I am sorry for taking almost 3 months since my last article but as most of you know I was getting married :)
In the sense of fairness, right after the last elections, I decided to give President Mursi and his party a 100 day chance to start working on their promises. Only then would I analyze and evaluate their willingness in handling the presidency of my Egypt - so far it doesn’t look good at all.
First you need to know that Islam dictates for all Muslims to respect all religions and all of their prophets. This makes us very sensitive about anything related to our beloved prophet Muhamed. The movie which turned into a fast growing snow ball is, in my opinion, nothing but a hate movie that shows nothing but ignorance; even those who oppose Islam would say the same. This crappy movie has nothing to do with freedom of speech and it represents no one. Showing a religious prophet as a fraud, a womanizer and a pedophile is a very shameful act. I have no doubt that all of this was planned from the start but nobody could dream it would escalate all over the region. This horrible movie has been out there since last June and yet the protests started in my Egypt 4 months later on 9/11.
First of all the Egyptian government knew all about the protests and the American embassy already evacuated its personnel as a precaution. The protests arrived later with no security forces or police guarding the Embassy, it was like telling the protestors it is ok to storm the embassy and tear down the flag. I think this lack of security on a day like 9/11 was a message from president Mursi to the Americans; but I also believe that the Muslim Brotherhood didn’t imagine that things would escalate and spread, taking out innocent lives such as the American ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, who was with no doubt one of the good guys - his death is a big loss.
Add to this a 4 day street war between the police and the angry mob which has resulted in, so far, around 500 injuries on both sides and around 360 police arrests. The police finally managed to end this mess by Saturday morning.
I strongly believe that if the Muslim Brotherhood protected the Embassy and the protests ended peacefully none of this would have happened. They played with fire trying to make a statement to the Americans. All the violence in all of these countries and the all those who died are on president Mursi''s hands.
The movie was a dumb move that has had serious consequences, like Obama''s statement on TV last Thursday that the US would not consider Egypt an ally, "but we don''t consider them an enemy.”
Honestly, I couldn’t blame him for saying that because so far all I see is a very amateur government that`s working on isolating my Egypt.
See Remembering Ambassador Chris Stevens here.