The call for freedom that rings louder than ever in the Arab world has spread from Tunisia to Egypt and Yemen in a matter of weeks. These developments have made one thing explicitly clear: It is 1989 in the Middle East. The desire for democracy now is most fervent in Egypt, where over the last week the disenchanted have taken to the streets of Cairo to demand that President Hosni Mubarak resign and bring an end to his 30-year regime. Out of this chaos has emerged an opportunity for President Obama to incarnate the ideal of American foreign policy that was a hallmark of his 2008 campaign.
While the moral authority that America commands is slowly being restored after taking nearly a decade's long shellacking, most of Obama's foreign achievements have been a continuation or slight alteration of the neo-conservative initiatives of George W. Bush. President Obama has indeed kept America safe from terror by ending combat operations in Iraq, but at the same time he has also escalated the War in Afghanistan, increased targeted drone strikes over the tribal areas of Pakistan and continued operations at Guantanamo Bay — not exactly a resume that sweeps in a new era of military prudence and humility.
With tactics deriding the naivete of a political neophyte, it becomes clear that a signature accomplishment achieved through negotiation and engagement is missing in contemporary American foreign affairs. These failings were made all the more visible by the release of the Palestine Papers this week, which serves as a searing reminder of the failures of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, as well as the United States' implicit endorsement of Israel's intractability. The unrest in Egypt should compel Obama to finally seize this moment and restore diplomacy.
Successfully doing so will require a balance between support for the Egyptian people and their demands, as well as respect for the sovereignty of a geopolitical ally. Throughout his reign, Mubarak has expressed support for U.S. interests in the region and has maintained a vital peace with Israel in exchange for a heavy supply of U.S. aid.
The leverage that comes with such support must be utilized to advance the sentiment made salient by the week-long democratic protests in Cairo. Obama should continue to publicly implore Mubarak to allow peaceful protesters to carry on. He must insist that all lines of communication within the country (the Internet and Al Jazeera television especially) remain open, giving an essentially incoherent movement a chance to organize around a secular and humanist agenda.
Given the cultural history of Egypt and the marginalization of religious political parties like the Muslim Brotherhood, we should be confident that Mubarak's Egyptian regime, not a more theocratic society, is what the people want. If this approach comes to fruition, Mubarak will have to cede to the demands of the people and schedule free, fair and open elections, and the U.S. leadership is in a position to help him do so.
Egypt's Berlin Wall is crumbling and the tides of democracy are rushing through the cracks. More than just being on the right side of history, President Obama should command the moment and lead us there.
