"Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur'an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope."—Muslim Brotherhood
Mohamed El-Baradei acts as though he wants “Barack Obama” to act as a dictator or supreme commander, depose Egypt’s lawful leader, and install El-Baradei as president, yet he sees this as a blueprint for “democratic” reform?
El-Baradei really needs to take his irony supplement.
The news reports I read initially either ignored the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in the rioting, or said the group was keeping a low profile, and though some mentioned that it supports imposing shariah, none that I saw mentioned that it was the Muslim Brotherhood that assassinated Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1981. In fact, some sites ludicrously reported that the Brotherhood has “renounced violence.” And Al Qaeda is just a Koran study group.
The Brotherhood has now agreed to support El-Baradei as the “lead spokesman” (elsewhere described as “leader”) of pro-democracy forces, but if Mubarak surrenders power, the Brotherhood will sweep El-Baradei away like so much dust.
Another voice in favor of “democracy” comes from our friends at The Daily Beast, who tell us,
Don't Fear Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood
The secretive Islamic opposition group has long renounced violence and may be the most reasonable option….
The prospect of change in Egypt inevitably raises questions about the oldest and strongest opposition movement in the country, the Muslim Brotherhood , also known as Ikhwan. Can America work with an Egypt where the Ikhwan is part of a transition or even a new government?
The short answer is it is not our decision to make. Egyptians will decide the outcome, not Washington. We should not try to pick Egyptians' rulers. Every time we have done so, from Vietnam’s generals to Afghanistan’s Hamid Karzai, we have had buyer’s remorse. But our interests are very much involved so we have a great stake in the outcome. Understanding the Brotherhood is vital to understanding our options….
After the army seized power in 1952, [the Brotherhood] briefly flirted with supporting Gamal Abdel Nasser’s government but then moved into opposition. Nasser ruthlessly suppressed it.
Nasser and his successors, Anwar Sadat and Mubarak, have alternatively repressed and demonized the Brotherhood or tolerated it as an anti-communist and right-wing opposition….
[“Don't Fear Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood,” by Bruce Riedel, The Daily Beast, January 27, 2011.]
Bruce Riedel’s claim that we have always had buyer’s remorse when we picked rulers is not true. Not in South Vietnam, and not in Iran. The former CIA officer also somehow neglected to mention that Nasser’s brutal suppression of the Brotherhood followed their assassination attempts on him, or that the group assassinated Sadat.
Note the non sequitur:
“Can America work with an Egypt where the Ikhwan is part of a transition or even a new government?
“The short answer is it is not our decision to make.”
The answer to what? Riedel’s answer is to a different question, whether America should have any say in the governing of a country that gets $1.5 billion in annual aid from us, and he admits that “our interests are very much involved so we have a great stake in the outcome.” Beyond that, as he well knows, Egypt is essential to regional stability.
Riedel never answers his question, because the answer is “no,” but he does not want to come clean with his true loyalties.
He also ignores the fact that the democratic Egyptian El-Baradei wants America to intervene, and “to pick Egyptians' rulers.”
The notion that America should be passive in the face of a possible Islamist takeover in Egypt, and in much of North Africa, is completely inimical to America’s interests. Then again, Riedel’s orientation clearly is anti-American: He supported the Communist takeover of South Vietnam, and supports an Islamist takeover of Egypt and North Africa.
You might as well say, “Don't Fear Al Qaeda.”
Alinskyite Marxist Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also seeks to install “a transition that will meet the needs of the Egyptian people and that will truly establish democracy…”
Eight years ago, Zeev Chafets observed that Arab Moslems don’t march in favor of more democracy, but for less of it. They don’t march for peace, but for war. Mohamed El-Baradei may have fallen in love with his press clippings, but Bruce Riedel and Hillary Clinton know these truths better than I do.
Democracy is not an option.
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