Blah.
I’m too distracted these days between Lebanon and work in Morocco to write about it much, but there are some important things taking place with the upgrade of the bilateral US-Egypt relationship. Condi Rice insisted that the US-Egyptian Strategic Dialogue (for that is it’s name) includes discussion of Egypt’s domestic situation, but the Egyptian press for the last few days has been quoting Mubarak saying that the US now understands that Egypt will not tolerate intrusion into its internal affairs etc… He literally goes on at lengths about this, and the message to the domestic audience is clear: fuggetaboutit — it being American pressure on the regime, or even deciding not to support the regime as long as it continues the current repressive trend.
What the temporary pressure from the Bush administration did “inspire” democracy activists to do (although I think the 2005 election period was more important as far as Egypt was concerned) was go to international public opinion for their cause. The result of the reversal of policy is that those who dared stick their necks out will now be served a cold dish of revenge by the regime. What started with Ayman Nour, continued with Kifaya and Muslim Brotherhood activists, the judges and most recently the press is likely to continue until the regime feels it has hammered in the message enough: you are alone. For activists, especially during the coming phase of succession-transition, this will leave two possibilities: getting off the streets and stopping (or greatly reducing) their efforts, or escalating either through campaigns by foreign-based groups (such as those started by by Egyptian-Americans recently), or through political violence.
“and heaps praise on the largely irrelevant former (?) regime “intellectualâ€� Osama Al Ghazali Harb and his irrelevant new party (will he be the Post’s new Ayman Nour, since the US has forgotten about him?)”
Why is Osama Al Ghazali Harb’s party irrelevant? I would think that Egyptians would throw their support behind a new reformist party. Seeing how there are no real vialble options right now maybe this could be a start…
And the US didn’t forget about Ayman Nour. Condi Rice gets a question about him every time Egyptan politics comes up. I bet she discussed it with Egypt’s Foreign Minister yesterday too. It’s just that Muburak himself personally crushed him, what’s the US to do aside from direct intervention from Bush himself which Nour declares over and over that he doesn’t want?
Depressing. Clearly supporters of democratic change and human rights in Egypt need to get better organized vis-a-vis the Americans and create a more stable international support base for their cause (one that will hopefully be less vulnerable to the whims and vagaries of what grabs the US foreign policy establishment in a given month). I wonder if Arab-American groups could be persuaded to widen their agenda beyond Palestine issues, because they clearly have some clout and a decent level of organization, and numbers and allies in Congress – though their Lebanese Christian leaderships might be scared off by the MB. What would it take for them to start paying attention again to home-country issues instead of focusing narrowly on discrimination and holding conferences on Khalil Gibran, I wonder…
Were Mubarak’s recent mediation efforts considered useful enough to buy him a few more years of American blind-eye? He didn’t achieve very much, did he?
الدايرة المقطوعة (1977)
عبد الرØمن الأبنودى
إذا مش نازلين للناس � بَلاش
والزم بيتك
بيتك .. بيتك
وابلع صوتك
وا�تكر اليوم ده
لإنه تاريخ موتى وموتك.
…
الله يخرب بيت ال�كر وبيت اليوم
اللى ورّانا ال�كر
لإن ال�كر كتاب
« وعيوضه » Øياته تراب وهباب
عايش زمنه الكدّاب
زى العادة مرتاب
كنكة على د�مْس
ونَ�َس مقطوع �ى الغاب.
ما سبعناش عنه ب�عد
وهو ما شبعْش غياب.
…
ولإن Øمول الأيام مش مرÙ�وع
إذا يدّ عويضة ما تر�عهاش
والقوله الØقّة مش Øقّه
إذا صدر عويضة ما طلّعهاش
والخطوة ØتÙ�ضل مشلولة
إذا قدّامنا عويضة ما خطّاش.
ولإن دى Øاجة
عويضة لسه ما يدركهاش
ولا يدركناش.
…
مش Øتعلّمنى أكتر ما اتعلّمْت
Ø±ÙˆØ Ø¹Ù„Ù‘Ù… أبو الواد والبتّ
اللى Øيرميهم Ù�ÙŠ Ù�رن الثورة
يطيّبوا بكره
واللى Ù„Øدّ الوقت ما يعرÙ�شى ازاى يكتب وازاى يقرا
وازاى يعشق وازاى يكره
ولا عنده �كره
عنك أو عن بكره ولا ليك ذكرى
…
“The Broken Circle” (1977)
by Abd El-Rahman El Abnoudi
If you don’t go down to the people, forget it
Stay in your chicken coop, little chick
Swallow your voice
And remember that day
Because it’s the day we both die.
[…]
To hell with thought, and to hell with the day
That first showed us thought
Because thought’s a book
And Aweda’s life is dust and soot
He goes through this age of lies
Suspicious as usual
Kettle on chaff
Panting into the hookah
We could hardly be further from him
And he could hardly be with us less.
[…]
And because the burden of the days isn’t lifted
Until Aweda’s hand lifts it
And the true word isn’t true
Until it comes from Aweda’s chest
And the step will be paralysed
Until Aweda walks ahead of us.
And because Aweda
Is still unaware of this
And unaware of us.
[…]
You can’t teach me anything.
Go teach the father of the boy and the girl
Who’ll throw them into the oven of revolution
So they’ll make tomorrow better
And who still doesn’t know how to read or write
Or how to love or hate
And hasn’t a clue
About you or tomorrow
And doesn’t give you a moment’s thought.
[…]
“Why is Osama Al Ghazali Harb’s party irrelevant? I would think that Egyptians would throw their support behind a new reformist party. Seeing how there are no real vialble options right now maybe this could be a start…”
Why indeed.
Egypeter, I think Issandr’s dismissal of Osama’s new political party is based on his long and disheartening experience with Egyptian politics. While Osama is no doubt a well meaning intellectual has all sorts of right-thinking ideas for the Egyptian people, it is very doubtful he is going to go through the mucky, unpleasant hassle of creating a truly grass roots organization to appeal to the average Egyptian.
The Egyptian political landscape is littered with “parties” started by intellectuals that have never attracted more than a dozen other salon intellectuals. It’s not just that their ideas don’t galvanize the people, they don’t want to get dirty with the necessary political work. Both Issandr and I worked for one of these right-minded intellectuals who ran for parliament and yet was convinced he wouldn’t need to campaign on the streets.
It’s not an uncommon point of view.
Ayman Nour, for all his faults, did like to get out there and had at least the makings of a grass roots organization, which 7% of the vote aside, made him an annoyance to the regime, hence his treatment.
The only people who have done grass roots campaigning and provision of services correctly and truly reached out to the average Egyptian is the Brotherhood. Love them or hate them, but they operate the most like a political party of any group in Egypt.
Just talk to the people who covered the parliamentary elections to get a sense of what kind of organization they had in funny little Delta towns, not to mention the cities.
When Osama decides to open regional party offices in Delinguet or Kafr al-Duwar, maybe we can actually refer to him as something besides irrelevant.
For Egyptian intellectuals tend to think just having good ideas entitles you to power.
Having attended Dr. Osama’s press conference, I have to admit that I share Issandr’s feeling that this bunch of academics and intellectuals is going to have troubel connecting with the street. Anwar Osmet Sadat was there and gave a breif speech to this effect, saying that he wanted the next event to be not in a five-star hotel but in a governorate, with the people. We’ll see if that happens. But let’s give them a chance, eh?
In the meantime, their website is up, however thin:
http://www.democraticfront.org
Very nice analysis Paul, thanks.
I got your point. Now let’s hope any number of these secular movements actually morph into a real political party with true grass roots support! Best of luck.
Peace
Thanks Paul for the clarification. Egypeter, another reason Osama is “irrelevant” is that, unlike Ayman Nour, from what I’ve seen he has not made an effort to make his politics about the key emergent political constituency for change in Egypt (youth) but rather surrounded himself with a bunch of “respectable’ old fogeys. Change in Egypt will have to mean breaking the current gerontocracy, which is perhaps the most important “cultural” struggle facing Egyptians at the moment (since you’re fond of tackling Egypt’s cultural-political problems). Nour was the only politician who did this in the legal parties. The Muslim Brotherhood doesn’t do it, among the other groups arguably only the Karama party does it now. My impression is that the Wafd is starting to get the importance of this.
The other reason is Osama is, after all, a former close advisor to Gamal Mubarak and full-fleded member of the ruling elite, which Ayman Nour never was. You have to wonder whether Osama is not just continuing the self-agrandisement that started when he loudly left the NDP (and whether he did so only because he was offended he was not really being listened to.)
There is an Arab literary tradition called nasiha, usually translated as “mirror for princes,” whereby intellectuals position themselves as “advisors” to rulers (like Machiavelli’s Prince). This type of text is common, for instance, in the 1001 nights (morality tales for young princes) but also more directly political ones, even sometimes in an aggressive way (Sheikh Abdessalem Yassin’s 1974 letter to the King of Morocco). These people usually have huge egos and make much brouhaha is there wise advice is not listened to. I suspect Osama Al Ghazali Harb was offended when he realized he was not being listened to by Gamal Mubarak and that’s why he left. But he is not a politician.