Ally

by Michael B. Oren

  Three weeks later, I walked the hairpin mountain turn where walls of fire had closed on the Prison Services bus. The asphalt was cracked from the heat. Carbonized stubs of what had once been five million trees studded the landscape. An Israeli forest ranger showed me where, beneath the ashes, charred bodies had been found intertwined. “Look,” he said, pointing to a nearby ridge combed by helmeted conservationists. “They’ve already started replanting.”

  Walking back from that deadly bend, I reflected on the complex turns in the U.S.-Israel alliance. Subjected to ceaseless strains, the bonds between America and Israel once again proved resilient. Like the Carmel forest, it, too, would regenerate. At that moment, Israel could not have had a better ally—truly a ben brit, son of a covenant—than Barack Obama.

  The Carmel disaster further confirmed my initial assessment that the president, contrary to common conservative belief, was not anti-Israel. On the contrary, he was intensely supportive of a specific version of Israel—the Israel of refuge and innovation. But the Israel he cared about was also the Israel whose interests he believed he understood better than its own citizens and better than the leaders they chose at the ballot box.

  I turned away from the place where defenseless human beings had been consumed, unaware that, elsewhere in the Middle East, another immolation was imminent. Unlike the Carmel disaster, though, this fire would not be doused. Rather, it would race, unsuppressed, across the entire region, burning down structures that had existed for decades, even centuries, igniting—it seemed—history itself.

  Wintry Spring

  His name, Mohammed Bouazizi, would soon be forgotten, but not his act. Slapped, spat at in the face, and berated by a police officer on December 17, 2010, the twenty-six-year-old Tunisian fruit vendor poured gasoline over his body and set himself on fire. As Bouazizi expired, Tunisia erupted. Thousands of protesters, many of them mobilized by social media networks, rioted in the streets, burning shops and overturning vehicles. More than two hundred people were killed over the next two weeks as the rampage expanded into a popular revolt. Finally, his security forces overwhelmed, President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia’s dictator for more than two decades, fled the country. For the first time in modern history, the citizens of an Arab state had risen up and toppled an autocratic ruler.

  The success of Tunisia’s “jasmine revolution” sparked elation throughout the United States. Momentarily overcoming partisanship, both Democrats and Republicans jointly praised the insurrection. The media covered it obsessively, with reporters unabashedly rooting for the rebels. Though once dismissive of his predecessor’s democracy agenda in the Middle East, President Obama now embraced it. “I applaud the courage of the Tunisian people,” he declared. “The United States of America…supports the democratic aspirations of all people.”

  But what Americans hailed as the start of a Middle Eastern march toward freedom, Israelis feared was a crack in the regional order. In contrast to Obama’s support for change, Netanyahu expressed his “hope that there will be quiet and security [and] that stability will be restored.” Americans perceived Bouazizi’s suicide as a protest against despotic rule and a desperate plea for freedom. Israelis, noting that the police officer who publicly assaulted the vendor was a woman, saw his fiery death as a means of purging humiliation. The violent tension between honor and shame, so central to Middle Eastern cultures and tragically familiar to Israel, was alien to most Americans. Interpreted in the United States as a revolutionary quest for liberty, Tunisia’s uprising looked to Israelis like a traditional demand for dignity.

  —

  The tremors radiating from Tunisia threatened further ruptures between the United States and Israel. In speaking before American audiences, Israeli ambassadors rarely receive a question they have never been asked repeatedly before—“Why does Israel build settlements?” for example, or “How come your PR’s so bad?” But after one campus speech, some precocious student surprised me by inquiring, “What’s more difficult for you, explaining Israel to Americans or America to Israelis?” I paused, pondering my answer, then confessed out loud what I had never fully admitted to myself. “Hands down, it’s much harder explaining America to Israelis.”

  Apart from complex issues such as the territories and Jerusalem, Americans basically understand Israel. A people that returns to its homeland after two thousand years, establishes a Western-style democracy, and defends itself against genocidal enemies—that narrative is readily grasped throughout most of the United States. But Israelis have difficulty understanding America’s missionizing zeal and the belief—hardwired into the nation’s identity—that the United States was created not only for its own good but for all of humanity’s. They recoil from the American tendency to impose its reality on the Middle East. The notion that the region secretly longs for American-style freedom is simply incomprehensible to Israelis.

  “Are they mad?” Amos Gilad, the Defense Ministry’s advisor and seasoned Arabist, shouted into the phone when I conveyed the American response to Tunisia. “This is the Middle East, for God’s sake, not Manhattan!” I explained that, just as rescuing a Jewish community from danger was embedded in the Israeli narrative, so too did the Tunisian revolt resonate among Americans as a modern-day Lexington and Concord. Gilad’s response nevertheless remained deafening: “Madness!”

  I understood America, but I agreed with the Israelis. A neoconservative friend once branded me a racist for denying that Arabs craved democracy. I responded that he, my friend, was the real bigot for setting the United States as the highest form of governance to which all peoples, irrespective of their customs, must aspire. But while I intellectually sided with Israel’s reading of Middle Eastern protests, I prayed that America’s was right. Rather than cleansing shame and restoring honor, I hoped that the Tunisian vendor’s self-immolation represented a shackled man’s outcry for rights.

  —

  The dissonance between the American and Israeli viewpoints deepened in late January 2011, when riots broke out across Egypt. In Alexandria, Suez, and Ismailia, Egyptians confronted helmeted police who repelled them with tear gas and water cannons and beat them with batons. The core of Egypt’s meltdown, though, was located in Cairo’s Tahrir (Freedom) Square, ironically named for the 1952 revolution that brought Colonel Nasser and other officers, including Hosni Mubarak, to power.

  First tens, then hundreds of thousands of Egyptians, many of them unemployed young men, converged on the square, demanding political reform and economic opportunities. By the month’s end, an Internet-declared “Day of Rage” and “Friday of Anger” mobilized an estimated one million demonstrators. Government buildings were burned, innumerable protesters arrested, and six hundred people killed. With Egypt’s colors—red, white, and black—painted on their faces, the people repulsed successive waves of security forces’ assaults and even a surreal charge of pro-Mubarak tour guides mounted on horses and camels. Still, the rebellion swelled. The call was no longer for an end to emergency laws and police brutality, but for Mubarak’s ouster. His military regime, deemed “stable” by the State Department only two weeks earlier, tottered.

  Yet Egypt’s massive army merely looked on. As tanks surrounded Tahrir Square, Israeli intelligence analysts debated whether Egyptian troops would step in to save their patron, Mubarak. But the military, “acknowledging the legitimate rights of the people,” announced that it “has not and will not use force.” The generals, it seemed, struck a deal with the demonstrators, jettisoning the president in exchange for retaining the army’s lucrative budget.

  But the question remained: who would rule Egypt? The protesters, a hodgepodge of liberals, nationalists, and Facebook-savvy activists personified by Google marketer Wael Ghonim, espoused no unified political program or leadership. Only the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928 and galvanized around the vision of a global Islamic caliphate, offered an amply funded and hierarchical alternative. The Brotherhood, Israeli analysts agreed, would wait for the mob to bring down the gov
ernment and then swiftly snatch up power. “Israel has long proudly called itself the only Middle Eastern democracy,” I briefed reporters. “And we’ll be happier still to be one of many Middle Eastern democracies. But we’ve seen it happen before in Iran, Gaza, and Lebanon. What begins as a secular, progressive revolution ends up as an Islamic radical coup.”

  The prospect of Egypt’s takeover by an organization dedicated to Israel’s destruction, the mother movement of Hamas, terrified Israelis. Yes, Mubarak was corrupt, and yes, under his rule, anti-Semitism in Egypt became rampant and weapons flowed into Gaza. But Mubarak also upheld the Camp David Accords, which, for thirty years, guaranteed Israel’s stability and facilitated its economic development. Peace freed the IDF to repel other threats rather than grapple with the thousands of advanced tanks and hundreds of fighter jets and as many as 1.5 million soldiers in the Egyptian army. “The people of Egypt will decide their own fate,” Netanyahu remarked. “But we want the Egyptian government to remain committed to the peace.” The prime minister maintained a calm demeanor, even while El Al airlifted four hundred Israeli tourists from Cairo and the Israeli embassy evacuated all diplomatic families and nonessential personnel.

  By contrast, in the United States, the sight of bearded and white-robed agitators around Tahrir’s fringes aroused little anxiety. Nothing—not the beating by Egyptian thugs of CNN correspondent Anderson Cooper or the mass sexual assault on CBS reporter Lara Logan—dampened the press’s frenzy. Extolling the overturn of “Paleolithic tyrants” by “new societies,” The New York Times welcomed the “post-Islamist revolutions” waged by “young Muslims demanding freedom, representation, and the rule of law.” New Yorker editor in chief David Remnick attested that “the historic moments of…oppressed peoples emerging as one from their private realms of silence and fear are thrilling.” The Washington Post lauded “the radiant sunrise” that “could forever transform the Arab world’s most populous country…and reshape a region where autocracy has nourished extremism and terrorism.” Sameh Shoukry, Egypt’s urbane ambassador—later, its foreign minister—was relentlessly assailed by American anchormen for standing up for his government. And after each interview, I called him to tell him, “Hang in there.” Yet my words of encouragement were overpowered by a media “preparing,” in the Post’s words, “for a new and more democratic Middle East.”

  Such exuberance could not be overlooked by the press-sensitive Obama administration. Shortly after the outbreak of unrest, the president called Mubarak and reportedly threatened to cut U.S. aid to Egypt unless far-reaching reforms were promptly enacted. “What’s needed right now are concrete steps that advance the rights of the Egyptian people,” the president told reporters, and called for “political change that leads to a future of greater freedom…for the Egyptian people.” Mubarak responded first by announcing broad political and economic measures and then by declaring he would not seek reelection. But neither statement relieved Washington’s pressure. “An orderly transition must be meaningful, it must be peaceful, and it must begin now,” Obama said emphatically on February 1. Three days later, he reiterated: “The only thing that will work is moving an orderly transition process that begins right now.”

  In all of modern Middle East history, no single English word has reverberated more thunderously than President Obama’s “now.” Years later, Arab dignitaries I encountered still spoke about it rancorously. “Nobody will ever believe a word America says anymore!” a leftist member of the Knesset called and shouted at me. “Obama’s just killed the Israeli peace camp!” Flagrantly brutal and corrupt, Mubarak was nevertheless America’s loyal friend for more than thirty years. And after a single week of demonstrations that, though highly publicized, involved a fraction of Egypt’s 85 million inhabitants, the United States abandoned him. That single act of betrayal—as Middle Easterners, even those opposed to Mubarak, saw it—contrasted jarringly with Obama’s earlier refusal to support the Green Revolution against the hostile regime in Iran. Other American allies in the region took notice. So, too, did America’s foes.

  On February 11, Mubarak resigned. Later he was arrested and put on trial for the premeditated murder of protesters. A sea of flags rippled over Tahrir Square, where countless Egyptians rejoiced. The reaction in the White House seemed no less exultant. Together with National Security Advisor Uzi Arad, I heard the news of Mubarak’s overthrow while discussing the Egyptian situation with senior National Security Council officials. They appeared delighted by the events in Cairo—high-fives were exchanged—and credited themselves for remaining “on the right side of history.” Obama issued a statement averring that “the spirit of peaceful protest and perseverance that the Egyptian people have shown can serve as a powerful wind of…change,” and that the transition “must bring all of Egypt’s voices to the table.” Turning to Dennis Ross, I mentioned that, to an Israeli ear, “all voices” sounded like the Muslim Brotherhood. He assured me that the administration had no intention of engaging the Islamic radicals.

  I doubted that. The president’s Cairo speech—that foundational document—offered America’s hand to Muslim leaders who were rooted in Islam and democratically voted into office. The Brotherhood met those criteria and would win at the polls, Israeli experts were certain. But even that process would take time as the chaos in Egypt, and along Egypt’s borders with Israel, deepened. And while part of me longed to share in our neighbors’ jubilation, the fears for my own neighborhood prevailed. The three regional powers—Iran, Turkey, and now Egypt—all former friends, were now arrayed against us. That anxiety weighed on me as Arad and I entered Dan Shapiro’s oddly cramped office, where much of one wall was taken up with a photograph of Mubarak. It showed the soon-to-be-deposed Egyptian president standing in the Oval Office and glancing at his watch. Arad quipped, “There’s a leader wondering how much time he has left in power.” When I next returned to Dan’s office, the photo was gone.

  —

  As the revolution swept over Egypt, a blizzard buried Washington in ten inches of snow. Thousands of households lost power but Middle Easterners rose to seize it. America’s capital wallowed in winter while an Arab Spring appeared to bloom.

  In Algeria and in Jordan, thousands of protesters crammed the streets, clamoring for change. The Pearl Roundabout in the capital of Bahrain became another Tahrir Square, where demonstrators erected tents and battled security forces. The people of Yemen, one of the region’s poorest countries, demanded the resignation of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in office as long as Mubarak. Desperate to avoid the Egyptian leader’s fate, the rulers of those countries swiftly quashed the revolts, shooting thousands, while taking pro forma steps at reform. Iran derided these measures and cheered the rebels on, then ruthlessly suppressed the largest domestic demonstrations since 2009.

  The Obama administration, meanwhile, scrambled to keep up. After rushing to secure Mubarak’s fall, the White House appeared to halt and even backtrack. While generally calling for restraint and promoting reforms, it refrained from supporting regime change in Algeria and Jordan, and counseled peaceful transition in Yemen. But on the Bahraini island—home to the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet—America remained largely silent while Sunni troops charged over a causeway from the Saudi mainland to crush the mostly Shi’ite insurgents. Likewise, the demonstrations in Tehran roused no reaction from Washington.

  The administration’s inconsistency was bewildering, yet at times I could commiserate. The Arab Spring, which from a distance appeared to be a uniform movement, was, viewed more closely, a melee of tribal and ethnic rivalries, religious tensions, and factional strife. Strangely, I found myself defending Obama to reporters who began to question the vagaries of his approach. “There’s no cookie-cutter response to these uprisings,” I told them. “No one-policy-fits-all.” But the president, no less anomalously, seemed perfectly at ease with his decisions. “I think we calibrated it just right,” he said, and advised Arab leaders that “to stay ahead of change, you have to be out in front.” />
  But the administration shrank from the forefront when the Arab Spring reached Libya. Previously, relations with the oil-flushed desert country and its loony but lethal dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, improved markedly under Obama. The two met briefly at a G8 summit in July 2009, posing for a handshake, after which a succession of high-ranking State Department officials visited Tripoli. In February 2010, representatives of twenty-five American companies led the first U.S. trade mission to Libya in nearly four decades.

  A year later, though, a merciless civil war pitted Gaddafi’s hyperequipped army against poorly armed and fractious rebels. Snipers, artillery, and helicopter gunships fired at demonstrators, killing thousands. Denouncing the violence as “appalling,” Obama issued a directive designed to “loosen the dictator’s grip on power” by freezing his assets. “Muammar Gaddafi has lost the legitimacy to lead and he must leave,” the president said, but he took no further steps. Both the U.S. embassy in Tripoli and the Benghazi consulate remained open.

  Instead, France took the lead. Early in March 2011, the preeminent French philosopher and public intellectual Bernard-Henri Lévy brazenly slipped into Libya, made contact with rebels, and put them into contact with President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris. “The blood of the people of Benghazi will stain the flag of France,” Lévy warned. Later, he helped convince Hillary Clinton of the urgency of rescuing Libyans from their own ruler. The result was a Security Council authorization for a NATO no-fly zone over Libya. Following the French contrails, American jets and cruise missiles pulverized government troops.

  Throughout, the White House insisted that the goal was to prevent a massacre, not change Libya’s regime, but the war was clearly aimed at Gaddafi’s downfall. “Brotherly Leader,” as he crowned himself, appealed to Obama—“our son”—for a cease-fire, reminding him that “democracy and building of civil society cannot be achieved…by backing…Al Qaeda in Benghazi.” Yet the airstrikes continued and, on April 30, took the lives of Gaddafi’s son, Saif, and three of his grandchildren. Beaten back to Sirte, his birthplace, the ruler and 140 of his henchman were captured, tortured, and shot.