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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 8-Apr-2011
8-Apr-11 News -- Egypt poll: Arab League's Amr Moussa in lead for presidency

Web Log - April, 2011

8-Apr-11 News -- Egypt poll: Arab League's Amr Moussa in lead for presidency

IMF says that Palestinians are ready for statehood

Welcome to new web site readers

For reasons that are unknown to me, the traffic to this web site is suddenly up 30% in the last couple of days.

Whatever the reason, let me welcome the new visitors. If you have any questions, send me a comment and I'll get back to you, though it may take a while. Also, feel free to post in the Generational Dynamics forum, where the discussion in the Financial Topics thread is particularly heated and informative.

Egypt poll: Arab League's Amr Moussa in lead for presidency

A telephone poll of a random sample of 615 Egyptians, conducted from March 9-20, indicates that there's very little reason for the West to be concerned about Egypt becoming a hardline Muslim country. In particular, there's absolutely nothing that supports any concerns that Egypt will become "another Iran."

Amr Moussa (Al Arabiya)

Amr Moussa (Al Arabiya)

The poll by the New York based International Peace Institute surveys attitudes of Egyptians as they approach elections in the fall. Generally, Egyptians are optimistic, and believe that the country is moving in the right direction. We're going to look at the responses to two questions.

Q4. In your view, what is the biggest problem facing Egypt?

Economy / Inflation/ unemployment/ poverty/oil price/ homelessness ............................................. 35% Demonstrations / strikes/ unrest/ riots / govt has no control ...................................... 17% Corruption / bribery / dishonest officials ................... 8% Women’s rights and freedoms compromised ...................... 7% Crimes/ violence/ insecurity ................................. 5% Formation of new government/ absence of democracy/ elections ................................................ 5% Terrorism/ no peace/ insurgency .............................. 3% Social justice / Growing inequality in society ............... 2% Freedom / free speech ........................................ 2% Water ........................................................ 1% Schools / Bad education/ educated people emigrate ............ 1% Rule of law/ injustice/ frauds/ judiciary not independent .... 1% Healthcare ................................................... 1% Relations with Israel/Palestine/Israeli-Palestinian relations/peace process .................................. 0% Roads/ transportation ........................................ 0% Other ........................................................ 7% Don’t know /refused .......................................... 6%

This is interesting because this list of problems is not much different from a list produced by people in Europe or America. The economy and terrorism are high on the list of concerns, and relations with Israel and the Palestinians are so far down the list, they're almost irrelevant.

As I reported several days ago, Egypt's youth uprising has split the Muslim Brotherhood along generational lines. But as we described, even in that case, the major issue dividing the generations is not Israel, but corruption and honesty in government, number 3 on the above list. (See "4-Apr-11 News -- Egypt's 'Save the Revolution' movement splits Muslim Brotherhood.")

Q17. If the Presidential election was held today, who would you vote for?

Amr Moussa ...................... 37% Marshal Mohamed Tantawi ......... 16% Ahmed Zewail .................... 12% Essam Sharaf .................... 7% Omar Suleiman ................... 5% Wael Ghoneim .................... 2% Mohammed el Baradei ............. 2% Ayman Nour ...................... 1% Other ........................... 0% Won’t vote ...................... 0% Refused ......................... 5% Don’t know ...................... 14%

The poll is led by Amr Moussa, the secretary-general of the Arab League. The photo of Moussa at the top is from Al-Arabiya, at a time several weeks ago, when the Arab League was voting unanimously to support the American and European intervention in Libya.

In early March, when Moussa declared his candidacy for Egypt's presidency, he declared his vision to rebuild Egypt into a fully functioning democracy. According to Al-Ahram:

"In both meetings, held in the shadow of the attacks on Copts in the village of Soul, and in the Cairo district of Manshiyat Nasser, Moussa, who asked participants to address him as "Citizen" Amr Moussa, rather than as Secretary General, warned against the dangers of counter-revolution. As he pointed out also in an official statement on Thursday, Moussa asserted that these incidents were not spontaneous eruptions, but rather deliberate, well-planned attempts at subversion and counter-revolution instigated and waged by the “remnants of the old regime”.
In substantiating this assertion, Moussa pointed to the spirit of tolerance and unity shown by millions of protesters during the revolution, with Muslims and Christians praying alongside one another, and with Coptic youth creating human shields to protect Muslims as they conducted their prayers. He referred further to the fact that “the Jewish synagogue in Adly street, a few minutes walk from Tahrir, and along which waves of protesters would pass daily on their to the square, was not touched, despite the total absence of any police protection around it.”
For Moussa, this was evidence of the new spirit generated by the revolution, which stood in marked contrast to the attempts at sectarian and religious incitement, which were hallmarks of the old regime."

The election is still far off, and Moussa may have won the poll simply because he's the most well-known, as secretary-general of the Arab League.

I've been watching Egypt, just like everyone else, to see if there are any signs that Egypt is going to turn into another Iran, or if Egypt is going to fall under the control of a radical Muslim group like al-Qaeda. As it's turned out, it's been very difficult to find any sign of a trend in that direction, beyond an occasional isolated incident of some kind.

A couple of months ago, I compared Egypt today to Iran in 1979, at the time of the Great Islamic Revolution. It's worthwhile summarizing the differences briefly

Iran in 1979 was in a generational Crisis era, and Egypt today is in a generational Crisis era, so that much is the same. But there are also significant differences that I've written about before at length.

Egypt has no historic fault line between monarchy and clerics, as in Iran, and there's no charismatic clerical leader like Iran's Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Egypt lacks any strong radical Muslim presence, which Iran had, and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt has long ago renounced violence. There's no sign of a civil war, which the Great Islamic Revolution was. The crowds in Tehran yelled "Death to America." If the crowds in Tahrir Square massively started yelling "Death to Israel," then I'd have to change my opinion, but there's been no sign of that. Quite the contrary, I get the feeling that the leaders of all the political parties are going out of their way to reassure everyone that the Egyptian revolution will most definitely NOT be another Iran, and the poll results support that view.

The Generational Dynamics prediction is that the region is headed for a new war between Arabs and Jews, re-fighting the genocidal war that followed the partitioning of Palestine in 1948 and the creation of the state of Israel. As part of that war, we can expect to see conflicts between Sunni and Shia Muslims, and between Palestinian factions. But right now, based on all the information available today, it seems more likely that the Egyptians will be fighting WITH us, rather than AGAINST us.

A wooden xylophone in the forest

The following video is well worth two minutes of your time. A Japanese company is selling cell phones made of wood, and to illustrate the concept, the company built a giant wooden xylophone in the forest. As the wooden ball rolls down the xylophone, it plays Bach. Truly amazing.

Additional links

Egypt's foreign minister is applauding the actions by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to to send troops to Bahrain to stop the Shia protests against the Sunni government. The statement accuses Iran of trying to destabilize Bahrain. According to the statement, "The stability and Arabhood of the Arab Gulf countries is a red line against which Egypt rejects any trespass." Al Bawaba

A survey of 1,564 villages in 17 provinces of China reveals that 60% of farmers have had their land confiscated by the government, and that they were unsatisfied with the compensation that they received. According to the report, "Illegal land confiscation has become the biggest threat to Chinese farmers’ land rights and conflicts related to land have become a threat to the stability of China’s rural society." South Asia Analysis Group (SAAG)

Turkey is centrally located, with geographic links with the Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, the Southern Caucasus and the Black Sea. This is enabling Turkey to take a leading role in relations between Europeans and Muslims. ISN (Zurich)

The Palestinians have completely given up on the Mideast peace process, and instead are focusing on a September goal of asking the United Nations to declare, by international mandate, a Palestinian state on pre-1967 borders. The plan took a big step forward this week, as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) issued a report praising Palestinian fiscal reform, and declaring that Palestinian financial institutions are ready for statehood. Ma'an News

Sex selection by parents in India has reduced the gender ratio substantially, to 914 girls aged 0-6 for every 1000 boys. There are also severaly skewed gender ratios in China, Vietnam Taiwan, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Even Indian emigrants to the United States exhibit similarly imbalanced birth sex ratios. World Politics Review

There was a huge political battle last year over France's attempt to return much of its Roma Gypsy population from their countries of origin. (See "15-Sep-10 News -- Europe bitterly attacks France on Roma Gypsy expulsions.") Now the European Commission has made it a top priority that all Roma children should go to school, especially in countries where Roma live in significant numbers – Romania, Bulgaria, Spain, Hungary, Slovakia, France and Greece. EurActiv

Is Japan hiding a nuclear weapons program inside its nuclear power plants? New America Media

Al-Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has been promoting the idea of jihadist attackers performing terrorist attacks on their own, without having to make contact with al-Qaeda trainers or to coordinate with others. For example, a homemade bomb can be made from chemicals found in the home -- peroxide and acetone or chlorine and brake fluid. By watching out for neighbors using these and other dangerous chemicals, you can help identify these lone wolf jihadists before they do any damage. Stratfor

(Comments: For reader comments, questions and discussion, see the 8-Apr-11 News -- Egypt poll: Arab League's Amr Moussa in lead for presidency thread of the Generational Dynamics forum. Comments may be posted anonymously.) (8-Apr-2011) Permanent Link
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