In Tahrir Square, I saw a young man holding a sign over his head. The sign urged President Hosni Mubarak to flee the country: “Hurry up! My arms are tired.”
Lots of Egyptians seemed to feel the same way. They said they’re sick of Mr. Mubarak and the entire regime — and are increasingly resentful that the Obama administration continues to seem more comfortable with the regime than with people power. My sense is that we’re not only on the wrong side of history but that we’re also inadvertently strengthening the anti-Western elements that terrify us and drive our policy.
President Obama and his aides were blindsided by the crisis from the beginning (as were we in the news media), and I fear that they’ve mishandled it since. When the protests began, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton described Mr. Mubarak’s government as “stable” and “looking for ways to respond to the legitimate needs and interests of the Egyptian people.”
Then our special envoy, Frank Wisner, called for Mr. Mubarak to stay in power, saying: “President Mubarak’s continued leadership is critical.” The White House has tried to backtrack, but it has been backtracking from backtracks so much that on Egypt its symbol might as well be a weather vane.
When well-known journalists like Anderson Cooper of CNN were being beaten up in Tahrir Square, the White House found its voice. But now that foreign reporters are no longer being routinely harassed, it has lost its sense of urgency. “Now” is no longer in the White House lexicon.
America seems to favor reforms under Mr. Mubarak’s vice president, Omar Suleiman, while perhaps throwing Mr. Mubarak himself overboard. But Mr. Suleiman is every bit as much an autocrat as Mr. Mubarak himself, and our emphasis on stability, order and gradualism suggests a profound allergy to popular will.
That raises a basic question: Why does our national policy seem to be that democracy is good for Americans and Israelis, yet dangerous for Egyptians?
One answer is simple. American officials worry that Mr. Mubarak has for decades stifled any secular democratic opposition, so the only organized dissent comes from the Muslim Brotherhood. The fear is that if elections come too soon, before secular groups can organize, the Brotherhood will do well.
That’s a legitimate concern, but it’s one that the Egyptian opposition is fully aware of and has a variety of mechanisms to address. And a new opinion survey shows that the Muslim Brotherhood has only 15 percent approval and its leaders get just 1 percent support in a presidential straw poll (the candidate to watch: Amr Moussa, the chief of the Arab League).
To many Egyptians, the U.S. is conspiring with the regime to push only cosmetic reforms while keeping the basic structure in power. That’s creating profound ill will. In Tahrir Square, I watched as young people predisposed to admire America — the Facebook generation — expressed a growing sense of betrayal. In a country where half the population is under 24, we are burning our bridges.
Americans, perhaps, don’t fully appreciate that the regime is mind-bogglingly corrupt and instinctively repressive. On my blog, nytimes.com/ontheground, I’ve linked to a video that appears to show Egyptian forces shooting an unarmed, unthreatening protester in cold blood and to another that apparently shows a government vehicle driving through a group of protesters, striking them and hurtling on. Those videos are heart-wrenching, and it is because of long experience with the regime’s callousness that ordinary Egyptians don’t trust people like Mr. Suleiman one bit. They think he’s stalling in an effort to retain the system — and they’re probably right.
Human Rights Watch has confirmed 302 deaths in the Egypt upheavals, based on visits to hospitals in three cities, and says the real toll may be significantly higher. To put that in perspective, that is several times the toll when Iran crushed its pro-democracy movement in 2009. And it’s approaching the toll when the Chinese Army opened fire on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing in 1989. Yet when it’s our ally that does the killing, we counsel stability, gradualism and order.
These are Egypt’s problems to work out, not America’s. But whatever message we’re trying to send, the one that is coming through is that we continue to embrace the existing order, and that could taint our future relations with Egypt for many years to come.
Many years ago, when I studied Arabic intensively at the American University in Cairo, I was bewildered initially because for the first couple of months I learned only the past tense. That’s the basic tense in Arabic, and so in any Arabic conversation I was locked into the past.
The Obama administration seems equally caught in the past, in ways that undermine the secular pro-Western forces that are Egypt’s best hope. I hope the White House learns the future tense.
Lots of Egyptians seemed to feel the same way. They said they’re sick of Mr. Mubarak and the entire regime — and are increasingly resentful that the Obama administration continues to seem more comfortable with the regime than with people power. My sense is that we’re not only on the wrong side of history but that we’re also inadvertently strengthening the anti-Western elements that terrify us and drive our policy.
President Obama and his aides were blindsided by the crisis from the beginning (as were we in the news media), and I fear that they’ve mishandled it since. When the protests began, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton described Mr. Mubarak’s government as “stable” and “looking for ways to respond to the legitimate needs and interests of the Egyptian people.”
Then our special envoy, Frank Wisner, called for Mr. Mubarak to stay in power, saying: “President Mubarak’s continued leadership is critical.” The White House has tried to backtrack, but it has been backtracking from backtracks so much that on Egypt its symbol might as well be a weather vane.
When well-known journalists like Anderson Cooper of CNN were being beaten up in Tahrir Square, the White House found its voice. But now that foreign reporters are no longer being routinely harassed, it has lost its sense of urgency. “Now” is no longer in the White House lexicon.
America seems to favor reforms under Mr. Mubarak’s vice president, Omar Suleiman, while perhaps throwing Mr. Mubarak himself overboard. But Mr. Suleiman is every bit as much an autocrat as Mr. Mubarak himself, and our emphasis on stability, order and gradualism suggests a profound allergy to popular will.
That raises a basic question: Why does our national policy seem to be that democracy is good for Americans and Israelis, yet dangerous for Egyptians?
One answer is simple. American officials worry that Mr. Mubarak has for decades stifled any secular democratic opposition, so the only organized dissent comes from the Muslim Brotherhood. The fear is that if elections come too soon, before secular groups can organize, the Brotherhood will do well.
That’s a legitimate concern, but it’s one that the Egyptian opposition is fully aware of and has a variety of mechanisms to address. And a new opinion survey shows that the Muslim Brotherhood has only 15 percent approval and its leaders get just 1 percent support in a presidential straw poll (the candidate to watch: Amr Moussa, the chief of the Arab League).
To many Egyptians, the U.S. is conspiring with the regime to push only cosmetic reforms while keeping the basic structure in power. That’s creating profound ill will. In Tahrir Square, I watched as young people predisposed to admire America — the Facebook generation — expressed a growing sense of betrayal. In a country where half the population is under 24, we are burning our bridges.
Americans, perhaps, don’t fully appreciate that the regime is mind-bogglingly corrupt and instinctively repressive. On my blog, nytimes.com/ontheground, I’ve linked to a video that appears to show Egyptian forces shooting an unarmed, unthreatening protester in cold blood and to another that apparently shows a government vehicle driving through a group of protesters, striking them and hurtling on. Those videos are heart-wrenching, and it is because of long experience with the regime’s callousness that ordinary Egyptians don’t trust people like Mr. Suleiman one bit. They think he’s stalling in an effort to retain the system — and they’re probably right.
Human Rights Watch has confirmed 302 deaths in the Egypt upheavals, based on visits to hospitals in three cities, and says the real toll may be significantly higher. To put that in perspective, that is several times the toll when Iran crushed its pro-democracy movement in 2009. And it’s approaching the toll when the Chinese Army opened fire on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing in 1989. Yet when it’s our ally that does the killing, we counsel stability, gradualism and order.
These are Egypt’s problems to work out, not America’s. But whatever message we’re trying to send, the one that is coming through is that we continue to embrace the existing order, and that could taint our future relations with Egypt for many years to come.
Many years ago, when I studied Arabic intensively at the American University in Cairo, I was bewildered initially because for the first couple of months I learned only the past tense. That’s the basic tense in Arabic, and so in any Arabic conversation I was locked into the past.
The Obama administration seems equally caught in the past, in ways that undermine the secular pro-Western forces that are Egypt’s best hope. I hope the White House learns the future tense.
