Diplomats knew 2 weeks ago Morsy was gone
The army chief came to President Mohammed Morsi with a simple demand: Step down on your own and don't resist a military ultimatum or the demands of the giant crowds in the streets of Egypt.
"Over my dead body!" Morsi replied to Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi on Monday, two days before the army eventually ousted the Islamist leader after a year in office.
In the end, Egypt's first freely elected president found himself isolated, with allies abandoning him and no one in the army or police willing to support him.
Even his Republican Guards simply stepped away as army commandos came to take him to an undisclosed Defense Ministry facility, according to army, security and Muslim Brotherhood officials who gave The Associated Press an account of Morsi's final hours in office. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
The Muslim Brotherhood officials said they saw the end coming for Morsi as early as June 23 - a week before the opposition planned its first big protest. The military gave the president seven days to work out his differences with the opposition.Read the whole thing.
Haaretz has a really rich editorial about sticking to election results.
The harsh dilemma between respecting the democratic process and dealing with the repression that it brought about was resolved the day before Thursday.
One may of course question the essence of a democracy that needs an army to achieve its goals, but it is wrong to judge the protest movements for their impatience with the product of their demonstrations.
The Egyptian spectacle, which deserves praise and admiration, is not without risks and still has no answers to the hard questions facing Egypt. The country is immersed in a deep economic crisis and the state of public security is far from satisfactory. The Muslim Brotherhood has not accepted Morsi's ousting and may act, even violently, against it. The way to political stability is paved with mines.
But the lesson to be learned by this new revolution has already been clearly outlined. Even in democracies, leaders are not permitted to cling to election results as though they were a promissory note that authorizes them to impose their ideology, while ignoring the wishes of the people.I wonder whether Haaretz would be willing to send the same message to Yair Lapid, or for that matter to Barack Obama, both of whom think they have 'mandates' to impose their ideology on their respective countries.
Labels: democracy, Egypt, Egyptian democracy, Egyptian Revolution, Mohammed Morsy, Muslim Brotherhood
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:26 AM
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