Another brilliant foreign policy move by Obama.
Via LA Times:
As rival camps of Egyptians protest for and against the toppling of President Mohamed Morsi, there is a rare point of agreement: America is to blame.
Anti-Americanism, which has long been an undercurrent here, is erupting again as Egyptians battle over the future of their country. Each side accuses the United States of backing the other and alleges conspiracies in which the Obama administration is secretly fostering dissent in an attempt to weaken Egypt.
It’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t quagmire in which the U.S. appears to have alienated both sides, underscoring waning American influence and credibility as it attempts to navigate the turmoil.
Islamists at a large pro-Morsi rally Friday afternoon questioned how the U.S. — which claims to stand for the rule of law and free elections — could so quickly abandon Egypt’s first democratically elected president and fail to condemn, or even acknowledge, Wednesday’s military coup.
“The morals of America are not being reflected in their politics toward Egypt,” said Sharif Hegazy, 37, who manages the Cairo office of a U.S. company he preferred not to name. “Because of its past support for [deposed President Hosni] Mubarak, America has always been seen as a veiled enemy. Now they are just waiting to see which side will win. That’s not ethical. The U.S. should support the election.” […]
Sheik Abdel Khalea Fahmi, 33, struggling to be heard over buzzing military helicopters that protesters say were sent to intimidate pro-Morsi crowds, saw an even more devious U.S. conspiracy. Mindful of the rising anti-American sentiment, he said the United States pretended to embrace Morsi’s government as a way of discrediting him.
“It was part of the U.S. plot to support Morsi so that the people would turn against him,” Fahmi said.
Just a few miles away in Tahrir Square, anti-Morsi protesters insist the U.S. is on the ousted president’s side, just as Washington supported Mubarak. They have been holding up signs reading “Obama supports terrorism” and pictures of U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson with an “X” mark.
Now many of the young Egyptians whom Obama tried to reach out to in his landmark 2009 speech here view the U.S. president as a hypocrite.