[Photo by CodePink]
Tomorrow’s New York Times reflects clearly what was evident on television tonight: the American establishment and the Obama administration too have turned harshly on Mubarak. This is great news. It means that he will be gone soon with surprisingly little bloodshed (I have my fingers crossed); and Egypt has carved out a heroic chapter in history. Events never feel so good as this one, shattering and positive.
On television, I saw the following figures condemning Mubarak’s thugs tonight: Eliot Spitzer, Richard Haass of the Council on Foreign Relations, and neoconservative Robert Kagan, also Richard Engel and Brian Williams. And I saw that Elliott Abrams says something eloquent about democracy at Jeffrey Goldberg’s blog. Bill Kristol is for extirpating Mubarak. So’s Max Boot.
I would just like to point out that several of these guys have made judgments– that the thugs were sent out by Mubarak, and this in itself is dramatic evidence of tyranny in Egypt– that they would never reach when it comes to the pogroms unleashed against Palestinians in the West Bank, including many Palestinians exercising the rights of assembly and free expression. Not a peep from the U.S. establishment.
Ok, but why are the neocons abandoning Mubarak when Israel obviously wants Mubarak around? Two reasons. The neocons have said they believe in democracy in the Middle East; and sometimes the rubber meets the road. Two, they are realistic enough to know that the king is dead; and they are fearful about what will eventuate in Egypt; they think about the Iran mistakes, and know that the U.S. will have more influence over the next leaders of Egypt if it can get on the people’s good side now rather than alienating them. The neocons haven’t stopped caring about Israel’s interests, no way. But the smart ones know that the best way to serve those interests is to be out front on Egyptian change.
