Yesterday, the Egyptians got their million-man march. The crowd in Cairo’s Tahrir (Freedom) Square, plus more crowds in Alexandria, Suez and Ismailia, made up that number under the watchful eye of the army.
They also got a step toward what they’ve been demanding for the last week: President Hosni Mubarak’s departure. Mubarak has announced that he would not contest the next presidential election in September.
The Egyptian march was a remarkable event for a number of reasons.
First, this was the first time that we had a vast crowd in an Arab capital without the old antics of burning American and Israeli flags and shouting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”
In fact, it was the first time that an Arab crowd wasn’t calling for anybody’s death — not even Mubarak’s. The slogan was Rahil ya Rais — Go away, Mr. President!
Nor were there cries of “Allah Akbar!” (Allah Is The Greatest), nor any sign of self-styled mujahedin with their heavy beards.
Next, there was the fact that no political party could claim ownership of the event — least of all the Muslim Brotherhood, the bogeyman that Mubarak used as an excuse for his autocratic rule.
With change in Egypt now appearing inevitable, who are the likely winners and losers in the region?
The most obvious winner is the Egyptian people. The march of one million belonged to all of them: Muslim, Coptic Christian, religious, secular, right and left. Egyptians showed a discipline and wisdom that surprised even longtime observers.
Yet what they’ll do with what they’ve won remains to be seen.
The next potential winner is Iraq — whose nascent democracy could find a sibling in a pluralist government in Egypt.
Democratic change in Egypt will also strengthen reformist forces in Tunisia, which has just seen off its own despot but is still at the crossroads. The despot is gone but despotism still hangs over the place like a toxic cloud. The “undead” could still come back in a different guise.
Democratic forces throughout the Arab world, notably in Yemen, Lebanon and Algeria, will also be heartened by Egypt’s change of course toward democratization.
That events in Egypt should influence the rest of the Arab countries should come as no surprise. This has been the case at least since the 1950s.
Gamal Abdul Nasser’s coup in 1952 set a trend toward military dictatorships in the Arab world. Within less than two decades, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Yemen, Algeria and Somalia experienced their own military coups patterned on Nasser’s. It was also Egypt that set the trend for Arab countries to join the Soviet bloc.
Also among the likely winners if Egypt takes the path of democracy is Israel.
Of course, conventional wisdom claims that only Arab despots can ensure Israel’s security. In fact, all the wars against Israel were started by such despots. Egypt’s despotic regimes launched four wars to wipe Israel off the map. Iraq under Saddam Hussein was a mortal foe of Israel. The new pluralist Iraq is not.
Today, the most anti-democratic forces in the region — the Palestinian Hamas, the Islamic Republic in Iran and Tehran’s Hezbollah agents in Lebanon — are alone in publicly seeking Israel’s destruction.
Potential losers from Egypt range from the mullahs’ regime in Iran to Saudi Arabia and its frozen system.
The mullahs lose under any configuration.
If Egypt becomes a democracy, it will be harder to deny the Iranian people’s demand for self-determination. But if Egypt falls under Islamist domination, the mullahs still wind up losers: An Egypt governed by the Muslim Brotherhood would represent a clear and present Sunni threat to Iran’s ambitions to dominate the region in the name of Shiite Islam.
Saudi Arabia could be the loser for similar reasons. A democratic Egypt would find it hard to ally itself with a traditional regime that resists meaningful reforms, while an Islamist Egypt would be a challenge to Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabi Islam.
The remaining Arab despotic regimes would also lose. Syria, Libya and Sudan would look much more like anachronistic concoctions than they do at the moment.
Jordan is especially vulnerable and may be the next Arab country to head for change. Last night, its king dismissed the government with a vow of fresh elections.
Those Arab societies that have stopped at a crossroad between despotism and democracy — countries such as Morocco, Algeria, Kuwait and the oil emirates of the Persian Gulf — would also be affected by change in Egypt. Even the anachronistic sultanate of Oman, where lethargy is almost a religion, may be shaken by what happens next in Egypt.
In each case, the regime will be among the losers — while democratic forces could be regarded as winners.
What is happening in Egypt is a political earthquake that could affect the whole “Greater Middle East” for years. What that effect might be remains to be seen.