DQ Egypt: impact on Israel
[ by Charles Cameron [hoping Zen’s ISP will be back up shortly] — cross-posted from ChicagoBoyz ]
Someone posted an excerpt from an interview with Khaled Hamza, the webmaster of the Muslim Brotherhood, as a comment on an earlier post of mine on ChicagoBoyz, where I also blog, and I was interested enough to track the original interview down, and have presented the key points of the excerpt here in Quote #1.
I am pairing it, in Quote #2, with an excerpt from an interview the BBC recently conducted with Mortimer Zuckerman – because I find the two quotes taken together suggest something of the complexity of the breaking situation in the Middle East.
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I’d like to float a trial balloon / try a though experiment, if I might. And since I’m more “tail” than “left” or “right wing”, I’ll be posting this in more than one place, and hope to get comments from all sides…
On the face of it, Zuckeman is applying what’s arguably a racist double-standard. He advocates democracy, “totally” and “without question” – but not for the Egyptians, or at least not today or tomorrow.
On the face of it, the Egyptian public seems distinctly unenthused by Mubarak’s regime and will, in a democratic election, presumably vote in a fair number of Muslim Brotherhood representatives – though it’s by no means clear that they would be in the majority, and their present ideology in any case is closer to the processes of electoral politics than those of violent jihad.
So there is reason for Israel to be concerned, and reason for those who support democracy to see some hope for democracy, in the ongoing events in Egypt.
Let me put it this way: Quote #1 illustrates why Zuckerman might make the remarks quoted in Quote #2, while Quote #2 illuminates why Hamza might make the remarks quoted in Quote #1.
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And here’s the thought experiment — I’d like to come at this from a Maslovian angle.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
I’d like to suggest that “democracy” is an ideal, or to get away from that word with its somewhat ambiguous political connotations, an activity of the “the better angels of our nature” – and thus, from a Maslovian perspective, an aspect of a group or nation’s “self-actualization” level of interest, whereas “stability” would fall under “safety” or even “physiological”.
If that’s right, Zuckerman is at least arguably articulating a “stability first, eventual democracy would be ideal” position.
Does that “Maslovian” formulation throw any additional light on the situation?
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The problem with the position I just described is nicely articulated by Mohammad Fadel at the very end of a Foreign Policy post, Can Black Swans lead to a sustainable Arab-Israeli peace? — and it’s only his conclusion I’m quoting here:
Tunisia and Egypt have demonstrated categorically that any peace which relies on the stability of police states is doomed from the outset.
If a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil can in theory cause a tornado in Texas – heaven alone knows what someone blinking in Cairo or Jerusalem or Washington can do.
Myself, I pray for empathy, which seems a reasonable request, I hope for wisdom, which seems a great deal more chancy — and I long for peace.
In the current environment of hatred and mistrust, that seems entirely beyond the capacity of anyone’s present thinking to achieve.
February 3rd, 2011 at 10:44 am
In the above quote the Brotherhood has outlined its problem with the Israeli State, namely its opposition to the occupation, surely that is the basis of any future negotiation between two democratically elected states?Israel is rapidly moving towards a place where they will no have the ability to deal with the rest of the middle east from behind an Ironwall.
February 3rd, 2011 at 3:03 pm
Hi Joey,
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That would depend on what is meant by "occupation" – the West Bank and Gaza or all of historic Palestine? One is negotiable for the Israelis and the other is a rejection that there can be Israelis at all. Most Islamists mean the latter, though there are pragmatists in the Muslim Brotherhood who would yield to the Egyptian military’s demand that the peace treaty and US aid be continued, at least for a time.
February 3rd, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Good to know that the U.S. dollar is still worth something (to someone)!
February 3rd, 2011 at 4:48 pm
In the face of a Nuclear armed Iran it would bolster Israel’s long term position if it was able to normalize its relations with a Democratic Egypt. Israel could have a unique opportunity here to undermine Iranian claims of primacy in resistance to occupation, if a democratic Egypt was to broker a withdrawal to the 1967 borders.Actually I believe Israels longer term viability is dependent on such an outcome. We are looking at a home grown democratic dawn here, lets not preempt our Edmund Burke moment, there will be plenty of time for that. It would be unwise to over emphasis the influence the military actually exercises at the moment over society at large (esp in a Democratic society), and American ability to influence the Egyptian military if a unfriendly Government came to power. As regards the Muslim Brotherhood, a wait and see policy would be wise, a new Democratic government would have few natural Allies in the MidEast, the Islamists could well respond favorably to a US olive branch.
February 3rd, 2011 at 4:53 pm
as an aside, its easy to make promises out of Government.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5DZBFbMdjI.:-)