Madrid daily ABC, in Spanish at:
http://www.abc.es/20110206/internacional/abcp-vision-desde-israel-esto-2
0110206.html
The Middle East - is it a Revolution?
The "revolution" in Egypt is still only an uprising, but even so it can
be considered a political and strategic earthquake.
Israel sees with great apprehension the events developing in Tunisia,
Egypt, Jordan, Yemen and beyond. Not that the Israeli leaders and people
would not be happy to acclaim democratic regimes in these countries. The
problem is we live in this dangerous neighborhood and are aware of its
recent and more distant history.
"Revolutions" in this area have turned in military authoritarian or
dictatorial regimes - see Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Syria, Sudan. The
revolutionary Islamic Party in Iran has assassinated and in the best
case imprisoned its moderate Islamists, liberal and communist partners
and imposed a repressive theocratic regime. Free elections in the
Palestinian Authority brought to power Hamas which killed its Fatah
comrades in a bloody coup. Where is Lebanon today, after the popular
uprising of 2005 against the Syrian occupation and the victory of 14
March forces in the 2009 elections? Even the slow Islamization of Turkey
under AKP does not bode well for the future of the region.
In Egypt there are roughly three possible scenarios: the best one would
be if the military stabilize the situation and lead a slow
democratization process; the second is quick free elections leading to a
secular/liberal coalition with the Muslim Brotherhood but in the end the
Islamists grab power by their sheer organizational skills and pitiless
determination; the worst scenario would be a period of chaos and
internal strife of the kind happening in Pakistan, including growing
activity of salafist radicals.
In the two last cases Hamas in Gaza will be strengthened and the balance
in the West Bank, and possibly in Jordan, could also turn in favor of
the Islamists.
Those in the West which are sure "this is not 1979, and Egypt's
Facebook-adept youth are not lining up behind the Muslim Brotherhood,
itself scarcely a band of fanatics,"* are not aware how effectively the
same modern tools are used by the Islamists and the al-Qaeda networks.
The Middle East is in turmoil and will change immensely even if the
uprising fails in Egypt.
Israel will for sure pay a price. The official Egyptian TV already
accuses "Jews" to have trained "insurgents" and it is known that the
liberal, nationalist and leftist opponents to the regime are fiercely
anti-Israeli, not to mention the Islamists.
It will be very interesting to see what happens in Syria in the next
days and weeks and if there the opposition will dare rebel against
Assad's dictatorial regime.
A positive development could be if events in Egypt provoke a
revitalization of the reformist uprising in Iran, where the economic
situation is appalling and the hatred to the regime growing after the
bloody repression.
Obama's administration's handling of the crisis and its abrupt rebuke of
President Mubarak, America's most important Middle Eastern ally, while
in June 2009 Obama didn't support the Iranian masses which rose against
the theocratic regime, projects a very negative US image to other Arab
leaders and raises serious concerns in Israel too.
Only the future will say if a real democratization process is possible
in the Middle East, as it happened in Eastern Europe and South America,
and if peace and stability will accompany it.
* Roger Cohen, "Hosni Mubarak Agonistes," The New York Times, February
3, 2011.
Ely Karmon, Ph.D.
Senior Research Scholar
International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) and
The Institute for Policy and Strategy (IPS) at
The Interdisciplinary Center (IDC)
Herzlyia, Israel
Tel.: 972-9-9527277
Cell.: 972-52-2653306
Fax.: 972-9-9513073, 972-9-7716653
E-mail: ekarmon@idc.ac.il
Web: http://www.ict.org.il/
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