The Second Egyptian Revolution of June 30, 2013 Has Waved a Final Goodbye to Exclusive Islamic Rule

Egypt has a durable face, and a changing face.  Its durability, expressed in stone, can be seen in the pyramids and the sphinx.  The same face is manifested institutionally in the armed forces, Al-Azhar, and the Coptic church.  The Egyptian changeable face could also be seen in its secular forces and its Islamist forces.

In this blog, I shall focus on one of the durables in Egyptian life, namely the armed forces.  This is in view of General El-Sisi's marshaling the power of the masses in his call made in July 24, 2013.  It was a call intended to put the Muslim Brotherhood on notice that the removal of Morsi shall not be reversed, and that the continuation of violence shall be met by force by both the army and the police.  In such a confrontation, the army undoubtedly has the upper hand.

Is this situation democratic, undemocratic, anti-democratic, liberal, illliberal street rule, mob democracy?  Here descriptions do not much matter.  The Egyptian revolution has not matured yet; the transitional government of July 16 is still feeling its way; the Brotherhood and their opponents have shed lots of blood (more than 200 dead); and the terms Selmia (peaceful) and Islamiah (Islamic) are now seen as definite opposites.

The heart of the matter is that the only institution which can save Egypt from civil war or even worse, disintegration, is the armed forces.  Since time immemorial, they have been an integral part of Egypt's political life.  Some Egyptian experts date that symbiosis to 3000 years B.C.

A good source on this is the book by Ahmed Abdulla, entitled "The Army and Democracy in Egypt" (1990, in Arabic).  That source is largely built on an earlier source by Anwar Abdel-Malek "The Army and the National Movement" (1974, in Arabic).

In my capacity as a guest lecturer at the Nasser Military Academy in 1974, following the October war of 1973 between Egypt/Syria and Israel, I made a discovery.  My host, the late field marshal Ahmed Ismail has allowed me to keep the texts of the 73 questions addressed to me by the top leadership of Egypt's armed forces.  The questions revealed an Egyptian military which was focused on the future of Egyptian politics.  Reflections of this could be found in the book by the very first Egyptian president, following the collapse of the monarchy in 1952.  That was the late General Muhammad Naguib in his book entitled "Egypt's Destiny."

Therefore it came as no surprise to those who follow this subject closely that the Egyptian Constitution of December 2012 assigns the military a special status.  Its task is "ensuring the safety and security of the country," and "shall be consulted about draft laws related to them" (Article 197).  The Constituent Assembly, dominated by the Islamists, signed on this.

In his call for public demonstrations issued on July 24, General El-Sisi reminded the nation, including the Brotherhood, that three reports had been submitted by the military to the then President Morsi.

• warning against the descent of Egypt into chaos resulting from the President's refusal to compromise with his secular opponents;
• expressing alarm at the Islamisation of the State through the merging of religion and the concept of the homeland; and 
• the rejection by the majority of the public of the Morsi mode of governance whereby that rejection was translated by the Morsi regime as a rejection of Islam itself.

In his call to the Egyptian street of July 24, El-Sisi made it clear that it became clear that "the conflict within Egypt was morphing into a religious conflict."

With the war in Sinai against Gazans, Bedouins, Syrians and Hezbollah infiltrators, the armed forces faced a military confrontation to the east, and a security confrontation with the pro-Morsi forces in Cairo, Alexandria, and other urban centers in the heart of the most populous country in the Arab world.  The Brotherhood seemed to be spoiling for a confrontation with the national army and the police using the fig leaf of the so-called "Shariyah" (legitimacy).

The Brotherhood most serious misfortune, marking the end of its peaceful co-existence with the armed forces, happened on August 5, 2012.  In Rafah, northeast of Sinai, a massacre perpetrated on the Egyptian army took place.  As troops sat to break their Ramadan fast, they were set upon by a group of terrorists who killed 16 soldiers in cold blood, and wounded 9 others.  The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), led by Field Marshal Tantawi, the de facto ruler of Egypt prior to the election of Morsi, issued the following pledge: "So God be our witness, we shall avenge our martyrs."

All of Egypt went into national mourning; Morsi's reaction was tepid; the results of the investigation ordered by Morsi produced no results; and the finger of accusation by the armed forces pointed to terrorists and so-called jihadi groups in Sinai who may or may not have affiliation with Al-Qaeda, with some criminal Bedouin support.

Sinai became the real battleground between a secularist Egypt supported by its cohesive national army, and the Morsi regime which acted exclusively on the premise that winning the presidency by 50.50% of only 22% of Egyptian voters in June 2012 was a license for Islamization en masse.  That was not Morsi's contract with Egypt.

Morsi interpreted the results of the ballot box of June 2012 as if they were a mandate for politically-cleansing Egypt from the latent anti-Brotherhood opposition.  His targets were the judiciary, the liberal media, the House of Fatwas (religious interpretation through non-enforceable guidelines), the independence of Al-Azhar.  Also among Morsi's targets was  SCAF which, through its support of the January 25 Revolution, had pushed Mubarak out of power, and helped the electorate reach the ballot box.

Sieges by the Islamists of iconic Egyptian institutions such as the headquarters of the Supreme Constitutional Court, the sites of the Egyptian TV and Artistic Production, and the Ministry of Interior whose police forces refused to battle demonstrators constituted an expanding Islamic coup against the soul of secular Egypt.

In the midst of this chaos, Morsi ill-advisedly thought that he possessed some silver bullets.  He abruptly sacked the transitional leadership of SCAF (Field Marshal Tantawi and General Anan); ordered the reconvening of a dissolved House of Representatives; and had that rump session of ex-parliamentarians of whom 70% were either Brothers or Salafis resolve in 20 minutes that legislative powers be transferred to him pending the adoption of a new Constitution.  To the rank and file of the Egyptian masses, Morsi and Ramses II began to look the same.  But Ramses II had kept Egypt united; Morsi was fracturing the land of the Nile.

Former professor Morsi then issued a constitutional declaration in November 2012 declaring in effect that he was above the law -his decisions were not subject to judicial review.  That declaration produced a fire storm, as the populace saw in Morsi, especially on the eve of the hasty adoption of the Constitution of December 2012, another Mubarak.  Although that ominous declaration was quickly withdrawn, but the specter of Brotherhoodization of Egypt especially at the provincial level, assumed alarming proportions in the public mind.

The president of the Judges' Club, Counsellor El-Zind declared on April 21 that he might sue Morsi through the International Criminal Court, though legally he had no standing.  It was a sign of desperation.  Out of 27 Egyptian provinces (governerates), 13 had new governors who were members of the Brotherhood.

Analyzing the issue of legitimacy, in the context of the Second Revolution of June 30, 2013, both law and politics lead to the following conclusions:

• In June 2012, Morsi was handed an Egypt of diversity, secularism, and protection of minorities both Copts and Shiis; Islamic moderation proclaimed by Al-Azhar; gender equality under the law; a fairly independent judiciary; and an army with an autonomous status whose task has always been border security, and the safeguarding, together with the police, of internal peace.  That was the deal, the contract, the trust and the obligation.
• Regardless what the outside world may characterize the sacking of Morsi on July 3 by the armed forces, in response to the appeals of 23 million Egyptians on June 30 for the intervention by the army, "the guardian of the nation," ex-President Morsi had forged ahead through his base in the Brotherhood, to nullify his contract with his nation.  
• Through his lack of governing experience, and his reliance on the narrow base of the Muslim Brotherhood and its party (Freedom and Justice), the broad sectors of revolutionary Egypt found their First Revolution of January 25, which, in Tahrir, had raised no Islamist flags, being swallowed by the new regime.
• The Brotherhood's continuous waving of the flag of "Shariyah" (legitimacy) which calls for Morsi's reinstatement, shall only lead to more bloodshed.  Their man has breached his contract in both letter and spirit.  The El-Sisi call on the Egyptian Street to rise up again on Friday, July 26, 2013 had resonance with the transitional justice period of Egypt.  Thirty five millions answered that call.
• In his capacity as Defense Minister and Deputy Prime Minister and in the absence of a functioning homeland both economically and politically, El-Sisi has summed up the country's status: "The State's national security is facing severe dangers."
• With a war going on in Sinai against terrorism, the army of Egypt is broadcasting the only credible message of the Second Revolution: "We shall strike with all our might at terrorism in Sinai and anywhere in Egypt."  The Brotherhood is now being labelled by the armed forces as an ally of terrorism, at least in Sinai, which is witnessing a low grade civil war with the Bedouins, and an external war with alleged Hamas operatives.
• As of Friday, July 26, the lines of battle with the Muslim Brotherhood have been sharply drawn.  And the judiciary has also swung into action.  The public Prosecutor has issued an order of 15-day detention against former President Morsi on account of high treason.  The charges are expounded below.

With a war raging in Sinai against terrorism, Egypt's armed forces are signalling their unwavering commitment to stamp out terrorism anywhere in Egypt.  The term "terrorism" now includes the Muslim Brotherhood.  Calls by the Brotherhood's spokesmen and other outlets for defections from these armed forces have put the Brotherhood in the defendant's box.  The attacks in Sinai against the army and the police have put them in the cross hairs of that mighty adversary.  Witness the declaration by Al-Beltagi, a Brotherhood leader, to the effect that the Sinai attacks shall not cease until Morsi is reinstalled.

With the battle lines between the armed forces and the Brotherhood so sharply drawn, the whole notion of a compromise has evaporated.  Signaling a no return, an armed forces ultimatum was issued to the pro-Morsi forces: end your disruptive demonstrations by July 27 or else.

On the civilian side of the crackdown, the Public Prosecutor remanded Morsi to a 15-day detention period.  Charges have been filed and investigations begun in alleged criminal activities including his jail break from Wadi El-Natroun prison assisted by Hamas operatives, murderous attacks against security forces, and espionage for Hamas (a foreign power).  The entire Islamist rule is now on trial.

The Brotherhood's response not only led to more bloodshed; it confirmed both the fact and perception of the danger to historic Egypt of an exclusive Islamist governance.  Such confirmation came in the form of elevating Morsi by the Brotherhood to divinity.  The Brotherhood's Supreme Guide called the unseating of Morsi: "worse than the dismantlement of the Kaaba (in Mecca where Muslims everywhere turn to prayer) stone by stone."  Morsi's supporters chanted "For Islam, we are ready to shed our blood."  And at Cairo University, bearded Muslim clerics urged their Muslim supporters to stand firm for "an Islamic State," and against "a secular State."

The counter response from 35 million Egyptians who thronged Squares all over Egypt honoring the call of El-Sisi for a mandate from the Egyptian street for the suppression of terrorism signaled where Egypt stood.  Those multitudes raised, not the black flags of Islamic governance, but the national flag of Egypt -the secular State.  With humor being a part of Egypt's DNA, the chants arose equating the Brotherhood (Al-Ikhwan) with sheep (Al-Kherfan).  The Islamists appeals for outside intervention were regarded as high treason.

Regardless of the bloodshed which has unfortunately took place since June 30, the criticisms made abroad of the Egyptian military ascendancy, a pivotal point of no return has been reached in Egypt.  Islamic rule in Egypt has been discredited and those who are still visualising its possible comeback are seeing a mirage.

The Second Egyptian Revolution, which began with Tammarrod in April 2013 and culminated in both the ouster of Morsi and the massive response of Tahrir to El-Sisi call for a mandate "to end terrorism," has also tarnished beyond repair the Brotherhood affiliates in Tunisia, Libya, Syria, the Gulf and beyond.

The reader may be in search of a descriptive label for the June 30 Revolution.  Labels are misleading because they gravitate towards a simplistically-conventional description.  But I owe it to the reader to dig into my multiple backgrounds in education/history/political science/law to find a label.  Let us try this one: "A Revolt by the Masses Against a Coup."  Translation:  The coup was perpetrated by the Islamists against the January 25 Revolution whose premise was secularism.

Secular Egypt is striking back.  It is delivering a body blow to extremism in Islam and giving prominence to the Al-Azhar principle:  "Islam does not recognize a State based solely on religion."  This is huge!!

Morsi's Foreign Policy and Practices Were Even More Foreign to Millions of Egyptians

Under the freedom of speech doctrine, you are entitled to call the camel a giraffe.  But every freedom has a price tag.  The price you pay for such a misnomer is that people would call you a buffoon.  The less kinder among them may even see written on your forehead the word "idiot."

It is an idiocy to call the events of June 30 to July 3 of this year a "coup."  A brief lesson in political terminology might help.  When millions of citizens call for a recall, the happening is called a revolution.  On January 25, 2011 and on June 30, 2013, millions of Egyptians exercised that right to populist democracy and won.  Their first revolution brought together 7 millions; their second, mustered 23 millions.  Supported by their armed forces whose personnel sprang from them as conscripts, they were shielded by the tanks of a national army.  That army told the losers, Mubarak then Morsi: "We are the army of the people; not the army of the President."

It took the American revolution eleven years (from 1776 to 1787) to correct its course, and it took the French revolution even longer to do the same.  The two iconic revolutions brought as their supreme leaders, General Washington (in America), and General Napoleon (in France).  In Egypt, we had Morsi for 368 days, and we now have Mansoor as an interim President until the 90 million Egyptians settle down on a post revolutionary system.  That system should embody diversity, cosmopolitanism, separation between religion and the State, and safeguards, with the help of the armed forces, for the character of the State as secular.  Turkey has this model.

The transitional government which was sworn in by President (formerly Justice) Adly Mansour in Cairo on July 16, 2013 reflects that character.  Its 34 cabinet members, including General Abdul-Fattah El-Sisi as both defense minister and deputy to Prime Minister Beblawi, count among them three, Coptics and three women.  Where are the Muslim Brothers in that technocratic line-up?  Nowhere to be found, refusing repeated offers of inclusion in the service of Egypt.  The Brotherhood has opted for futile demonstrations and for calling for the return of the status-quo ante.  Their abstention means no vote in the future.

Someone at the Cairo-based "International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance," commented on the post-Morsi administration from the two sides of his mouth.  On the one hand he says: "The only institution that can hold government accountable is the people."  Rational!!  But then he adds: "Legitimacy is hanging by a thread."  Irrational, both legally and politically.  Why?

Sovereignty resides in the people.  It has two pillars defining a sovereign State: enactment of its laws, and conducting foreign affairs.  Egypt, as a sovereign State, is able to enact laws and to conduct foreign affairs.  When I teach law, whether in New York City or at Cairo University School of Law, I remind my students of these two pillars of sovereignty.  At present, Somalia is not regarded as a sovereign State because of the absence of these two pillars.  That absence or deficiency, makes Somalia "a failed State."  Since 1922, Egypt has never been bereft of either the competency to make laws for its people, or to conduct foreign affairs in the world outside its borders.

Examining, in this issue, the pillar of conducting foreign policy during the defunct Islamic regime of Mohamed Morsi, I give that regime's performance the low grade of "F" for failure.  I wish that I could have given it a "W-P" meaning "withdrawal-passing."  Morsi did not withdraw as he had promised the public in Tahrir when he took his first oath of office on June 30, 2012.  On that day, Morsi pledged accountability to the people.  Then he added: "If I fail, remove me."  He failed, and 23 millions, on June 30, through "Tammarod" backed by the armed forces, forced him out of power.

Morsi's second oath of office was before the Supreme Constitutional Court, whose Chief Justice is now his replacement.  The third oath of office by Morsi was at Cairo University where the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood, his movement and the parent of his party "Freedom and Justice," was given the front seats of honor.  That was prophetic: Morsi was gradually distancing himself from the historic character of a secular and inclusive Egypt, and was gravitating towards his Islamist cocoon.  A cocoon is a silky case spun by larva for protection.  That protection proved unequal to 23 million Egyptians shouting "IRHAL" (Go).

At Cairo University, the leadership of inclusive Egypt saw on that day the writing on the wall.  Sheikh Ahmed El-Tayeb, the Rector of Al-Azhar, abandoned the Cairo University ceremony protesting the commencement of the Brotherhoodization of Egypt.  The opposition to the Brotherhood's coup against the substantive character of the State began to coalesce.  The January 25 Revolution to which the Brothers came late was being hijacked in the name of Islam, not as a faith, but as an expedient cover for a blatant political grab for power.

Moving towards analyzing the failure of the Morsi's one-year rule in foreign policy, let us first have a look at my inbox marked: "Miscellana."  Egypt's Foreign Ministry has been, since its beginning 90 years ago, a superb professional department which has made Cairo's foreign policy a point of reference for global diplomacy.  The personnel is highly trained; their educational and linguistic qualifications are above par; their performance, even during the darkest hours of military humiliation, admirable.

However, my "Miscellana" inbox, contains embarrassing episodes during Morsi's one movement/one year rule.

• For Washington, D.C., his interlocutor was a Muslim Brother spokesman, Gehad El-Haddad - "the President Foreign Policy Advisor."  An embarrassing lack of knowledge of diplomacy.
• At a summit meeting between Morsi and Germany's Chancellor, Angela Merkel, the then - President of Egypt kept on looking at his watch as if he had a train to catch.
• Morsi, the engineer who taught the subject of "the new materials" on America's west coast in English, could not articulate in English during foreign encounters.
• He shouts to his supporters the severance of relationship with Syria as if it were a great achievement.  This prompted Bashar, a world class killer, to retort: "Morsi: Grow up."
• In the context of the Nile water issue with Ethiopia, his meeting was aired, deliberately or not, advocating military action against a sister African State for building a dam on the Blue Nile.
• He attempted a rapprochement (a recommencement of harmonious relationship) with Iran -a Shii majority Middle Eastern power.  Yet he sat passively at a mosque where a sectarian rabble-rousing Imam called the Shiis "dirty apostates." Triple failures as regards the inclusiveness of Islam; the war against sectarianism; and the promise of normalizing relationship with Iran, especially in a revamped Middle East.

From my inbox of "Miscellana" to my research notes.  Among the sources I perused in the preparation of this blog is the booklet issued by the Brotherhood in April of this year under the title of "Achievements of Dr. Mohamed Morsi, President of the Republic."  I dealt with that 24-page booklet, published in Arabic in Cairo, in last week's blog under the abbreviated title of "Achievements" (Injazat).

Under the title of "Foreign Affairs," (p. 16) there is a list of 12 "achievements."  None of these twelve items would qualify as a foreign affairs item per se.  It is a strange list of grants, loans, and foreign deposits intended to shore up the sagging Egyptian economy.  From the contents of that list, the reader is obliged to conclude that the highly professional Foreign Ministry of Egypt had at best a limited input in that amateurish list.

What adds to this "dehors foreign affairs" nature of the list is item 10.  The item is entitled "The immediate cessation of Zionist aggression in the Gaza strip."  By definition, an achievement is a completed act.  If the Brotherhood means to refer to Egypt's mediation between Israel and Hamas for the prolongation of the present cease fire, this matter is tasked, not to the Foreign Ministry, but to Egypt's military intelligence.  On the other hand, if that out of context listing is meant to curry favor with Hamas, that type of Morsiism reflects a lack of reading of Egyptian growing hostility towards Hamas.

For the past 2 1/2 years, the Egyptian masses have looked upon Hamas as an instrument of offensive overreach in Sinai.  Sinai, from time immortal, being Asian Egypt, has always been a highly sensitive security/sovereignty issue.  There is an undeclared war between Hamas operatives, supported by Bedouin criminal elements, and the Egyptian Second and Third field armies.  The top commander of the Second Army, General Wasfi, was nearly assassinated recently while inspecting some check points.

Here I do not wish to go into the present criminal investigation of the presumed role of Hamas in springing pre-presidency Morsi from behind prison bars in Wadi Al-Natrone in Egypt's western desert.  Dwelling on the Hamas/Sinai issue is due to the confluence of national security, foreign policy and Egyptian treaty obligations.  One of Nasser's misguided plans, which were summarily abandoned, was settling Palestinians in Sinai.  At that time, at least Nasser had two excuses for that later aborted project: an Egyptian administration in Gaza (1948-1967) and a so-called war of attrition with Israel.

But under Morsi's Islamic rule, Hamas was looked upon as an Islamist partner of Egypt.  At present, Egyptian general public opinion perceives an underground invasion of Sinai by Gazan tunnels through which arms, drugs, terrorists and Egyptian subsidized goods flowed regularly.  Under Morsi, Egypt's north-east began to resemble the tribal areas of Afghanistan north-east.  Egypt's armed forces were chafing under Morsi's attitude of "go easy on our Gazan brothers."  Then came Ramadan of last year where no less than 16 Egyptian army recruits and officers were massacred by Hamas and Bedouin elements.  El-Sisi declared that the armed forces would bring the assassins to justice, the tunnel invasion to extinction, and Bedouin criminality to an end.

The chasm between President Morsi and Defense Minister El-Sisi began to deepen into a "Grand Canyon."  Under the special status conferred by the December 2012 Constitution upon the armed forces, the military might of Egypt came into play, especially through the non-declared modification of the protocols relating to Area G of Sinai in the Egypt/Israel Peace Treaty of 1979.

The iron fist of Egypt's armies punching Gazan invaders and Bedouin outlaws in Asian Egypt is a combative replay of an adage used by the American novelist Tom Clancy in his best seller "The Teeth of the Tiger."  It says, "If you want to kick the tiger in the (rear), you'd better have a plan for dealing with his teeth."  That is especially so when Hamas has lost its perch in Damascus, its support from Hezbollah, and its leverage with both Tehran and Ramallah.  The Morsi regime was politically derelict to turn a blind eye to the rise of the so-called "jihad" cum criminality on Egypt's north east -a counter revolutionary movement which also contributed to the drying up of tourism to Egypt.

The Nile water issue between Egypt and Ethiopia was also a glaring foreign policy disaster.  Egypt is benefiting from a generous share of the Nile water under a 1929 Nile Water Treaty.  That treaty was concluded during colonial times when Britain controlled the destiny of the riparian States from Egypt to the north, to the Sudan and Uganda to the south.  Six years after that treaty was concluded, fascist Italy invaded Ethiopia.  Now sovereign Ethiopia is constructing a dam over the Blue Nile which carries to both the Sudan and Egypt 60% of the Nile flood waters.  That Ethiopian dam is looked upon by both Egypt and the Sudan as potentially limiting their water intake.  Ethiopia rebuts this opposition as exaggerated.

So what does President Morsi do in the face of this delicate issue?  As mentioned briefly above, he convened a meeting attended by a number of heads of political parties and others to discuss Egypt's options under the uncomprising slogan of: "Not one drop of Nile water would be lost to Egypt."  The discussions were aired to the whole world, some say by error, others say by design.  What were some of the recommendations: Bomb the Ethiopian dam!!

A war with Egypt's historic neighbor Ethiopia was proposed as an option at a leadership meeting headed by the Egyptian President.  This is at a time when Egypt is struggling to feed its people; big powers are finding that wars are anathema to economic recovery; Egypt is already immersed in a hit and run war in Sinai; and the Sudan is mired in its internal and external armed conflicts.  Discovering the historic links between the Egyptian Coptic Church and its Ethiopian sister Church, the Morsi regime, arguably without the benefit of professional diplomacy, sought support from the Pope of Alexandria. The answer was negative.

That was another episode of the Brotherhoodization of Egypt which was running amok.  No room for diplomacy, negotiation, conciliation or arbitration -the very tools which Egypt's foreign policy has mastered for a long time.  Was General El-Sisi consulted prior to this threat of the use of force, a threat which is legally forbidden under the UN Charter, and the Charter of the African Union?  I do not know.  But Egypt heard no military voice rising out of that Morsi hallucinating conclave.  After the broadcast threat of war, came a quiet and belated visit by Egypt's foreign minister to Addis Ababa.  Since then, Ethiopia has been raising the banner of self defense.

The Syrian question was another foreign policy blunder.  The greatest majority of the Egyptian public has been horrified by the Bashar killing fields in that sister Arab country.  The League of Arab States, whose headquarters is in Cairo, has already given the Syrian opposition the seat of their country.  In view of the complexity of that widening civil war, that measure should have been enough.  Egypt has been actively trying to get all the parties to the conflict to the table in the framework of the US/Russia plan.

Then suddenly, like a thunder bolt, President Morsi, while recently haranguing his supporters, declared that he had decided to sever diplomatic relations with Damascus.  His motley crowd cheered.  But it must have been a sad day for the occupants of that magnificent building by the eastern edge of the Nile -the Foreign Ministry.  To the Syrian regime, it was like pouring salt into the wound.  Bashar was not silent.  He called Morsi inexperienced, reminded him of the Cairo-Damascus historic amity, and in effect told him "shut up."  To Morsi, foreign policy was a matter for the pulpit.

The drift towards the pulpit as a locus for non-digested foreign policy issues, during the Morsi regime manifested that Egypt's secularism was slipping away.  A recent fatwa by Al-Qaradawi, who heads the Organization of Muslim Scholars (a Sunni entity) was issued after July 3.  It confirmed, especially to Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and Kuwait, their fear of an Islamist Egypt in the making.  This fatwa which, under Islamic jurisprudence has no standing, claimed that Morsi "was elected to the presidency due to heavenly design."  A devine right for Morsiism!!  To those Gulf sources of financial assistance to Cairo, the Arab Spring of Egypt had become a potential tornado against Arab monarchies.

It was on August 17, 2011, that Al-Azhar, with the full concurrence of the Coptic Church and a broad representation of Egyptian political movements, issued eleven basic principles about which there was a solid Egyptian consensus.  Its first principle declared: "Islam, in its legislation, civilization, and history does not recognize a religiously-based State."  (my translation from the Arabic).  During the interregnum between Mubarak and Morsi, General Sami Anan, Deputy Chairman of the Egyptian Supreme Council of the Armed Forces declared: "The secularity of the State is a matter of national security which is non-negotiable."  These pronouncements were not what the Muslim Brotherhood wished to abide by.  Power, not principle, was their goal warped in the abaya of "faith and governance are one." 

Now this is over, hopefully forever.  A new transitional cabinet was sworn in by interim President Adly Mansour on July 16.  Technocracy, meritocracy and inclusiveness are back.  How can the Foreign Ministry, now under veteran diplomat and scholar Nabil Fahay, not be jubilant?

With historic Egypt back, normalcy in Cairo was being politically and financially rewarded.  When Burns of the US Department of State was in Cairo he did not even utter the name of Morsi.  The calls by the Brotherhood for outside intervention went nowhere.  The reign of terror against the judiciary came to an end.  Goods and services seem to flow back calming the Egyptian street.  El-Sisi, who was recently called by the Brotherhood "an American agent," added to his post of Defense Minister, the post of Deputy to Prime Minister El-Beblawi.  Twelve billion US dollars flowed from Riyadh, the Emirates and Kuwait into the Egyptian treasury, thus postponing the day of wrangling with the International Monetary Fund.

Commenting on these developments, former Kuwaiti permanent representative to the UN, Ambassador Abdullah Bishara, the first Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council, said in a recent article (my translation):

"Whatever one says about the Brotherhood, one cannot escape the conclusion that they are not fit to join the universal march which is guided by certain foreign policy principles.  Neither they nor Morsi are equipped with the legitimacy of enlightened leadership which promises that the future shall bring fulfillment of Egypt's big dreams."

The Dark Art of Demonization: How Did the Regime of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt View its Opponents?

They joined the January 25 Revolution late.  Sat on the fence, waited for the young revolutionaries to gain a momentum with the armed forces in their defense, then they bounced.  The Brotherhood, suppressed by Royal Egypt, then by the so-called Republican Egypt since 1954, was back to the surface.  Their reputation unsullied by the corruption of public life in Egypt; their grass roots organizational ability enabling needy Egyptians, and their message simple: "Islam is the solution."

When they ran for the post of President, after Mubarak downfall in February, 2011, I voted for them twice from New York City: First for Abdel-Monim Abu-Elfotooh, then, in the run-off between Muslim Brotherhood Morsi and General Shafik, both from my home province of Sharkia, my vote went for Morsi.  Why?

Like many like me, I did not wish to have another military man back in the Presidential Palace in Cairo.  I was not turned away from the Brotherhood (I have never joined any political party either in Egypt or in America) by their "Islam is the Solution."  I teach Islamic jurisprudence; follow Al-Azhar definition of Islam as inclusive, diverse and tolerant; value my late father's advice, an Azhari, when he admonished me not to even think of suggesting to my American Catholic spouse to convert ("It is unislamic," he used to say); and I felt sympathy for the downtrodden, the Brotherhood.

But 368 days of Morsi's rule convinced me that the seeming angels of the Brotherhood were not what I had perceived them to be before they took over the reigns of power.  For they turned their slim majority in the presidential elections (50.50% to 49.50%), and their plurality of 50% in the House of Representatives, enhanced by the Salafis to a total of 70%, into a dictatorial iron grip.  To them "legitimacy" meant excluding the opposition, and inventing a constitution depicting Egypt as an "Islamic" State.  Democratic means were quickly subverting the democratic ends.

So when Morsi was pushed out of power on July 3 by the screams against him by 23 million citizens, and by the near collapse of the State, I sighed in relief "Good Riddance."  Some outsiders, judging by pro-Morsi demonstrators, described that corrective reset of the Egyptian Revolution as a coup.  Among those was Senator McCain, who has rendered to his country historic services.  Such services should not excuse his intervention in Egyptian internal affairs.  If he is basing such intervention on the US aid to the military in Egypt, he should keep in mind that such aid is tied to the Egypt/Israel peace treaty of 1979.

Let us now examine the Muslim Brotherhood's outlook on its reign of one year of the Morsi regime.  This is not to vilify them as a major mass movement in Egypt.  We shall look in their little book in Arabic to discover their failure at uniting Egypt behind the Morsi collapsed presidency.  Yes, they issued in early 2013 a little book entitled "The Achievements of Dr. Mohamed Morsi, the President of the Republic."  Its small size of 24 pages reminds me of the "Green Book" of Qaddafi in the early 1980s, and of Nasser's "Philosophy of the Revolution" of the 1950s.  I read those three tracts in their original Arabic and reached one conclusion: Each one of the three booklets was a harbinger of the fall of their Zaim (Boss/President).

In "The Achievements" (Injazat) I found the Brothers demonizing their liberal and secular opponents.  Their opponents were depicted as "enemies of the Islamic project."  What is the Islamic project?  Egypt itself, being folded, with its Copts, its judges, its women, its diversity, its authors of the January 25 revolution, in to an "Islamic Project." 

That was the tip of the iceberg, or the early hotwinds of the sand storm (khamasin) in the Brothers honing of their dark art of demonization.  "The Achievements," published in April 2013, less than 3 months before the uprising of June 30, has one frightening message:  "If you are not with us, you are against us."  And us meant also Islam itself.

It is difficult to cover all of "The Achievements" in one single issue of this blog.  We may come back again to it to fathom its weird advocacy of "The Islamic project 'uber alles' -above all."  Here follow some of its main propositions: (my translation)

• Why doesn't President Morsi communicate his plans to the citizens?  Because such concern with dialoguing with the Egyptians will keep him away from focusing on solving Egypt's problems!! (p.3)
• What is wrong with sharing with the citizens the President's concerns and aspirations?Because presidential responses to the dust of public questions and to the fog of accusations and allegations, even by those who pretend to be "supporters of the Islamic project," would be against the Sunna (the path of the Prophet).  Then a quote of one of the alleged sayings of Muhammad: "God does not wish for you three things: polemics, wastage of resources, and an avalanche of questions (addressed to the Ruler)." (p.5)
• How is the conflict between the Islamists and their opponents perceived in the context of the Morsi presidency?  That conflict is waged by elements eager to serve their own personal ends.  They are sectors of the public which have benefitted from the Mubarak regime, and have united with other elements brainwashed over 60 years.  The results is that these sectors of the population do not know right from wrong.  (p.6)
• What is the ultimate objective of the opposition to the regime of the Brotherhood?  Through their coalitions, the opposition intends to confuse the general image of the Egyptian scene, produce an atmosphere of violence, chaos, terrorism, and destruction.  Such objectives, if attained by the opposition, are meant to confuse President Morsi and his helpers.  The result would be postponing the projected parliamentary elections, delaying the institutional reconstruction of the new Egypt, and convincing the public that Morsi has no achievements.  The opposition's goal is to cause the populace to turn their backs on the Islamic experimentation pursued by the Muslim Brotherhood.  Rejection of the Islamic project, leading to rejection of the Brotherhoodization, is the path of the opposition to perpetuate the environment of corruption which had enriched those opponents. (p.7)
• What shall be history's characterization of the Morsi's presidency?  The President shall go forward without giving his opponents any attention to their judgement of his governance.  Thus the President shall inflict on them a fatal blow.  Out President is going forward with his plans in order to prove that he is a powerful president.  History, Inshallah (God Willing), shall regard him as the most powerful President the country has ever known throughout its entire existence."  (p.7)

The above reflects only the statements contained in less than one third of the book issued by the Brotherhood on Morsi's achievements.  A retired Egyptian senior diplomat told me when I reached him at his home by phone on July 4, following the removal of Morsi from power:  "The Muslim Brotherhood had failed to read the map of the New Egypt."  Indeed they have failed the test of democracy, and thus brought upon themselves not only the collapse of the Morsi presidency.  Their calls to violence against the present transitional government are leading to the Brotherhood's gradual suppression and exclusion from the remaking of the new Egypt.

Let those who are mistakenly grieving for the ouster of Morsi as undemocratic and a coup remember an essential fact: What was ousted was the abbreviation of Egypt as "the Islamic Project."  There was nothing about it that was truly Islamic.  It was a shameful masquerade abusing the banner of Islam and its main tenets of diversity.

The Fall of Morsi: The Defects of Definitions and the Dilemma of Realities

President Morsi, the first elected President of of Egypt was removed by the military from office on July 3.  His Islamist reign, backed up by the Muslim Brotherhood, did not last more than 368 days.  This is a huge transformational event in the 2 1/2 year old Arab Spring.  It shall not affect Egypt alone.  It shall reverberate throughout the Arab and Muslim worlds encompassing 1.5 billion people.  The swiftness of condemnations, though mostly cautious, by outside powers is ill-advised.  Events in Egypt should always be left to the 90 million Egyptians to decide.

The installation by the military, the only cohesive and disciplined force in post-Mubarak Egypt, of an interim president, Judge Adly Mansour, the Chief of the Supreme Constitutional Court, is a fait accompli.

This fait accompli is not yet accepted by the Muslim Brotherhood which calls the events of July 3 a coup, refuses to join the post-Morsi government headed by a judge, and sneers at the new authority as a bunch of "usurpers."  The divisions within the Egyptian body-politic, which this blog had previously analyzed, have deepened.  Egypt's stability is threatened.

The specter of intensified armed confrontations between the supporters of the so-called "legitimate" and freely-elected President (now under house arrest) and his opponents numbering 23 millions in all public squares in Egypt is a distinct possibility.  Who is right, and who is wrong, are questions which shall be debated, if not settled, for a long long time.

Here follows my own personal debate with myself as if I were two Yassins:  Yassin the lawyer v. Yassin the professor.  The lawyer is on the side of applying the mechanics of the law; but the professor is applying the dictates of fairness.  The law is written, transcribed, objective, and conventional.  Fairness is subjective, controversial, debatable, and inchoate.  Fairness has to do with values.  The professor in me sides with General El-Sisi who led the military ouster of President Morsi.  WHY?

Let us start with the defects of definitions in order to lead us to the dilemma of realities.  No credible dictionary has ever offered a consensual definition of any of these three terms: democracy, aggression, and terrorism.  Customary law and practices vary from one political culture to another, giving each of these terms subjective definitions.

Since we are here dealing with the concept of democracy, let us raise the question of the presidential elections in the US in 2000:  Bush v. Gore.  In my estimation, as both a lawyer and a professor of law, I find the 5-4 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court stopping the State of Florida from the vote recount a subversion of the democratic process.  It gave Bush, thanks to the vote of Justice Sandra O'Connor which tipped the scale, an unmerited presidency.

That vote has changed the course of history.  It led the U.S., after 9/11, to two wars: in Afghanistan and in Iraq.  That slippery slope also led to the histrionics of legal advisers, such as John Yoo, who devised for the pinnacles of U.S. power, voodoo "laws," setting aside the Geneva Conventions of 1949.  In effect, these so-called "laws" indirectly enabled world-class criminals such as Bin Laden to claim, with some unmerited justification, that their criminality has duped the U.S. into immersing itself in the so-called "war on terror."  It took the U.S. 12 years before declaring through President Obama that that "war" was over.  It was a declaration of fatigue.

This historic lesson in the imprecision of defining democracy leads Yassin the lawyer to look at how Morsi came to be President of Egypt.  After 60 years of military dictatorship, Mubarak was removed from power in February 2011, thanks to the armed forces.  They protected the massive demonstrations in Tahrir.  As a lawyer, I would insist that you do not hold presidential elections before you draft a constitution and have it ratified by at least a legislative power.  In Egypt, this was not done.

In its rush towards populism, Egypt voted, some say unfairly, for Morsi as President.  He was not even the first choice of the Muslim Brotherhood.  This was done without a charter defining the powers of the three branches of Government (legislative, executive, judiciary).  The cart was thus placed before the horse.

This was followed by another set of legal defects.  The judiciary dismissed the lower house of Parliament claiming that one-third of its membership was voted wrongly into office as party representatives.  That quota had been reserved for independents.  Why not disqualify only that one third, and why did the judiciary which was charged with electoral supervision not stop the vote?  It did not happen.  And the judiciary at that point was not yet governed by now constitutional provisions.  The whole process was plagued by one ad hoc measures, one after another.  The pre-Morsi constitution was the only available charter resorted to as expediency dictated.  The Morsi presidential advisers were in the mold of John Yoo in regard to the Bush administration.

With 70% of the membership of the House of Representatives belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis (50%; 20% respectively), the Islamists lambasted the judiciary (the Supreme Constitutional Court) as "Folool" (remnants of the defunct Mubarak regime).  On this chaotic stage, strode President Morsi with an activism of his own.  He instructed the Speaker of the House (Mr. Al-Katatni, a senior member of the Guidance Council of the Brotherhood) to convene the dissolved House in open defiance of judicial rulings. The war between the two camps, the President and the Islamist-dominated House of Representatives, on one side, and; the judiciary on the other side, was now in full swing.  It was a war in which the secularists sided with the well established and highly professional judiciary.

The House of Representatives met for only 20 minutes then adjourned.  That was enough time to transfer its law-making authority to the President.  Thus, Morsi, without Constitutional sanction, became both the head of the Executive and the law-maker at the same time.  The declaration that ensued to the effect that that accumulation of power was transitory convinced the opposition that the dictatorial President was marching to the orders of the Brotherhood.  Morsi, with no experience in governance, confirmed the worst fears of the secularists.  On Nov. 22, 2012 Morsi issued  a so-called "constitutional declaration" putting himself above the law.  The opposition screamed foul.  Nobody listened.  Absolute power was corrupting absolutely.

The experimentation with democracy was proceeding in the wrong direction.  Following the Nov. 22 "constitutional declaration," Morsi became faced with a strengthening wall of rejection.  It was diverse, secular and determined.  His opponents were bolstered by Al-Azhar, the Coptic Church and the elements of creative Egypt (the arts, the theater, the film industry, the world of song, dance and music of cosmopolitan Egypt).  Later that dictatorial declaration was withdrawn, but the damage had already been done.  Nobody knew where the cart leading the horse was going.  Compounding the legal problems, Morsi's arrogated legislative powers were transferred to the Senate (the Shura) of which one-third were Morsi's appointees, pending the holding of parliamentary elections for the House of Representatives.

These elections did not take place.  They were deferred until after the Constitutional Assembly, also dominated by the Islamists, had finished its drafting of the post-Mubarak constitution.  That Assembly became also infected with endless confrontations between the Islamists who wanted an Islamic State, and the secularists who struggled to keep Egypt a secular State.  The casualty became the art of compromise in which neither the Brotherhood nor Morsi were trained.

Most of the more than 250 articles of the new Constitution were presumed to have been agreed.  But other articles defining the character of the new Egypt remained contentious.  Suddenly the opposition called it quits; walked out of the Chamber.  Without hesitation, the Islamists took advantage of that situation and got their own version of the controversial articles approved.  The document became rightly known as "the Islamist Constitution."  What was the hurry in rushing that charter through a rump Constituent Assembly?  Fear by the Islamists that the judiciary would strike again and dissolve the Constituent Assembly.

Morsi and his Qandeel Government were desperate to get that text approved in a hurriedly arranged plebiscite.  It became clear to the opposition that the Islamists were engaged in a zero sum game which precluded any meaningful compromise.

The Islamists were deceived by the power of their numbers, not realizing that a large segment of the voting Egyptian public could not even comprehend most of those constitutional articles.  I was in Cairo in December 2012 when the plebiscite, in two stages, was conducted.  The turn-out was low; Egypt was divided; the Islamists were triumphalist; and the document by the end of 2012 was declared the law of the land -a divided land with a Constitution lacking the consensus of the populace.

The presidential calls for a dialogue with the opposition were premised on "let us go forward with what we got now."  The opposition turned deaf ears to what they regarded as a constitutional charade.  They wanted a new beginning.  The experiment in democracy, whatever that meant in the context of Egypt of the Arab Spring, was showing signs of a deepening malaise.  As of the end of 2012, Egypt was rudder-less; the Islamist chants all over Egypt was "Islamiah" (meaning an Islamist Egypt).  That term replaced the slogan of the January 25 Revolution of "Selmiah" (meaning peaceful).

Now to Yassin, the professor dealing with higher values of governance and the inchoate notion of fairness.  Morsi has inherited huge burdens.  Egypt was economically broke; the IMF would not agree to loaning the country close to $5 billion; unemployment surpassed 60%; goods and services were not being delivered.  Bread, electricity, cooking oil, gas, diesel fuel and other basic commodities were in short supply.  The police was not yet re-organized; the Suez Canal cities had to be subdued by emergency laws; the rate of crime shot up; the young authors of the January 25 Revolution were side-lined.  Tourism dried up; various unions went on strike; rail travel was interrupted.

Journalists were being hounded by the authorities for articles putting the new Egypt in bad lights, jewelers emptied their stores of gold for fear of robbing; each neighborhood had its vigilantes guarding its persons and property; some large cities declared themselves "independent Islamic Republics."  "L'Institut" of Egypt, the repository of its historic past, which was established by Napoleon in the early 19th century was torched.

In the meantime, the "Brotherization" of Egypt accelerated; 13 out of 27 provincial governors were members of the Muslim Brotherhood; and Luxor, the capital of Egyptian tourism, had a governor, Mr. El-Khyyat, a Salafi, who had been implicated in the bloody murder of foreign tourists in pre-revolutionary days.  His appointment was like putting Ayman El-Zawahri of Al-Qaeda in the position of the Mufti of Egypt.  Egypt's great monuments, like the pyramids, and the Sphinx, were declared by some Islamists pagan idols; the statue of Um Kalthoun, the pan-Arab lady singer, had its face veiled; and women were frightened to take part in demonstrations for fear of sexual harassment and rape.  The police had disappeared.

Sectarianism reared its ugly head in Egypt all over the country.  Islamist incitement of violence became common.  All kinds of arms flowed from Libya next door.  Copts and Shiis were attacked, and several of their congregants were killed; their places of worship were burnt down.  Morsi even sat passively during a sermon in which the Shiis were declared "unclean apostates."  The call for Muslim prayers sounded in parliament while in session.  All sorts of red lines were being crossed by the Brotherhood in total reliance on the results of the 2012 elections.  Secular Egypt was fast receding.

The documents of 2011 and 2012 which were issued by Al-Azhar with the imprimatur of the Coptic Church calling for moderation in Islam and respect for minorities remained mere ink on paper.  The Coptic question risked being internationalized; the Bedouins of Sinai continued to attack and kill members of the armed forces and the police; and Gazans seemed to look upon Sinai as their hinterland for smugglers of drugs and arms.  And foolishly, a meeting held by Morsi with some of the country's leaders on the Nile water issue between Egypt and Ethiopia was aired, carrying threats of attacks on Ethiopia for its construction of a dam on the Blue Nile.

• Wishing a Copt "Happy Easter"  began to be frowned upon as unislamic.  On that high Coptic holyday, Morsi did not see it fitting to attend at St. Mark's Cathedral as had been the presidential practice;
• The top position of "Rector of Al-Azhar" was coveted by the Brotherhood which regarded moderate Islamic advocacy by that 1040 year old institution as a deviation;
• The Arab Republic of Egypt became more recognizable as the Islamic Republic of Egypt;
• While in Cairo, in December 2012, I witnessed El-Baradie appearing on TV denouncing Egypt's fast descent into dark practices of fabricated values.  He pleaded with Morsi and his Islamist minders to "Take Pity on Egypt;"
• President Morsi, adding to himself at times the voluntary role of a preacher at Muslim prayers, began to be seen as an Imam;
• Morsi's interference with security operations against rogue elements of Hamas and marauding Bedouins in cahoots with those elements infringing Egyptian sovereignty was adding to the burdens of the armed forces in El-Arish and Rafah;
• Attempts by those criminal elements in Sinai to sow discord between the army and the police proved to the armed forces that the Hamas and Morsi entente was a looming security threat;
• The Islamic media, through its calls for an "Islamic code of dress," regulation of hours of alcoholic consumption, and differentiation between Muslim and non-Muslim in the great touristic spots on the Red Sea and upper Egypt were sabotaging tourism in Egypt.  Qatar was offering to run Egyptian tourism;
• The opposition derided those regulations and measures as socially and economically subversive.  It said the authorities were less concerned with the country's infrastructure than with "women's infrastructure;"
• Morsi's utterances about "legitimacy" began to be shrill, rambling, pugnacious, in your face, and sounded to the opposition "putchist."  It gave the Morsi concept of "dialogue"  the connotations of "my way or else;"
• The presidential palace and the HQ of the Mulsim Brotherhood guided by Khairat El-Shatter began to look interchangeable.

The backlash of TAMMAROD against Morsi proved highly effective.  Chants rose all over Egypt: "Sisi to the rescue!!"  It was akin to France's call upon General DeGaulle, at its hour of near national disintegration in 1958 during the Algerian war: "L'armee au pouvoir!!" General El-Sisi publicly warned that Egypt was facing a total collapse.  His calls for national reconciliation went unheeded.  The opposition, demanding constitutional nullification and a new beginning, would not accept the presidential call for a national dialogue.  No compromises were offered, and the Islamists began to call their opponents "enemies of Islam."  Morsi was made in effect the personification of faith, and his utterances, laden with Islamic phraseology, seemed to bolster that notion.  The Islamists road map was no more than the mantra "Shariah" (legitimacy); the armed forces had a road map inspired by historically secular Egypt.
To Yassin the professor, the issue boils down to weighing between "the legitimacy" emerging from the ballot box, and "the fairness" emerging from the dilemma of realities of post-Mubarak Egypt.  Put differently, is the ouster of Morsi a coup against "democratic" Egypt, or an impeachment of a President who seemed oblivious to the fact that complex Egypt needed a nuanced productive and inclusive leadership?  Is democracy mere mechanics with a universally-accepted standards, or is it a process that needs to mature in an Egypt which has not experienced it except during brief periods in the 1920s?

I vote for the actions taken by the military to remove Morsi from power. He has failed to deliver and has lost the trust of his public -his broad public.  Islamic jurisprudence which I teach at Fordham University School of Law in New York City sums up the purpose of governance in two principles: Justice (Adl), and Service benefiting the citizens (Ma Yanfaul Nas).  Morsi the Islamist has even failed his presumed standards.  What happened in Egypt on July 3, 2013 should be looked upon as a revolutionary course correction.  Nominal democracy has ended with the end of his regime.

Under any version of the new constitution, a House of Representatives has the power of impeaching a President.  Such body does not exist at present.  23 million Egyptian citizens have filled that void.  El-Baradie aptly described that mass action as "voting by their feet."

Many of those voting for Morsi, including me, were not voting for the candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood. They were voting against his opponent, a military man, General Shafik.  The score was 50.5% to 49.5%, hardly a landslide for the winner.

The "Islamist" constitution was approved by 22% of an electorate that numbered 53 million voters.

Morsi's defiant speech of July 2 was his last -in effect an abdication speech.  The ballot box is a process.  Its purpose and substance are good inclusive governance that delivers goods and services.  So if you are a devotee of the mere process, you are likely to call the ouster of Morsi "a usurpation."  But if you value the substance, you would call it a restoration.  Morsi has frustrated the purpose of his contract with Egypt.  Frustration of the purpose of a contract rightly leads to its nullification.

The military did not "usurp" Morsi's powers.  He and the Brotherhood, who were late in joining the January 25 Revolution, have turned out eventually to be the veritable usurpers.  They attempted to usurp the historic character of cosmopolitan Egypt.  If they truly want to put Egypt above their ideology and paper-thin legitimacy, they should heed the calls of the interim President Adly Mansour, the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court, to join hands with the new transitional regime to put Egypt back on the right tracks.  "Faith is for God: the homeland is for everyone."