Tuesday, February 01, 2011

Changing times

There is a lot of commentary on Egypt filling the press. These two had something distinctive to say. First there is Hitchens:
People do not like to be treated like fools, or backward infants, or extras in some parade. There is a natural and inborn resistance to such tutelage, for the simple-enough reasons that young people want to be regarded as adults, and parents can't bear to be humiliated in front of their children ...

...The whole lumbering apparatus of the Egyptian state conspired to make itself appear humorless and thuggish and to convince its people that they were being held as serfs by fools.
Then there is a moment of sanity and clarity from the ever optimistic Gershon Baskin exploring the consequences of the uprising for Egypt's future relations with Israel.
The future of Israel is not linked to the corrupt, nondemocratic regimes which we prefer to call “moderate” Arab states, but to the masses of people who are willing to take to the streets to demand their rights. When we understand that correctly, we will make peace with Palestine, we will have real democracy and we will be a lot more secure.

1 comment:

George S said...

I hope - I think - Baskin is right. It will depend on the amount of propaganda the Egyptian people have been subjected to and on who eventually emerges from the current conflict.

Unity in opposition means little once in power. Unity in opposition is unity of necessity. Those who know exactly what they want are generally stronger and better organized than those who only know what they don't want.

For all that, this is an Egyptian affair: hoping and thinking are the only proper options open to us for now. How could one possibly not support the people in the square?