Future unclear

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a careful statement after Mr Mursi was declared the election winner.

"Israel values the democratic process in Egypt and respects the results of the presidential election," his office said in a statement.

Israel's traditional enemies, Shiite Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Islamic republic of Iran, hailed Mr Mursi's victory.

Hezbollah called his election "historic", while Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for stronger ties between Iran and Egypt.

"I congratulate you for your victory as head of Egypt, a friendly and brotherly country," Mr Ahmadinejad said in a statement addressed to Mr Mursi.

Although Iran's predominant faith is Shiite Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood adheres to the Sunni branch of Islam, the Iranian leadership has been reaching out to the organisation in Egypt in recent months.

According to Iran's Fars news agency, Mr Mursi yesterday voiced interest in restoring long-severed ties with Iran to create a strategic "balance" in the region.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-26/egypts-president-starts-to-form-new-government/4092088

From Robert Fisk

A couple of hours after Mohamed Morsi's supporters greeted the democratic election of the first Islamist president in the Arab world with cries of "Allahu Akbar", a young Egyptian Christian woman walked up to my coffee table and told me that she had just been to church.

"I have never seen the place so empty," she said. "We are all afraid."

I'd like to say that Morsi's placatory speech on Sunday – CNN and the BBC made much of his all-inclusive message because it fits in with the Western narrative on the Middle East (progressive, non-sectarian, etc) – was a pretty measly effort in which the army got as much praise as the police for Egypt's latest stage of revolution.

Put bluntly, Morsi is going to be clanking down the road to Egyptian democracy with tin cans dangling from his feet, fear and suspicion mingling among the old Mubarakites and the business elite, and, of course, the Christians, while the uniformed bulldogs of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces – its acronym, SCAF, is somehow appropriate to its inefficiency – go on biting off the powers that any president of Egypt should hold. He's got no constitution, no parliament and no right to command his own country's army.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-egypt-has-no-constitution-parliament-or-control-7881235.html

Now Morsi and most of his aides are under house arrest. In addition, two leading politicians with the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) have been arrested. According to the state newspaper Al-Ahram, another 300 members are wanted.

Morsi Failed to Weaken Military

The Muslim Brotherhood, the region's most influential Islamist movement, has fallen into disfavor. In 2011 the army let Mubarak, who was one of their own, be deposed. This time they wanted to get rid of the disagreeable Morsi. It happened despite the fact that el-Sissi was at least nominally dependent on the president, who appointed him to lead the military in August 2012, after he fired the powerful Mohammed Hussein Tantawi. At the time, some feared the Muslim Brotherhood would form an alliance with the military.

El-Sissi is known to be devout, though he sees himself as a follower of the late, secular, authoritarian Gamal Abdel Nasser, the father of modern Egypt and a critic of the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi had probably assumed that by making El-Sissi its leader, he had weakened the military. Apparently, he was wrong.

At 58, el-Sissi is the country's youngest general. He has never fought in a war, and only knows about conflicts with Israel from the stories of others. He belongs to a generation that was invited to receive military training in the West. In 1992 he was in Britain, and in 2006, the United States.

He made international headlines in 2011 when he justified the degrading"virginity tests" conducted by soldiers on Egyptian women who had taken part in the revolution. But el-Sissi learned from the debacle of 2011, when the military itself formed the government after Mubarak was toppled. The military leadership was openly pulling the strings, which quickly made it subject to the scrutiny of the public.

Behind the Scenes

This time the head of the military has been trying from the outset to stay in the background. The events of Wednesday night are clearly a coup -- the army has deposed a democratically elected president and suspended the constitution. Yet Sissi acted as if the generals had been compelled by the Egyptian people to intervene.

Behind the scenes, Sissi and his colleagues set the tone, especially in two areas: Security policy is traditionally their domain, but the government should also keep clear of the generals' monetary privileges. The army is one of the most important economic power brokers in Egypt.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/military-plans-to-maintain-power-in-egypt-after-coup-a-909386.html

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