Egypt Wins

By S.P.SETH

One good thing about the revolutionary upsurge in the Middle East was a debate of sorts in Pakistan about its relevance and possible replication in this country. However, the only common thread between the two situations is that people in Pakistan, like their counterparts in the Middle East, are frustrated with their rulers and would like deliverance from them. Which the Egyptian people have achieved by overthrowing Hosni Mubarak.

But the situation in Pakistan is quite different. Pakistan’s identity is much more fragmented on ethnic, regional and sectarian lines. And there is no single symbol of all that is wrong with the country, like Hosni Mubarak was in Egypt. The religion (Islam) that was supposed to be a binding factor has increasingly become divisive with terrorist violence, and the country seems to be loosing its moorings. The Taliban in Pakistan want to redefine the country in their own image and their own version of Islam. And realizing how hard that task would be, they have decided to achieve it by terrorizing the people into submission.

But even in Egypt, the revolution didn’t have an easy task. Until the last moment Mubarak kept everyone in suspense and then announced on the state television that he wasn’t going anywhere until next September when elections were likely to be held. In other words, he would still preside over the country’s transition. When the people’s revolution started in Egypt, Mubarak seemed so close to becoming another Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia. But since then, the regime regrouped, threatening to hold on to power at almost any cost.

There were reasons for this. The most important was that the Mubarak regime put up a united front, even when people read signs that the army was somehow empathetic with them. The army had said that they wouldn’t shoot at their own people and expressed understanding of their legitimate aspirations. But there were first hand accounts of the army’s involvement in the kidnapping and torturing of many people in the popular protest movement. Vice-President Omar Suleiman was even threatening the country with a military coup. He said that the protests are “very dangerous for society and we can’t put up with this at all.” This was not the talk of an empathetic army.

The spontaneous outbreak of the people’s movement took the regime totally by surprise. Not surprisingly, its initial response was ad hoc, though brutal. As it went along, it tried a stick and carrot approach, initially coming out with a police crackdown that didn’t work. The army declaring that they wouldn’t shoot down their own people followed this. This obviously encouraged the people, and unnerved the regime. The next stage was another dose of intimidation and killings when the regime mobilized their squads of thugs attacking peaceful protesters. This proved counter-productive, creating angry reaction among the regime’s foreign backers like the United States, and its Western allies.

Which brings us to the United States, and its major Western allies’ inability to decide whether to back the Egyptian popular upsurge or stand behind their loyal ally. In the event they seem to have decided to stand on the fence. Even when the US sought to put extra pressure on the Mubarak regime for change, the emphasis always was that the process of change should happen through the agency of the existing government. Indeed, the Obama administration’s special envoy to Cairo, Frank Wisner (a former US ambassador to Egypt), sent to assess the situation and report back to his government, told a security conference in Munich, “President Mubarak’s continued leadership is critical—it is his opportunity to write his own legacy.” Imagine President Mubarak being allowed to write his own legacy by leaving the presidency to his son, Gamal.

Hosni Mubarak regime was hoping to wear down the protesters through a process of attrition, hoping that the “silent majority” (dictators always live with such fantasies) will rise up in support of the regime. Which, as we know, didn’t happen. The US vacillation, even though frowned and criticized at times when it bordered on criticism, was not altogether discouraging. For instance, if you were Hosni Mubarak, you wouldn’t be discouraged with Hillary Clinton’s comment that “revolutions have overthrown dictators in the name of democracy, only to see the process hijacked by new autocrats [read Muslim Brotherhood] who use violence, deception, and rigged elections to stay in power.” A constant US refrain was that change and stability should go hand in hand.

Mubarak was also encouraged by the active advocacy of his case with the United States by Israel and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi king reportedly was even ready to replace US aid for Egypt from its own coffers. All these factors kept Mubarak’s hopes alive that if only he could hold his nerves, and his regime stood by him, he would be able to write his own legacy, as US special envoy, Frank Wisner, said at a Munich security conference.

Encouraged by these factors, Mubarak was going to tough it out. And his loyal intelligence chief (made vice-president), was right behind him. He bluntly told people that there would be “no ending of the regime” and no immediate departure for Hosni Mubarak. He expressed his preference for dialogue with the protesters, issuing a veiled warning, though, “We don’t want to deal with Egyptian society with police tools.” Which meant that if the Egyptian people didn’t behave; the government might have no option but to use brutal force. This would suggest that Egypt was close to a bloodbath if the army had gone on to enforce Mubarak’s declaration on the state television that he wasn’t going anywhere. So what happened within less than 24 hours that made Mubarak quit the presidency?

It would be fair to assume that the army eventually decided against using force on its people gathered in large numbers in Cairo, Alexandria and elsewhere in the country. And without the army’s prop and support Mubarak was a nobody, when his people were dead set against him. It is also relevant to note that by this time the popular revolt had engulfed much of the country. Mubarak’s much touted rural supporters were nowhere to be seen. In the circumstances, the task of keeping Mubarak in power till September, when elections were due, seemed absurd at horrible cost in terms of people’s lives.

The scenes of jubilation on the news of Mubarak’s departure went on into the night, and the feeling was so overwhelming that many people seemed unwilling to go home. They wanted to keep on savoring their victory. One academic from the American University in Beirut even described it as cosmic. It was a truly historic moment, not only for Egypt but for the region and, indeed, for the world. Just to see a country like Egypt, with its rich history and traditions emerging out of a mummified state to once again take its place in the living world, is an inspiring moment in history.

Of course, there are worries about the future. At the best of times military coups are not good for any country (as this has been, in a sense), as the people of Pakistan might attest. But in this case, the military council, headed by the country’s defense minister, Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, a Mubarak lackey, will rule the country until whatever alternative political order emerges. The army has promised peaceful transition to democratic civilian rule after the elections, whenever they are held. Frankly, there is too much lack of clarity and uncertainty about all aspects of transition.

But people of Egypt have won and let us rejoice with them. One thing is for certain. Which is that Egypt, and indeed rest of the Arab world, will never be the same again. It is quite possible, indeed probable, that more dominoes will fall inspired by Egypt’s example.

A revolutionary upsurge in the Middle East

By S.P.SETH

Tunisia is becoming a byword for hopeful resurgence in Arab countries. Who would have thought that Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, its president, who had mastered ruling by dictate for 23 years, would just fall by the way in a matter of days. Not only that, the people’s power that brought him down, do not want any vestige of his regime. They want them all to go lock, stock and barrel and start the new era with a clean slate. The country is in the midst of great anticipation and expectation from a new order that has still to arise.

However, the developments in Tunisia have created a new wave of people’s power sweeping or threatening to sweep much of the Middle East. In a sense, the Arab world is experiencing a surge of revolutionary expectations. In other words, it is not just a national movement affecting Tunisia but has regional ramifications.

But let us put all this in the context of recent Arab history. In the post-colonial period around the fifties, there have been tumultuous events in some of the Arab countries, the most important, perhaps, was the overthrow of Egypt’s King Farouk in 1952 led by a group of army officers under the nominal leadership of Brigadier Mohammed Neguib. The real leader behind the putsch was Colonel Gamal Abd al-Nasser, who managed to depose Naguib in 1954.

Nasser was not only the new hope of Egypt but also the trailblazer for Arab nationalism. It looked like the days of Arab monarchies were almost over; such was the political environment of the time. And this period also saw increasing hostility toward the newly created state of Israel that had annexed more territory to its domain following the defeat of Arab forces in late 1940s.

But what created a wave of Arab anger (and in much of the world) was the joint invasion of Egypt by Anglo-French-Israeli forces in 1956 to undo the nationalization of Suez Canal by the country’s Nasser-led government. Nasser became an instant Arab hero with his determination to stand up his ground against, what looked like, insurmountable odds of facing three powerful enemies.

Nasser was unwittingly helped by the United States because it came out against the joint attack, forcing the aggressors to withdraw. The US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, was enraged that UK, France and Israel had the audacity to undertake the invasion without the knowledge or approval of the United States, still harboring dreams of their colonial days. The United States was now the undisputed leader of the “free world” as the Cold War started to hot up between the Soviet Union and the United States and its allies.

The Suez Canal saga, with Nasser leading the charge of Arab nationalism, emerged as a unifying force of sorts in a region that had not seen anything like this before. Such surge of popular enthusiasm scared the day lights out of the region’s monarchs. At the same time, Nasser’s Egypt got sucked into the Cold War, having to depend more and more on the Soviet Union for economic and arms aid as it was not forthcoming from the United States.

Arab nationalism was also perceived as a serious threat to the US oil interests concentrated in the oil producing countries ruled by kings and the likes. In the same way, the US commitment to Israel started to become more pronounced as the United States’ most reliable ally in the region, beefed up by the work of the US Jewish lobby in the United States.

Even as this surge of Arab nationalism was worrying the United States, Nasser was feeling increasingly confident riding a wave of popular support after his success in nationalizing Suez Canal and the humiliation of its attackers. And in his rallying cry for Arab solidarity, Israel increasingly appeared as the next challenge to restore Arab pride.

Nasser was a great Arab leader but also a demagogue. His 1956 success had given him a false sense of confidence hoping that such feats can be replicated again without necessary military preparations to take on the Israelis. The resultant six-day war in 1967, with Israel launching a surprise attack, finished off Egyptian air force, as it lay exposed on the ground. As part of the then rising Arab nationalism, Jordan and Syria were Egypt’s military partners. They all suffered humiliating defeats, with Israel occupying large chunks of their territories and creating the new issue of occupied Palestine.

The six-day war put to rest, for the time being at least, the surge of Arab nationalism triggered by the nationalization of the Suez Canal. Israel emerged from this a much stronger power than it ever was, and its support base in the United States expanded further embellishing its credentials as the United States’ most reliable and strongest ally in an unstable region.

By the same token, the region’s reining monarchs got a new lease of life with the United States’ as their protector. Another attempt at rescuing Arab pride also failed disastrously in the Yom Kippur war of 1973, with Arab forces once again suffering a humiliating defeat. Which finally convinced some of them, like Egypt and Jordan, to make peace with Israel.

The Arab world has been in doldrums ever since, ruled by aging kings and despots clinging to power at any cost. During such times, the events in Tunisia have an entirely new meaning. Although, it is still early days but the collapse of the first Arab dictator under popular revolt is the first of its kind in the Arab world for as long as one can remember. And the message is uplifting for all Arabs. It also shows how thin and frayed are the threads that tie together the different arms of every repressive regime. They tend to buckle under when enough popular pressure is applied.

For instance, in Tunisia, the army that should have been the bedrock of Ben Ali’s dictatorship decided to stand aside, refusing to slaughter civilians to save his political hide; leaving him no choice but to find asylum with another kindred dictatorship in Saudi Arabia.

Egypt, Yemen and Algeria are also under pressure, with popular demonstrations seeking the removal of their rulers. After Tunisia, Egypt appears to be the next domino to fall. Its dictator, Hosni Mubarak---now 82--- has been in power for thirty years, and reportedly has plans to engineer his son’s succession. His government seems determined to tough it out, even if it means killing its own people and youth of the country. Imagine the prospect of another scion of the Hosni Mubarak lineage ruling over Egypt for another 30 years.

Mubarak’s only claim to fame/notoriety is that he has presided over his country’s stagnation, and brutal political repression. He is, in so many ways, the King Farouk of today, and his people need redemption from a relic of the past. If his people overthrow him, this could be similar to the beginning of a new resurgence in the Arab world, not unlike the overthrow of King Farouk in 1952. But the United States would hate to lose him. Over the years, he has fitted ideally into the US regional strategic plans, including support for Israel. An important example of Egypt’s docility is that it has kept effectively closed its border with Gaza to help Israel choke up its people.

And in Yemen, it is the same old story of a dictator, President Ali Abdullah Saleh, presiding since 1978 over his country’s journey to nowhere. In Algeria, just when the Islamists were about to win elections in early nineties, the military stepped in to quash any such prospect and have been presiding ever since in an on-off fratricidal war.

While the popular movement is building up in Arab countries against their despotic and repressive regimes (it is reported that in a region of 333 million people, nearly 325 million live under the yoke of unelected leaders), helped by Tunisia’s example and the dexterous use of social media like Twitter, Facebook etc, it is not going to be all that smooth and easy.

There are several reasons for this. First: these countries lack institutional alternatives. It is in the nature of dictatorial regimes to destroy all alternative political structures so they do not become a rallying point for opposition to the regime. Therefore, while at the popular level people hate their rulers they lack organized alternatives to concretize their aspirations. Hence, there is danger that even if the spontaneous popular upsurge in Arab countries does manage to overthrow the tyrants this could result in some sort of anarchy without credible leadership and institutional back up.

For instance, the immediate power transition in Tunisia, after Ben Ali’s flight, involved, more or less, the old government without the old chief. How the events in Tunisia or, for that matter, in any other Arab state in that situation, will eventually work out will be a painful process.

Second, in this transitional phase of months, or even years, there will be enough scope for the revolution’s enemies to create mischief and subvert the new hopeful trend. Here, the United States and its allies will have an important role to play, as we know from the past. For instance, in 1953, the CIA and British intelligence operatives played a decisive role in the overthrow of Iran’s nationalist Prime Minister, Muhammad Mossadeq, and the restoration of the Shah as the country’s ruler to serve US interests. Which, in turn, brought into power the clerical regime of Ayatollah Khomeini and his successors in 1979, pitting them against the US and its Western allies in, what looks like, a never-ending US-Iran saga.

Similarly, the Hamas’ election victory in Palestine in 2006 was extremely unpleasant for Israel and its Western supporters, leading it to be dubbed a terrorist organization. Algeria too experienced a similar situation in the early nineties when the Islamists had almost won elections. But it was not palatable to the West. The generals in Algeria stepped in to quash the elections.

In other words, if any of the alternative political order emerging from Tunisia, Egypt or elsewhere in Arab lands, is unacceptable to the United States, it will do its best, with its allies and hangars-on in the Arab countries, to subvert the emerging revolution.

The United States is unlikely to tolerate any alternative political order (democratic or otherwise) that is perceived to threaten its oil interests, and compromises perceived Israeli security; not withstanding Barack Obama’s reported congratulation to the youth of Tunisia for having the courage to revolt.

Look at what Washington’s behind-the-scene power structure has done to Obama’s message of reaching out to the Islamic world as spelled out in his Cairo speech, soon after he came to power. The Palestinian Papers released by Al Jazeera disclose the sordid doings of all those involved in or facilitating peace negotiations between the Mahmoud Abbas administration and the Israelis.

The mess in the Middle East, where people have no say in how they are governed, has created a sense of hopelessness and utter frustration. One great positive of the Tunisian uprising is that it has shown that people can overthrow their tyrants if they put their collective minds and energies to the task. This will have the effect of lifting that sense of desperation about a future just like the past, and worse.

If the United States wants to be part of a new future in the Middle East, it should not, like in the past, obstruct its course to make it fit into its own narrow interests. That has only perpetuated the stagnation and tyranny that is today’s Middle East. And this cannot continue, especially after the events in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere. Therefore, the lesson for the West is to welcome the birth of a new Middle East and help it with political support and economic aid to lift itself from its morass.

At the same time, the US shouldn’t panic if Islamic elements manage to win elections here and there. Because, the historical process of transition in the Middle East has to go through a process of twists and turns for it to eventually become a stable region. Even the Islamists will have to provide jobs for their constituents to lift many of them out of poverty and destitution. This is probably the biggest problem with the young populations of the Middle East without work and no future. They too, as governments, will need to interact with the world at large for trade, aid, diplomacy and other needs of governance.

The situation at present, though, is so murky that it is not possible to see a clear picture. But things are starting to move, and that surely is a good thing.

Note: This article was first published in Daily Times