Things Be Rotten in the State of Egypt

By Barry Rubin

There’s a new political timeline for Egypt. Apparently horrified by disorder and radicalization, the military junta has decided to slow things down.

Its proposal is for parliamentary elections on November 28, with the resulting parliament choosing a committee to write a new constitution by April 2012. That group will have a year to produce the new document and only then — after April 2013 — will there be presidential elections. Bottom line: The generals will retain executive power for the next 18 months.

What’s likely to happen in the elections? My estimate is that the Muslim Brotherhood will be the single largest party, with 30 to 40 percent of the seats.

In contrast to the united Islamists, there are more than a dozen moderate parties. The three main ones are the left-oriented Justice Party, the opportunistic Wafd Party, and the Free Egyptians’ Party, the closest thing to an anti-Islamist moderate force.

These three will each get roughly 15 percent of the seats and will consequently be much weaker than the Brotherhood and will perhaps be willing to make deals with it in order to get a share of power. Most of the remaining seats are likely to go to a party favoring the old regime. That party might do better than expected as bad conditions make some Egyptians nostalgic for the Mubarak days.

If so, the Brotherhood won’t be taking power in Egypt soon, but there will be a radical (leftist, nationalist, Islamist) majority in parliament. As different as these ideologies are, they’re united by their opposition to America, the West, and Israel and their support for radical groups abroad — especially Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip.

In addition, the Brotherhood will play a central role in writing the new constitution, which will enshrine Sharia as the main but not sole source of legislation.

There are many other ways in which the Brotherhood can lay the foundation for its future rule. For example, it wants to bring the two top Islamic offices — mufti and Al-Azhar University head — under parliamentary control. This will let it control Islam in Egypt, even choosing mosque preachers and religious teachers throughout the country.

Yet the Brotherhood doesn’t seem eager to take power quickly. The group continues to have a strong cautious — though that’s not the same thing as moderate — streak, having suffered bloody repression in past decades. To move too fast might upset the military and unite the group’s opponents, whose divisions will make them easier to conquer.

There’s another reason for the Brotherhood’s hesitation. Egypt’s economic situation is terrible and likely to get far worse. The Brotherhood doesn’t want to be blamed when the crash comes, preferring to go tsk-tsk at the alleged evils of capitalism, the Mubarak era, foreign aid, and the International Monetary Fund. It could then approach a frightened public with the comforting assertion that Islam is the answer to all of Egypt’s woes.

Is a war with Israel possible? If the military holds onto executive power into the second half of 2013, that’s far less likely. The worst-case scenario is if Hamas deliberately starts a fracas with Israel — firing rockets and mortars by the score and launching cross-border raids — to provoke retaliation.

The Brotherhood, radical nationalists, Salafi super-extremist Islamist groups, and leftists would then demand that Egypt go to the aid of the brothers next door. At a minimum, this would mean letting volunteers, money, and weapons flow into the Gaza Strip. At a maximum, it could bring direct involvement of an Egyptian leadership too frightened and stirred up to resist. Probably, though, until Egypt has a president, that outcome is not so likely.

Meanwhile, what is far more probable is that the domestic situation will deteriorate further, with the first and greatest victims being Egyptian Christians. The number of Coptic Christians in Egypt is greater than the entire population of Israel, Jordan, or Lebanon. A recent report by an Egyptian human rights group claims that almost 100,000 Christians have left the country since January.

With almost daily attacks on Christians and the destruction of churches by mobs, the violence is escalating. Neither government officials nor the army will help the Christians, who can also not depend on any foreign protection.

Except for the military — and it often appeases anti-Christian, Islamist, and anti-foreign forces — there is absolutely nothing to prevent the further radicalization of the situation in Egypt, which also includes rampant crime and skyrocketing inflation. The dream of a moderate, stable, and democratic Egypt is quickly becoming a nightmare.


Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His book, Israel: An Introduction, will be published by Yale University Press in January. Latest books include The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is at http://www.gloria-center.org and of his blog, Rubin Reports, http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com

Egypt’s “Moderates” Unite? A Step Forward But Not as Good as it Seems

By Barry Rubin

Fifteen “liberal” groups have formed The Egyptian Bloc to contest the parliament elections that might be held in November. If they actually do run a single slate of candidates there is a real chance to block the power of the Muslim Brotherhood. But that’s a big “if.”
And there are some other problems you won’t be seeing in Western media coverage of this development:

• Fifteen parties sounds an impressive grouping but most of them are not very important and have little or no base of support. I estimate that the committed parties collectively can claim about 25 percent support, mostly for the Free Egyptians party (al-Masriyin al-Ahrar).

• Some of the parties are left-wing and anti-democratic parties. One of them is the Communist Party, which gives you a sense of how “moderate” and “liberal” are being defined.”

• The most important of all centrist parties, the Wafd, which has about 20 percent support, seems undecided as to whether to join this bloc or remain in an alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood. That last point also tells you something about the nature of contemporary Egyptian politics.

• There are some hints that the bloc might be a bit more attuned to current Western debates than to Egyptian conditions. It will promise the voters equality, social justice, more housing, health insurance, and a better educational system. The problem, of course, is how it could possibly produce these things.

For coverage of this development see here and here.

 Liberal political groups and a traditional Islamist party on Monday launched a coalition, "The Egyptian Bloc", to challenge powerful Islamists in a November parliamentary election.

Many Egyptians have voiced concern that Islamists, including the Muslim Brotherhood -- the country's best organised political force, may try to create an Islamic state if they manage to secure a majority in parliament.

"Our goal is to say very clearly that we believe that new Egypt has to be a civil democratic state," said Osama El Ghazali Harb, founder of the liberal Democratic Front Party, an opposition group under Mubarak.

The coalition of 15 groups agreed to work together to raise funds for the elections and to field one list of candidates and campaign together.

They have also endorsed a proposal by the government of Prime Minister Essam Sharaf calling for a "constitutional decree" that will prevent Islamists monopolising the drafting of a new constitution if they win a majority in elections.

Analyst Nabil Abdel Fattah, of the al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, said the coalition was "a final attempt by the various political forces" to form an opposition group to stand against the Islamists in the elections.

"This alliance could have a chance if it acted quickly and used (to its advantage) the increasing public fears of the Brotherhood and their goals", he said.

As well as the Democratic Front, the coalition included Al Masreyeen Al Ahrar (Free Egyptians), a liberal party led by Christian telecoms tycoon Naguib Sawiris, the Farmers Syndicate and the Sufi Liberation Party, traditional Islamists.

The liberal Wafd party also joined the coalition on Monday after warning last week it may end its alliance with the Brotherhood amid differences over the new

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, and Middle East editor and a featured columnist at PajamasMedia http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is http://www.gloria-center.org. His articles published originally in places other than PajamasMedia can be found at http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com  

Polls Prove Strength, Not Weakness, of Islamists in Egypt

By Barry Rubin

Several recent polls purport to show the Muslim Brotherhood is unpopular in Egypt. An article in the Atlantic is particularly laughable, claiming the Brotherhood is less popular than Richard Nixon when he resigned!

The most important single point is this: the Brotherhood isn’t at an “unpopular” 17 percent but a very popular 34% from Egyptian voters who declared support for a party that might win seats. In other words, one in every three Egyptians who have decided and will have a real role in the outcome are ready to cast their ballots for the Brotherhood. It is the largest single party. And it has advantages that make it likely to get more than 33 percent of the seats.

That isn’t bad in an election with more than 20 parties. With 20 political parties would you call the one supported by one-third of decided voters “unpopular”? In the United States you need 50 percent plus one vote to win but the current ruling parties in multi-party Israel, Holland, and Turkey came to power with that level of direct support. In the last German elections, the Christian Democratic Union won with 27 percent of the votes (which yielded 31% of the seats); the Socialists have won French parliamentary elections with 39 percent.

Here are my adjusted figures for parties based on voters who back a party likely to win seats (more than 5 percent support in the polls). I am not saying this analysis is perfect (for example, a party with 5 percent might get 2.5 percent of the seats due to half being elected on a national level) but it does give a good general idea of the situation.

1, Islamists: 34% Muslim Brotherhood (Freedom and Justice Party). Note that Salafist (even more radical) Islamist groups don’t do well. Islamist voters are uniting behind the Brotherhood despite all the talk of splits.

2. Pro-Old Regime: 14% National Democratic Party, Mubarak’s old party.

3. Liberal, pro-democratic
14% Free Egyptians Party, a liberal, anti-Islamist party founded by big businessman Naguib Sawiris.
10% Justice Party. This is the party most associated with the Facebook kids and well-known opposition leaders.
22% Al-Wafd Party, historic liberal party.

Total for liberals: 46% That is impressive but far less than it seems. Keep in mind, though, that it is better to have 34% for one candidate than 46% for three. In a district with that outcome the Brotherhood would win.

Moreover, liberals are badly divided. The Wafd has at times toyed with a Brotherhood alliance, while the Justice Party has some far left leanings. The Free Egyptians seem to be a really serious anti-Islamist party but it is largely dependent on the largesse of one man. If liberals got one-third of the seats they could block the Brotherhood from power but not from having tremendous influence. By the same token, the Brotherhood would block a liberal majority. These three parties don’t like each other though if they cooperate and make election agreements that are implemented this might really change things.

So far i’ve left out the divided radical left, four parties combining hardline anti-American, neo-Marxist and radical nationalist views: Egyptian Labor, ElGhad Party, Tagamoe, and ElKarama. All together, they take 19 percent. But since they are rivals they would probably get about 10% of the seats.

The bottom line is that the Brotherhood will be the most powerful party in Egypt’s first election. There are a number of reasons to think it would get more than 34 percent:

–It is quite likely that just five parties—Brotherhood, Wafd, Justice, Free Egyptians, New Democratic Party—will have any significant representation. With many votes “wasted,” the Brotherhood will have the advantage as the largest single party and might well take 40 percent of the seats.

–The Brotherhood could win in many districts merely by coming in first albeit with only a minority of overall ballots. Liberal parties will “steal” votes from each other and put Brotherhood candidates into office in many places. Hamas only won the Palestinian elections because Fatah candidates ran against each other.

—Egypt’s first elected government will be very unpopular within a year or two. The economy is going to collapse; promises cannot be kept. The Brotherhood might prefer to be in the opposition during this period to reap more support in future.

–The Brotherhood can coopt independent candidates using ideology, offers of electoral backing, or rewards in parliament (such as—if you excuse the expression–“pork” projects for their districts). Thus, the Brotherhood in parliament could command seats outside of its own official delegation more easily than its rivals.

–Given its better organization, the Brotherhood will get its voters out on election day. Intimidation and the pressure for conformity so powerful in Egyptian society will also count, especially in the many tradition-oriented villages and poor areas of the big cities.

–Don’t assume the far left and Brotherhood won’t cooperate. They have similar views on foreign policy.

–Presumably the National Democratic Party will be a pariah and neither liberal nor Islamist blocs will work with it. Thus, another 14 percent of the seats will be irrelevant in forming any coalition, proportionately increasing the Brotherhood’s numerical edge. Liberals cannot deal with the hated old regime party but leaders of the National Democratic Party could make a deal with the Brotherhood in order to keep their privileges. Brotherhood supporters would support such a bargain if it helped obtain their main priorities.

I never thought the Brotherhood will get a majority. My concern is that it will control around 40 percent of the seats, be the largest single bloc, and get most of what it wants in a new constitution. The president will most likely be Amr Moussa, a radical nationalist who opposes Islamism but will probably buy off the Brotherhood, Salafists, and radical left with a militant foreign policy.

(Fun Fact: In my parallel analysis of the Palestinian elections, I predicted the same thing about Hamas, that it would be the largest party and most powerful single bloc. In fact, it won. Perhaps I’m being too cautious over the Brotherhood’s prospects in Egypt, too.)

In such a situation, the idea that the Egyptian government would be friendly to the United States is laughable. At most it would do the bare minimum to keep U.S. aid. The Obama Administration is likely to be easy to please so it can claim a diplomatic success with Egypt.

Of course, I will have plenty of time to revise my analysis as the campaign develops. But the key factor that would soundly defeat the Brotherhood–unity and good organization on the liberal side—-just isn’t there. As usual, note that literally none of the points suggested above has appeared in a mass media determined to prove that there’s nothing to worry about.

Methodology: Taking the Newsweek poll, I’ve recalculated by dropping the no opinion and “other” categories as well as the support for parties with less than 5 percent. I assume that small party votes will be largely wasted and that undecided voters will choose along the same lines as decided voters.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His book, Israel: An Introduction, will be published by Yale University Press in January. Latest books include The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is at http://www.gloria-center.org and of his blog, Rubin Reports.