Whither Egypt?

The Muslim Brotherhood, emerging from decades of suppression by the former military government of President Hosni Mubarak, has found favour with the current military government that has replaced the previous one, in the wake of Tahrir Square uprisings. The irony is, of course that the Tahrir Square protesters were primarily liberal-minded securalists. Little did they imagine that their insistent courage would result in the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, much less the tag-along Salafist al-Nour party.

Yet this is precisely what has occurred. The protest leaders that led Egypt to disown its president and accept the continued military administration as a temporary bridge between an elected parliament and the military rulers who pledged to step down as soon as elections brought a civilian government to power, little realized what would step into the breach. They had envisaged a free and tolerant society, one based on a democratic principle of equality and opportunities. Instead they got a recalcitrant military government, not too eager to surrender power.

And what the idealists managed to do was unleash a splendid opportunity for the Muslim Brotherhood to finally come to the fore, a political group which had, over the years of repression, fronted candidates for election that did not outwardly identify their Muslim Brotherhood bona fides. The Muslim Brotherhood has been transformed from an outlawed political group suppressing their affiliation to field independents for parliament, to the position of inheritor of Egypt's parliamentary rule.

Now, China and Russia, Nigeria, Cuba, Spain and other countries have sent their diplomats to pay their respects to the clearly successful Muslim Brotherhood, meeting with their chiefs in acknowledgement of Egypt's new political direction. And they're not alone. The United States also understands that it is essential that they"engage with the party that won the election"; Senator John Kerry, chairman of the foreign relations committee stated: "The United States needs to deal with the new reality."

And if it needs to do that, so too does Israel. The Muslim Brotherhood, at this juncture of alternating worlds leading to a questioned future in the Middle East and outward-bound, claims it looks forward to an Egyptian government for which respect for religious freedoms will predominate. Whose religious freedoms they haven't enunciated, but clearly, given what has occurred recently in Egypt and elsewhere in the latterly-Islamist world, not for Christians, nor for Jews.

While assuring the West that it will respect free markets and international commitments, including Egypt's long-standing peace treaty with Israel, it says so to the West, and speaks quite differently to itself. Its deputy chief, Rashad al-Bayoumi, informed Al-Hayat newspaper the Brotherhood has no requirement to recognize Israel, which they characterized as an "occupying entity". Nor is any Brotherhood member evidently prepared to meet with Israeli representatives.

Moreover, as for respect for religious freedoms, the Brotherhood has recently stated that henceforth, as far as they are concerned, passage which has been routine but not uncontroversial for Israelis, to visit the Tomb of hallowed rabbinical figure, Rabbi Yaakov Abu Hatzira will be a thing of the past; saying that to attempt such an accustomed visit by Jews henceforth would be akin to a "suicide mission".

Tomb of Rabbi Yaakov Abu Hatzira

The Brotherhood has captured the loyalty of a large aggregate of Egyptians, eager to vote for them. They have done this by the simple expedient of providing to Egyptians the necessities of life which the government has never bothered to concern itself unduly with. ( They have done this elsewhere, where Muslims reside, and where Brotherhood branches were situated in other countries.) Everything from medical assistance to food and fuel has been subsidized by the Muslim Brotherhood, making them indispensable to the well-being of indigent Egyptians.

This is a strategy that the Muslim Brotherhood has used for generations, to encourage loyalty to itself, and it was deployed equally successfully by its offshoot, Hamas in Gaza, and by Hezbollah in Lebanon. The commitment to democracy by the Tahrir Square protesters may be repeated by the Muslim Brotherhood, but it will be an entirely different 'democracy' that emerges when shortly both the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafist party become the effective government.

The Brotherhood is confident it will reap a near-majority of votes when the final tally is taken; in the range of 48%. And its Salafist counterpart, which is so fundamentally inclined that in contrast the Brotherhood takes on the mellow tones of 'moderation', which will have roughly 20% of the Egyptian vote will between them transform the country markedly. Whether this will in the final analysis, be a positive passage for Egypt will be debatable.

How the Middle East reacts to this new Egyptian reality will be a compelling - and one may hope, not entirely fearsome transformation - impacting stability if not of the Arab world, then of the volatile world of a tiny nation in their midst threatened by non-Arab Islamists and Arab Islamists alike.