“I don’t think that Fatah will be able to go back into Gaza,” said Mr. Reedy. “This is the irony of Israel’s military strength. They will not eliminate Hamas. Hamas will live in the minds of the people.”
Except for the title, this almost seems like straight reporting. Amazing from NYTimes.
Portion below; whole thing here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/10/world/middleeast/10cairo.html?hp=&pagewanted=all
The mood on the streets of Cairo feels somber, dark, dejected. There is a very heavy security presence. Armed riot police are massed outside of professional organizations, like the Doctor’s Syndicate, which are often run by members aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, the officially outlawed but tolerated Islamic movement. Massive troop carriers clog small side streets of the city.
Over three days of interviews here, people seemed deflated about the public criticism their country has received, let down by the failure of their own government to help the Palestinians and sickened by the deaths of hundreds of Palestinians, many of them women and children. Over and over, Egyptians said they felt the only ones they could trust were the Islamists — not their government.
“The Muslim Brotherhood’s work gives them credibility,” said Heba Omar, 27, who collected about $4,000 from her neighbors to donate to a charity controlled by brotherhood members. “They do what they can do at times of crisis.”
On Thursday, three young men looked over the railing at the choppy gray waters of the Nile River, schoolbooks tucked beneath their arms, jackets zipped up to their chins against the winter chill. “Of course we are sad,” Muhammad Atef, said in a low, defeated voice. “There is nothing we can do. There is nothing in our hands.”
Mr. Atef and his schoolmates, Hazem Khaled and Ramy Morsy, all 19 years old and studying to be electricians, were walking along the Nile Corniche, just opposite the imposing office tower that houses Egypt’s Foreign Ministry.
The diplomats handling the crisis were out of town, in New York City at the United Nations. But the young men said they were looking elsewhere for a chance to help the Palestinians. “The Islamists are very close to us,” said Mr. Atef.
“They are people we can trust,” said Mr. Khaled.
“We trust Islamist organizations,” Mr. Morse said.
Talk like this has helped press Egypt to change its approach to Gaza, if not its actual policies. When the war first began, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit lashed out at Hamas, blaming it for inciting the violence by refusing to heed Israel’s warnings to stop its rocket fire.
Egypt took a similar position in 2006, blaming Hezbollah for provoking Israel and sparking its bombing campaign against Lebanon by grabbing two Israeli soldiers in 2006. But then, as now, the government quickly changed its posture in the face of public outrage. “Mubarak lost credibility, not just in the Arab world but in Egypt, too,” said Fahmy Howeidy, an Egyptian writer with Islamist sympathies whose work used to appear in the main government-controlled daily newspaper, Al Ahram.
Egypt quickly tried to recover its standing by promoting a cease-fire initiative. That failed, and again the pressure has been growing. Political and diplomatic experts here say that officials are hoping to prop up Fatah, the secular Palestinian faction which was routed by Hamas and now is in charge of the West Bank. But they fear that as the fighting goes on, their reluctance to come to the aid of Hamas will accomplish exactly the opposite. Fatah may be undermined and Hamas empowered.
“I don’t think that Fatah will be able to go back into Gaza,” said Mr. Reedy. “This is the irony of Israel’s military strength. They will not eliminate Hamas. Hamas will live in the minds of the people.”
For average people, the concerns of the state pale in comparison to the desire to help stop the bloodshed. At Friday Prayer, which serves as a nexus between religion and politics for Muslims, leading Islamic scholars in the Middle East called for Muslims throughout the world to come together under the flag of Islam to help. And preachers heeded their call, very often taking aim at Israel, the Jewish people, the United States and the Egyptian president.
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