Benny Morris, who of course has rationalized ethnic cleansing to build a Jewish state (very outmoded idea), warns Americans in the National Interest that we are only hearing the English-speakers atop the Egyptian revolution– and missing the true and dangerous spirit of the revolution, Arabs with glittering scimitars.
The sophisticated, not to say manipulative, interviewees know that this [unthreatening message] is what BBC and CNN viewers in the West want to hear.
Alas, I fear, Westerners will see what most Egyptians actually think and want if and when the country holds free and fair general elections (perhaps in September-October). And I fear that they will be surprised—perhaps even shocked—by the results, and by what the Egyptian masses then say about what they actually think and want. I fear that at that point, “Death to Israel,” “Death to America,” and “Allahu Akbar” will drown out every democratizing and liberalizing chant.
But by then the genie will be well out of the bottle; by then, it will be too late.
