policy as an extension of our corporations’ greed and of a misdirected sense of the American empire and American exceptionalism. Our foreign policy generally saddens me. If it was not so self-centered we could be doing some real good in the world with our resources.
I bring up American foreign policy because for decades our policy in Egypt has been to aid and abet the military and strong, dictatorial leaders. We definitely were not promoting democracy in Egypt.
I have watched Arab and other Muslim countries that have for various reasons strongman leaders. Rid the country of this leader, and they seem almost always to dissolve into partisan conflicts. I have read about the differences between Sunnis and Shiites, but as an outsider it seems like the difference between saltine brands. Coptic Christians have been in Egypt for centuries, they are Egyptians too. The conflicts have given me the passing thought that maybe these societies cannot operate as democracies, that these societies need an authoritarian leader.
There are many things to make a democratic society work. One is an educated population with free access to news. Egypt has one of the better educational systems in the Arab world and North Africa. I do not believe that it could be said that Egypt has ever had a very free press. Another very key component to make democracy work is tolerance. This is sadly lacking in much of the Muslim world as exampled above. I do not believe that this is the stance of most Muslims, but it definitely is of a seemingly large minority.
Just as an aside when I reflect on those two components of democracy in my own country, I am greatly bothered. The education system in the US is deteriorating, TV news and much of the Internet news seems to have degenerated into entertainment first. Facts seem to be played with very loosely. In some ways we are a very tolerant country, but the rancor between political parties, between individuals of different political beliefs is at the high point (low point) of my lifetime. It does not give me a lot of hope.
I was excited by the Arab Spring and followed it closely in the news. I thought here was a chance for the folks in these countries to shed their restrictive governments and to have whatever type of society they wanted. Admittedly, as a Westerner I was thinking of that sausage factory that is democracy.
I was especially enthralled about Egypt as one of the few Arabs I know is an Egyptian. I was thrilled about Egypt as it was a country of which I had some knowledge of its history, of the part it played in civilizing the world. I did not like Hosni Murbarak, and was appalled that my government kept supporting him. I was thrilled by persistent and mostly peaceful protests of the Egyptians. I was amazed at the restraint that the Egyptian military exhibited. It gave me hope for the world in general.
Eventually there were elections in Egypt and Mohammed Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, was elected. I wondered how that could be. But he was duly elected by the people of Egypt and that must have been what they wanted. When you turn the sausage grinder of democracy you do not always get pretty results. In this country I was outraged and perplexed by the rise of the Tea Party, by how much influence the Religious Right seem to have, but I thought it my duty as a citizen to deal with them and discuss the issues with them. I thought it would be the same in Egypt. I had been excited about the Egyptian elections, but I ended up feeling very blue like I did when Bush and Cheney were elected
The longer Morsi ruled, the more it seemed like the same old thing with a different coat of paint. He was trying to enforce a different set of beliefs into Egyptian society than Murbarak, but it was still force. It was not democracy. I do not understand why these religious groups cannot live their religious lives without society at large having to live the same beliefs. There should be room for all to believe how they will as long as it does not physically harm others or repress in some way.
The protest started against Morsi. My initial response was well… there will another election, just don’t vote for him. Obviously, many Egyptians did not feel like they could wait that long. Demonstrations, as long as they are peaceful, are part of the democratic sausage factory. Then there started being reports of violence. Whether it was true or not most of those reports of violence were of violence by the Muslim Brotherhood. Then there was a military coup. Whatever happened to democracy? The military should be there to protect a country, not to force it into subservience. God bless our political leaders, they refused to call it coup. As I listened to the convoluted path the Administrations’ spoke person followed to not say the word coup, I wondered at the lack of transparency and genuineness of my government.
I was saddened by the coup in itself and by the response of my government.
The situation turned really ugly with military using extraordinary force against their civilian population. Hundreds of Egyptian citizens were basically massacred. There has been a lot of lip service my Administration condemning such actions, but we continue to provide support to the Egyptian military. From what I have been reading a big part of this is so that we can maintain what is essentially unrestricted fly over rights across Egypt. It is also so that our military ships can have preference in the Suez Canal during emergencies. And, of course, let us not forget oil, much of which is shipped through the Suez Canal. Add to the above that our support of the Egyptian military has been in large part a payment to keep them out of armed conflict with Israel. We have supported Israel far too much, both in money and policy. I have no idea what the answer to the Israel-Palestinian conflict is, but there are definitely two sides. I understand why the Palestinians are angry. Take away our land we would be angry too. Add on to that the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israelis and it is a wonder that is not much worse than it is.
I’m still confused.
I have a huge issue with a religious group promoting and performing violence. I am an agnostic, but if there were a God I would think he would be sadden beyond comprehension by how we treat each other. We are not perfect in this country, but we work hard to allow all religious groups freedom of expression. Some groups here would like to impose their beliefs on the society as a whole, but for the most part they do not. The Muslim Brotherhood needs to learn to this lesson. The whole country does not have to be who they are. Their attitude of forcing their beliefs on everyone else, and the use of violence is part of the problem. That part I am not confused about.
I am never in favor of autocratic rule. Somehow Egyptians need to learn to live with tolerance for others. The military needs to learn to allow the messiness of democracy to not bother them. There is something so utterly abhorrent about an army turning force on its own citizens that I am beyond words. As long as the Army is willing to stifle, control and kill, they are part of the problem.
I keep hoping that our government will start working off of humanistic values rather than self-interest. Humanistic values would not have us supporting a government that slaughters its people. We probably cannot affect what is happening in Egypt, but we do not have to keep enabling the Egyptian military with money and arms. We are part of the problem.
Until tolerance of other people’s beliefs is the rule and until everyone forswears violence there will not be a lasting solution. It really appears that the flowers of the Arab Spring have withered away in the heat of violence and intolerance.
Links of Interest:
4 Reasons America’s Still Funding the Egyptian Military As They Slaughter Their Own People
In my mind, I agree with about 60% of what you wrote.
As you know, I was there. Cairo sit-ins were NOT peaceful; they contained people who were armed with AK47s, shot guns, and Molotov cocktails. I lived less than 2 miles from The Cairo University sit in, (the smaller of the two, but the one containing the more radical elements), and almost every night, and until we left, those “peaceful” demonstrators would fire a few “we are here, armed and ready for u” rounds.
Naturally, they used these weapons, against riot police, and not the army, during the breakup of the sit-ins, which transformed that to a war between two sides, both suffering casualties, with the side better trained, and more heavily armed eventually prevailing. The same happened at the other sit in, which had a much larger crowd, and had armed personnel, according to various accounts. There were 150 policemen killed that day, almost all by gunshot wounds, and I doubt they all fell to “friendly fire”.
Any loss of life is deplorable, but anyone who bears arms, and start firing rounds for any reason, should be ready to bear the consequence of their action.
In 1963, When the governor of Alabama (George Wallace), allowed his beliefs to stand between him and the law, and refused to desegregate the University of Alabama, who came to the aid of what was right? It was the US 2nd Infantry Division from Fort Benning, GA (I.e. the US army). Wallace thought that this was, and I quote “The beginning of Military dictatorship in the country”, which sounds a lot like a “coup” to me. I think you and I know he was wrong.
Close your eyes, and imagine for a minute, what would have happened if the US Army was not summoned, or refused to interfere, and the KKK staged a “peaceful” sit in at the University of Alabama campus, refusing to abide by what the entire country thought was the right thing to do. I am sure such KKK sit in would have been broken up, and they would have resisted, shots would have been fired, and KKK members would have been killed, and on one would have blamed the US army for killing “its own people”.
Was the army of the Union, killing “it’s Own people”, or doing the right thing, when it went to war against the confederates in the south in order to basically apply what was right and abolish slavery in the United States?
Morsy won by a very thin margin. In all fairness, Shafeek would have been the winner, if the ballots, from the precincts in Upper Egypt where Copts were forcibly ordered, by the MB, to stay home and not allowed to vote were disqualified.
After a few months it became clear to a lot of Egyptians, that the MB, and not Morsy, was the de-facto ruler of Egypt, and they were failing miserably at every aspect of running the country, while allowing their most radical elements and allies to slowly transform Egypt into another Taliban era Afghanistan, and forming and training thousand of militia men in Sinai, to be summoned at will. Those same militias or at least what is left of them, as recent as this Monday executed, in cold blood, 36 unarmed Egyptian soldiers, on the day of their army discharge.
There is little doubt in my mind, that if Morsy was allowed to finish his term, things would have been much worse, and about 30 million Egyptians realized that, and took to the streets on June 30th 2013. Initially they would have been content if Morsy agreed to a National Referendum on whether he should be allowed to finish his term, but the MB wouldn’t have that, in all likelihood because they knew he was going to lose, and loose big this time, even if all Copts were not allowed to vote.
Like in the Wallace case, here you have a fascist (albeit an elected fascist) and his allies standing against the will of the majority of the people, but with no one to “officially” summon the army. So, the army summoned itself, forced Morsy out, and came to the aid of its own people. They appointed the head of the highest court in the land, someone who I am sure is no paper pusher, or used to taking orders from Generals, as an interim president, a Noble peace prize winner, as a VP, and a respected autocrat as a Prime Minister, the three of whom, at least theoretically, have the power to relieve the minister of Defense of his duties.
The Egyptian Army did the right thing, and they need the support of the US administration, Judiciary, people, and army, who have been allies to the Egyptian people for over thirty years.
One personal tragedy in all this, is that I find myself turning away from NPR, and PBS, my trusted news sources for over 16 years, and watching FOX news, who unlike a lot of media coverage of Egypt these days, are among the few ones, who in my opinion, and I can’t believe I am saying this, are getting it right.
The one source I remember reading during what we Westerners dubbed “Arab Spring” that provided past and future guidance (don’t I sound like I work for the Federal Reserve?) that has been borne out by events was STRATFOR. Since I have been reading them, I realize, like most publications, they have an ideological bent, pragmatic in the exercise of power as it may be. But, ideological or not, if they make predictions and those predictions come true, then they may be reading the tea leaves correctly. At the very beginning of the Egyptian events, STRATFOR laid out Egyptian politics and history over the last 50 years or so. From their viewpoint, Mubarek was “first among equals” as the top echelon of the Egyptian military built an economic model that has it owning and running economic enterprises. Mubarek had begun to attempt to make the Presidency a family possession, not a military title. This concerned the other generals; the “Arab Spring” presented an opportunity for the military to depose Mubarek; it did so. From the very beginning, as all the reporters, talking heads and even the U. S. government were declaiming that democracy was flowering, STRATFOR was warning that events would only be allowed to unfold as the military allowed them to unfold. Recent events seem to have borne this out. Now, much like Gorbachev’s desire to gradually open up the USSR, events may yet spiral out of the military’s ability to maintain their control of Egypt, but, to date, all of the to and fro commentary reminds me of the quote I heard recently that reading history from the news is like telling time by the second hand.
As the Arab Spring unfolded I watched from the comfort of my suburban family room. I applauded as the Egyptians overthrew a military backed dictator (are there any other kinds?) and hoped the U.S. would stop sending “aid” to Egypt in the form of military hardware. Of course we didn’t.We continue to supply the Egyptian military with weapons and “spare parts”.
When Morsi was elected, I had a feeling that this wasn’t going to turn out well. I’m sure I was partially guided in my apprehension by our less than informative media and their dislike of the Muslim Brotherhood. I was certain though, that the U.S. military machine could not allow a Muslim Brotherhood controlled Egypt to continue very long. That is/was not in OUR best interests.
FYI: For my own part, I disagree with any and all political groups that derive their guiding philosophy from a religious text, be that text the Bible, the Koran, the Torah, the Baghava-Gita, or Fox News.
While I applaud the Egyptians in their search for Democracy, the stories of the elections, and the voter suppression, had a familiar ring to them. We continue to struggle with democracy and voters rights here, after 237 years of democracy. Our recent elections and our less than supreme court rulings insure that rigged elections will continue ad infinitum.
As far as our foreign policy actions, we only need to look at what is going on today, less than a month after your article was written.
Egypt is not currently on our radar, it barely registers on our nightly news. We are letting their military run the country, again. Meanwhile, our leaders babble over another bombing campaign in another Muslim country. Today, our sights are on Syria, hoping to draw Iran into the mix. I think the U.S. has ADD since we can’t seem to keep focused on any one country for too long. We need to keep moving on to the next targets.
While I honestly hope things come to a honorable and peaceful conclusion for the Egyptian people, I believe that allowing the U.S. Military to supply or consult with the Egyptian military is a continuing recipe for suppression and violence.
Meanwhile we have to take care of Syria now, and then Iran, and then……………
I had not thought of Syria being a pretext for giving us a back door against Iran, but it does make sense.
I personally think the Swedes need to make a real statement and retract the Nobel Peace Prize from Barack Obama.