My Vote for Morsi Was a Big Error; My Vote for El-Sisi Shall Redeem It

In 2012, I voted for the wrong President.  Now comes my chance for course correction.  A vote for El-Sisi shall be a vote for a resurgent Egypt, in spite of the naysayers.

When Morsi ran, his opponent was Shafik, a General.  My friends, especially my Coptic brothers and sisters, urged me to join them in voting for Shafik.  They reasoned that Egypt needed security and stability which can only be guaranteed by a strong military hand.  I rebutted their counsel with a ready-made argument: "How can I vote for the continuation of yet another military regime after 60 years of the same?"

They were right; I was wrong.  This had nothing to do with my being a Muslim by faith, with Morsi being my co-resident in the eastern province of Sharkia, or even with Morsi being on the faculty of my home University of Zagazig, the provincial capital.  It had to do with giving the Muslim Brotherhood, suppressed for 80 years, a chance at governance.


Morsi won; so did chaos!!  That one year of Islamic rule was a true calamity: the liberals were on the run; the new Constitution was rigged in favor of islamization; the Copts were persecuted; non-veiled women were harassed; Hamas in Gaza threatened to undo the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty of 1979.

Under Morsi, Egypt itself was marginalized.  "To Hell With Egypt" was uttered by a Supreme Guide of the Brotherhood who believed in pan-Islamism; tourism dried up; the army's hand in dealing with terrorism in Sinai was stayed; the Shiis were called apostates; Al-Azhar's independence and its message of moderate Islam was curtailed; the police disappeared from the streets in an attempt to curtail the Brotherhood's influence; Qatar and Turkey seemed to regard Egypt as their protectorate with Al-Jazeera TV Channel as its official voice; the Egyptian judiciary was besieged.

The great armed forces of Egypt were looked upon as the protectors of the Brotherhood and the presidency, not of sovereign Egypt; the great monuments of Egypt, which belong to the whole world though located in Egypt, were regarded as idols insulting Islam; music, dance, songs, the arts, and the great museums became suspicious cultural aberrations.

The list of examples of the Brotherhoodization of Egypt can go on and on.  In essence, my vote for Morsi has contributed to the enfeeblement of that historic country of my birth.  The revolution of January 25, 2011, against which the Muslim Brotherhood issued fatwas, was being hijacked under the cover of the ballot box and the so-called democracy.  Secular Egypt had to strike back.

And it struck back on June 30, 2013 with 35 million Egyptians in Tahrir and in every public square in Egypt of 90 million people, saying "KEFAYA" (ENOUGH)!!  As they protested the Islamist regime, the army and other security forces protected the popular uprising.  Refusing to be inclusive through reaching a compromise with the opposition, Morsi ridiculed an ultimatum issued by the SCAF (the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces), headed by El-Sisi.  The unavoidable result was Morsi's ouster on July 3, 2013, and his replacement by Judge Adly Mansour, of the Supreme Constitutional Court.  The irony here was that the judiciary, which had been the nemesis of the Brotherhood, was now, through Mansour, its successor.

At that point, it was time for the Brotherhood to resort to what it has practiced for 80 years: sloganeering, intimidation; strong arm tactics, and a call to arms to its thugs inside Egypt, in Gaza, and elsewhere through its international network which propagates the re-establishment of a pan-Islamic caliphate.

In response to these calls which use Islam as a ready-made cover, mini-emirates were formed in Cairo: one in Rabaa Square; the other at Al-Nahda.  For six weeks these two locations fell outside the control of the interim regime brought about by, not by the military, but by populism.  Barricades were constructed; arms were smuggled; bakeries, barber shops, mini-commerce flourished, weddings were celebrated; hostages were tortured.  At the same time, opponents were abducted and tortured; through-traffic was halted, taunting the authorities was the daily practice.

The false calls from Rabaa and El-Nahda were for the return of the Islamic reign of terror.  For six weeks, the Government of Prime Minister Dr. Hazem El-Beblawi appealed to the "sit-ins" to disperse.  These appeals were laughed at by the Brotherhood which manned the ramparts.  Finally on August 14, 2013, the police and the army struck, leaving exits for these who wished to extricate themselves.  Hundreds, mainly dead-enders, fell, including a limited number of security and army personnel; more were injured.  Human rights organizations cried foul, but the millions of June 30, 2013 celebrated the Brotherhood's containment.

El-Sisi announcement of March 26 that he intended to resign his army service in order to run for the post of president of Egypt was in essence denounced by the New York Times of March 27.  Its principal reporter in Cairo, David Kirkpatrick, using his worn-out, script reported the news under the heading of "Commander of Egyptian Takeover Leaving Army to Run for President."  The Kirkpatrick problem is anchored in a non-workable formula based upon measuring the events in Egypt by the yardstick of the last century.  How?:

• It was the Muslim Brotherhood which upended the vote for Morsi through interpreting the vote for him as a vote for an exclusive Brotherhoodization of the country;
• The Brotherhood's coup of June 2012 was ended by the Second Egyptian Revolution of June 30, 2013 which, in the absence of "a recall" provision in the Islamist Constitution of 2012, effected Morsi's removal;
• The bloody confrontations of August 14, 2013 between Morsi's supporters and the forces of law and order were precipitated by the rebellious refusal to abide by the newly-minted law regulating public demonstrations.  That law is a replica of all such laws in democratic societies, including the U.S. where "Time, Place, and Manner" govern the expression of popular feelings through demonstrations.
• August 14, 2013 shall forever go into history books, especially in Egypt, as the day which unleashed Brotherhood's terror on the Coptic community everywhere in Egypt.  Churches were burnt; bible schools torched; Coptic icons and religious symbols desecrated; private businesses looted; Coptic citizens massacred; peaceful citizens fled their historic family houses.  The Brotherhood was doing what it knows best: Shift the blame for their removal from power on others.  The Brotherhood is "infallible" (incapable of erring).  Insane!!
• Terror affected the length and breadth of Egypt, from Sinai to the Libyan border, and from the Mediterranean to Lake Nasser at the Sudanese border.  Hit and run attacks on the army, the police, tourists, cabinet members, museums and highways became common events.  Al-Qaeda affiliates, such as Jihad of Gaza, and the "Friends of Jerusalem," in search of the unattainable return of Morsi to power, enjoyed the unmerited publicity of "popular opposition to the coup of July 3, 2013."
• With terror rampant, the economy in tatters, illegal funding of terrorism flowing from abroad, and faith being manipulated for the Brotherhood's sordid ends of power through the barrel of a gun, Egypt had to react in self-defense.  
• The Brotherhood was declared a terror organization. Egypt, a traditionally security State, marshaled its resources of pre-Mubarak days, with the armed forces, and intelligence apparatus in the forefront.  A strong hand was needed to navigate the ship of secular Egypt to a safe harbor.
• Ignoring the realities on the ground in Egypt by a powerful medium like the New York Times can not change those realities.  The country is at war with terror.  Its success in these efforts shall undoubtedly rebound to the benefit of global security.  Regardless of what David Kirkpatrick might devine in the service of worn-out formulas about "a coup" and a "revolution," his advocacy does not see in the Brotherhood's two raised swords another depiction of the Nazi's swastika.  The latter made of exclusive nationalism a new religion; the former made of exclusive religion (Islam) not only a new nationalism, but an imaginary pan-Islamism.

That is why I shall vote for El-Sisi to atone for my mistake of voting for Morsi in June 2012 (I am a dual citizen: an Egyptian American).  El-Sisi did not remove Morsi.  He protected those who removed Morsi.  The right of a president (in this case Morsi) to the honor of being described repeatedly by Kirkpatrick as "freely elected," is inferior to the right of his "free electors," of whom I was one.

Reading El-Sisi's declaration of March 26 in Arabic (which I assume is not the native language of David Kirkpatrick), I shall construct what the former general is advocating in broad terms:

• Egypt is facing security challenges which must be confronted.  Moreover the economy is in a free fall, and millions of Egyptian youth are unemployed.  The country is threatened by terrorists who are bent on destroying Egypt's peace and security.
• Running for the presidency has been demanded by the rank and file of Egyptians; nobody who has not offended Egyptian laws can be excluded from the political process.
• Egypt, a country which has abundant natural resources, should not remain reliant on foreign assistance and donations.
• As potential president of Egypt, El-Sisi does not promise miracles; only hard work and selfless efforts intended to revive an Egypt. The country should assume its natural place within the community of nations, free form fear, from poverty, from need, and from national doubt.
• The new Egypt shall not brook any outside interference in its internal affairs.

Well!!  If that is the Egypt of the future, why should I not favor the guiding strong leadership of El-Sisi under the post-Islamic Constitution of 2014 which has been adopted by a broad national consensus?  I, like many others have limitless aspirations in a rejuvenated secular Egypt to be ushered in by El-Sisi who is favored to be Egypt's 8th president after the collapse of the monarch in 1952.

Who are the World's Number One Enemies of Islam? The Jihadists!!

They go by different names: Al-Qaeda; Al-Nussrah; Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Boko Haram, Jihad in Gaza, Ansar Al-Sharia, Al-Qaeda in Arabia, and the like.  They use Islam as a cover for killing the innocent and destabilizing regimes and societies.  Their faith is in power, their recruits are mostly the ignorant and the unemployed, their environment is one of intrigue, and their fallen are undeservedly glorified as "Shaheed" (martyr).

They burst on the international scene by perpetrating the criminal act of 9/11.  In a way, Islamophobia is their unintended ally as it generates for them funds and recruits.  The more they kill, the more Islamophobia, the greater justification for more killings by jihadists.  Hatred is their oxygen.  Even in deaths, Osama Bin Laden, a global crook, remains their prophet, and El-Zawahiri, his successor, a physician whose prescription is brutal killing, preferably by beheading, is their Calipha.

Where does Islam stand from them?  And why are they Islam's number one enemy?  Here follows a crash course in Sharia or Islamic law (a mini presentation of the course I teach at Fordham University School of Law).

The two primary sources of Islamic law are the Quran and the Sunna (The words and conduct of the Prophet Muhammad).  However, if there is no textual reference to a specific issue, ijtihad (application of reason and common sense to the text) fills in those gaps.  In general, ijtihad, though allegedly ended to avoid subjective controversies and divisiveness, has remained available.  Changing circumstances over 1435 years have made ijtihad and indispensable tool for the judiciary in Muslim societies.

In appointing judges, Muhammad made the resort to competent ijtihad in matters where the Quran and his own authentic utterances offer no clear guidance, a condition of appointment.  This is particularly so because the concept of "justice" (Al-Adl) is so highly regarded in Sharia that, in Islamic tradition, it is one of the 99 names used in reference to God (Allah, in Arabic).

A corollary of the concept of justice in Islamic jurisprudence is "the free will."  Coercion is abhorrent to the point that for centuries, that principle has become a sanctified adage: "No Coercion in faith."  The dogmatic justification for that principle is that faith is a matter of the heart, that it cannot be negotiated.  The reason is simple: the relation between God and man (i.e. male and female) is direct -no intercession and no middle man!!

In Islamic law and practice, this is the main gate to diversity of all kinds, especially in religious matters.  Thus from a legal perspective, this means that a Jew, a Christian, a Muslim, a Hindu...etc stands in equal position, proximity and status before their Creator.  Muslim jurists have even issued fatwas (a non-enforceable legal opinion -opinio juris, to the effect that Islam accepts agnosticism.  That is holding that nothing is known, or likely to be known, of the existence of God or of anything beyond material phenomena.  Is that extreme?  No!!

The premise here is that no human being has the right to judge another as a believer or a non-believer.  It is God who is regarded as the only evaluator, the only assessor.  Hence the Quranic verse: "The truth is from your Lord: let him who will believe, and let him who will reject" (Chapter 18/Verse 29).  The flip side of this total acceptance of diversity is that in Islam, the Prophet Muhammad is a messenger of God, and as a messenger, he is not a controller, a dictator, a thought oppressor, a deputy God.

What flows from these textual and ijtihad premises is a whole panoply of legal premises:
(a) gender equality; (b) judicial discretion in sentencing, due regard being given to the accused.  Such discretion dictates that the treatment of sentencing stated in the Quran, as in the cases of theft (cutting of hands or legs) or of adultery (stoning) as parables.  Consequently Omar, the second caliph after Muhammad, acted accordingly in dismissing cases even where the accused of theft offered his hand to be severed.  Omar's rationale: the accused has been victimized by society which did not afford him the means for a decent living; (c) freedom of expression and of assembly; (d) the right of the governed to remove an oppressive ruler; and (e) good government is based on justice which is premised upon the protection of minorities which might be vulnerable to the dictates of the majority.

From the above, one could see the huge distance between Sharia (Islamic law) and jihadism.  In fact the solid interpretation of the term "jihad" is the inner fight within the person to overcome his/her base urges, and the resort to self-defence in cases of outside territorial aggression.  In Islamic law, there is no offensive war, no proselytizing, no infidels, no difference between Sunni and Shii, and no terrorism.

Taking into account the aforementioned Sharia framework as an indispensable yardstick to measure the islamism of the terrorist jihadi organizations which sport the deceiving label of "Islamic," we find them lacking in every respect.

The Jihadist primary tool is terror.  Terror is anti-thetical to the exercise of the free will which is regarded by Sharia as an inalienable right for every human being.  Through the unislamic process of TAKFEER (declaring an individual an apostate), the jihadis nullify the twin concepts of the individual's direct relationship with God, and of diversity.  Those twin concepts have been at the heart of the vibrant Abbasid dynasty which had Baghdad as its capital, and which had fully absorbed the great experiences of the Byzantine empire, the Persian empire, and of Coptic Egypt.

Under the black banner of Al-Qaeda and like-minded retrograde murderous groups, gender equality does not exist.  Women liberation under Islamic Law had been obliterated.  The brutal resort to inhumane sentencing for illegal acts by reading the Quran's parables about the cutting of hands, legs (not to mention decapitation), as an external sentencing guide, attest to their total ignorance of what Islam is all about.

As to freedoms of expression and of assembly, these are the first casualties of jihadism where the right to rebel against injustice is regarded as a rebellion against God.  For them, sectarianism and endless war are to be waged for the glory of the Almighty God -for a quick ride to paradise!!  By the way, the fiction of 70+ virgins in paradise is a sample.  It is a reflection of a jihadi freedom from sanity zone of jihadi hallucination.

The abdication by the jihadis of this frame of Islamic Law and jurisprudence has made them Islam's enemy No. 1.  Their malicious call for the return of Islam to its pristine origin rings hollow: They are returning to a red dawn of their own making, as a means to sinister ends.

Where in Islam is the justification for terrorizing the innocent?  Where in the Quran, the Suma, or in ijtihad, is a license to attack the Copts in Egypt, the Shiis in Iraq, the Americans in New York, the Spaniards in Madrid, or the Christians in Nigeria or in the Central African Republic!

Their criminal and insane acts in Egypt of attacking the army, the police, and innocent civilians, are solely intended for destabilization of the emerging new order in the vain hope of stopping it to fill the vacuum.  Robbing them of the description of "Islamic" this or that, is a priority in warring against the mayhem which they are trying to spread from various locations thus giving the false impression of their "wide reach."

The only hope they cling to is to stay alive, and for them staying alive requires suicidal acts by their misguided cohorts which their leadership adopts for both fund-raising and more recruitment.

Their use of the pulpit in small mosques scattered throughout rural villages for spreading their venomous hate against moderate Muslims and all non-Muslims is being curtailed.  As an example, the Government in Egypt has recently announced the sequestration by the State of all such places of worship.  The purpose: Teaching of Islam to Muslims must be taken away from uneducated free lancers who, at times, are jihadi conduits.  The jihadis are in fact the propagators of world-wide resentment toward and suspicion of Islam.  In their attacks against U.S. President Obama, the American right keeps on calling him "a closet Muslim," and citing his middle name "Hussein."

In support of this process of preempting jihadism within its borders, and as an example to other Arab Spring States, the new Egyptian Constitution of 2014 contained various articles providing as follow:
Article 7: Al-Azhar is an independent Islamic entity ... and is the main recourse in matters of religion and Islamic affairs;
Article 74: It is not permissible to undertake political activity or to organize political parties based on religion or on discrimination based on gender, national origin, sectarian or geographic differentiation;
Article 237: The State is committed to combat terrorism in all its forms.

In the Quran, we read: "We ordained for the Children of Israel that if anyone slew a person -unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land -it would be as if he slew the whole people..." (Chapter V/Verse 32).

You, "Jihadists," have the blood of thousands upon thousands of innocents on your hands.  You continue to spread "mischief" (FITNAH) every where.  You psyche up yourselves to dream of the unattainable and unwanted resurrection of an "Islamic Caliphate."  Your advocacy of "freedom to hate" is not a human right.  You have even created a fiction of "the jihad of fornication" whereby your operatives justify prostituting young Muslim woman as a religious offering for satisfying them while waging "jihad."

You have recreated the medieval tradition of assassination.  In spite of all your acts of aggression against Islam and civilization, the real jihadis are those who are hunting you down worldwide in order to close down your "Murderers Without Borders!!"

What is There In Common Between a Reality Called Egypt, a Fantasy Called Hamas, and a Mouse That Roars Called Qatar!!

Cairo has had enough!!  Hamas, the so-called Islamic Resistance Movement, encircled by Israel in Gaza, has crossed more than one red line in regard to Egyptian national security.  From smuggling of weapons and jihadists into Sinai through illegally-dug tunnels, to consorting with the Muslim Brotherhood which has recently been declared a terror organization by Cairo.  From espousing Al-Qaeda affiliates like Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis (Friends of Jerusalem), to becoming hostage to Qatar's manipulation through petro-dollars.  From declaring repeatedly non-recognition of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, to declaring the overthrow of Morsi in July 2013 a military coup.

With such accumulated grievances, made even more grievous by a series of hit and run terrorist attacks on Egyptian security personnel and army officers and soldiers, Egypt at long last has banned Hamas and frozen its assets in Egypt.  This is a prelude to the tightening of the movement of persons, goods and services between Egypt and Gaza.  Now the only available land connection between Hamas and any Arab territory has been sealed.  The dark fantasy of Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, now has to face on a daily basis the bright reality called Egypt.

From 1949 to 1967, Egypt has administered Gaza, but for good measure, has refrained from annexing it.  Cairo has done that out of its hope that one day, a State of Palestine would rise up on territories allocated by the UN partition resolution of 1947.  That hope, which has been repeatedly dashed by extremism on the two sides of the green line, has cost Egypt lots of blood and treasure.  The Egyptian/Israeli war was the longest war in the annals of the Egyptian military -a 30 years war from 1947-1977.

That 30 year long war was bought to a sudden end by a great visionary -the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.  In 1977, he journeyed to the Kennest, sued for peace, concluded with Prime Minister Begin the Camp David Agreements of 1978, and finally signed the first Arab-Israeli peace treaty in Washington, D.C., in March 1979, with former President Jimmy Carter smiling broadly.  For that act of unbelievable courage, both Sadat and Begin received the Nobel Prize for Peace, and Cairo, once again, became a tourist Mecca for thousands of Israeli tourists.  But the price of that historic peace, which is still in place, was high.  Sadat was assassinated in his own capital on October 6, 1981, at the hands of so-called Islamists.

The first Arab reaction to the Sadat assassination came from the PLO in a short unbelievably cruel statement: "May God Bless the hand which pulled the trigger!!"  Arafat was in charge, and he bore the responsibility for that betrayal.  It should be here noted that "betrayal" has been a modus operandi for the Arafat regime: In 1970, the PLO tried but failed to replace the benign Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan; in 1981, the first advocates for isolating Egypt for having entered into a peace treaty with Israel, were the Arafat conclave; in 1983, the PLO tried but failed to subvert Lebanon through reneging on the Cairo Agreement of 1969 concluded by Nasser between PLO and Lebanon; in 1990, Arafat flew to Baghdad to hug Saddam Hussein for having invaded the State of Kuwait, thus precipitating an en masse expulsion of Palestinians from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

Finally, as the corruption within the Palestinian leadership shot up (Forbes magazine has estimated Arafat's net worth upon his death at $5 Billion), Hamas' appeal to Gaza voters in 2006 increased.  The notion there, as in Egypt toward the Brotherhood, that the Islamists were "pure" (above corruption).  Not so!!

By 2008 Hamas rode rough shed on Fatah/PLO in Gaza, and through a mini-civil war, Hamas, under Haniya became "the Gaza government."  Thus, as of 2008, we have two Palestines: One in Ramallah headed by Abbas; the other in Gaza strip, ruled by a rebellious splinterist Hamas.  Ramallah sought peace with Israel; Hamas sought war through rocketing Israel.  Egypt's Mubarak, with the help of Omar Soliman, the then head of Egypt's State Security, spent years trying to unite the Palestinians, and to stave off Israel's might against Hamas.  These were wasted Egyptian diplomatic efforts.

With the Arab Spring, Mubarak and Soliman were gone.  The Muslim Brotherhood, having won in 3 successive elections, closed ranks with Hamas, its offshoot; sectarianism, a la Gaza, became the daily formula with the Copts and the Shiites its cannon fodder; and the peace treaty with Israel was targeted by Hamas through attacks on Israel from Sinai.  Morsi, in response, tied the hands of Egypt's armed forces which were eager to end Hamas' rampage in Sinai.

Studying the Islamist rule in Egypt under Morsi (June 2012-July 2013), one is surprised at how Egypt began to look as a colony of Hamas, aided and abetted by Qatari financial infusion.  Egyptian secular anger at that situation was misread as reactionary pressure against Egypt's Islamist march toward democracy.  And the U.S. swallowed the poisonous bait.  Then came the Second Egyptian Revolution of June 30, 2013 (shamelessly called a coup by its opponents), to put an end to Islamism in Egypt, especially in Sinai.  The Hamas invasion of Egypt through tunnels was halted, causing Hamas to lose $250 million annually.

One can safely say that Egypt's political liberation from the Mubarak autocracy in 2011, was soon followed by Egypt's liberation from a rule by false turbans and deceptive beards in 2013.  The dependency of terrorism by Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis and Ansar El-Sharia and other similar lunatic fringes of Al-Qaeda on the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas and Qatar came abruptly to a screeching halt.  The declaration by Cairo of the Brotherhood to be a terror organization, followed by the banning of Hamas was in effect a declaration of the primacy of security over other considerations.  The bright reality called Egypt has won over the dark fantasy of Islamic rule.  That fantasy has been made even darker in Gaza.  Pity the Palestinian cause which had no leadership dedicated to its cause.  That cause has never benefited in terms of leadership from the equivalents of a Ghandi or a Mandela.

As a result it had turned into an endless political game with an eye on empty sloganeering and on continuous search for a "sugar daddy" like Qatar whose ambassadors were kicked out on March 5, from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Egypt.

In a joint statement, those countries accused Qatar of engaging in espionage against them by supporting the Brotherhood and providing a media platform for its allies.  That media platform is Al-Jazeera which is now banned in Egypt, having been accused of fabricating news instead of reporting the news.

Commenting on his country's isolation, a former Qatari ambassador to Washington told Al-Jazeera: "The whole issue is really about Sisi.  These countries are supporting a coup d'etat...We are not going to support dictators."  Compounding Qatar's confusion, the Qatari foreign minister declared that that expulsion had "nothing to do with security or stability."  For all intents and purposes, Qatar's petrowealth could not save it from becoming a pariah State.

In a recent diplomatic confrontation between Russia's foreign minister, Lavrov, and Qatar's foreign minister, the former, in exasperation, is said to have told his Qatari counterpart: "Sir!! I cannot find your country on the map!!"  But the mouse that keeps on roaring (Qatar), artificially elevated by a mountain of oil money, by Al-Jazeera TV channel, and by a US huge naval base, sees its reality in pursuing impossible causes.  Political Islamism and Hamas are such causes.  There is nothing in common between the mouse (Qatar), the fiction (Hamas), and the reality of Egypt whose recorded history goes back to 10,000 years!!

On March 7, a great anchor on MSNBC TV Channel, Chris Matthews, recently described Egypt succinctly in a few words: "A real country with a real history!!"

No wonder that Qatar and Hamas are ideologically suited to one another: a roaring mouse and a stealthy scorpion!!  While Qatar is busy trying to subvert other Arab regimes through illicit financial subventions, Hamas is busy trying to use these subventions to subvert those regimes including the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

The Dangerous Sport of Pre-Judging an El-Sisi Presidency

Thomas Friedman, in an article in the New York Times of March 2, 2014 says "Putin and El-Sisi both rose to power on that longing for stability after so much revolutionary ferment."  I could not see the face of a factual comparison between the two personalities, except for Friedman's anticipation of rulership with a strong hand by El-Sisi in Egypt.

Pre-judging of events in an Egypt presided over by El-Sisi is a dangerous sport.  In effect it harbors triple anticipations: that El-Sisi shall be a presidential candidate; that he will win; and that he shall rule democratically.  To my mind, this is a reflection of either panic or deception.  It could be both even if we overlook the awkwardness of a journalist whistling in the wind like Mr. Friedman.

I do not expect media presentations to be akin to a classroom lecture.  The reason is that in a classroom, a well trained instructor is supposed to train his or her charges not in what to think, but in how to think.  A classroom should not be a pulpit for the propagation of the private thoughts and convictions of the professor.  I personally have not tried it even once since I began my teaching career in Cairo in 1948.  Not even when I taught a graduate course on the Arab/Israeli question, from 1966 to 1972 at St. John's University, New York City, then from 1972 to 1997 at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

It is of course naive to expect media opinion-makers to sanitize their material from their preconceived ideas.  But at least in the case of a Mr. Friedman, the distinguished author of Beirut to Jerusalem, one expects a measure of healthy detachment.  Even at the pragmatic level, his abhorrence of a predictable El-Sisi presiding in Egypt shall not change the situation on the ground.  It is nothing more than a ventilation of personal preferences.

The naysayers say that the Revolution of June 30, 2014 resulting in the ouster of Morsi was a coup.  We say it was a revolution ignited by 35 millions citizens against the Brotherhoodization of Egypt.  The naysayers say that Field Marshal Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi ended the Islamic rule of one year using military muscle.  We say the armed forces led by El-Sisi acted on the basis of the popular will in the absence of any other institutional mechanism to have Morsi recalled.  The naysayers say that Islamic rule from June 30, 2012 to July 3, 2013 came through the ballot box.  We say that this a half truth as the ballot box produced a Brotherhood iron-fisted rule which threatened to tear Egypt apart.

The primary issue here is what shape and content would the Egyptian revolutions of 2011 and 2013 produce?  The majority of Egyptians as attested to by the millions in the street respond: "A secular not a religious State."  This has been the rock bottom position adopted by the January 25, 2011 Revolution in which the Muslim Brotherhood participated, though belatedly.  From January 25, 2011 to the presidential elections of June 2012, Egypt reflected inclusiveness of all currents of opinion, and covered both Muslims and Christmas.  So it was no wonder that Al-Azhar reflected that broad national consensus which carried the stamp of approval of the great Coptic Church and community, in its Declaration of August 19, 2011.

The first of those 11 principles of that Declaration entitled "Al-Azhar Document on Egypt's Future," provided as follows:

"Egypt as a State is based upon a constitutional democracy with separation of powers, of which the legislative power is to be exercised by the people's representatives.  Islam, in its legislation, civilization, and history does not recognize a "religiously-based" State.  The overall arching principle of Islam (Sharia) are the primary source of legislation, providing that the adherents of other religions are guaranteed, in their personal status cases, resort to their own religious laws."

The reaction to that declaration on the part of the Egyptian Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), which ruled the country prior to the election of Morsi to the presidency in June 2012, was confirmatory.  SCAF's Deputy Chairman, General Sami Anan who was Egypt's point man in US-Egyptian military relationship stated: "The secularity of the State is a matter of national security which is non-negotiable."  The nexus placed by Egypt's military between secularity and security could not be more organically emphasized.

With the rise of terrorism within Egyptian borders, security has become the number one issue.  It has become the national portal to secularity.  And the more police and army officers and innocent civilians including tourists are killed or injured by the acts of the so-called jihadis, the more attachment to the army and security forces is manifested by the public.  Thus the new Prime Minister, Ibrahim Mihleb, at his first press conference held on February 25 summed up his cabinet's priorities in these few words: "Restoration of security and defeat of terrorism."

In a phone conversation I had earlier today with one of my nieces who resides in Cairo, I asked her about her expectations for the forthcoming presidential elections to be held later this Spring.  I asked her: "For whom would you vote?"  Her immediate and non-varnished response was: "For El-Sisi, if he runs."  My follow-up question was: "Why?"  Her long response included the following: "Where in Egypt of today do we find the most stable, the most inclusive, the most nationalistic, and the most cohesive institution outside of our armed forces?!"

Theoreticians like Tom Friedman and Fareed Zakaria can keep on attempting to create the myth of an Egyptian Revolution hijacked by the military.  It is the Egyptian Revolution which is being hoisted aloft by the military, regardless of whether or not El-Sisi becomes the next president of Egypt.  Such voices are reading Tahrir from the narrow windows of faulty measurements applied from a distance of 7000 miles.  This is the distance between the Nile river to the east, and the Hudson river to the west.

To American Critics of Egypt's Handling of Its War on Terror, I Would Retort: Where Were You When John Yu Falsely Claimed "The Geneva Conventions Are Obsolete?"

Or is it a double standard?!  Is America's war on terror to be set apart from Egypt's ware on terror?  Does terrorizing Americans call for a robust response, but terrorizing Egyptians in Egypt calls for velvet handling?  Is trying to explode an aircraft on its way to Detroit terrorism, but the downing of an Egyptian military helicopter in Sinai a form of dissent?

Is water boarding of suspected Taliban operatives in Afghanistan an accepted form of interrogation, as former U.S. Vice President Cheney opined, but detention of collaborators with the banned Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt a violation of basic human rights?

Whatever the answers to the above list of questions might be, sovereign Egypt does not answer to Amnesty International or to the talking heads on Al-Jazeera of Qatar.  It answers only to its public which is clamoring today for resolutely confronting the so-called jihadists.  Today secular Egypt is in an active armed confrontation with those who wish it ill including through the return to Brotherhood's hegemony.  The battle might be long.  But its outcome might determine the future shape of the new Middle East.

What did John Yu advocate?  Upending the norms of international law developed as of 1942, this former legal counsel essentially advised both the U.S. Department of Justice and the White House of the Bush/Cheney era that warring against terrorism called for ignoring the Geneva Conventions of 1949.  His take was that terrorists were not legal combatants; that, with terrorism, the world has entered the era of war without end; that new rules of engagement had to be developed; that due process, whether substantive or procedural, was inapplicable; that "enhanced interrogation" (i.e. torture) was not illegal in dealing with terror suspects; that military commissions were appropriate replacements for a criminal court adjudication; and that sovereign borders should not impede finding and "bringing to justice" any terror suspects.

The John Yu's approach was an open invitation for the use of draconian measures which in his opinion were the new tools needed for the security of the U.S.  Thus Counselor Yu may be regarded as one of the main propagandists for what might be described as an American imperial security system.  In 2009, the new Obama administration signaled the end of that system which, in effect, caused the membership of terror organizations to soar.  But that administration did not dismantle it.  It largely recast it in a new garb, new terminology, and new rationales.

In the midst of those transformative events, the voice of civil society organizations was muted.  But with the Arab Spring, unleashed as of 2010 in Tunisia, and sweeping into Egypt in 2011, Arab masses rediscovered the power of the street.  And soon the presidents of Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, were respectively, either on the run, or in jail, or massacred.  With these Arab voices clamoring for dignity, democracy and development, NGOs and other civil society organizations, most of which were being funded from abroad including from the U.S., discovered a new role for them in Tahrir and its equivalents across the Middle East.

That new role was wrongly anchored.  Their index for the progress of democracy in a country like Egypt was measuring democratization by a western yardstick even after the Muslim Brotherhood had demonstrated its penchant for violence for the sake of naked power.  And with the Brotherhood's resort to terrorism to avenge the popular uprising which unseated Morsi in July 2013, these civil society groups, in their attacks on Egypt's actions against that "jihadist" mayhem, seemed to forget the John Yu rules.

This is not to applaud the John Yu rules.  This is to remind that Egypt, as it fights for its secular existence as it confronts terrorism on its soil, must at least be measured by the standards afforded to the U.S. in its war on terror inside and outside the U.S. during the reign of the administration of Bush II.

This is not only a media matter.  It is a situation of vast geo-strategic importance.  U.S. uninvited intervention in Egypt's internal affairs, especially during this phase of Egypt versus Jihadi Terrorism, is probably destined to dismal failure.

The U.S., though refraining so far from calling Egypt's Second Revolution of June 30, 2013 "a military coup," has basically looked upon Egypt's difficult transition to democracy, with ambiguous and doubtful reserve.  The Christian Science Monitor Weekly of February 26, 2014 reflected this state of affairs in a lengthy commentary headlined "Democracy's Dangerous Decline in Egypt and Turkey."  

The substance of the entire article is summed up in the following paragraph:

The U.S. can no longer afford to remain mute in the face of assaults on democratic norms in countries as vital to regional and global security as Egypt and Turkey.  While certain strategic interests -such as military partnership with Egypt and its peace treaty with Israel -may encourage Washington to emphasize stability over democracy, this is a mistake."

Then the two authors go on to emphasize their thesis in these words: "A failure to speak out against the erosion of liberty in Egypt and Turkey, which seem to be following in Russia's authoritarian footsteps, not only damages America's ideals and image, but it harms long-term strategic U.S. interests."

Through writings like those paragraphs quoted above, I see an imperialist approach to domestic happenings which have no impact on "long-term strategic U.S. interests."  This is not to mention its reflection of the double standard syndrome which has plagued the preaching of those who talk about "assaults on democratic norms" and "America's ideals and image."

Such expressions of concern might be taken seriously by the new Egypt providing that account is also taken of the embarrassing facts surrounding John Yu's rules, or National Security Agency surveillance of telephone calls, Guantanamo, or surveillance by the police in New York and New Jersey of mosques.  On the latter, a U.S. District Court Judge in Newark dismissed, on February 20, 2014 a civil rights lawsuit brought in 2012 by eight Muslims.  The Muslim plaintiffs said the New York Police Department's surveillance was unconstitutional.

The plaintiffs in the Newark, New Jersey case claimed that that program focused on religion, national origins and race.  The federal judge disagreed.  In his ruling dismissing the case, he said: "The motive for the program was not solely to discriminate against Muslims, but to find Muslim terrorists hiding among the ordinary law-abiding Muslims."  In response, the Center for Constitutional Rights which represented the plaintiffs declared:

"By upholding the New York Police Department's Muslim Surveillance practices, the court's decision give legal sanction to the targeted discrimination of Muslims."

Therefore, I say to the American critics of Egypt's handling of its war on terror: look at your own backyard.  Clear it from its overgrowth before you cast your critical gaze seven thousand miles east toward Egypt.

What is wrong with us, Americans, minding our own business and lending credibility to our ideas?  Let Egypt solve its problem with its national security, even by borrowing a page from America's handling of its own security.  Egypt is not an American protectorate!!

The Egyptian street, to which this blog has been dedicated since its inception in April , 2011 is clamoring for a decent living.  In accepting the resignation of the Beblawi cabinet on February 24, President Mansour described "the burden of the nation's problems" as "immense, both in terms of economic deterioration and marginalization of a number of different segments of society."

Pretending that Egypt's first need is democratization and total freedom of expression is a false pretense.  It ignores the realities on the ground, and the hierarchy of values brought to prominence by the Arab Spring.  The pragmatic sequence seems to be stability leading to development leading to democratic structures which stress, among other things, freedom of expression.

A forthcoming book by Paul Brinkley entitled War Front to Store Front brings this point home.

Speaking of Iraq and Afghanistan, Brinkley who had worked for the Pentagon to build companies came to an unavoidable conclusion: The single most important task in both countries was to create a self-sustaining economy to which the U.S. paid little attention.  As reported by Fareed Zakaria in Time magazine of February 17, Brinkley told him:

"Our focus in Iraq and Afghanistan was to get the politics right -have elections -and somehow economics will flow naturally.  But that's not actually how it works.  We need to get the economics right first, create a self-sustaining market economy, and then the politics will get much better...In the West, trade and markets led to individual liberty and political freedom, not the other way around."

That important sequence seems to have been understood by jihadi terrorism in Egypt when in February they attacked South Korean tourists in Taba, Sinai.  Tourism is a huge asset for Egypt's economic recovery.  Egypt, in striking back at those criminals, has to place its economic recovery ahead of the uninvited advice of the so-called civil society organizations and Washington, D.C. talking heads!!