A leading Egyptian politician criticized the Obama administration for backing the Muslim Brotherhood and abandoning the Egyptian people.
Liberal Egyptian politician Mona Makram-Ebeid condemned President Barack Obama on Monday for repeatedly supporting the oppressive regimes of former Presidents Hosni Mubarak and Mohammed Morsi as million of protestors demanded their removal.
As the Obama administration courts Iran and grapples with the raging civil war in Syria, it has completely abandoned its responsibilities in Egypt, Makram-Ebeid said during a discussion hosted by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP).
"The U.S. has twice missed it," she said, referring to the 2011 and 2013 revolutions that toppled Mubarak and Morsi.
The United States is "not listening to the people in the streets," said Makram-Ebeid, who most recently served from 2012-2013 on the Egyptian Parliament’s Shura Council. "This is the second time now."
While U.S. policymakers have called he Egyptian military’s forceful removal of Morsi a "coup," the people of Egypt do not view it that way, said Makram-Ebeid, who also spent five years in Egypt’s legislative People’s Assembly.
"I call it a popular impeachment," she said, comparing Morsi to disgraced former President Richard Nixon.
"OK, you [the United States] see it as a military coup, but we don’t," she said, explaining that the Egyptian military was only carrying out the will of the country’s citizens "Thirty million coming out in support of the military who have averted a civil war, violence."
"Listen to the people. That’s what they want," she said. "They couldn’t face this violence themselves because they don’t have arms and the others [in the Muslim Brotherhood] have arms, they are armed militias."
"The American reaction was extremely disappointing at this time in history," she added.
Obama’s "credibility" and "respect" in the region "is much worse than it was last year" due in part to his tepid response to the revolution, she added. "We are sorry for that."
Asked about a proposal to reduce by about $500,000 the amount of aid the United States gives Egypt, Makram-Ebeid bristled.
"How can we do without the American assistance," which tops about $1.3 billion, she asked. "This is one of the debates now."
U.S. aid is more of a morale booster than anything else, Makram-Ebeid admitted.
"I think American assistance is not in its dollar value, but its moral value," she said, referencing the "psychological" value. "It shows the relationship with the United States that has endured for so long."
Makram-Ebeid went on to warn that Egypt’s Sinai region near Israel is becoming more dangerous as Muslim extremists affiliated with Morsi continue to turn the area into a lawless terror zone.
"Today the army is really concerned about what’s happening in the Sinai," she said, explaining that Morsi was known to collaborate with Hamas operatives in the region during his short tenure in office.
"Among the allies of Mr. Morsi were Hamas" and other extremist factions, she said. "He was acting more like a conspirator than a head of a party. It was a conspiracy going on with his own people."
"The Sinai is very, very dangerous," she said.
Egyptian citizens have become increasingly outspoken as the country struggles to reassemble its political system, according to Makram-Ebeid.
"A people that had been enduring apathy for all these years" now discusses politics constantly, she said, noting that around 40 percent of the Egyptian public is illiterate.
Asked if the Muslim Brotherhood should be able to participate in a future government, Makram-Ebeid said that the group should first "disappear for 10 years."