Egypt Takes a Stand

From Friday's NY Times:

"CAIRO — Just a day after Egypt’s military-backed government declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group, a more aggressive crackdown was already emerging Thursday, as the authorities announced dozens of arrests across the country, and the seizure of land, stocks and vehicles belonging to the Islamist movement’s members.

Social and charitable groups even loosely associated with the group struggled after their funds were frozen by the state. It was a new level of disruption to a society already riven by violence and suspicion in the months since the military ousted Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically elected president and a Brotherhood leader.

Egypt’s new leaders clearly signaled that they had opened a wide-ranging and possibly protracted war on every facet of the Brotherhood’s activities, with the terrorism designation giving the security forces greater latitude to stamp out a group deeply rooted in Egyptian social and civic life. The government had also sought to deny the group foreign help or shelter, urging other Arab governments to honor an anti-terrorism agreement and shun the organization."

If you recall, I wrote about this on September 3 in my commentary called "The Pharoh Is Dead?", when I discussed the arrest of Mohammed Morsi for his abuse of power by ordering the killing of his opponents, the horror of the "Arab Spring" and the tyranny of the Muslim Brotherhood. Upon reflection, my view of this action by the interim Egyptian government is strengthened because the government had the courage to treat this organization for what it is: a terrorist organization. 

As I said at the time: The Muslim Brotherhood came to power under the guise of democracy, but it has shown itself to be anything but. The Egyptian people elected Morsi and his party to power believing things would be better economically, politically, religiously. But instead, basic freedoms have been stifled, the economy is worse and the Coptics are being persecuted and murdered for not professing Islam.

As I wrote in "A Coming Disaster" in August and "The Israeli-al-Qaaeds War" in June, while both of these commentaries are "what-if" scenarios, some of these events are beginning to evidence themselves. Our country, unfortunately, is looked upon as the moral compass of the world by those countries rho understand the geopolitics of that region."

The Obama Administration needs to recognize it made a mistake by backing Morsi and his thugs, by coming out now and support the actions of the Egyptian government. Israel is certainly welcoming the actions of Egypt today, so why not the US? The President needs to remember which country in this region who has our back, so a reciprocating gesture is necessary to reassure our friends that we stand with them, and not some thug, punk group that the country who elected it has now outlawed it.

That action by President Obama would show the world we have regained our backbone and our moral compass. We need to do this now before our role is diminished by the actions of others. And the clock is ticking.