The regime in Egypt has become a threat for the people. President Hosni Mubarak admitted this implicitly. In his last two speeches, he recognized the mistakes made by those around him. He said that he would not run for President. He excluded the idea of inheritance of power. He promised constitutional amendments. He appointed a government from which he excluded corrupt businessmen. He worked hard to have someone from the army at its head. He appointed a Vice President. He changed the Minister of the Interior. He did all of this in an effort to absorb the anger, as well as to appease and reassure public opinion. As for his allies abroad, and most prominently the United States, he reassured them by keeping Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, who has in the past few years become the symbol of implementing what those allies agree over in the region, in coordination with Mubarak. Also to reassure foreign powers, Mubarak spoke of the threat of the Muslim Brotherhood, and some of those around him did not forget to mention Iran and the threat it poses. Certainly Cairo has been the one standing in the face of such religious rule in the Middle East, making use of its political weight in both the Arab and Muslim worlds, taking no heed of the sectarian wars that have started to emerge in Lebanon and in Iraq. And while Mubarak admits his mistakes and blames those around him for them, the machine of power he created and fostered for thirty years was carrying out a plan, one which any dictator would resort to during difficult times. Thus the regime unleashed its reserves of state-sponsored “balatgiya” (thugs): illiterate men, who bear no relation to society or to the youth, save for oppression and carrying out orders. The elegance of Ahmed Ezz or Gamal Mubarak is only an illusion masking the camels which those men rode to confront the internet youth. Mubarak, after admitting to some of his mistakes, such as letting loose the corrupt and overlooking their looting of the country, covering for their deeds, rigging elections, etc, should have publicly announced his resignation. This would have been the logical conclusion to his apologies. But he clung to his illusions. He continued into the final moments to insist on exercising his power. He issued orders, or suggested to his Vice President and the Interior Minister, to lift state cover from a few businessmen and former ministers, prompting the Office of Public Prosecution to ban them from traveling and to freeze their assets (their wealth is stored abroad). Mubarak's plan for facing the millions of protesters demanding that he leave seemed more like hair dye. Dye covers white hair, but it does not prevent ageing. Scaring those who have risen up was unsuccessful. The game was exposed from its very first moments. Talk of the constitution did not convince anyone, because the constitution is tailor-made for the President and the ruling oligarchy. As for pulling the police out of the streets, it was set up to bring about chaos. But the security breakdown remained limited. Young men were able to protect their neighborhoods better. No one attacked a church or a mosque. No Muslim assaulted a Copt – and neither did the opposite take place. When churches were under the protection of the regime, sectarian confrontations repeatedly took place. Some people do not deem it unlikely for those attacks to have been set up, and not by foreign forces as the regime claims. The failure of Mubarak's plan domestically coincided with the failure of his plan at the foreign level. His main ally, the United States, invited him to prepare himself to accept the fact that he will be excluded from the presidency, and asked him to hand over power in an orderly fashion. The US made him understand that it was no longer in its interest to stand alongside a weak President, preferring to continue allying itself with a strong new regime that would meet some of the demands of the protesters – a regime guaranteed by the military institution, which the people rallies around, and which has had strong ties with Washington ever since the Camp David Accords. What the US (as well as Israel) cares about, out of everything that is taking place in Cairo, is preserving those accords, regardless of who rules Egypt. Everyone now, both within Egypt and outside of it, is preparing for the phase that will follow the overflow of the Nile, in order in sow their seeds in the soft earth. And none is more experience in growing crops than those who inhabit the Nile Valley.
