While the furore over the genocide that is happening in Palestine has mostly been correctly leveled at Israel and its western backers, the question of why Egypt has sold Palestine out is rarely asked.
Sadly the answer to why the powerful neighbor and former custodian of the Gaza Strip has been so impotent in looking after its brethren is alarmingly simple. It has occurred because not only is Egypt a stooge of both Zionism and the United States, but it is also a self-serving military dictatorship more concerned with retaining power than doing what is right.
Revolutionary Egypt is no more
This though was not always the case, with the regime of President Nasser not only being a regional military superpower, but also a beacon for Arab Socialist governments and movements throughout the Middle-East, including Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya and what was formerly North Yemen.
Few would now argue that Nasserism was extremely successful in industrializing the country, developing it, as well as educating a largely illiterate population, its military history though has faced some severe revisionism.
And this not just in regards to its wars with Israel, but also its revolutionary struggles within the region. That Egypt and its allies lost the 6 Day War, with Egypt losing the Gaza Strip is well known, but that the country managed to hold firm against the UK, France and Israel during the Suez Crisis (1956) is now painted as Israeli :constraint” that saved Nasserist Egypt. This is not only untrue, but demeaning to one of the greatest victories against colonialism in the 20th century.
Another clear example of this is over “Egypt’s Vietnam” or the Civil War in the Yemen Arab Republic (YAR). This pitted the YAR, backed by Egyptian troops against Israeli, the United Kingdom and the absolute monarchies of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iran and the former royal rulers of the country. Yet while Egyptian losses were large, with an estimated 26,000 troops dying, the Egyptians and their North Yemeni comrades were victories. Saudi Arabia would recognize the Yemen Arab Republic, a Nasserite state in 1970. It would remain secular and largely socialist until unification with South Yemen in 1990. This is not to mention that it also avoided being an absolute monarchy akin to Saudi Arabia.
What cannot be denied though is that the loss of the Arab coalition in 1967 and the capture of the Gaza Strip (from Egypt), as well as the West Bank are partially causes of the problems we see today.
The sellout of Egypt to the USA
Nasser would die in 1970, which would see in the rule of Anwar Sadat, who despite again going to war with Israel in 1973 would reposition himself as a US ally during the Cold War.
Not just that, but he would also begin the process of stripping Egypt of much of its revolutionary zeal, with polices that still reverberate today.
Chief among these of course was the Peace Treaty Between the State of Israel and the Arab Republic of Egypt in which Egypt recognized Israel, being the first Arab state to do so. Yet while this is championed as a benchmark for peace and some huge success, the people of the Gaza Strip see things somewhat differently.
Sadat himself was assassinated for these actions in 1981 by military that have been described as “fundamentalist”, but would better be called traditionalists and patriots.
His assassination would lead to the rise pf President Mubarak and an almost continual military dictatorship to the present day. This is because while Mubarak was overthrown as part of the Arab Spring his successor President Morsi (the only democratically elected Egyptian president) was allowed little time to govern before again be replaced by a military leader, namely Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
How the military dictatorship of Egypt sold out Palestine
Egypt is currently the benchmark for what the west sees as democracy in states that might drift from their sphere of influence. And that is a nation, like Thailand that has rigged elections, but due to a strong military will never ever be allowed to elect a government unacceptable to their western overlords.
Let us not forget the Hamas were elected to rule in the Gaza Strip by the masses, a point that has now seemingly made all Gazans military targets. This is not of course to condone Hamas, but to illustrate that the US policy of “you can have elections”, but don’t elect the wrong people” is not democracy manifest.
And what has the military government of Egypt and other Arabs done since the massacre of Palestinians begun? Not only have they stayed silent, save some crocodile tears, but have refused to help refugees, as well as use their military.
It should not be forgotten here that the government of Netanyahu is currently hanging on by a thread and that were Egypt and other countries in the region were to even threaten to fight Israel then him and his government almost certainly fall. Sadly the reason that the military leadership has sold out Palestine is fairly simple. Firstly after 50 years of heeding to the US economy, Egypt the ancient civilization that brought us the Pyramids would be impotent without US support.
This has led to the secondary factor in that the survival of the military regime is now hand in glove with US interests and quite simply they have no intention of ever giving up power.
So, while it is admirable that patriots such as Bassem Youssef still fight the Palestinian cause, international capital and multiple governments, including Egypt’s subservience to it has already ensured not just a Palestinian defeat, but also perhaps its complete annihilation.
That it was South Africa that drove Israel to the International Criminal Court not any Egypt or any other Muslim nation merely adds insult to injury on the Egyptian sell out of the Palestinians.