Egypt

This week's coup in Egypt leaves President Obama’s administration in an awkward position. Although the State Department has insisted it remained neutral in the dispute, American taxpayers have been supporting the Egyptian armed forces since 1948 with more than $70 billion in military and economic aid. A further $1.3 billion of military aid is budgeted for next year. Obama has now instructed officials to review American aid commitments to Egypt. There is a delicate balancing act to be played here. Neither Obama nor the State Department called yesterday’s events a ‘coup’ because there are legal implications restricting U.S. aid to countries where an elected head of state is overthrown by a military coup.

Democracy and holding elections are not the same thing. There could be no better demonstration of this than the experience of Egypt. Protesters who two years ago gathered in Cairo to force a dictator out of office, and to win the right to replace him with an elected governmentS, are back — this time to demand the resignation of the president whom they elected. The likely result is, by popular demand, a return to what preceded the Arab spring of 2011: a military dictatorship, for a period at least. From a western perspective this is inexplicable: why would people want to risk their lives to overthrow a military-backed president, only to come back two years later to reverse what they seemed to have achieved?

Bassem Youssef is better known as ‘Egypt’s John Stewart’. He is a 39 year old cardiologist who made his name with an online comedy programme styled along the lines of The Daily Show. Ever since Egypt’s revolution in 2011 Youssef has attracted a large following in the Middle East, making fun of religious and political figures. With both of those features merged somewhat toxically in the country’s ruling Muslim Brotherhood, there was almost a sense of inevitability about Youssef’s arrest last week on charges of insulting Islam and the President. Youssef’s case has generated a lot of international attention but there are scores of arrests like his. Consider Ali Qandil, a stand-up comedian who appeared on Youssef’s show.

The emergency law has returned to Egypt less than two years after Hosni Mubarak was ousted from power, when Mohammed Morsi reintroduced it to curb unrest which claimed 33 lives over the weekend. It is a remarkable move given that the law epitomised much of what was wrong with Mubarak’s administration and fuelled the anger against him. Provisions in the law allow police to detain suspects indefinitely, often with little evidence; subvert constitutional rights; and curb press freedoms. Mubarak used these laws throughout his thirty year rule. The Muslim Brotherhood is sensitive to accusations of authoritarianism despite Morsi frequently revealing his proclivity for repression.

Hugely exciting Ten O Clock News last night on the Arab Spring – or ‘Arab Uprising’ as the BBC now prefers to call it, the word Spring usually being associated with nice things like lambs and daffodils. They had George Alligator in Egypt and Lyse Doucet in Tunisia and some other bloke somewhere else. I like Lyse Doucet, she’s less credulous than most. George Alligator, in a piece which was largely a string of clichés, said that Egypt’s democracy was ‘a work in progress’, at which point I fell off the sofa in hysteria.

The thing about Islamists is that they just can’t help themselves. Mohammed Mursi’s stock was riding high in certain quarters shortly after he slapped down Hamas in Gaza and avoided a full-scale confrontation with Israel. Foreign policy panjandrums in London and Washington who tout fashionable theories of a ‘moderate Muslim Brotherhood’ felt vindicated in their convictions, arguing the group is really just an Arab version of European Christian Democrats. Yet so attracted is the Brotherhood to the clarion call of reaction that after the ceasefire, Mursi instantly seized the moment to reveal his proclivity for authoritarianism.

I have a piece in the Wall Street Journal (Europe) today on the pyrrhic ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Also - this week’s magazine carries a cover piece by me on the change that is happening in the region. As though determined to prove me right, the new Egyptian President has – with the praise of Hillary Clinton and Ban Ki-Moon still ringing in his ears – made certain declarations of intent: ‘Egypt's President Mohammed Mursi has issued a declaration banning challenges to his decrees, laws and decisions. The declaration also says no court can dissolve the constituent assembly, which is drawing up a new constitution. President Mursi also sacked the chief prosecutor.

As tensions between Israel and Gaza continue to flare, the real story is what’s happening in Cairo. The conflict represents an acute crisis for the Muslim Brotherhood, which knows the West has long been apprehensive about how it would conduct itself with regards to Israel. So far, the Brotherhood has been in no rush to give a definitive answer, offering instead a mix of sabre-rattling and olive branches. Its hand is now being forced. Internally, the Brotherhood is divided over the Gaza conflict. Hard liners see this as an excuse to tear up the peace treaty, reassert Egyptian pride, and impose themselves on the conflict.

What do you do when confronted with a prejudice so strong it takes your breath away? In my case, I did what was immediately necessary. I took a deep breath to replenish lost oxygen, and moved on. It wasn't the time or place to take on this particularly ugly example of intolerance; but it is an intolerance which needs to recognised. I was giving a lecture at a charity that trains journalists from around the world. Some are already making their way in the industry and are expected to do well. I was talking about my theory that the term 'Arab Spring' actually clouds our understanding of what has been happening in the region over the past 18 months.  From the Egyptian coup d'etat onwards, I've argued that calling these events the 'Arab Spring' automatically frames them as positive.

Western media and governments which are currently white-washing the Muslim Brotherhood should take note of the following, a classic example of the organisation’s traditionally forked-tongue way of working. Ahram Online carries the story which relates the recent rioting across North Africa and the Middle East. After the attack on the US Embassy in Cairo on Tuesday, the Muslim Brotherhood’s official English-language twitter yesterday tweeted: ‘We r relieved none of @USEmbassyCairo staff were harmed & hope US-Eg relations will sustain turbulence of Tuesday’s events.’ The US Embassy tweeted their thanks in the following way: ‘Thanks.  By the way, have you checked out your own Arabic feeds?  I hope you know we read those too.

It is not uncommon for new leaders of new nations to flex their muscles. And in spite of its millennia of history as a nation, this is precisely where Egypt now finds itself. It has hosted its first free and fair democratic elections, and, for the first time, has a civilian occupying the Presidency. In this new nation, reborn for the umpteenth time, Mohamed Mursi is busy showing off the Brotherhood’s sinews. He landed in Tehran today, a move the Ahmadinejad government had touted as a diplomatic coup. No Egyptian leader has visited the country in more than three decades, and relations have been little more than frosty at the best of times. But as I suggested on Coffee House last week, Mursi was not headed there to prostrate himself before the Ayatollah's authority.