Redux: Mubarack Vs. Nasser
Mubarack Vs. Nasser
Redux: Carlos Slim Vs. Leftists in Lebanon
Mubarack Regime Targets Family of Opposition Candidate
Saudi Arabia-Israeli Conspiracy During Nasser Years
Redux: Blackwater Charges Dropped
Since the days of Anwar Sadat, Egypt’s regime has long since tuned its back to Arab nationalism. Gamal Abdul Nasser was such an electrifying icon in the Arab world it is quite difficult to express for an audience unfamiliar.
Nasser espoused Arab brotherhood and argued that in such unity lay the path to the Arab Renaissance. Nasser was an eloquent speaker who rallied Arab from Morocco to Iraq. Nobody then nor now has matched his status in the region. He did not shy away from expressing his pride in the Arab people and from telling the Western world where it could get off. Nasser also attacked the reactionary monarchs of the Gulf as docile, backward and part of the past. And he supported their end.
Nasser’s height of popularity was when Britain, France and Israel were forced by U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower to humiliatingly withdraw from Sinai after their thuggish invasion and occupation. A little more than a decade later saw his fall. After the Arabs’ own experience of humiliation after the so-called ‘Setback’ against Israel in the 1967 Six Day War when Israel attacked both Egypt and Syria, Nasser resigned. An outcry amongst the Arabs brought him back to power. From that moment he was in many ways a broken man. Egypt’s military was devastated in the Israeli onslaught, the Sinai came under occupation under Israel for the second time and it was clear that the United States would not dislodge Israel this time, and Nasser’s reputation has fallen. He ceased with his rhetorical fire and when cap-in-hand to the oil monarchs he once mocked asking them to help him rebuilt the Egyptian military. They compiled provided he stop criticizing them. He did. And died three years later in 1970.
Nasser’s end was not inspiring, but his moment still is - especially in the age of submissive, pathetic and openly collobrationist Arab regime - Mubarak, House of Saud, King Abduallah, the Dahlan-PA. No leader even brothers pretending to be like Nasser today. They are too glued to U.S. patronage and too submissive toward Israel. This disparity against Nasser’s standing reputation and disconnect with what the Arab people want is naturally magnified in Egypt more than anywhere else. The Egyptian regime is not only only a U.S. client but one partaking in the suffering for the Palestinian people for its own ends. Because Egypt’s corrupt and deeply unpopular regime is a client state of the U.S. empire and the Mubarak clique needs U.S. patronage. Egypt’s ailing tyrant seeks to place his son - Gamal - as his successor. And both know that U.S. support for Gamal would ease the transition amongst the ruling elite - especially the generals who receive $1.7billion in annual military aid. The Egyptian people are not considered at all in this equation - passionately pro-Palestinian the Egyptian regime is trying to distract them with petty feuds over soccer and efforts to stroke vulgar nationalism against other Arabs. Egypt’s elite no longer cares about even a semblance of popular legitimacy, only U.S. sanction is what matters. And they think that the path to Washington’s heart runs through Tel Aviv. And they are right.
No regime is as openly colloborationist - not even Dahlan. The Egyptian regime is so offending that nostalgia is openly traded in Egypt. The people long for the great and honorable one:
To transliterate: il-3lee bana il-saad il-3lee. il-woatee bana il-saad il-woatee. To translate: The high one built the high dam. The low one built the low dam.
Perfectly captured.
Redux: And here's another comparison. The real leader of Egypt shakes hands with Che with a firm grip and then the client tyrant subdues himself in buffoonish manner to fanatical Likud Zionist and occupier Benyamin Netanyahu, who has Arab, including Egyptian, blood on his hands. But Mubarak smiles and is honored to shake his hand and wash his feet:
"The difference is dignity."
H/T: Angry Arab.
