Wither Egypt? (Are they really our friend?)

Great Debates
1

What follows are excerpts from No Wonder the Muslim Man in the Street Misjudges America, by Thomas L. Friedman as printed in The New York Times. I seem to recall that Egypt is supposed to be out ally. Why then is an editor of one of the largest newspapers in that country allowed to make such baseless speculations? Especially an editor that is appointed by the President of Egypt! I have previously started threads on the less than vocal response of the mainstream Islamic community towards the 9/11 atrocities. This seems to be a continuing pattern and it is not only wrong, but it fans the flames of resentment with misinformation and outright lies. There needs to be direct repercussions for this sort of blatant incitement. I’m interested in what Collounsbury, Tamerlane and others may have to post on this topic. I am disgusted by this.

-------------------- excerpts --------------------

If you want to know why the United States is hated in the Arab street, read the recent editorial in the semiofficial Egyptian daily Al Ahram, written by its editor, Ibrahim Nafie. After saying that America was deliberately making humanitarian food drops in areas of Afghanistan full of land mines, Mr. Nafie added: “Similarly, there were several reports that the humanitarian materials have been genetically treated, with the aim of affecting the health of the Afghan people. If this is true, the U.S. is committing a crime against humanity by giving the Afghan people hazardous humanitarian products.”. This was written by Egypt’s leading editor, personally appointed by President Hosni Mubarak. It accuses the United States of dropping poison food on Afghans, according to unspecified “reports.” So is it any wonder that people on the Egyptian street hate America?. Such is the game that produced bin Ladenism…

(emphasis mine)

The regimes crush the violent Muslim protesters, but to avoid being accused of being anti-Muslim the regimes give money and free rein to their most hard-line, but nonviolent, Muslim clerics, while also redirecting their public’s anger onto the United States through the press. Result: America ends up being hated, and Islam gets handed over to the most anti-modern forces. Have a nice day. What these Arab regimes still do not get is that Sept. 11 has exposed their game. They think America is on trial now, but in fact it is stale regimes in countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia, which produced the hijackers, that are on trial. Will they continue to let Islam be hijacked by anti-modernists, who will guarantee that the Arab world falls further behind? Will they continue to blame others? Or will they look in the mirror, take on intolerance and open their societies to a different future?

In Qatar, Al Jazeera, the freest and most popular television in the Arab world, recently ran a debate featuring the liberal Kuwaiti political scientist Shafeeq Ghabra versus an Islamist and a radical Arab nationalist. While the latter two tried to excuse Osama bin Laden, Mr. Ghabra hammered back: “The Lebanese civil war was not an American creation; neither was the Iran-Iraq war; neither was bin Laden. These are our creations. We need to look inside. We cannot be in this blame-others mode forever.”

Your thoughts please.

2

Zenster: Well, I’m really not sure what to say on this general topic that hasn’t been said already.

I don’t know the domestic politics of Egypt a tenth as well as Collounsbury. His is the opinion to solicit. But for what very little it’s worth, I’ll throw in my $.02.

An ally of convenience, wooed away from the U.S.S.R. at some effort during the Cold War, and not all that dissimilar to some of those brutal Latin American oligarchies we propped up during the same period. The interests of Egypt’s ruling class and the U.S. State Department coincide to a certain degree ( not completely, I’ll note ). But in terms of allies Egypt is no Britain. It’s not even a France. More an El Salvador.

shrug Long-standing tradition?

You partially answered your own question later in your post. But I’m not being entirely facetious. Anti-U.S. propagandizing has been going on in these countries for decades. I suspect that the political culture that has grown up with this reality, now takes this sort of thing for granted. Indeed I sometimes wonder if bizarre conspiracy theorizing takes the place of crossword puzzles as the idle intellectual hobby of the masses in these countries ( note: That’s an half-serious, half-tongue in cheek assertion that’s not meant as a statement of fact ).

I share your concern, as you know. But we’ve discussed the whys and wherefores of this before. ( And of course, in all fairness, some have spoken out ).

Sure. Which is why counter-propaganda and careful diplomacy is so important in this campaign. IMO the U.S. neglected this task in the region for far too long ( probably for perfectly valid cost/benefit assesment reasons ) and is reaping the whirlwind of that decision(s). But I’m not of the opinion that it’s a lost cause.

There needs to be direct repercussions for this sort of blatant incitement.

What do you suggest?

It can’t be the regime “silencing” the reporter. Never mind moral considerations. Egypt has enough domestic problems without adding one more cause celebre to the opposition. Even firing him for not fact-checking might come off as repressie ( though I wouldn’t be too disturbed if this route were taken ).

It can’t be diplomatic sanctions against Egypt. The U.S. can’t risk alienating a key ally in the region over something that to the much of the world will appear trivial and petty.

Other than replying directly with real facts ( i.e. counter-propaganda ), I don’t see any good options.

It’s a sad fact ( and I really mean that - it IS sad ), that these “stale regimes” are currently necessary in the short-term as a bulwark and ally against Islamist extremeism. I would hope that eventually democratizing movements ( even Islamizing movements, which could be more democratizing if they’re not taken over by fundamentalist agendas ) would begin to take hold and transform these states into more stable, functional societies. But in the near future, I’m not going to hold my breath. To these regimes, both democrats and Islamists are equally anathema. And in an absolutely fucked-up Catch-22, that’s why some people turn to the Islamists. They appear more representative than the regimes that seek to crush them.

Again, doesn’t mean I’m totally pessimistic. It just means that this will probably be a problem that’s a long time in the solving.

See? There are voices in the wilderness :slight_smile: .

  • Tamerlane
3

I’m still your friend :).

4

You read lies and propaganda in the unfree press in an unfree country? Zenster, I’m SHOCKED!

I just saw the Egyptian Ambassador to the U.S. speak here in Chicago a week ago. He affirmed Egypt’s support for the U.S., offered some lessons learned from Egypt’s war on terrorism over the past 20 years (describing their struggle to get Western banks to disclose or freeze assets of terrorist groups, refused by banks for privacy reasons; economic development efforts focused on the poorest areas of the country and therefore the most fertile recruiting grounds for terrorism).

However, Ambassador Fahmy had two strong points to make:

  1. According to Egypt, the U.S. will not win this war on terrorism alone. We cannot win without winning the public relations war for world opinion. While it will be frustrating to constantly explain, re-explain, and justify a very justifiable fight - (“They attacked our citizens. Now we are eliminating them and their ability to do so in the future”), we need to be transparent in our actions and pay attention to public relations. He suggested suspending bombing during Ramadan not for religious but for public relations reasons - why give the Taliban a card to play if we don’t have to? It would go a long way toward helping our Middle East “allies” at home and helping us in world opinion.

  2. Also according to Egypt, the U.S. needs to continue the Middle East peace process and mediation in other hot spots like Kashmir. He came right out and said "The U.S. needs to hand Israel and Palestine an agreement for two states with pre-1967 borders and all seized territory returned to Egypt and Lebanon. They need to say ‘this is the agreement. Sign or don’t sign.’ and stop bickering about the “principles” and “framework” for the next 20 years. He said he understood how furthering these causes could be seen as giving into terrorists, but he made the point that we had been working on these problems for more than 20 years and STOPPING the process would be giving into terrorists.

Egypt is our ally in the region. Ambassador Fahmy expressed unconditional support for U.S., horror at the attack, and support for military action. But Egypt, like our other allies in the Middle East, have their own agendas and their own political games to play at home.
President-for-Life-Hosni Mubarak’s regime, like many in the region, is not popular at home. If Mubarak supports the U.S., many people will be against it simply because Mubarak is for it, despite the billions in USAID dollars poured into the country. Islamic fundamentalists in Egypt are the ones getting the trash picked up, running local municipalities, building hospitals and schools, and in many cases agitating for more openness and democracy and less corruption within Egypt.

Or, what Tamerlane said. :slight_smile:

5

Egyptian media. What can I say, it’s not my favorite. Even though I consider a few editors at al-Ahram, al-Ahli etc good friends. Very queer.

As for why al-Ahram’s editor is allowed to make such claims – well that’s hard to say.

Egypt’s media is not 100% censored. Even al-Ahram, not a state organ but it comes close, gives some alternate voice now and again. Or indirect criticism of some policy. Not bloody common but for example where there is a lot of tension --Israeli policy springs to mind-- al-Ahram allows steam to be let off through editorials all the while supporting on the front page anything the fat shrimp eating boy does.

Then there is an old and deep Nasserist tradition of anti-Americanism, which has never been addressed. It runs deep and above all among the middle class. Often leads to strange combinations of pro-American feelings and anti-American ones.

It can be worse with the opposition papers which can really go off the deep end.

To be precise he’s not appointed by Mubarek, as far as I recall, legally speaking. He’s certainly approved of by Mubarek, but al-Ahram is nominally independent. Friedman is getting a little ahead of himself saying appointed. That may be a difference without meaning but it is slightly different.

It may be the government sees this sort of thing as letting off steam.

I see a deep need for American “public diplomacy” --propaganda-- to directly engage the Arab press. We don’t do that. It’s a mistake, I also am against calls for pressuring governments to censor the papers --and the rumored pressure on al-Jazeera. It makes us look like hypocrites and fearful. The only thing to do is to take them head-on with counter-letters, with public appearances above all by people who speak Arabic. In all my time, our public presence was near zero. The Brits were the only ones I saw putting Arabic speakers up.

6

I am from Egypt originally. The press is not free in Egypt, as we all now know, but neither is it in many countries in similar situations. The government does not allow dissent but allows anti-American rhetoric to divert frustration. This policy has bit it in the ass. But it is not just the Egyptian press, it is the clerics as well. Keep in mind that the average man on the street in Egypt (and other Mid-Eastern countries) is uneducated, and ignorant. I do not mean this as an insult but the fact is that the lower-class is the majority of the population. Even if the media is reformed, the majority of the population would still get skewed information from the clerics and from the streets.

I knew many well-educated people in Egypt who had no feelings of hatred against the Americans. They now can go on the internet and see the American viewpoints. Unfortunately these people are a small fragment of the population. The lion’s share of the population cannot read the paper, are poverty stricken, can’t get on the Net, have no access to outside information.

As for whether or not Egypt is a friend of the States, I would say generally yes. Most people who found out I am half-American were enthusiastic to know more about us. America has a mythic image there. People spoke about it as though it were another world, like a paradise. But there is also a disgust of American foreign-policy, specifically that concerning Israel. There is strong sympathy for the Palestinians and a belief that they were robbed of their land. America’s support of Israel makes it, in their eyes, accessories after the fact.

Despite this, I believe that a minority of the Egyptian population supports terrorism. The government has been fighthing these terrorists for years (remember that Al-Zawahiri is an Egyptian fugitive). The attacks in Luxor and the Cairo Museum aginst foreign tourists hurt the tourism industry pretty badly. And these same terrorists are calling for the overthrow of the current Egyptian government. The government has responded pretty severely. Mubarak also has been calling for a worldwide council on terrorism over the past few years.

Personally, I believe that America has the ability to help the Egyptian government fight these terrorists. It would be in our best interest to do so. Although the current government is not perfect, it is much better that the only other current alternative–a fundamentalist regime.