Egypt: Another Middle Eastern country descending into chaos, talks of a possible civil war, violent protests, violent repression and another notch in the butt of the Clash of Civilisations gun.
A democratically elected government has been deposed by an army in response to a massive social movement that saw that government as undemocratic. Many of the people who voted for Mr Morsi had a change of heart because they had considered him less islamist than he turned out to be. But now many people who demanded action against him are having a change of heart because the army has turned out to be much more violent in their repression than they were expected or hoped to be.
In this all round confusion, it is difficult not to notice that there is an external power exercising tremendous influence in a situation that is already difficult enough. The US, manipulating through its aid or not aid power game, is yet again treating the voices of different visions of life as if they were its own puppets.
Somehow it seems appropriate to quote here Sacha Baron Cohen’s words as General Aladeen in film The Dictator
‘Why are you guys so anti-dictators? Imagine if America was a dictatorship. You could let 1% of the people have all the nation’s wealth. You could help your rich friends get richer by cutting their taxes. And bailing them out when they gamble and lose. You could ignore the needs of the poor for health care and education. Your media would appear free, but would secretly be controlled by one person and his family. You could wiretap phones. You could torture foreign prisoners. You could have rigged elections. You could lie about why you go to war. You could fill your prisons with one particular racial group, and no one would complain. You could use the media to scare the people into supporting policies that are against their interests.’
It’s all best summed up in the words of Mohamed ElBaradei, the interim vice president who resigned saying that the military had refused to listen to him:
“As you are aware, I always saw peaceful alternatives for resolving this societal wrangling, certain solutions were proposed, which could have led to the national conciliation, but things have come this far…. It has become difficult for me to continue bearing the responsibility for decisions to which I do not agree, and I fear their consequences”.
“Regretfully, what happened today is only in the interest of advocates of violence, terrorism, and extremist groups; and those words of mine will be recalled one day.”
Democracy Now! on the other hand reports
‘President Obama responded to the situation in Egypt from Martha’s Vineyard where he is on vacation. He condemned the violence but stopped short of calling Morsi’s ouster last month a coup or announcing any cuts to the $1.5 billion a year of mostly military aid to Egypt.
President Obama: “While we want to sustain our relationship with Egypt, our traditional cooperation cannot continue as usual when civilians are being killed in the streets and rights are being rolled back. As a result, this morning we notified the Egyptian government that we are canceling our biannual joint military exercise, which was scheduled for next month. Going forward, I’ve asked my national security team to assess the implications of the actions taken by the interim government and further steps that we may take as necessary with respect to the U.S.-Egyptian relationship.”
Later Thursday, State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said the administration is reviewing aid to Egypt “in all forms.’
Nonviolence, the only way to open the future
Let us hope that people in Egypt have a long, hard look at many of their neighbours, in particular Libya, Syria and Iraq, and realise that if they accept the premise that they can emerge from this mess only if they defeat the other side through violent means, Egypt will collapse also through internal strife. There are enough factions, even more than in Syria, and there are many itchy fingers on triggers and arms dealers savouring future profits to make the situation potentially disastrous.
Only nonviolence can offer hope for reconciliation through dialogue. Democracy is not just a vote and elect exercise, democracy, real democracy, should include all, serve all, benefit all. Without external interference.
