| Submitted by: Pat T THE OPPORTUNITY OF EGYPT |  |  |
| Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler | |
| Tuesday, 01 February 2011 | |
It's a sign of age when you see pictures of two million people massing in Cairo's Tahrir Square, and the very first question that occurs to you is: How do they all go to the bathroom? It's a puzzle. What isn't a puzzle is the next question: What do these masses of Egyptian demonstrators want? Let's start the answer by recognizing that it's very clear what they do not want, what they are not chanting and demonstrating for: Radical Islam and an Iranian-type Islamic theocracy. Sure they are 90% Moslems (about 10% of Egypt's 80 million are Coptic Christians), and when the muezzin calls out prayer time, the demonstrators kneel en masse to pray. Yet whenever someone starts shouting religious chants over a loudspeaker, the crowd shouts back for him to stop. Leïla Trabelsi and her family. She was an illiterate hairdresser who got Ben Ali's attention because she was astoundingly attractive. He married her in 1992 and she proceeded to do what all Tunisians would do in her position: steal as much as she could for herself and her Trabelsi extended family. Tunisian envy finally swept her, her family, and her husband away. The revolution in Tunisia had nothing to do with Islam. And it was really a palace coup, not a true revolution, for today the same politicians control the government, and the same generals control the army. Only the dictator himself and his minions are out. What made this possible was the generals saying to the protestors, "We are with you," and that their troops were ordered not to use live ammo. So they're still in power and still have the guns. So when a Khomeini wanna-be like Yes, this is all a moving target. Yes, thugs from Napoleon to Lenin to Mao to Khomeini succeeded by taking over, not starting, an already ongoing revolution. So yes, Egypt could go sideways and we could have a Islamic mega-disaster. But there's never opportunity without danger, for dangers are what make opportunities possible. Therefore - will all the doomsaying handwringing conservatives please stop their ceaseless worry-worting about the Iqwan - Iqwan Muslimi, the Moslem Brotherhood - and focus on how we can take advantage of the Arab Revolt instead? Focus first on three basic facts. 1). Mubarak is toast. He's 82, dying of prostate cancer, there's no way he can hold on to power any longer, he'll soon be gone like Ben Ali of Tunisia - so it is stupid of anyone from Israelis to a gaggle of US conservatives to demand that he be kept in power. It's over, his music is finished, deal with it. 2). What really matters now, as it always does in these situations, is who ends up controlling the guns. Lenin was just a schmuck in St. Petersburg until his Bolshies got enough guns to take over. The Shah's generals were suicidal fools to let Khomeini take control of their guns. 3). History does not repeat itself. Could we let that sink in? History does not repeat itself. If this were not true about history, we could never learn from it to do things better or differently - it would just keep repeating itself with us as passive spectators. Egypt is not Iran, this is not 1979, and Iran of 2011 is not Iran of 1979. What motivated the protests in Tunisia that started all of this? Envious rage at the enormous greed of Ben Ali's wife, Rachid Ghannouchi shows up in Tunis, he immediately genuflects towards democracy and denounces Islamist terrorism - because the generals have told him to behave or he'll take a one-way helicopter ride over the Mediterranean. Which brings us to the key player in the Egyptian drama - Omar Suleiman. He's Egypt's spymaster who's run the EGID, Egyptian General Intelligence Directorate, since 1993, and since Saturday (1/29) the country's Vice-President. Suleiman is a very smart man. Both our intel agencies and those of Israel have immense regard for him - as do the generals of the Egyptian Army. He's the one to watch, for he's the one determining Egypt's future now. On Sunday (1/30), he and Defense Minister Mohamed Tantawi sat down with Mubarak and told him he had to resign. When is the only question (trying to wait until after the next election won't work). Suleiman's brokering a deal with ElBaradei and the April 6 Movement organizers of the protests for a transitional government leading to actual elections. The Iqwan will be included in the deal under the same ground rules as in Tunisia. Yesterday (1/31), at Suleiman's order, the Egyptian Army announced it would not fire on any peaceful protestors. Thus today, those million folks in Tahrir Square are having a party of a protest with a rock festival feeling, and not one of violence and rock-throwing anger. The Palestinian terrorist group Hamas that runs Gaza is an Iqwan affiliate. Today (2/01), Israel gave permission for Egyptian troops to enter Sinai and seal off Gaza, preventing Hamas agents getting in to Egypt and helping the Iqwan. This was arranged by Suleiman. All the radical Muzzies hate Suleiman - Iqwan, Hamas, Al Qaeda, Islamic Jihad, Iran's Mullahcracy. If he continues to run Egypt's show, if only from behind the scenes, then Egypt will not succumb to them, for they will never get the Army's guns. As I'm writing this, Reuters just reported a perfect example. A spokesman for Iqwan has announced that General Sami Enan, the army's chief of staff, would be acceptable as a successor to Hosni Mubarak. This has Suleiman's fingerprints all over it. So - at this moment, things are going well. Which is why it is critical to seize the moment and focus its energy on the right targets, such as Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and Palestinian terrorists. Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad proclaimed today that anti-regime revolts in Tunisia and Egypt "can't happen here." At the very time he was saying this, Agence France Presse was reporting a "2011 Syrian Revolution" was being organized via Facebook (same as the April 6 Movement) in Damascus. Today, Human Rights Watch condemned Hamas and the Palestinian Authority for brutally breaking up rallies in Gaza and the "West Bank" in support of the demonstrations in Egypt. Hamas and the PA are rival dictatorships. They are terrified that a successful pro-democracy revolt next door could be exported to them. Palestinians are Sunni Moslem. A half-million of them live in Lebanon as "refugees" from Israel and treated as üntermenchen by Lebanon's two million Shia Moslems. Hezbollah, the great threat to Israel with its vast weaponry supplied by Iran, is a Shia outfit. Now would be an especially apposite moment to spark an anti-Hezbollah revolt by Palestinians in Lebanon demanding full rights and citizenship. If Lebanon's 1½ million Christians get caught in another Lebanese civil war, Israel could offer them asylum and a path to Israeli citizenship. Israel needs all the anti-Muzzies they can get. And who knew Iran's Foreign Minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, was such a comedian? Today he declared his dictatorship's support for the "freedom, justice and independence seekers" of Egypt. He actually called for "an end to unpopular regimes" and for people "to have their own self-determination." Certainly some prominent world leader or diplomat - hello, White House, anyone home? Hillary, are you there? - could announce their support for the freedom, justice and independence seekers of Iran, and for an end to the unpopular regime so hated by the people of Iran who deserve their own self-determination. Wouldn't this be an excellent time for the Stuxnet cyberworm to "trigger the atomic calamity" at the Bushehr nuke plant? That would meltdown the Iranian economy and precipitate an uncontainable rebellion across the country. However it's done, Bibi Netanyahu should be focusing his efforts on how to best export the Egyptian Revolution to Iran. Omar Suleiman will be all too happy to assist. What is going on with these Arab Revolts is young people rebelling for food, economic opportunity, and political freedom - not for their lives to be controlled by imams and mullahs. Further, the world's largest Moslem country, Indonesia, is a real democracy - so much for the "Islam is not compatible with democracy" myth. There is no doubt whatever that Islam can also be quite compatible with fascist tyranny and medieval oppression. Right now, this week, there is chaos and revolt with octogenarian dictators teetered or teetering. It could go Islamo-fascist bad. Yet it could also go in the direction of freedom. This could end up being a monumental disaster for the Fascists of Islam. That's the opportunity of Egypt, and we - us, the Israelis, and advocates of freedom anywhere - had better take advantage of it fast, or the moment will be gone and the forces of darkness may instead prevail. |
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