Egypt

This article was originally published here on Fortune.com on Friday, February 28, 2014. Over the last three years, as uprisings and demonstrations have erupted around the world, journalists, pundits, and other analysts have wrongly drawn parallels between these events. When protests broke out in Istanbul last spring, some news outlets wondered whether Taksim Square was Turkey’s "Tahrir Square" -- a reference to the now iconic traffic roundabout in central Cairo where Egyptian demonstrations brought an end to then president Hosni Mubarak’s rule in early 2011. More recently, journalists covering Ukraine’s uprising against ousted President Viktor Yanukovych have made direct comparison to Tahrir Square. These comparisons make great copy and perhaps keep viewers interested, but they are largely superficial. It is true that the protests that brought down both Mubarak and Yanukovych were in squares whose names are derived similarly, but other than at that most abstract level, the political dynamics in Egypt and Ukraine are hardly analogous. Yet there is one specific area where the Egyptians and the Ukrainians have strikingly similar challenges: Both countries are broke. And this raises the prospects for further political instability. Neither Egypt’s 2011 uprising nor the recent demonstrations in Ukraine was principally about economic grievances, however. Egyptians poured into the streets wanting to live in a freer and more just society. Ukrainians were responding to Yanukovych’s rejection of an agreement with the European Union in favor of a generous financial assistance package from Moscow. Although the trigger for the protests in Kiev may have been linked directly to trade, finance, and the country’s economic well-being, for many Ukrainians, the demonstrations were about their country’s identity. Continue reading here...

On February 17, Lieutenant-General Sami Enan, Egypt’s former armed forces chief-of-staff, announced that he would be running for president. One can be forgiven for asking: Why?  Enan’s candidacy seems impractical and impracticable. Based on what is known publicly, which actually is not very much, it is widely assumed that Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi will be the military’s candidate.  It seems hard to imagine that if al-Sisi runs, he would have much trouble winning.  Despite the crude propaganda in the form of al-Sisi sweets, sandwiches, pajamas, posters, t-shirts, and odes to the man, there are many Egyptians who seem inclined—at this moment—to want the Field Marshal’s firm hand.  Enan, whose sterling reputation was tarnished during the 18 months he was the second-in-command of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, does not have the kind of broad appeal of al-Sisi.  So what is going on?  Why does Sami Enan want to be the president?  As with everything in Egypt, Enan’s candidacy may (or may not) be a bit more complicated than a man with an ambition to lead a great country back from the brink. Who is Sami Enan? On August 12, 2012, it seemed that Lieutenant-General Sami Enan would fade from view.  That evening, then-presidential spokesman Yasser Ali announced that Enan and his boss Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi were no longer Egypt’s two most senior military officers.  There would be more shuffling of the command structure in the coming days, but Tantawi was retired and Enan was made a “military adviser” to the new president, Mohammed Morsi.  This seemed like a humiliating end to a successful and well-respected military career—worse than an ambassadorial post in some placid European country.  Enan, who trained in France and the Soviet Union, came to prominence in late 1997 when troops under his command chased down the perpetrators of the massacre at the Temple of Hatshepsut (known commonly as the Luxor massacre) that left 58 tourists and four Egyptians dead.  A few years later, Hosni Mubarak promoted Enan to lead the air defense command and in 2005 he was elevated to chief-of-staff. By all accounts, Enan was a popular and highly regarded officer, especially in comparison to the man with whom he will forever be tied, Field Marshal Tantawi.  The Lieutenant-General was a primary interlocutor with the United States, where he was well respected.  When the January 25 uprising began, Enan was actually in Washington for routine talks with his American counterparts, though they were cut short and he returned to Cairo on January 28—the Day of Rage.  At the time, Enan’s Pentagon meetings fueled conjecture about the role of the United States in the uprising, which never amounted to anything other than the idle speculation of people far away and given to believe such things. Why is Enan running? It is entirely unclear why Enan has decided to enter the presidential race that now includes himself, Egypt’s Nasserist leader Hamdeen Sabbahi, possibly the lawyer and activist Khaled Ali, and presumably Field Marshal al-Sisi.  There seem to be four possible explanations for Enan’s improbable run: 1.     Duty.  The most innocuous explanation is Sami Enan’s deep sense of duty and patriotism.  The same ideas and principles that encouraged him to enter the military academy in 1967 and spend his entire adulthood defending Egypt have inspired him to run for president.  In Egypt, where cynicism runs deep, this may not seem to be a likely explanation, but never underestimate the officers’ profound sense of responsibility for the country.  Observers may not agree with them, but the commanders themselves believe what they are doing is right for the country. 2.     Legitimacy. Lieutenant-General Enan is running in order to give al-Sisi’s candidacy and subsequent election a patina of credibility.  This seems strange, but it is not unprecedented.  Remember when Omar Suleiman announced his presidential candidacy in the spring of 2012 only soon thereafter to be declared ineligible to run?  Omar Pasha’s brief candidacy was a ruse. There was no question that he was going to be disqualified, but that was beside the point. At the same time that Suleiman was running so was Khairat al Shater, the deputy Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, and another Islamist, Hazem Abu Ismail.  The authorities were deeply concerned about the candidacies of both al Shater and Abu Ismail, but they could not outright bar them from running without creating an uproar and precipitating large demonstrations that would no doubt result from such a decision.  So when the Supreme Election Commission banned al Shater, Abu Ismail and Suleiman (as well as a dozen lesser known candidates) at the same time, the government could argue without being totally disingenuous that they were not solely targeting the Islamist candidates, but the apparent standard bearer of the felool as well.  In the same way that Omar Pasha’s disqualification gave al Shater’s ineligibility some legitimacy, it is possible that Enan’s candidacy can give al-Sisi’s run for the presidency a sense of credibility.  If there are two military figures battling it out, al-Sisi’s election would seem less like a coronation and the coup of July 3 would seem less coup-y. 3.     Second Thoughts & Payback. It is also possible that Enan’s candidacy is intended not to help al-Sisi, but rather to encourage him to think again or even damage the Field Marshal’s candidacy.  Although not necessarily of different generations of officers—Enan and al-Sisi are only eight years apart—they are of different military academy cohorts and are surely part of different military networks.  It is true that at moments of national stress and crisis the officer corps has demonstrated a capacity to act with coherence and common purpose, but it is important to recognize that the Egyptian military is a big organization.  It is top-heavy with officers who, despite being socialized and educated in ways to ensure unity, have different views on the important issues of the day.  Although observers tend to look at the military through the prisms of October 6, 1973; February 11, 2011; and July 3, 2013, these were extraordinary moments.  This is a long way of saying that Egypt’s military establishment does not have “a view,” but rather many of them.  Al-Sisi’s likely run for the presidency is probably controversial because it turns everything the military has learned since June 1967 on its head.  It is possible Enan’s run is intended to give al-Sisi second thoughts, pulling him back from the brink of making a mistake that will hurt the military as an organization. Enan might also be seeking to complicate al-Sisi’s candidacy.  Observers should not dismiss the possibility of payback.  It was the Field Marshal who effectively ended Enan’s military career and as noted above, hardly in the most flattering fashion.  When asked recently about his relationship with al-Sisi, Enan’s response was decidedly circumspect and those who can only be described as “Enan surrogates” have expressed concern about the Field Marshal’s presidential aspirations, implicitly suggesting it would not be good for the armed forces. Enan’s entry into the race and the fact that others—including retired officers— are willing to question al-Sisi’s apparent candidacy undermines the sense of the Field Marshal’s inevitability that Egyptian authorities have sought to reinforce in recent months.  Enan being another military figure presents a challenge to the Field Marshal that someone like Hamdeen Sabahi does not. 4.     The Power Behind the Throne It is also plausible that Enan and al-Sisi are complicit in a broad effort to protect the military and its interests.  They may very well understand that an al-Sisi presidency is actually bad for the military, Egypt, and the Field Marshal.  As a result, he may opt not to run in favor of the elder, retired military man who is already in the race.  There is a possible scenario in which Enan ends up in the presidency, but al-Sisi remains the most powerful man along the Nile.  This has significant benefits for the military and al-Sisi.  It restores the informal institutional link between the presidency and the senior command, ensures that someone with a similar worldview is in the chair, and allows the military to rule without the complications and dangers of having to govern.  This would essentially return Egypt to the pre-uprising status quo in which an officer looked after the interests of the armed forces from the presidency, allowing the military to take a low profile in a political system that nevertheless ensured their power and prestige. Regardless of how the presidential race develops, it may not be as straightforward as al-Sisi runs and al-Sisi gets elected.  The consensus around the Field Marshal and the political process in general is more apparent than real.  Everything in Egypt remains contested, even the presidency, and even in the era of Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.  

Adhaf Soueif’s Cairo. Resource Governance in the Middle East 2013 Regional Fact Sheet. An infographic on Lebanon’s car bombs since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war.

Ahmet Erdi Ozturk says that the sphere of authority of Turkey’s Directorate of Religious Affairs should be redefined. A post from Cairobserver argues that Cairo has a strong potential for civic tourism, in which visitors come to see the city itself instead of only specific sites, that has not been tapped. Mohamad-Salah Omri discusses Tunisia’s recently approved constitution, claiming that it is important both for its content and for the process from which it resulted.

Significant Developments Syria. Russia today presented a draft resolution on Syrian humanitarian aid access that includes a condemnation of “terrorism” to the UN Security Council. Yesterday, Russian deputy foreign minister Gennady Gatilov rejected a proposed resolution on humanitarian aid access drafted by Australia, Jordan, and Luxembourg that demanded “all parties, in particular the Syrian authorities, immediately end the sieges of the Old City of Homs.” Gatilov denounced the Western-backed resolution as an attempt to lay the groundwork for a military strike against Bashar al-Assad’s government if its demands are not met. Meanwhile, the humanitarian ceasefire in Homs was extended for an additional three days today. Over 1400 men, women, and children have been evacuated from besieged parts of Homs since the ceasefire first took effect last Friday. The Syrian opposition presented a plan for a post-war Syria yesterday in Geneva, calling for a transitional governing body that would oversee a total ceasefire under UN monitoring. All foreign fighters would be driven out of Syria under the plan. The opposition’s confidential draft, shown to international mediator Lakhdar Brahimi, made no mention of the fate of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. The Syrian government delegation has not officially responded to the proposal yet, although it has suggested that negotiations need to focus first on fighting terrorism. Syrian deputy foreign minister Faisal Mekdad said that, “We are not closed to discussing any issue. But we have to discuss them one by one.” The exchange came after a discouraging beginning to the second round of talks on Monday. International mediator Lakhdar Brahimi is scheduled to meet with Russian and U.S. officials today in an effort to give new momentum to the talks. Meanwhile, Sigrid Kaag, head of the UN-Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons mission overseeing the dismantling of Syria’s chemical arsenal, has urged the Assad regime to speed up operations. This happened after the government missed two important deadlines in December and early February, leading to western concerns of a deliberate slow-down by the regime. Egypt. Russian president Vladimir Putin today endorsed field marshal Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to become Egypt’s next president. In his first visit outside of Egypt since coming to power in early July, Sisi is visitng Moscow to negotiate a $2 billion arms deal with Russia. According to state-owned al-Ahram, Russia would be the tentative broker of a deal funded mainly by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Meanwhile, the State Department disclosed yesterday that Egyptian authorities have detained a local U.S. embassy employee for almost three weeks without any official charges. American officials say that Ahmed Aleiba, an Egyptian citizen who works for the American embassy was arrested on January 25. According to military-aligned newspaper al-Watan, Aleiba had arranged meetings between U.S. government officials and Muslim Brotherhood deputy head Khairat el-Shater last July. Iran. Iran celebrated the thirty-fifth anniversary of the Islamic Revolution on Tuesday. President Hassan Rouhani told a crowd of tens of thousans of Iranians gathered for celebrations that “Iran will maintain a permanent nuclear program.” Throughout his remarks, Rouhani emphasized a purported absence of a military option against Iran by any western country and called for Iran to move past the internal divisions that emerged following Ahmadinejad’s contested reelection in 2009. His statements came shortly after International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors signaled on Monday their determination to get to the bottom of allegations that Iran may have worked on a nuclear bomb design. Meanwhile, Iranian defense minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan announced on Monday the successful test launch of two new missiles, including a long-range missile capable of evading radar. U.S. Foreign Policy Jordan. King Abdullah of Jordan will meet President Obama in California tomorrow. Abdullah met yesterday with Vice President Joe Biden and Congressional leaders during his visit to Washington. According to the White House, Abdullah and Biden discussed achieving a sustainable political solution in Syria. The Jordanian monarch stressed the need for emergency humanitarian access following his meeting with Speaker John Boehner on Tuesday. The bilateral discussions are part of an administration outreach effort to Arab allies that also includes a visit by President Obama to Saudi Arabia in late March. See my take on this outreach here. Israel-Palestine. The White House announced yesterday that President Obama will host Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on March 3. Netanyahu is scheduled to address the 2014 AIPAC conference on March 4 in Washington. Meanwhile, Palestinian spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh stated on Tuesday that an Israeli-Palestinian agreement would be “useless” if the two parties were allowed to express reservations.  Abu Rudeineh said that the “use of the word ‘reservations’ bogs down the peace process and the use of this concept in the past has got the process stuck.” On Saturday, U.S. secretary of State John Kerry said Israeli and Palestinian leaders needed “to have the right to be able to have some objection.” While We Are Looking Elsewhere Yemen. President Abed Rabbou Mansur Hadi on Monday formally approved turning the country into a six-region federation. While the move was intended to grant the south more autonomy, it was immediately rejected by southerners pushing for secession. Opposition also came from northern Shia Houthi rebels on Tuesday, who said that the division of the republic does not distribute wealth evenly. Meanwhile, the Yemeni government handed twenty-nine al-Qaeda militants to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday. According to the Yemeni defense ministry website, the fighters were Saudi nationals. Iraq. An instructor for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) that had been teaching militant recruits to make a car bomb accidentally set one off on Monday, killing twenty-one of the recruits in a blast. The blast brought the training camp’s exisitence to the attention of Iraqi authorities, who then arrested over twenty operatives. The late instructor may become a nominee for a posthumous Darwin Award. Kuwait. Following in Saudi footsteps, a member of Kuwait’s parliament, Nabil al-Fadl, proposed a law that would make Kuwaitis participating or instigating participation in conflicts abroad face up to thirty years in jail. The law would penalize members of the National Guard or police more heavily than civilians. In order to pass, the law will need to be approved by the emir, the government, and the parliament. Libya. The headquarters of Tripoli-based Libyan television channel al-Assema were rocked by three blasts yesterday morning. Al-Assema, known for its anti-Islamists stance, has been accused by Islamist groups of instigating demonstrations against the General National Congress. The attack comes after six journalists have been kidnapped in recent days in Tripoli. Israel-Palestine. A municipal planning committee gave preliminary approaval for a plan to build a Yeshiva in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah. The news of the municipality’s action led Palestinian officials to accuse the Israeli government of efforts to undermines Secretary Kerry’s peace efforts.

President Obama meets King Abdullah of Jordan on Friday in California. The president will also travel to Saudi Arabia in March, just after Secretary of State John Kerry makes a special stop in the United Arab Emirates. All three of these events are part of a larger whole: an attempt by the Obama administration to reassure key American Arab allies that the United States is not retreating from the Middle East or going soft on its leadership role in the world. This effort was exemplified by the extraordinary joint plea by Secretaries Hagel and Kerry recently at the Munich Security Conference to skeptical European partners. The upcoming diplomatic outreach by President Obama to U.S. Arab partners is positive and necessary. The critical question is: will it help smooth ruffled feathers? The White House should harbor no illusions that mere back-slapping and hand-holding will suffice. If Washington is saying: “The meeting is the message,” the Arabs will instead be asking: “What have you done for us lately, and where are you heading?” For the upcoming outreach to the Arabs to be truly effective, America’s top officials will need to bring compelling answers to three critical questions that their Arab partners will pose: First, Iran: “What is the Obama administration’s game plan for Iran?” President Obama and Secretary Kerry will doubtlessly stress their commitment to preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. That message won’t do. What the Arabs really want to know is whether or not Washington is seeking a much broader modus vivendi with Iran that will lead to a new and “more balanced” security architecture in the region. Is Washington going to continue to seek Iran’s isolation and containment? Or does the United States, as the Arabs now fear, seek to engage, temper, and ultimately reincorporate Iran into its old role as a pillar of Gulf stability? Second, Syria:  What is the United States’ objective in Syria? Is it to contain the fighting, continue to pursue some sort of diplomatic track with the regime it once called on to step down, and to give primacy to Syria’s weapons of mass destruction? Administration calls for Assad to step down as part of a political process, and confidential assurances that limited U.S. covert assistance is now underway, will do little to convince the Arabs that the administration does not seek to get by with as little involvement as possible. Indeed, it will lead Gulf Arabs to conclude that they should redouble their efforts to pour arms and money into Syria pursuing goals clearly not aligned with U.S. interests. Cautionary words by Obama or Kerry to the Arab allies will surely fall on deaf ears. Third, Egypt: President Obama’s silence on Egypt in his State of the Union did not go unnoticed in the Middle East, and is seen as a reflection of a hands-off approach to the Arab world’s most populous country, and main epicenter of the 2011 Arab uprisings. Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the Emirates have all welcomed, mainly through dollar diplomacy, the July 3, 2013 coup (or military action as some prefer) that toppled the Morsi government. They will now want to know if Washington’s policy remains the one articulated by Secretary Kerry in his last visit to Egypt in November: that Egypt is on the road to democracy. If so, they will be pleased. Hints by Obama or Kerry to quietly urge restraint by Egypt’s military will be met by subtle admonitions by their Arab hosts—however unjustified—that countries that abandon their allies in times of trouble should remain silent when things then quiet down. When they meet with their Saudi, Jordanian, and Emirati interlocutors, Kerry and Obama will surely highlight their Sisyphusian efforts to advance the cause of Israeli-Palestinian peace, and the president will seek to assure them that he stands squarely behind his secretary of state’s mission to bring peace to the Holy Land. The Arabs will welcome these American peace efforts and encourage them to continue. But long gone are the days when Americans could engender Arab felicitations by focusing on the peace process. Today’s Middle East turmoil has brought about threats that U.S. allies see as existential. Unless Obama and Kerry can credibly answer pressing questions on Iran, Syria, and Egypt, whatever goodwill engendered by this outreach is likely to be as enduring as the jet contrails that will follow their aircraft when they depart their meetings.

Last week, a knowledgeable and respected DC-based Egypt expert commented that Field Marshal Abdel Fattah al Sisi is “just a cog in the machine.”  It is not at all clear what exactly this means.  If there is a machine, who is behind it?  And if it is not al Sisi, who is it? The “cog in the machine” explanation of Egyptian politics is not new, it has just become more pronounced over the last three years.  It ranks high with other myths of Egyptian politics, notably the “evil genius” view of senior military commanders who allegedly pull levers and push buttons in a masterful subterfuge that produces only the outcomes that serve the military’s interests.  Perhaps al Sisi is a cog in the military’s machine, but it seems that Egyptian politics are more prosaic. There is no machine in Egypt, but there is most certainly a system—a self-reinforcing one—that is the result of an environment of uncertainty in which Egyptian elites are individually and collectively trying to discern the direction of politics. Once they think they know how events will unfold, these elites will do everything possible to ensure that they are on the “right side” of history.  It is unlikely that Field Marshal al Sisi actually ordered the arrests of three Al Jazeera journalists in December of last year, though he created an environment that helped make such violations of basic norms such as freedom of the press possible.  The Ministry of Interior went ahead and did it, which is unremarkable, but the fact that a long list of Egyptian intellectuals, ostensible liberals, and alleged revolutionaries lined up to applaud this clear violation of press freedoms, while the pro-government media was egging everyone on, is remarkable.  (All irony is lost in Egypt.)  This system is the reason why in Egypt’s Jacobin-like discourse anyone who openly expresses concern about human rights violations is branded a terrorist sympathizer. It also explains how otherwise respectful and previously respected Egyptians are falling all over themselves to prove that they are with the new program. Of course, the pressures to conform in Mubarak’s Egypt were pervasive if not always effective.  There was constant hedging among Egypt’s elites as the end of the Hosni Mubarak era drew closer.  It was as if thousands of people who operated within the ambit of the regime had their fingers in the air all at once trying to determine the direction of the wind should the president not wake up one day—Egyptians, particularly the elite, never imagined that Mubarak would outlive his own presidency.  So privately people criticized Mubarak, his son, his wife, the regime, the system, but just in case, they remained publicly supportive of the president and all too willing to do the government’s bidding. This phenomenon was considerably less pronounced during Mohammed Morsi’s brief tenure at the Itihadiyya Palace, but it existed.  Western journalists were not the only ones who lined up to see Khairat al Shater after it became clear how well the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party had done in the first and second round of parliamentary elections in late 2011 and early 2012.  Egyptian business elites, senior bureaucrats, and the media began either quietly reaching out to the Brothers or subtlety (and not so subtlety) accommodating themselves to what seemed like a new era in Egypt. It is hard to blame Egyptian elites for their predisposition to curry favor even if it violates privately held principles and beliefs.  There is no reward for dissent in Egypt.  It might get an activist a ringing and eloquent defense on the editorial page of the Washington Post, making him or her a Beltway hero (for a few days), but that will hardly make up for the onslaught that said activist will undoubtedly face within the Mehwar.  Confronted with the choice, some brave Egyptians have spoken out, but many more have chosen instead to burnish their pro-coup credentials, calculating that it will ensure them a place (and the attendant benefits) within the new regime.  It is hard not to feel sorry for people put in the seemingly impossible position between their conscience and the system. When Abdel Monem Said Aly wrote an article called, Khatiyat Steven Cook or “Steven Cook’s Offense” it was hard not to be angry immediately. But upon reflection, I understood precisely that he is bowing to the relentless pressure of the system.  The piece, which appeared in Al Sharq Al Awsat on January 22 and re-published in English the following Friday in Al Ahram Weekly as “Where Steven Cook is Wrong” offers a strong and fair critique of my recent blog post “Do Not Run Sisi…Do Not Run,” and erroneously and maliciously ties three colleagues—Marc Lynch, Tamara Wittes, and Michele Dunne—along with myself, to the Muslim Brotherhood.  Abdel Monem, who was very much a part of the Mubarak power-structure, was signaling to those now in power that despite his longstanding ties to Washington, Brandeis University, and a host of organizations in the West, he can be trusted to advance their political agendas.  It is uncomfortable to be drawn into the current Egyptian political dynamic this way.  Abdel Monem and I have broken bread together more than a few times and I always valued his insight, but I was never naïve. I always knew who buttered his bread.  

IRIN reports on Jordan’s neglected refugees. Mada Masr presents “Lexicon of a revolution’s insults,” which looks at new terms and labels invented after the Egyptian uprising of January 25. For those participating in the boycott on Israel, here are ten brands that you would have to give up…

Significant Developments Syria. The United Nations and Syria agreed today to allow humanitarian aid into the besieged old city of Homs, and to allow women and children safe passage out. The agreement came just hours after Syrian rebels announced a new campaign in Aleppo against government forces which escalated its air assault earlier this week. On Sunday, al-Qaeda’s central leadership officially cut its ties to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), a major insurgent group that operates in Syria and Iraq and has caused widespread conflict among rebel factions fighting against Bashar al-Assad. Divisions between the two groups began emerging last year when al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri ordered ISIS to withdraw from Syria in order for the rebellion to be led by their official affiliate, the Nusra Front. Meanwhile, the Syrian government yesterday missed another deadline in its chemical weapon destruction plan. According to a timetable issued by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, Syria was supposed to have given up its entire chemical stockpile by February 5. Even though the Syrian government says it will still meet the final deadline of June 30, U.S. officials claim Syria had only removed 4 percent of its most toxic chemicals thus far. Iran. On Monday, the United States confirmed that Iran received its first $550 million installment of assets resulting from the sanctions relief agreed to in the November interim deal. According to Iran’s official IRNA news agency, the funds went into an Iranian Central Bank account in Switzerland. In the interim deal, six major powers agreed to grant Iran access to $4.2 billion in its oil revenues frozen abroad in exchange for nuclear disengagement. Also on Monday, the Iranian government began handing out food packages for millions of Iranians. While meant to ease the pressure on Iranian citizens, the poor implementation of the food distribution program—at least three people died while waiting in the cold to receive handouts—led some Iranian parliamentarians to criticize Iranian president Rouhani.  U.S. Foreign Policy Syria. Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham told reporters that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry had suggested to a bipartisan congressional delegation that President Obama needs a new, more assertive Syria policy. The conversation reportedly took place on Sunday in Munich, one day after Kerry joined Defense Secretary Hagel to give an uncompromising defense of the administration’s foreign policy. Meanwhile, U.S. officials said the Department of State’s Syria point man, Ambassador Robert Ford, plans to retire from his post by the end of the month. A longtime Middle East expert, Ford was instrumental in efforts to bring together different factions of the fragmented Syrian opposition in order for them to enter negotiations in Geneva. Ford was reportedly tapped by the Obama Administration to become the next U.S. ambassador to Egypt, but the appointment was rejected by the Cairo government. Saudi Arabia. The White House announced that President Obama will travel to Saudi Arabia in March. The visit will be the first to the kingdom since popular uprisings across the Middle East began in 2011. “Saudi Arabia is a close partner of the United States, and we have a bilateral relationship that is broad and deep and covers a range of areas,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said Monday. The visit appears designed to patch up differences between Washington and Riyadh that have spilled over into the public over the United States’ handling of Syria’s civil war. Israel-Palestine. Israeli politicians continued to criticize Secretary of State Kerry this week, accusing him of manipulating the threat of an economic boycott against Israel to pressure the government into peace concessions. U.S. State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki rebuked the criticisms, emphasizing Kerry’s demonstration of “staunch opposition to boycotts.” Kerry yesterday also brushed off the criticisms, telling CNN that, “I’ve been, quote, ’attacked’ before by people using real bullets, not words. And I am not going to be intimidated.” Israel’s chief peace negotiator, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, rebuked fellow government ministers over their criticisms of Secretary Kerry. While We Are Looking Elsewhere Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah issued a royal decree on Monday punishing citizens who fight in conflicts outside Saudi Arabia. Regional civil wars such as Syria’s have been attracting a large flow of Saudi fighters, worrying the monarchy that the fighters could return radicalized and threaten their own government. The royal decree comes just one day after the implementation of a bold counterterrorism law that criminalizes virtually any criticism of the government. Algeria. The head of Algeria’s ruling party, Amar Saidani, called on powerful intelligence chief General Mohamed “Tewfiq” Mediene to resign in an interview published on Monday. Saidani blamed Mediene for failures of the DRS military intelligence agency, and declared that, “The presence of internal security in every institution gives the impression that power in Algeria is not in civilian hands.” Meanwhile, long-time Algerian president Abd el-Aziz Bouteflika was backed by a large majority of political forces for the upcoming presidential elections. The elections are currently scheduled for April 17. Yemen. A ceasefire was restored today between Sunni tribesmen and northern Houthi rebels after fighting broke out just north of Sana’a last night. The fledgling truce was agreed to on Tuesday to end fighting that had killed nearly 150 people in the past week. Egypt. A video of the arrest of two Al Jazeera journalists was leaked on Monday in Egypt and broadcasted on a pro-government private channel. The two journalists, Egyptian-Canadian television producer Mohamed Fahmy and Australian correspondent Peter Greste, have been detained since their arrest on December 29 and were among twenty Al Jazeera journalists charged with broadcasting false reports to help the Muslim Brotherhood. Turkey. The Israeli government offered Turkey $20 million on Monday in compensation to the families of those killed or wounded during the 2010 raid on the Gaza-bound flotilla. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized over a phone call last March. Iraq. Seven car bombs exploded across Baghdad today, killing at least thirteen people in the latest of a series of explosions that have wracked the Iraqi capital. Yesterday, a wave of bombings included blasts in the city’s “Green Zone” and a busy square in the city center. While no group has claimed responsibility for the killings, the bombings followed a long series of attacks blamed by the government on the Islamic State of Iraq and the Syria (ISIS). Israel-Palestine. Abbas proposed that a NATO deployment could play a role in maintaining security as part of a peace agreement with Israel. “The third party can stay,” Abbas said. “They can stay to reassure the Israelis, and to protect us.” Meanwhile, Jerusalem municipality’s planning committee gave final approval for 558 apartments in East Jerusalem yesterday.

When I was at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, I enrolled in a seminar on the revolutions in Eastern and Central Europe with Professor Michael Mandelbaum.  The Soviet Union, Poland, Hungary, East Germany, and Czecholsolvakia were not quite my thing, but the course was an interesting diversion from the Middle East and it was topical (this was 1994).  When Mandelbaum—who is now a friend and mentor—returned my first paper, he scratched along the bottom of the last page, “Your conclusions are surely correct, but you make a series of dubious assertions along the way.”  I had the same reaction when I read John J. Mearsheimer’s recent contribution to The National Interest, “America Unhinged.” Without spoiling the plot for those who intend to read the piece, Mearsheimer argues that because the United States is so strong and that its margin for error so great, nothing constrains the country’s national security elites from pursuing a reckless foreign policy.  Despite this strength and apparently wide margin for error, this misguided foreign policy—based on the idea of American exceptionalism—has serious consequences: for Washington’s standing in the world, for the U.S. economy, for the young men and women who have fought two misbegotten wars in the Middle East, and for a liberal-democratic system.  Mearsheimer prefers an approach to the world that focuses solely on securing America’s interests—the free flow of oil from the Persian Gulf, ensuring that China that does not dominate Asia and the pacific, and preventing another great power from establishing hegemony over Europe .  Everything else is an unnecessary distraction that, given Washington’s penchant for neo-conservatism and liberal interventionism, just gets the United States into trouble. Before I go on let’s stipulate that Mearsheimer is a polarizing figure.  Let’s also stipulate that he is one of the most important theorists of international politics of the last three decades or more.  Long before he collaborated with Stephen M. Walt on The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, he wrote such influential works as “The False Promise of International Institutions” and The Tragedy of Great Power Politics among many other significant works.  Mearsheimer has a reputation for being tough, arrogant, and unapologetic about both, yet all his graduate students whom I know, former or present, would lay down in traffic for him.  I read The Israel Lobby and the article that preceded it.  Mearsheimer and Walt got some facts wrong, but in the main I shrugged.  I liked J.J. Goldberg’s far more complex and nuanced look at pro-Israel groups in his book, Jewish Power: Inside the American Jewish Establishment better.  I do not think that Mearsheimer and Walt are anti-Semites, though they are willfully blind and thus insensitive to the dilemmas of Jewish identity in the diaspora and the fraught relationship that American Jews have with Israel. Whether you like Mearsheimer or you hate him, there is no denying that he is always interesting, which is why I read his work.  He writes to make people think, even if what he says makes them uncomfortable. That is what academics and public intellectuals are supposed to do, yet their arguments are also supposed to be grounded in reality.  Not so with good portions of "America Unhinged" and its description of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, especially Egypt and Syria.  It is true that much of the American foreign policy establishment believes Egypt and Syria are of strategic importance, but there is far less agreement than Mearsheimer asserts that there are “compelling moral reasons for U.S. involvement in Syria,” even less agreement that Washington can “affect Egyptian and Syrian politics in significant and positive ways” and thus no agreement that unless the United States fixes the problems of these countries great harm will come to American interests.  For Mearsheimer, these issues are settled and they have produced once again a reckless and aggressive policy in the Middle East. I could be wrong, but it seems clear from the newspapers of record, the leading foreign policy journals, opinion magazines, a seemingly endless number of meetings between the analytic community and government officials, and the roster of Congressional hearings that where Mearsheimer imagines a consensus, there is actually a heated and bruising debate.  Washington these days is hardly reminiscent of 2002 when the “cakewalk consensus” carried the country merrily and irresponsibly into the invasion of Iraq. Not only is Mearsheimer making dubious assertions about this alleged consensus, but his article is also at variance with the facts of Washington’s Egypt and Syria policies.  There has been a lot of criticism of the way the United States has approached Egypt since the January 25, 2011 uprising that brought Hosni Mubarak down, but few would argue that Washington has sought to “micromanage Egypt’s transition,” as Mearsheimer claims.  Even fewer—with the possible exception of various spokesmen for the Muslim Brotherhood—would make the claim that the Obama administration “facilitated” the July 3 coup d’etat.  Instead, Washington has essentially surfed the news cycles and accommodated itself to outcomes that Egyptians produced entirely on their own—the fall of Mubarak, the election of Morsi, and the return of the military.  It seems clear that the White House recognizes that it cannot affect the outcome of Egyptian politics, so it is essentially doing what Mearsheimer prescribes—standing aside and letting the Egyptians work it out for themselves. Not a bad idea, overall. Of course, Washington has a number of residual security interests in Egypt, which is why the annual aid package will continue to flow in some form or another. Yet in case Mearsheimer did not notice, the Obama administration has decided to ratchet back American efforts to promote democracy and good governance in Egypt and the rest of the Middle East much to the significant dismay of a variety of non-governmental organizations and activists close to these issues.  It was in all the papers. On Syria, Mearsheimer makes the rather startling claim that, “By backing the campaign against Assad, the Obama administration has helped turn Syria into a haven for terrorist groups.”  The president and his two secretaries of state have said that Assad must go.  Washington has delivered some non-lethal aid to rebel groups and devoted about $5 billion to help care for Syrian refugees, but other than that, the administration has studiously avoided getting involved in Syria.  Perhaps Mearsheimer missed it, but throughout much of 2012, the Turks encouraged, cajoled, and begged the United States to support a more robust effort against Assad.  The Saudis have grown so frustrated with Washington’s desire to avoid Syria’s civil war that they have very publicly threatened a breach in the bilateral relationship.  Other actors—the Qataris, al Qaeda-linked groups, Hizballah, and Iran—all understood that there would be no American action in Syria and thus pursued their agendas there with impunity.  Mearsheimer may believe that American support for an end to the Assad regime created the situation we now observe in Syria, but that is giving way too much credit to empty American rhetoric. There was, of course, that moment in late August and early September 2013 when the Obama administration threatened an “incredibly small” military intervention in Syria.  This was to punish the Assad regime for its use of chemical weapons, but even then the White House was hardly enthusiastic, throwing the issue to Congress in order to avoid having to order up airstrikes in Syria.  When it became clear that the United States would not take military action, interventionists in Washington, Ankara, Riyadh, Paris and elsewhere were apoplectic.  You have to give credit where credit is due, however.  Mearsheimer is correct in the sense that American involvement in Syria would likely not have made a difference and there was even a good chance that U.S. intervention would have made things worse—points the Pentagon has been making since the first calls for intervention in Syria were heard in early 2012. “America Unhinged” would have been a more successful piece had Mearsheimer stuck with the issues he seems to know best: Iraq and Afghanistan.  I understand the desire to be topical, but his effort to shoehorn Egypt and Syria into cases of reckless American foreign policy undermines what is otherwise an important argument about the very real costs of foreign policy adventurism. Like my paper for Mandelbaum, Mearsheimer earns a B/B- for this essay.