After the fall of Bashar al-Assad and the emergence of Jolani and his HTS faction as the new power in Syria, Israel hopes for El-Sisi in Syria but may end up with Morsi, if history in the region is any guide.
During the Arab Spring, Egypt was one of the countries that experienced a dramatic pendulum of change—from really bad to semi-better and then to worse. The uprising in Egypt, epitomized by Tahrir Square, became a global symbol for the Arab Spring. One of its earliest consequences was the downfall of Mubarak’s 32-year dictatorship. However, once the protests started in Cairo, the most worried person was not Hosni Mubarak himself but Benjamin Netanyahu. The reason for his concern was the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel in 1978, in which Israel and Egypt ended their 30 years of open-ended war with the help of the United States. Initially, war-weary Egyptians welcomed the accord. However, public support for the treaty plummeted with Israel’s military continuing genocides in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.
After the assassination of President Sadat in 1981—partly due to his policy towards Israel—his successor, President Hosni Mubarak, took it upon himself to safeguard the peace treaty. Mubarak’s commitment to upholding the agreement, even at the cost of his nation’s lives and interests, made him a key strategic ally of the West and earned him $1.3 billion (£818 million) a year in U.S. military aid.
Israel—with the backing of the U.S.—secured a favorable deal with the Egyptians. The southern border, Israel’s main concern in its first 30 years, became quiet and required little attention. Egypt agreed to sell gas to Israel, tighten security in Gaza, oppose the advancement of Iran and its allies, and prevent resistance movements from infiltrating through the Sinai Peninsula. The deal also significantly reduced Israel’s military expenditure. Before the peace agreement, Israel spent 27% of its GDP on the military, not to mention the workforce losses in the private sector due to the military readiness needed to secure the border.
Therefore, the agreement was critical for Israel, even though it was unpopular with the Egyptian people, who opposed it in large numbers. Maintaining it became imperative for both Tel Aviv and Washington. If Israel were to continue the oppression and enslavement of the Palestinian people, the treaty had to be maintained at all costs. Preventing democracy in Egypt was key to achieving that goal. Thus, a dictatorship in Egypt, responsive only to Israeli and American demands and not to its people, became a vital Israeli national interest. This indispensable role of Egypt for both the U.S. and Israel was summarized by a senior U.S. national security official: “For the United States, Egypt is the keystone of its Middle East policy. For Israel, it’s the whole arch,” according to the New York Times.
Another reason Egypt’s dictatorship was a priority for Israel and its main backer, the U.S., was its strategic importance. Egypt not only shares the most critical border with Israel in terms of security but is also the most populous Arab nation. Historically, it has been seen as the artery of Arab and Muslim nationalism. It is the birthplace of pan-Arabism—the movement to create a unified Arab republic stretching from Iraq to Sudan. Egypt, under the charismatic leadership of Gamal Abdel Nasser, embodied the pan-Arabism fever dream that was at the heart of much of the 20th-century geopolitical struggle. Therefore, Israel has always viewed Egypt not as a sovereign state but as a national security issue requiring constant monitoring and engagement. So, when the Arab Spring reached Tahrir Square, it wasn’t just the Egyptian ruling class that was terrified; there was a palpable sense of impending doom in Tel Aviv. Hosni Mubarak may have feared for his reign, but Israel feared for its very existence. This sentiment was reflected in an article by Eli Shaked, a former Israeli ambassador to Cairo, who wrote at the time in Yediot Aharonot: “The only people in Egypt who are committed to peace are the people in Mubarak’s inner circle, and if the next president is not one of them, we are going to be in trouble.”
For the sake of Israel dictators must be protected by democracies
In response to this emerging threat, the U.S. and Israel deployed all their resources and influence in Egypt—including the media and social media, particularly Facebook—to help keep Mubarak in power. Israel even offered to send Shin Bet to help Mubarak crush the protesters. Mubarak, wary of the bad optics this would create and concerned it might exacerbate the protesters’ anger, urged Israel to direct their assistance through the U.S.
Netanyahu tapped Obama on the shoulder and told him to intervene. Obama publicly stood with Mubarak while trying to temper expectations and undermine the revolution by urging the regime to make symbolic changes to placate the crowd. Interestingly, the proposed change was spearheaded by Omar Suleiman, a former Egyptian intelligence officer and a favorite of Obama, Hillary Clinton, the CIA, and Mossad. On January 29, Mubarak was forced to appoint Suleiman as his vice president—a position that didn’t exist in Egypt’s presidential system—to oversee a transitional government tasked with preparing the nation for sham elections that would ensure the old regime’s return. Hillary Clinton made it clear that this was the U.S.’s desired outcome during the Munich Security Conference: “There are forces at work in any society, and particularly one that is facing these kinds of challenges, that will try to derail or overtake the process to pursue their own specific agenda,” she said. “Which is why I think it’s important to support the transition process announced by the Egyptian government, actually headed by now Vice President Omar Suleiman.”
Clinton’s handpicked envoy, Frank Wisner, a lobbyist and a key Jewish Jihadist in the U.S.’s Egypt strategy, went even further. He endorsed Suleiman to oversee the process without involving the protesters and advocated for Mubarak to remain president until after the elections. “We need to get a national consensus around the preconditions for the next step forward. The president must stay in office to steer those changes,” Wisner stated. “I believe that President Mubarak’s continued leadership is critical—it’s his chance to write his own legacy.”
However, after two weeks, the protests grew in both size and intensity. Recognizing the shifting momentum and knowing the U.S. still had the Egyptian military as a fallback plan, Obama and Netanyahu called for Mubarak to step down. They were assured by the Egyptian military establishment that any democratically elected leader would be subordinate to the military on sensitive foreign policy issues, particularly concerning relations with Israel and the U.S. With this guarantee in place, Mubarak was ousted, and truly competitive elections were held in Egypt for the first time in its history.
Everybody, including the U.S. establishment, expected the Muslim Brotherhood to win the election because they had been the most organized and effective opposition force to Mubarak’s 30-year dictatorship. The Muslim Brotherhood had evolved into a reformed and much more progressive Islamic movement compared to the 1970s. Instead of advocating violence, they called for the peaceful coexistence of all Egyptians and sought good relationships with the world, especially with America and Israel—but on their own terms. They wanted to engage with the West economically and diplomatically on fairer terms. The Muslim Brotherhood was seen by the majority of Egyptians and the Muslim world as a moderate, populist social force.
They pledged not to engage in violence or spread jihad to other nations. However, they insisted on restoring Egypt’s lost sovereignty for the first time since, perhaps, the fall of the Pharaohs. They made it clear that Egypt would act in its national interest based on the popular vote of its citizens, rather than following what Israel or America wanted.
The U.S. responded with skepticism, essentially saying: “No, that is not how things are supposed to be conducted in the Middle East, especially in Egypt. However, have your elections first, and we will see what happens.”
Morsi: the chosen one
On May 29, 2012, the people of Egypt overwhelmingly voted for Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, giving him the mandate to put Egypt back on the world stage as a force to be reckoned with.
This outcome caused alarm in Israel. Netanyahu and his security ministers called on the CIA for help. Immediately, American “soft foot soldiers”—media and paid activists—were deployed in Egypt to ensure that pressure was constantly applied to Morsi. Their goal was to make sure he never felt comfortable or secure in the presidency. They wanted Morsi to understand that no matter his plans for change, they would not succeed unless first approved by the U.S. or Israel—or both. Moreover, if America approved but Israel opposed it, his plans still would not work.
However, Morsi, buoyed by his mandate and the trust of the Egyptian people, believed he was untouchable. He thought he could easily transform 40 years of Egyptian foreign policy—which had been subservient to Israel—overnight.
What Morsi did was remarkable and historic based on the major foreign policy decisions he implemented. First, he reversed the near-total lack of relations between Egypt and Iran that had existed since the Islamic Revolution, becoming the first Egyptian head of state to visit Iran since then. Second, President Morsi fulfilled his promise to allow Egyptian citizens to cross into Gaza and provide assistance to their Palestinian brothers and sisters.
Morsi argued that just as Israel has the sovereign right to keep its borders with Gaza closed, Egypt, as a sovereign state, could decide not to keep its border with Gaza closed. Millions of joyful Egyptians poured into Gaza, delivering food and other essential supplies to their brothers and sisters. After Israel flattened parts of Gaza in 2012, Morsi sent Prime Minister Hesham Qandil to Gaza to express solidarity with its people and Hamas—a stark contrast to Hosni Mubarak’s approach of treating Hamas as an enemy during the 2008–09 Gaza War.
These moves were early signs that a new Egyptian leader had arrived. Everyone, including the Americans, expected the new Egyptian president—a Sunni, Wahhabi-aligned member of the Muslim Brotherhood—to gravitate toward Saudi Arabia and the UAE. They assumed he would act more like the centrist, quiet Gulf sheikhs than the revolutionary Iranians. However, they were shocked when Morsi made it clear he was pursuing a strong, independent foreign policy—not beholden to Israel, America, or the wealthy Gulf States. This bold stance surprised not only the West and Israel but also Saudi Arabia and the UAE, who had hoped Morsi would uphold the anti-Iranian Sunni alliance.
The oil-rich Arab states could accept this new Egypt, but the Israelis and Americans could not.
What happened next is history.
Obama and Netanyahu overthrew Morsi.
The U.S. activated its foot soldiers embedded within Egyptian society. The first wave involved media outlets, activists, and civil society groups incentivized through bribes and a program called the “Democracy Assistance Initiative.” Documents obtained by the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley exposed the details of this subversive strategy. The funding was funneled through a network of agencies within the State Department. Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars were channeled through the Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), the Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI), USAID, and the Washington-based quasi-governmental organization, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).
This money went to carefully selected individuals and groups trained in sabotage and subversion. These included police, military, and intelligence officers, as well as NGOs and secular, pro-Western politicians who openly advocated closing mosques and forcibly removing preachers. Among these politicians was Mohamed ElBaradei, the former UN nuclear chief who had lied about Iraq’s WMDs to facilitate the U.S. invasion. ElBaradei was used by the U.S. and Israel as the nucleus for stirring unrest in Egypt.
The plan was clear: once these subversive elements created enough chaos and discontent on the streets, the U.S. and Israel would direct Defense Minister Abdel Fattah el-Sisi—a figure they had pressured Morsi to appoint as part of the supposed transition from military dictatorship to civilian democracy—to take action.
As planned, these groups orchestrated a major destabilization campaign, culminating in weeks of protests in Tahrir Square. However, the protests didn’t call for new elections or policy changes; instead, they demanded the military’s intervention to remove Egypt’s democratically elected president. Following the CIA’s blueprint, the military declared a state of emergency, ousted Mohamed Morsi, imprisoned him, and later executed him. The trumped-up charge against Morsi was leaking state secrets to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, with the accusation pointing to none other than Qassem Suleimani—the same figure assassinated years later by Donald Trump on Israel’s behalf.
Morsi’s supporters responded with massive protests, again gathering in Tahrir Square. With the approval of the U.S. and Israel, el-Sisi launched one of the most brutal crackdowns in recent history. Thousands of civilians were slaughtered, while thousands more Morsi supporters were arbitrarily imprisoned and subjected to savage torture. The Muslim Brotherhood was hunted down, purged, and banned from participating in Egypt’s political life.
This repression occurred under the watch of liberal darlings like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, with the tacit support of figures like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer—all because Morsi defied Netanyahu and upset Israel.
The Jolani dilemma.
Now, with the rise of Abu Mohammad al-Jolani and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) faction in Syria, Israel faces a similar dilemma. In Israel’s strategic playbook, dictators and terrorists are seen as allies, while democratically elected leaders are viewed as mortal enemies. If elections were held in Syria today or even six months from now, it is widely believed that Jolani and his faction would win decisively.
Once in power, the least they would do is emulate Morsi’s approach, as this is the minimum expectation of their electorate. Radical Muslim movements look to Iran for inspiration, viewing it as the ideal model, unlike Saudi Arabia or the UAE, whose aristocratic systems are anathema to revolutionary ideals. Everything about these Gulf monarchies—elitism, hereditary rule, and subservience to the West—repels Islamic revolutionary movements, which thrive on dynamism and anti-establishment ideals.
For this reason, Syrians are unlikely to allow Jolani to align himself with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, or Egypt’s el-Sisi. Having just ousted their own dictator, Syrians will not tolerate a leader who disregards the popular will. Jolani’s only viable path to respond to these demands, which extend beyond Syria’s borders, is to adopt the Morsi model.
This means Jolani will likely come to the realization that Iran, not Saudi Arabia, is his natural ally. Alternatively, he could abandon his revolutionary facade, declare himself the new el-Sisi, and slaughter thousands of Syrians to prove his loyalty to Israel and the United States.
