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Strength of its culture makes U.S. loved, hated on Arab street
CAIRO, Egypt — He doesn't have much by Western standards. Two dusty
acres of okra, peppers and peanuts, a home made of cinderblock and mud,
a television hooked to satellite — a must when you live in Egypt's
desert scrub, closer to the pyramids than to downtown Cairo.
But even here, 5,800 miles from the world's superpower, Saber Mohamed
Mossa feels as though he knows the United States.
"Since I realized life," says Mossa of his birth 45 years ago,
"this is what I hear: The Americans are good people. They give support
to the Arab people. … On the TV I see American officials on the
news, and they (behave) with respect."
Today, however, he's not so sure. Speaking to an Egyptian interpreter,
he pauses and weighs recent events: the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11,
the killings of Palestinians by the U.S.-backed Israeli military, Palestinian
suicide bombings.
The mayhem can be traced to "the master of the world" —
America — and to the power it wields, Mossa says. Why doesn't the
master call off Israel? he asks.
His Muslim wife places a fist over her heart and speaks of Palestinian
children killed by American-made weapons. Egypt's government-controlled
media doesn't often dwell on the Israeli deaths. So Sabah Sayed Ali focuses
on the dead Muslim children. She makes a slicing motion at her throat.
"Haram," she says sharply, meaning "forbidden."
Her tone is telling of the times, pre- and post-Sept. 11. Of perceptions,
East and West. It's telling also of what some Arabs see as the new Cold
War — a Muslim versus non-Muslim world view — and of the dangers,
real and imagined.
"Do they have security?" a doorman at the Nile Hilton asks an
Egyptian interpreter, concerned for the safety of two light-skinned, fair-haired
journalists escorted in Cairo. "Are you armed?"
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Land of paradoxes
Contradictions and tensions seem endless here.
The U.S. flag is torn and trampled at the same demonstrations where Americans
are greeted with handshakes, as if American voters bear no responsibility
for the actions of their government.
The city’s 16 million residents wake each day to the amplified cries
of muezzins summoning the public to prayers while friendly Muslim guards
stand sentry over a century-old Jewish synagogue, but worshippers rarely
show. On a spring Sabbath, only a calico cat wanders the dusty pews.
Cairo's casinos welcome foreigners but by law refuse locals. The imams
who preside over Cairo's forest of minarets revile loose Western morals,
but "Sex in the City" and other American exports thrive in replay.
Television gives American lifestyles the appeal of forbidden fruit, says
American University professor Abdallah Schleifer, a former NBC News correspondent
living in the Middle East since 1965.
"The American woman is seen as sexually available," he says.
"Just about any American woman walking the streets of Cairo (alone)
will get her butt pinched."
Five years ago, Muslim militants slaughtered 58 foreign tourists near
Luxor, Egypt, in an effort to drive a larger wedge between East and West.
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was assassinated in 1981 for similar reasons.
Yet Cairo's 83-year-old American University — guarded heavily by
Egyptian police since Sept. 11 — is revered as Egypt’s Ivy
League.
Standing statue-still amid a raucous anti-U.S. demonstration in downtown
Cairo, 40-year-old Iman Badawi would appear to all the West as the antagonist.
She wears the galabeya dress and hijab head covering of her Muslim faith,
and in her hands are several posters the size of traffic signs. She shuffles
them like TV cue cards:
"Sharon + Bush (EQUALS) Real & Only Axis of Evil," reads
one, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. "Go to Hell
Enemies Forever," reads another.
"We do not have anything against Americans,” Badawi says politely,
in perfect English. “What we have is against Bush's administration.”
She offers her American Hotmail dot-com e-mail address.
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Is it envy or Israel?
In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, Americans sounded expert on
the subject of Islamic extremism.
"They hate us for who and what we are,” CBS Evening News anchor
Dan Rather told David Letterman on Sept. 17: “They want to kill
us and destroy us."
Three days later, Bush told the country, "They hate our freedoms;
our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and
assemble and disagree with each other."
On Oct. 1, the cover of the National Review read: "The United States
is a target because we are powerful, rich and good. We are resented for
our power, envied for our wealth, and hated for our liberty."
Schleifer, 67, a Muslim convert who was reared in New York as an American
Jew, describes those assertions as naive and arrogant — two adjectives
attributed to Americans globally.
"This says, ‘We are great, we are wonderful,’" he
says, holding a copy of the National Review. "That is profoundly
simplistic. It sounds more like the knee-jerk, anti-American rhetoric
coming out of Europe."
Egyptians trace the true source of anti-American hostility to their country’s
northeast border.
"Arabs see American-made tanks and American-made guns going in and
smashing up the homes of the Palestinians,” Schleifer said.
It's no coincidence, Egyptians say, that Israel, a country about the size
of New Jersey, is one of only eight nations known to have nuclear weapons.
"Israel is an abnormality fed by your military money," says
retired Michigan State University professor Ashraf El-Bayoumi, a resident
and native of Egypt and a naturalized U.S. citizen.
As he spoke, he helped rally Arabs at an anti-U.S. demonstration in Cairo
marking the 1948 creation of Israel. In protests in March and April, a
McDonald's was pelted with rocks by secondary school students and a KFC
next to Cairo University was ransacked and closed.
"We don't want your (expletive) food," El-Bayoumi says. "We
don't want your globalization."
Last year, he helped establish the General Committee for the Boycott of
American and Zionist Goods and Companies, which targets six U.S. brand
names including McDonald's, Coca-Cola and Marlboro — all ubiquitous
in the Middle East.
"We don't want your politics or your aid," El-Bayoumi shouts.
"Please take your money and leave."
Egypt has received about $50 billion in U.S. military and economic aid
in the last quarter century. El-Bayoumi and other critics consider it
a leash on the moderate Egyptian government, which is generally pro-American
and has held to a 1979 peace treaty with Israel.
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Love-hate, or just love?
But without U.S. military and economic aid — $1.9 billion, or 2
percent of Egypt's gross domestic product, is budgeted for 2003 —
the Egyptian government might be overthrown by Muslim militants and its
infrastructure would be "in the forest," much as it was 20 years
ago, says Egyptian playwright Ali Salem.
"The taxpayer in America has not wasted his money," Salem says.
"We are an ally. We are going toward liberalism, actually. And you
have gained many things; the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt
is quite respected."
Salem, 66, is controversial for visiting Israel and advocating peace between
Israelis and Palestinians. Sipping Turkish coffee and chain-smoking Marlboros,
he dismisses the notion that Americans are hated.
"Open the door to America and all these men will go to submit a request
to go to America, these same people who are ready to demonstrate in the
streets against America."
Cairo is a city with Manhattan's frantic pace, Washington's sense of history
and Hollywood's love of cinema. A fortress manned by armed guards protects
the seven huge satellite dishes that supply foreign television here.
Nike, Ford and Microsoft products are everywhere, along with Radio Shacks
and Applebee's restaurants and Gold's Gyms. Muslims praying outside downtown
mosques are framed by advertisements for Polo Sport and Coca-Cola —
the legacy of Sadat’s decision to fling open Egypt's doors to trade.
Arab fascination with America, Salem says, is “a very severe pathological
love."
"In Egypt, we would say, 'La bahebak wa la akdar ala boedak —
I don't love you and can't bear being away from you,'" he says.
In the hours and days after Sept. 11, South Korean children prayed for
America outside the U.S. embassy in Seoul. Bells tolled in Austria and
the Czech Republic. Portugal declared two days of mourning and "The
Star-Spangled Banner" played at Buckingham Palace, in the streets
of Paris and at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate.
Even in the West Bank and Gaza, there was a great tide of sadness. Palestinian
children were filmed celebrating with treats of free candy, but that was
an isolated incident magnified by the news media, says Fathi Arafat, the
brother of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
"Over such death, believe me, there was deep sadness," he says.
So even for the lone superpower often characterized as an arrogant bully,
there was empathy.
An Egyptian interpreter who is a citizen of Egypt and Canada and hopes
to move someday to America, sees the duality.
"You are so powerful, we admire you,” he says. “You are
so powerful, we are insulted."
RELATED STORIES
U.S. battling image as arrogant superpower
Essay: Perception of U.S. and its policies lend to
combustible environment
INTERACTIVE MAP:
U.S.
relations with the world
CONTINUE ON TO: PART 2
Return to top of page | Return to contents
©2002,
Gannett News Service
"Since I realized life," says Mossa of
his birth 45 years ago, (this is what I hear): The Americans are good
people. They give support to the Arab people. … On the TV
I see American
officials on the news, and they (behave)
with respect."
Saber Mohamed Mossa
An Egyptian farmer
Mossa's farm near
Giza, Egypt
McDonald's is one of many American franchises that have made their way
to Cairo, Egypt.
"The American
woman is seen as sexually available.
Just about any American woman walking the streets of Cairo (alone) will
get her butt pinched."
American University
professor Abdallah Schleifer
"We don't want your (expletive) food. We don't
want your globalization."
Egyptian resident and
retired Ameircan professor Ashraf El-Bayoumi
(center)
Egyptians gathered in May at Mogamma Square in Cairo, Egypt, to protest
the
American policy toward
Israel. The anti-American protest was the first
approved by the Egyptian government.
"The taxpayer in America has not
wasted his money.
We are an ally. We
are going toward liberalism, actually. And you have
gained many things;
the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt is quite respected."
Egyptian playwright
Ali Salem
Gannett News Service
photos by Heather Martin
Morrissey
