I understand that the Egyptian vote was not a democratically conducted referendum. It gives us a picture of the actual situation in the country, which replaces the previous one which was worse.

Morsi was elected “democratically” but I did not trust those elections and we saw what we got. I did not expect anything else from Morsi than to advance the Muslim Brotherhood agenda, by siding with Hamas and preparing troops of terrorists in the Sinai, that were supposed to fight against the Egyptian army. He clearly showed that he was not going to respect the Israel – Egypt peace treaty.

The way the US handled Mubarak was neither elegant nor appropriate. In my view it was utterly insulting to the entire country, as we did not take into consideration that Mubarak, despite the fact that he was not elected, maintained stability in the Middle East for over 30 years. We should not forget that Mubarak was good friends with Saudi Arabia. As we insulted Mubarak, we insulted Saudi Arabia. General Abdel Fatah al-Sisi was one of Mubarak’s envoys to Saudi Arabia.

It is regrettable that in all the countries where we saw the “Arab Spring”, which was encouraged by the US, the action was not well prepared and people were not ready for this change. In any case, the situation today is worse than it was before the “Arab Spring”. The US needs better knowledge of the ways of the Arab World and the Iranian mentality.

For sure the elections we are used to in the US are different from those we see in the Middle East, but we cannot force the people to our ways, as long as they are not ready and prepared. We must allow Egypt to find its own way to its own kind of democracy, the one that fits their culture and not a democray that we have in the United States.

Copyright 2014 Emile Tubiana