By Barry Rubin
Yes, friends, it’s once again time for that exciting game of Spin the Polls by the Pew Foundation. Here are the rules:
Rule 1: Pew does a good job on the poll itself.
Rule 2: The Pew analysis ignores or misunderstands the implications of the poll.
Rule
3: The Western media and government misread the poll, often
misinterpreting the results into the exact opposite of what they
actually mean. They then adopt the wrong policies.
Rule 4: If correctly interpreted the polls are a gold mine that can help us comprehend the present and predict the future.
Some
years ago, for example, I analyzed a Pew poll. The poll showed that
people in Arab countries had a low opinion of al-Qaida. It was then
interpreted as meaning that they were moderate. In fact, as I wrote the
poll showed a shockingly high level of support for revolutionary
Islamism, especially in Egypt and Jordan.
Once again we have the misleading spin beginning with the headline: “Egyptians Remain Optimistic, Embrace Democracy and Religion in Political Life.”
If I were writing the headline it would be: “Egyptians Want Radical Islamist State More Than Anything Else.”
To be fair to Pew, the lead of their analysis is something very significant that couldn’t have been imagined before now: “Opinions of the U.S. and President Obama continue to be overwhelmingly unfavorable.” This is somehow spun, however, to imply that there is no real crisis and that U.S. policy need not be reexamined or changed.
After all, the Obama Administration’s role in helping to overthrow
not just President Husni Mubarak (a reasonable action) but the entire
regime brought no gain for the United States whatsoever. Instead it
helped bring to power an anti-American regime likely to destabilize the
region and bring war.
The poll concludes that Egyptians still
want the same type of relationship with the United States. But what
does this mean other than continuing to take U.S. aid money? Using
America as a scapegoat—as Middle Eastern dictatorships have done now for
more than a half-century—it won’t be long before hate-America rallies,
demagogic anti-American speeches, a lack of cooperation on issues, and
violence-inciting broadcasts or articles become routine.
You won’t be surprised to hear that
two-thirds of Egyptians want to throw out the peace treaty with Israel.
The U.S. Congress has properly determined that this would lead to an end
of U.S. aid. So what will the next Egyptian government do? Simple,
don’t throw out the treaty formally but just break it in every way
possible.
What’s most critical is how Egyptians
think of their own country. Here’s a very revealing apparent
contradiction. Read carefully.
The Pew poll’s headline says that
Egyptians are optimistic but that they also believe the economic
situation is not good. Half of them claim things have gotten worse since
Mubarak fell. Why then do 53 percent (albeit 65 percent) believe the
country is headed in the right direction?
The answer is that they are happy with
the political direction—toward radical Islamism—but do not think it will
improve their material lives. They make a distinction between material
benefit and spiritual-ideological preference. Such a choice is never
understood in the West, especially by those who argue that everyone
wants the same things in life, so an Islamist regime must deliver
prosperity or fall, and consequently that radicals must moderate in
order to fill their people’s stomachs.
Remember what Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini, architect of Iran’s revolution, said back in 1979: People in
the West don’t understand that we didn’t make this revolution to lower
the price of watermelons.
No, the substitute for such material
success is repression plus finding the right scapegoat and subsidizing
certain key constituencies (notably the military), which brings us back
to the antagonism against the need to build antagonism against the
United States, Israel, and the West, doesn’t it?
Another apparent contradiction is
equally revealing. When asked whether they preferred to model Egypt on
Saudi Arabia or Turkey regarding religion’s role in government, thy
chose Saudi Arabia by a 61 to 17 percent margin. Note that Western
pundits and experts keep insisting that there is some kind of Turkish
model of moderate Islamism. Aside from the fact that Turks aren’t Arabs,
this is a sign of the base of support for a fully sharia state.
Remember that as Sunni Muslims, Egyptians are not going to cite Iran as
their model. And when they are talking about Saudi Arabia they are not
indicating its basic alliance with the United States but its extreme
form of Islamic rule in domestic life.
When asked if Egypt’s laws should strictly adhere to the Quran, 60
percent said yes while another 32 percent said it should follow the
values and principles of Islam more generally. Let’s say that this 60
percent (see the Saudi model, above) is the firm base for Islamist rule.
This is less than the 75 percent the Islamists received in the
parliamentary elections, suggesting that 15 percent of these voters are
not so totally for an Islamist society.
That
32 percent are not “moderate Muslims” or “secularist Muslims” but they
are non-Islamist Muslims. A few years ago there were a lot more of them
but their ranks are steadily eroded by the advance of revolutionary
Islamism. Since there is no strong alternative theological or political
leadership in that direction, this is unlikely to be strong enough to
block an Islamist transformation. And who is left as the genuine,
secular or for a minimally religious state? The Christians, that’s about
all.
Pew
makes much of supposed moderation by pointing out that two-thirds of
those who endorsed the Saudi model also said democracy is their
preferred form of government; 64 percent want a free press; 61 percent
want free speech.
But
what does this really mean in the context of Egypt? Of course they
support “democracy” since the alternative they have in mind is the hated
Mubarak dictatorship. And what does democracy mean to them? A landslide
victory for the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists! Thus, when they
think about, “This is what democracy looks like,” that means eternal
Islamist victories.
As
for a free press and free speech, that means diversity, though we
should remember that proportionately newspaper reading in Egypt is tiny
compared to the West. Yet what would happen if someone used this free
press or free speech for something deemed critical of Islam?
Already
we are seeing people brought to court for saying things the Islamists
don’t like. Yet the cases are heard by Mubarak-appointed judges. What
will happen when the Islamists appoint the judges?
The
hypnotized observers in the West keep chanting that the Brotherhood has
renounced violence and would never ever use force and intimidation. If
you want to know what Egypt has in store consider the following:
In 1992–under Mubarak’s regime–Farag Fouda, a fearless secularist, debated a Muslim Brotherhood leader at the Cairo Book Fair. Five
months later, an Islamist assassinated Fouda. At the trial, a Muslim
Brotherhood leader testified as a defense witness that the killing was
the proper punishment for an apostate, at which point the defendant
shouted, “Now I will die with a clear conscience.”
That was a Mubarak court and the killer was found guilty. What will happen in an Islamist regime’s court?
Many Egyptians will die, as will U.S. interests. Will the Western apologists and enablers have a clear conscience?
PS: The Washington Post covered very briefly the debate between two presidential candidates, the radical nationalist secularist, Abu Moussa, and Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh. The Post article
informs us that Aboul Fotouh is “considered a moderate Islamist.” By
whom? In the debate, Aboul Fotouh said he would implement Sharia with
supposed moderation. His formula, which the report missed, is that
Sharia might not be imposed 100 percent. So much for moderation.The Post also reported that he called Israel the enemy of Egypt. But the article missed Aboul Fotouh’s signal about Israel, which he called “ built on occupation.” To any Egyptian that says: Israel is an illegitimate entity that has no right to exist. Abu Moussa personally has shown he hates Israel but also demonstrates why he would make a president more likely to keep Egypt out of war and disaster:
“We have lots of disagreements. Most of our people consider it an enemy, but the responsibility of the president is to deal with such things responsibly and not run after hot-headed slogans.”
In broader terms, this is the choice Egypt will have to make–radical ideology and hot-headed slogans or pragmatism. The electorate’s views; size of Egypt’s problems; lack of resources that would allow constructive policies that would improve people’s lives materially; parliament; drafters of the new Constitution, violent Salafists (who support Aboul Fotouh), and probably the president will all be in the former camp.
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