So lets talk about Egypt. I've had the pleasure of visiting Egypt a few times but never quite understood the political climate there. My focus is generally in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Probably the most amazing part of the revolution in Egypt was how it shattered the various stereotypes on Muslims that have plagued the media in recent years. The idea of "violent jihad" and "terrorist" have almost become synonymous with Islam. Now we all know better than to believe that right? I would beg to differ when one in five people still think our president is a Muslim. The key question there being "so what if he is?" What we saw in the last few weeks was an organized and peaceful uprising. What probably was not reported often enough were that the security checks to get into Tahrir Square were set up by the protesters themselves. The whole point was not to allow any weapons in and to only to resort to violence out of self defense. I thought these were Muslims? Where were the suicide bombers? In reality the protests also included Coptic Christians working together with the Muslim population. So it appears people of different religions and can work together for common goals. What a novel idea. I doubt this will completely change how the general US public views Islam but I hope it helps. If they can avoid the opinions of Rick Santorum who said "We've turned our backs on... almost all of our allies. What does the president do? He sides with the protesters." So obviously when a country is looking for the same kind of freedoms we take for granted here we should obviously side with the guy who has been in power for over 30 years. I'm sure the Muslim Brotherhood will be scrutinized even though they have denounced violent jihad. The next few months should be very interesting for that country. Before you denounce the Arab nations looking for equal rights just try and remember how this country was formed. Assuming anyone reads this i'm probably preaching to the choir but it had taken me some time to realize the scope of this.
