Open season on Christians in the Middle East; how democracy is used to legitimate tyranny

David Warren writes,

So much has happened, especially in Egypt over the last half year. But nothing new has happened. The Muslim Brotherhood continue to consolidate their power, & by now President Morsi, who quickly gathered to himself as much power as President Mubarak had, has more. His constitutional coup, confirmed by low-turnout quick referendum, provides a wonderful illustration of how democracy is used to legitimate tyranny, all neatly ordered in a short sprint of time. Too, how it can be used to befuddle Western statesmen, who will grant a pass to anything that is arguably “freely elected.”

Throughout the Middle East, as Islamists come to power, or merely into a position to terrorize, ancient Christian communities are put to flight. They don’t leave casually; they leave because their homes & businesses & churches are firebombed, & their walls are decorated with slogans to communicate, “You’re next!” Most of Iraq’s million-&-a-half Christians are now gone; Syria’s Christians have started their exodus in anticipation of Assad’s fall. With the advance of Islamism throughout the Muslim world (including Bosnia & Albania), it becomes open season on them everywhere.

I fear that the fate of the Copts will be worse, than that of others who got a head start on them, & behind whom the doors now close. There are just too many Copts for the West to assimilate, given shrinking immigration quotas everywhere: something in the order of 10 million Christians, in a country of 80 million Muslims, actually hungry for Shariah & becoming unhinged by the Islamist propaganda.

But back to the Coptic Christians of Egypt. They have no place to go; & they are being demonized. Wherever the slightest altercation occurs between a Muslim & a Christian in rural Egypt, a massacre of Christians is quite likely to follow. The Copts are among the poorest of Egypt, but also among the richest: resentment for the latter, & avarice for their wealth, provides meat to the demagogues in a culture already accustomed to blaming “the other” for every domestic failure.

And of course, the Egyptian economy, such as it was, has been disintegrating since the Arab Spring began. It is a country without oil money to fall back on; & now without tourism, or any other way to earn the foreign currency it needs to import basic foodstuffs, as well as fuel & the luxuries to which its elites have become accustomed; a country whose limited stock of arable land is already dangerously over-burdened; which is approaching ecological catastrophe on several fronts. The Nile Valley, since the Aswan dam, no longer benefits from the replenishment of soil; the great river now only washes it away. (That, & not global warming, accounts for the accelerating recession of the Mediterranean coast: the Nile Delta is gradually dissolving.)

Someone must be blamed, & since Nasser, there have been no Jews left to kill. This leaves the Koran-denying Copts for the historical role of scapegoat. Lord have mercy on them.

Read more here: http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/2013/01/26/apocalyptic-egypt/