Is there any coherent, consistent thought going on behind our policy toward Egypt?
Let me ask you a question: What do the majority of Egyptians want? Do you know? Does Obama?
Here’s what veteran observer Edward Luttwak writes today in the Wall Street Journal
The few journalists who speak colloquial Egyptian Arabic report that among the poor majority of the population—those who wear the traditional robe (djellaba) and depend on bread subsidized by the state—many still support Mr. Mubarak.
Israel and our Arab allies in the region, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, think we are making a mistake by pushing Mubarak out right away. They know their region.
And yet, in a remarkably blunt American intrusion into the internal affairs of another country, we have the president of the United States bowing to the mob in the street, trying to force Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak out of power.
The Obama administration has no consistent policy other than to take the temperature in Tahriri Square. And to throw a longtime friend to the wolves. Not that Mubarak isn’t himself the king of the wolves, but he is our ally. And to “avoid violence.” Allies, shmallies.
Here is how our policy started out Sunday. Hillary Clinton suggested Mubarak should stick around and have a “dialogue” about the future.
What we’re trying to do is to help clear the air so that those who remain in power, starting with President Mubarak, with his new vice president, with the new prime minister, will begin a process of reaching out, of creating a dialogue that will bring in peaceful activists and representatives of civil society to, you know, plan a way forward that will meet the legitimate grievances of the Egyptian people.
Monday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said it’s not our place to figure out who should rule Egypt.
That is not for our country or our government to determine. I don’t think that people that seek greater freedom are looking for somebody else to pick what and how that change looks like.
On Tuesday, Obama decided that, oops, it is U.S. policy to interfere, telling Mubarak to start getting the Hell out now.
What is clear — and what I indicated tonight to President Mubarak — is my belief that an orderly transition must be meaningful, it must be peaceful, and it must begin now.
By Thursday, the message to Mubarak had evolved from start getting the Hell out now to GET THE HELL OUT NOW.
From a New York Times article this morning titled, “White House and Egypt Discuss Plan for Mubarak’s Exit.”
The Obama administration is discussing with Egyptian officials a proposal for President Hosni Mubarak to resign immediately and turn over power to a transitional government headed by Vice President Omar Suleiman with the support of the Egyptian military, administration officials and Arab diplomats said Thursday.
Does Obama think the Egyptian people will tearfully, gratefully thank us for our help in shoving Mubarak aside? After we supported him for 30 years?
Nobody can replace a man who has ruled a country for 30 years and have the same credibility he would – the same base of support – to oversee an orderly political transition. Without Mubarak, the chances for chaos go way up.
Once Mubarak gets on a plane and heads for the Ritz Carlton Doha, an immense power vacuum is created, the giant sucking sound of which will be animated by every fundamentalist America-hater who can be found in Egypt.
The people of Egypt will never love America. They won’t – it’s shocking for the White House – even love Obama. And once the Muslim Brotherhood is running Egypt, they will suffer, and so will we. And Egyptians will get plenty of violence.
18 thoughts on “Slapdash Obama Policy Toward Egypt”
I am not sure I agree with this ally stuff. Strange bedfellow maybe–or not so strange–this country has always liked to think it could control strongmen-torturers. This is all in aid of Israel, right? We need to try to reshape this govt–including our little fingershaking sessions saying things are “unacceptable”–for Israel? I am doubtful that the “protestors” are all idealistic students summoned through Facebook. Certainly the burners are hired by the govt. This is a mess–and the fact that it’s happening across the Muslim world–is no coincidence.
I keeping read bits and peices on the net that the protestors are hired by Hamas-Hezbollah-Fatah and funded by Iran.
If PresidentMubarak decides that it’s in the best interest of Egypt that he stays in office and the military supports his decision, we can kiss that special friendship with Egypt goodbye.
I think they are banking on our contacts with the military to keep our hand in–oh, and the $1.3 billion we give the military.
Excellent overview. What is particularly galling to me is that when BO went on his apology tour in 2009 this was exactly the sort of US policies he was apologying for. Now he’ll after go on his own apology tour.
There is less than 600,000 protestors in Tahrir Square. There are 80,000,000 Egyptians. The Administration has been making its decisions based upon the temperature of the protestors, the liberal media and the EU, not what the majority of Egyptians choose by election.
The way he is falling apart on this,just imagine the outcome that will arise from Iran and the DPRK’s nuclear weapons programs…
Yep,Were in trouble
Jeff, that is probably an understatement.
The Carter-Clinton-Obama Administration’s (were)/are bound to votes and public sentiment, not a bond of national integrity between allies. Carter lost Iraq, Clinton lost Lebanon and Obama has now lost Iran, Lebanon (again), and now Egypt. Plus, Obama supports pan-Arab Islamic extremism in its modern-Nazi, terroristic, gutter form: the Muslim Brotherhood.
JE, makes a good point about George Soros. Any minor research on his Open Society Initiative (OSI) shows that Soros-dollars are used to foment extremist, anti-Semitic, anti-American causes. Why the Bush Administration never shut this man down I will never know. The Obama Administration works WITH this anti-Semitic bigot. When Glenn Beck pointed out just WHO Soros is, Beck was attacked as an anti-Semite by our liberal media filth. I bet, in another few months, we will probably see that Soros may have been involved in the “student uprisings” in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan and now Syria.
With the United States geo-politically decapitated, politically truncated and now testicularly-challenged in leadership, Israel will be all alone. The Arabs know that to destroy Israel they must use the liberal “peace now” movement inside her own borders to disarm her. Once Israel abandons her nuclear weapons, the Arabs will launch a multi-front offensive (1948, 1956, 1973) to destroy her piecemeal.
Interesting, many Democratic, liberal, anti-Israel groups are working through various left-wing Israeli groups (including the Israeli Labor Party) to have Israel retreat from the Golan Heights. Moshe Dayan: “Whoever controls the Golan Heights, controls Israel.”
Jeff, good point. If we collapse at the sight of this protest, we will never deal with the really big problems in a forceful way.
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Obama Regime never turned Egypt into the UN’s Human Rights Violations Committe yet the Obama Regime turned the State of Arizona into the UN for Human Rights violations for their Illegal Alein policy. Now Obama wants to take credit for the Egypt revolt? Obama is a complete fraud.
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