We'll Pay A Price For Crushing Egypt's Democracy

'President Morsi (I prefer to call him by that name, since the military coup that displaced him was not just illegal but immoral) was meant to face trumped-up charges in court, but did not appear. The authorities mysteriously blamed 'bad weather'' Photo: AFP/GETTY

By Peter Oborne

The earliest political decision made by Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Egyptian doctor who has presided over such a dramatic resurgence of al-Qaeda since Osama Bin Laden’s death, was to join the Muslim Brotherhood.

Even then, back in the mid-Sixties, the Brotherhood was proscribed. This meant that it was impossible for a young man like Zawahiri to get involved in mainstream politics. Instead, Egypt’s brutally repressive system of government forced him down the path that led to al-Qaeda and the Twin Towers.

Is history about to repeat itself? I ask this urgent question because I have just returned from a very troubling trip to Cairo, a city that I last visited in the summer of 2011. Everything seemed possible back then, when the crowds gathered in Tahrir Square during the hopeful, happy, good-natured months that followed the fall of President Mubarak.

Today, protest is punishable by jail. Abductions are commonplace, torture routine. Demonstrators get shot dead. 

Following the coup that removed President Morsi on July 3 last year, a military junta is in control. Acting president Adly Mansour is a puppet. The defence minister, General Sisi, runs the country.

Meanwhile, what of the Brotherhood, which won the presidency in free and fair elections only 18 months ago? On Christmas Day, the military junta used Article 86 of the national penal code to ban it as a terrorist organisation. The excuse was a bomb attack carried out by the Sinai-based terrorist group Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis (“Supporters of Jerusalem”) on a police station in the northern town of Mansoura, which claimed 16 lives.

Ansar Beit are long-standing opponents of the Brotherhood, having once attacked Morsi as an “unbeliever”. Never mind: anyone who attends one of the Brotherhood’s protest marches now faces five years in prison. Its supporters can no longer appear on TV, indeed, only those who concur with the official view that the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organisation are allowed on air.

The entire leadership is now either in jail, or hiding, or fled the country. The organisation has retreated to the secret cell structure used to protect itself during previous periods of repression. Meetings now take place in private homes: the only objective is survival, and there are suggestions that even the cell structure has been compromised.

I did not try to meet anyone from the Brotherhood during my visit, and not just because of fears for my own safety – though I could easily have ended up in jail alongside three journalists from Al-Jazeera who were picked up late last month. I was rather more worried about the consequences for anyone I approached.

President Morsi (I prefer to call him by that name, since the military coup that displaced him was not just illegal but immoral) is in prison. He was meant to face trumped-up charges in court in Cairo yesterday, but did not appear. The authorities mysteriously blamed “bad weather”: it was fine both in Alexandria, where Morsi is in jail, and in Cairo.

Britain, Europe and the United States, while not directly involved, have been complicit in much of this. Presumably afraid, as so often, to annoy the Americans, William Hague has yet even to utter the phrase “coup d’état”. Indeed, he immediately recognised the new regime. John Kerry went even further. In an interview on Pakistani TV in August, he hailed General Sisi for “restoring democracy” and praised him for averting violence.

These remarks from the Secretary of State went beyond satire. Well over 1,000 protesters have been shot dead in the streets, the bloodiest encounter coming at the Rabaa el Adawiya Mosque in Cairo last August, when more than 600 people were killed.

Egyptian police are well practised in crowd control and the use of rubber bullets. It can therefore be assumed that the mass killing was deliberate. According to survivors, more than 20 people were run over by a police bulldozer. 

So far, General Sisi’s regime has made no attempt to investigate these crimes. During my brief stay I met a few of the journalists who have attempted to go out and tell the truth: they are very brave.

Since my return, I have been trying to make sense of British and American policy. I guess that Western leaders are making the cynical but – as they see it – realistic judgment that a military regime led by Sisi is the best hope of stability. In the short term, that might be right. But in the longer term, I wonder.

Let’s revisit the story of Ayman al-Zawahiri, driven underground by the Nasserite reign of terror 50 years ago. 

For several years, one of the biggest selling points for al-Qaeda, the organisation he now runs, was the claim that the Western powers would never allow democracy in the Muslim world – meaning that there was no alternative to armed struggle. The men... pointed to the democratic victory of Islamist parties in Algeria in 1992, who were brought down at once by a military coup, followed by a decade of civil war.

The Muslim Brotherhood rejected this analysis, and spent eight decades plodding towards power. Eventually, it secured it peacefully, having come out top in three separate tests of popular opinion – the parliamentary elections of January 2012, the presidential elections of May and June 2012, and the constitutional referendum that December. It has now been declared a terrorist organisation.

The Brotherhood’s leaders continue to preach non-violence. But will all their followers agree to wait another 80 years before winning power through democratic means? A number are bound to turn to violence. Already, parts of the Sinai are starting to resemble northern Syria, Benghazi in Libya or Anbar province in Iraq – ungovernable havens for militant groups.

Britain cannot take sides in the great civil conflict that engulfs Egypt. But we can surely sustain the values that we claim to cherish. Thus far, our response has been poor, and will remain a blot on William Hague’s record as Foreign Secretary.

This week, a group of lawyers claiming to represent President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood asked the International Criminal Court to investigate crimes against humanity committed by all sides during the course of the revolution. Since the Sisi regime shows no appetite to investigate the killings, Britain should support this request. 

Since the Brotherhood continues to demonstrate its faith in Western concepts of justice and democracy, it would be more than polite to return the compliment. It would also be sensible and wise.