Reevaluate America's Relationship with Egypt

Ben Chouake

I am writing at this time to ask you to and your fellow senators and congressmen to reevaluate America's longstanding, one sided, ill-advised relationship with Egypt.

The United States currently provides President Mubarak's government with more than Two Billion ($2,000,000,000.) Dollars per year in financial aid. Most of the aid provided by the United States is in the form of military credits, which are being used as part of a military buildup to go to war with one or both of Egypt's more likely enemies, the United States or Israel. This is a shamefully large sum of money to dispense to a country that denies its citizens the most basic human rights, including freedom of religion and freedom of the press. Even more troubling, Egypt often persecutes, jails and tortures those who seek such freedoms. Egyptian academic Saad Eddin Ibrahim is a tragic case in point.

Ibrahim is a respected sociologist who in May 2001 was sentenced to seven years in prison. His "crime"? He challenged Mubarak to hold free elections, respect Egypt's Coptic Christian minority and to work towards real peace with Israel. The United States has ignored Ibrahim's plight and Egyptian officials have utilized the September 11 attacks to justify its actions with respect to individuals like Ibrahim. This is someone the United States should support, a man who could make an impact on Egyptian society, yet we dare not whisper his name.

To the contrary, Egyptian Prime Minister Atef Abeid has stated that "... Western countries should begin to think of Egypt's own fight against terror as their new model." (See Peter Beinart's article in the New Republic, November 5, 2001.) Egypt long ago imposed a special emergency law, (which has been in effect since 1981), which permits special military courts, condones torture, and permits the imprisonment of anyone who speaks out against Mubarak's totalitarian regime. There are other recent activities by the Egyptian government which should cause us great concern. Books that are deemed contrary to the beliefs of Islamic fundamentalists are banned and their authors arrested. In July 2001, 52 alleged homosexuals were placed on trial for "contempt for religion". Schools have banned the Egyptian flag and its national anthem as symbols of secularism.

Egypt has also reacted inappropriately to the September 11th attacks by failing to show even minimal support for the American reaction to the attacks. Mr. Mubarak's issued a lukewarm endorsement on October 9 (two days after the bombing began) coupled with the demand that we "take measures to resolve the Palestinian problem." Foreign Minister Amr Moussa, who also serves as Secretary General of the Arab League, sponsored a resolution on October 10 at the 56 nation Islamic Conference to oppose American attacks on any Arab country as part of the current anti-terrorism campaign, simply to cover Sadaam Hussein. (See Washington Post, 10/11/01). Moussa went on to state that the world must address the "causes" of terrorism, an all too unsurprising comment in light of Moussa's revival of the slanderous "Zionism is racism" chant at the Durban conference earlier this year. It was Moussa who led all Arab countries to reject the Norwegian compromise proposal that was offered at Durban. Nabil Osman, Mubarak's chief spokesman, issued the following statement in response to the September 11th attacks: "One cannot condemn these acts without condemning the acts of the occupier."

Mubarak's actions (or inactions) reflect his "plan" to insure that his totalitarian regime remains in power, at any cost. Largely through American financial aid, Mubarak maintains his morally and economically bankrupt rule over an increasingly impoverished and uneducated people by encouraging state controlled clerics and state supported media to deliver virulent, hateful anti-Western, anti-Semitic and anti- Israel statements. Let us look at just a few examples, most of which can be read in Jeffrey Goldberg's article in the October 8 New Yorker:
* Lotfi Nasaf, deputy editor of the Egyptian government sponsored daily, Al-Gomhuriya, wrote that the "Holocaust is an exaggeration" and that the gas chambers were the product of "Jewish imagination"; he also wrote that "The crimes of the Zionists against the Palestinians far outweigh any of the crimes committed by the Nazis".
* Al Akhbar, a moderate government sponsored paper recently authored an editorial as follows: "Thanks to Hitler, of blessed memory, who on behalf of the Palestinians, took revenge in advance, against the most vile criminals on the face of Earth."
* Mustafa Bakri, the editor of Al-Usbu, a government sponsored Egyptian weekly, wrote that he dreamt he was Ariel Sharon's bodyguard, that he shot Sharon, and screamed "Long live Egypt, long live Palestine." and also wrote that if the United States responds to the September 11th attacks, America "will be a legitimate target of Arab anger".
* Ahmad Murad, a columnist for a government sponsored paper known as Al Arabi wrote shortly after September 11th as follows: I am happy about what happened to America; I am happy about the great number of American dead." These horrific thoughts were echoed in the days after September 11th by many of the paper's other writers.
* Mustafa Mahmod, founder of the mosque in Cairo that bears his name, a respected surgeon who manages several clinics and hospitals, and the host of a popular Egyptian television show entitled "Science and Faith" had this reaction to the September 11th attacks: "This was an attack on American arrogance", and then added that "the Branch Davidians attacked the World Trade Center... the Mossad gave them help."

These are not the rants of uneducated, poor, discontented ordinary Egyptians. These are the voices of Egyptian clerics and writers; these are Egypt's intellectuals, who are the product of the state sponsored Egyptian media. Mubarak, in order to protect his own economic interests, has delivered to Islamic fundamentalists total and absolute supremacy over Egyptian educational and cultural activities.

The dissemination of these vile, false, ideas have consequences; and their impact on Egyptian society is powerful. Has anyone stopped to ask why so many of the terrorists involved in the September 11th attack were Egyptians? Aren't we all aware that Bin Laden's chief lieutenant Ayman al-Zawahari, is Egyptian and the product of these hateful ideas? Don't we all acknowledge that while Egypt maintains strong diplomatic ties with terrorist friendly nations such as Iraq, Libya and Iran, it continues to vote against American interests at the United Nations in more than two thirds of all votes? It would be fair to say that Egypt is the root of radical Islam and that the Mubarak regime, by sponsoring and supporting the media, has played a substantial role in inciting this cancerous growth.

We all understand why Mubarak advances such positions; Egypt's economic failures and low standard of living would cause massive unrest domestically if there weren't a convenient target, whether that be the United States or Israel in terms of foreign policy, or liberal secularists at home. As critic Fouad Ajami stated: "The terror has given Mubarak a splendid alibi and an escape from the demands put forth by segments of the middle class and its organizations in the professional syndicates-the lawyers, the engineers and the journalists- for a measure of political participation." That in turn means increased poverty and corruption, which only benefits the Islamic fundamentalists in their search for discontented minds.

What better way to sidestep criticism and divert attention from the real issues facing Egypt than by using anti-Israel and anti-American statements as a refuge to maintain power, unfortunately at American expense. What better way to maintain control domestically than by denying basic freedoms to elements of society that can be easily repressed. Mubarak does not present a program for his people because he has no vision for the future. Mubarak does not share the values we are trying to defend since his only goal is self-preservation. Stephen P. Cohen, a prominent Middle East expert, was quoted in the New York Times on October 9 as follows: "Regimes such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia have a legitimate fear of democracy- the fear that free elections would be exploited by Islamic extremists who are basically undemocratic. But these Arab leaders have to understand that if we root out these extremists-who have been produced by their own bad governance-we are not doing it so these regimes can keep their countries free of democracy for everyone else. We want to make the world safe for democracy, and they want to make the world safe from democracy."

It is time to acknowledge that our financial support to Egypt fuels public rage directed at the United States and promotes a vicious and corrupt government that cannot be trusted in a war against terrorists. If the United States government insists on delivering extensive aid packages to Egypt in the future, we should then have the right (if not the obligation based on recent events) to insist (a) that the public dialogue in Egypt be changed dramatically and immediately, (b) that financial aid be used to educate and not to misinform the Egyptian people, (c) that freedom of thought and freedom of expression be advanced and (d) that our financial aid package promote the ideals with which we are fighting to defend. If the United States is intent on continuing its policy of providing aid to Egypt, the aid must be limited to economic credits only. Let aid given to Egypt be in the form of the purchase of American manufactured consumer goods; but let us also insist that this economic aid be tied directly to the termination of any and all state sponsored slander and libel against America and Israel, or else all aid must cease.

If Mubarak doesn't understand these basic points, then he should suffer the consequences of his actions-no financial aid and no political support. Common sense dictates that if Egypt enables or promotes terrorism, it gives the United States, which is fighting terrorism both at home and abroad, and which is seeking to promote liberty and justice throughout the world, little common ground on which to base a relationship with this inflexible, autocratic regime.

Ben Chouake
President