Egypt and Israel
The “Chill to Democracy in Egypt” (editorial, June 11) is part of the “chill” to the peace agreement with Israel. Since 1993, at the height of the optimism for a new, peaceful Middle East, Cairo was pressing Arab states to slow the “normalization” with Israel. Egypt, jointly with Saudi Arabia, put the brakes on the regional, multilateral negotiations that included Israel. In 1994, while Israel agreed to let Yasser Arafat come back to Gaza in triumph and establish the Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait abandoned the multilateral framework.
In 1996, after Benjamin Netanyahu’s election, Cairo convened an Arab summit meeting to freeze relations with Israel. At the same time Egypt put on a “show” trial against the Israeli Arab textile worker, Azam Azam, and the hate rhetoric against Israel and Jews reached a new high. The country to which Israel handed back the Sinai Peninsula for a peace treaty declared a “cold war” on Israel and a chill on democracy.
AMIT PELES
Corona
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