Even before the end of the Jan.25-Feb.11, 2011 anti-government uprising in Egypt that brought down President Hosni Mubarak, pundits, bloggers, and journalists outside of Egypt were focused on what role the Muslim Brotherhood would have in Egyptian affairs and indeed what role they had played in the uprising itself.
Generally speaking, the fear among those writers in the West was palpable and Egypt was declared to be the next Iran and war with Israel on the immediate horizon, constrictive Sharia law already in place and hands cut off. In my own view as one who had seen the uprising firsthand and spoken with many of the protesters, the West's view on this matter ranged from a stretch of the imagination to seeming propaganda and disinformation although this latter could be easily made out to be simple ignorance. That last is understandable as Egypt is not a simple country to understand comprised as it is of over 80 million souls and it has layers on top of layers when one is speaking about its internal and external politics that range from realistic views about the fragile and outward looking and outwardly dependent Egyptian economy, to matters of religion and tradition, the very real hostility with which Egyptians view Israel and the little matter of the also very real ,cruel and corrupt police state that is the country of Egypt. There were some writers in the West who laughed off the idea of the Muslim Brotherhood coming to fruition politically in Egypt but they were in the distinct minority.
Some of this layering involves generic terms in Egypt almost incomprehensible to the West involving Sufis and Salafists and where they reside poltically and religiously in contrast to the much more well known Muslim Brotherhood. Those in the West who fear fundamentalists coming to power in Egypt should be aware that these 3 groups are at cross purposes and dilute each other in terms of votes.
The fear in the West as regards the Muslim Brotherhood working within an Egyptian democracy is that once they are voted into power that there will simply be no more voting although what would probably happen in reality is that the Muslim Brotherhood would have to rely on giving lip service to voting that was entirely rigged but whether the Egyptian people will put up with such a thing is another story. In my view it is unlikely that the street protesters who brought down Mubarak allowed themselves to be gassed, murdered, arrested and beaten simply to bring into power a version of a Mubarak that would in its own way might be just as corrupt and constrictive. There is nothing to suggest that the uprising in Egypt had any specifically religious slant to it. In fact, the Muslim Brotherhood, before the first street protests on Jan.25, 2011, said outright that they would not participate. What this tells me is that the MB thought the uprising would fail and wanted to risk no more of the wrath of President Mubarak who had already outlawed the MB in Egypt. Naturally, once the protests started gaining traction the MB hopped on board but in terms of being in on the ground floor of the uprising they were nowhere to be seen.
The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928 and has organizations all over the Islamic world and is said to be the most venerable and largest politicized Islamic group in that context. Generally speaking the goals of the group appear to be a non-violent when needful and violent when possible expression of subverting not only greater Islam but the West itself through immigration to a form of government wherein Islamic religious imperatives would be the source of law. Taking over an entire planet is a pretty heady goal which at once speaks to the arrogance of Islam in its stricter adherents but also how its reach exceeds its grasp since, other than a baby boom and immigration, there is nothing within Islam itself that can hope to compete with the West.
There is a lot of worry in post-revolution Egypt about the Muslim Brotherhood coming into power but also skepticism about whether it can be done. Said Okasha, writing in Al-Ahram for on April 21, 2011 had the following to say:
"The first fact is that the Muslim Brotherhood is not that powerful, whether on the level of the organisation's cohesion or its diffusion. The challenge of being in public (after they have become accustomed to working in secret for most of their history) will diminish their capability of gaining the public's sympathy. The public has previously shown an inclination towards them as a form of objecting to the regime of former president Hosni Mubarak. With his stepping down, the Muslim Brothers will lose a part of the votes they had. The results of the student union elections at Cairo University clearly showed this fact: the Muslim Brothers' list only got 25 per cent of student union seats after they had won most of the votes in previous elections and while they were legally banned."
To address this, the MB apparently buys into the belief that Islam can somehow take over the technological innovations of the West while infusing the West with the morals it lacks. There is nothing said about how those innovations would continue or how practible it is for an organization that has fought colonialism almost from its beginnings to in turn become a colonizer itself; double thinking hypocrisy is not a good way to start one's moral ascendency over the rest of a decadent world.
Outwardly speaking the Muslim Brotherhood only seems to come right out and clearly advocate violence in the case of Israel and also the United States in whatever capacity the U.S. would support Israel. In reality, no one seems to agree on the aims of the Muslim Brotherhood and to what extent they could find success in Egypt in fair elections although the consensus within Egypt seems to be that they are neither wanted or needed.
In the context of the Jan.-Feb., 2011 uprisings in Egypt, Western writers have sought in vain for some sign of the Islamic fundamentalism that in the past has come to be entirely associated with muslims rioting in the streets. In this sense Western observers can scarce be blamed for not believing their own eyes since what happened in Egypt is almost unprecedented in this respect.
In particular there have been some rather absurd attempts to find evidence of anti-Semitism or anti-Americanism among the hundreds of signs that were carried about by people in Tahrir Square in downtown Cairo. Tahrir Square was the centerpiece of the revolt in Cairo, occupied by the protesters from the night of Jan.28 after a ferocious battle til the downfall of Mubarak on Feb.11.
However, what is notable about the mass of people within Tahrir Square which was at times estimated to be as large as 250,000 people, is the lack of signs saying "Down With America" or "Down With Israel". In point of fact there were none, not one that I saw and I was in Tahrir Square during 10 of 16 days from Jan.29 to Feb.13. There were no American or Israeli flags being burned, none, not one.
Some few writers have brought attention to the signs in Tahrir Square that depicted President Mubarak with a Star of David on his face or variations thereof, insisting that this was undeniable proof of the anti-Semitism of the protesters. First of all, these signs were in the vast minority, maybe 2% of the considerable signage in Tahrir Square. Secondly, a sign showing that a person doesn't like Mubarak's peace treaty with Israel is not anti-Semitism any more than a U.S. flag across Mubarak's face would have been anti-caucasian. One has to ask oneself why anti-Semitism, if in fact present, didn't take a more direct expression as it easily could have done. Furthermore, I had the signs in Arabic that I took photos of translated and they were all variations of "Mubarak Get Out".
Many people asked me where I was from and all reacted happily to the fact that I was an American and none took the trouble to ask me if I was a Jew. Having said that, months before the uprising I was aware that the Egyptians had a thing for Israel. Among the protesters in Tahrir Square a few told me that Israel would be taken care of once Mubarak was dealt with and I was twice asked by the security the protesters set up to enter Tahrir Square if I'd been to Israel and my passport scanned for visas.
For me the point about the Muslim Brotherhood or Egyptians in general as regards Israel isn't really about their hostility towards Israel or the West which is obvious but their ability to act on that hostility. If the MB came to power in Egypt they would not be able to do anything directly to Israel, certainly not attack them; the Egyptian army is American equipped and supplied and then there is the little matter of the Muslim Brotherhood taking control of it in the first place. It's hard for me to imagine the anti-government protesters allowing their revolution to be hijacked and trading the yoke of Mubarak for one of strict compliance with Sharia law. Another Iran in Egypt doesn't seem like a likely scenario but a continuation of an enforced peace with Israel does. The Muslim Brotherhood is in fact divorced from reality in their general philosophy and it remains to be seen whether they would temper this with a pragmatism geared toward the realities of Egypt. A worst case scenario with the MB is absolute control of Egypt would see that country’s destruction and utter humiliation compared to how it is presently constituted.
Some have written about the worrying problem of the Suez Canal being under the control of a Egyptian fundamentalist government with the Muslim Brotherhood in charge, hostile to the West and to Israel. Since Egypt cannot even close the Straights of Tiran without going to war with Israel it doesn't seem likely the West is going to allow the Suez Canal to be compromised. One can easily see a consortium of powers enforcing business as usual at the canal even to the point of declaring the Suez to be a neutral zone under the administration of the United Nations but this time without the ineffective U.N. troops but rather a mixed group of Russian, Chinese, English or American troops. The world at large is simply not going to allow an asset as important to the world's economy as the Suez Canal to be hijacked by yet another fundamentalist group of religious fanatics with delusions of grandeur; fooling around with 2% of the worlds oil in Libya is one thing, compromising the Suez another.
Add to this the revenues that are generated from the canal and into the coffers of Egypt and it's plain to see that a Muslim Brotherhood dominated government would only help wreck the Egyptian economy by trying to use the Suez to extort concessions from the West. Egypt does not have the oil Iran has to finance radicalism and shrug off the economic pariah status that radicalism towards the West produces; Egypt needs to get along with the West whether it likes it or not.
Tourism is the next problem for the Muslim Brotherhood though they claim to welcome it. Tourism was calm before the uprising in Jan. but police rules on tourist movement still strict in some instances or only very recently relaxed due to the 1997 attack on tourists at Luxor by fundamentalists that left 68 dead and the tourist industry is said to be a 10 billion dollar industry for Egypt. To reduce tourism in Egypt by 10 times say, would help wreck Egypt's economy. Thousands of Egyptians would be thrown out of work and the hundreds of hotels in Egypt that cater to the tourist trade would simply disappear and their owners go bankrupt. The loss of tourism would be a major blow to Egypt's economy. For me the equation is a simple one: the more the Muslim Brotherhood successfully inserts itself into Egyptian politics up to and including the Presidency, the more the Egyptian economy will suffer.
The International Monetary Fund is not going to be forgiving any outstanding debt or helping with new debt simply to buy off the Muslim Brotherhood to not rattle sabers at Israel. Israel is quite capable of defending itself and any military confrontation that would result in yet another loss of the Sinai Peninsula by Egypt would actually play into the hands of the international community as regards the Suez Canal and a potential hostile Islamist government in Egypt. The problem for Egypt is that if they lose the Sinai Peninsula again it is probably gone for the foreseeable future.
Another factor to consider is that of foreign investment which is something Egypt very much needs. Any anti-Western government in Egypt that dreams of eventually subverting the West is going to see foreign investments likely drop off quite radically. Although there are always those willing to do business for a dollar or to fill the vacuum left by the West such as China or India, a pariah status for Egypt would in the end not make up for a more friendly attitude towards all when it comes to the Egyptian economy.
Any military adventurism against Israel is simply impossible with American tanks and jets the U.S. will not re-supply or give spare parts to. Re-tooling the entire army would bankrupt Egypt given the presumed cold shoulder from the International Monetary Fund, the drying up of foreign investment and disappearance of tourism which would throw thousands out of work with billions more in revenue lost. Egypt has no oil to finance fundamentalism like Iran and China or Russia is not going to fill the financial void and start another Cold War. Egypt will certainly turn to sharia banking in order to attract money from the Arab states to act as a hedge against any losses from the West; Mubarak frowned on Islamic banking in the past and so it is only natural it will see some kind of a surge, though with what effects and popularity is unknown right now. Corrupt schemes in Egypt's recent past regarding sharia banking might still be fresh in people's memories.
To the south, the new anti-muslim country in Southern Sudan could have a dam built with Western funds whose sole purpose would be to divert the flow of the Nile which even now is only just sufficient to meet Egypt’s needs. Once again, that dam could be protected by foreign troops and Egypt blackmailed at will.
The presence of a truly radical Hamas in Gaza which has a border with Egypt is a factor that would only make life more miserable for Egyptians if that border, which has been mostly sealed under Mubarak, were to be opened and traffic permitted to freely move. Hamas is for all intents and purposes a brother organization with the Muslim Brotherhood and they are dedicated to the destruction of Israel. Many observers in the West see what happened in Gaza when Hamas was elected to power as a microcosm of what could happen in Egypt.
If the MB took over Egypt and wanted to play as tough as their rhetoric suggests, they would only succeed in having Egyptians pine for the good old days under Mubarak. And throw in Egypt’s greatest current problem which is it’s growing population and you have a recipe for disaster.
Sharia doesn’t work in a modern world it chooses to conflict with since it is divorced from reality by many centuries of human social evolution and simply cannot compete. In the case of Malaysia for example, which has a fairly strict version of Sharia but does not agitate against it’s neighbors, Sharia is workable as long as the people in charge keep a weather eye on economic reality and supress any outward expressions of hate.
Let's be honest here - you can't talk about the superior organization and 83 year history of the Muslim Brotherhood as giving it the edge in experience and then not talk about the fact that in that 83 years the MB has accomplished exactly nothing aside from murders, certainly it has not overthrown countries, and to do so is to simply gerrymander facts in a way that is self-contradictory and hope no one notices.
As far as I am concerned it is not journalism to portray the Muslim Brotherhood as already as good as in power in Egypt but irresponsibilty. There is not an ounce of nuance to such claims unless you consider invoking Iran in 1979, slapping it on Egypt irregardless of cultural or political differences to be analysis. Without speaking plainly about specific mechanisms by which the Muslim Brotherhood could exert its political will in Egypt one is really talking about intent without addressing the ability to carry out that intent and this at its heart is wishful thinking not to say fear mongering and to what point.