Egypt showdown over Morsi kicks off Sunday

Ms Hadidi interviewing Heikal last night (top and bottom) and a call for Morsi "to go"

The battle lines are drawn for post-June 30 Egypt.

The opposition is billing June 30 as President Mohamed Morsi’s last day in office -- “but we don’t have an inkling of what comes next,” says Mohamed Hassanein Heikal.

Egypt and the Arab world’s leading journalist and commentator for 50 years was talking last night to CBCEgypt TV anchor Lamis Al Hadidi.

Egypt’s prominent media figure Emad Adeeb wrote earlier for ElWatanNews, “I don’t believe June 30 and the days leading to the [July 10] beginning of Ramadan will pass peacefully. With great regret, I smell blood.”

With the Sunday showdown approaching, this is my abridged version of a curtain raiser penned by Ahmed Maher for BBC News:

Morsi promised when he was inaugurated a year ago to give Egypt a face-lift in just 100 days.

One year on, he faces widespread discontent as much of the country is seething with anger and frustration over the perceived failure of the president to tackle any of the country's pressing economic and social woes.

And from the beginning of his four-year term, Morsi has fallen out with key institutions, chiefly the judiciary, police, media and more recently artists…

The opposition accuses the president and his group, the Muslim Brotherhood, of trying to Islamize the state and of giving the Islamists a monopoly over key public institutions.

In return, hundreds of thousands of Islamists rallied for Morsi in Cairo last week, symbolizing Egypt's increasing polarization.

They dismissed the anti-Morsi campaign as unconstitutional as the president does have electoral legitimacy.

Many locals fear the protests on Sunday will turn into bloody showdown between both camps.

Fearing the worst, the Egyptian army has deployed reinforcements of troops and armored vehicles to strategic locations across the country, chiefly the main presidential palace in Cairo.

As political rivals lock horns over the "Brotherhood-ization" and "secularization" of the nation, opinion polls point out to the mounting public discontent.

A new poll by the Egyptian Center for Public Opinion Research (Baseera) indicated a sharp decline in the president's approval ratings to 32% compared with 78% at the end of the first 100 days of his tenure.

Public anger is soaring over expanding power cuts, water cut-offs in some districts and falling living standards.

Fuel is in short supply as well. So is patience.

For the millions of poor, it is the stagnant economy -- caught in collapsed sources of income like tourism, rising food prices and a growing population dependent on subsidized bread -- that matters.

Foreign currency reserves are half of what they were under Hosni Mubarak and the value of the Egyptian pound has fallen by 10% against the U.S. dollar since last year.

Almost daily strikes by angry civil servants and factory workers demanding better conditions have also become a fact of life.

The president says he has been left with no options but to rely on Muslim Brotherhood members and Islamist allies after the opposition turned down his national reconciliation endeavors.

The opposition, in turn, says Morsi's calls for dialogue are never sincere and insist on early elections.

With the circle tightening around him, the president gave a televised marathon speech on Wednesday night in a bid to upstage the massive demonstrations planned by the opposition on Sunday.

In his interview with Ms Hadidi last night, Heikal gave this feedback on Morsi’s televised speech 24 hours earlier:

The president was unclear as to what he intends offering or doing.

He substantiated Egyptian society’s polarization by choosing to sound like a party leader. You can’t speak as a part leader when addressing an invited audience of state officials. The party is one thing and the state is another.

The president we saw on screen (Wednesday night) looked baffled, yet his words resonated with drumbeats of war.

I think Morsi is under immense pressure. At the same time, the office of president has taken his breath away. For instance, he kept repeating, “I am Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and Police…”

His attack on the media was totally misplaced. It showed him fighting the wrong battle at the wrong place and time, the country being already stirred up.

Because of its poor political performance in office, the Brotherhood-Islamist partnership has seen its popularity-rating plummet to 30% from 60% in the last parliamentary elections.

The reason for this, I think, is the Muslim Brothers’ misplaced arrogance. I saw them when downtrodden first and then arrogant. Some of them now sound more pompous than Queen Victoria.

Morsi expressed a compassionate concern for the poor, but failed to give them hope in the future.

“Pre-emptive demonstrations” organized by the Muslim Brotherhood and fellow-Islamist in the countdown to June 30 are misguided.

The role of a regime is to persuade people with deeds, not muscle and rhetoric. A ruling party does not kick-off bolstering its position with “political armies.”

Morsi was unclear about what he intends doing and how. I don’t understand, for example, how he can complain about inheriting a debt-ridden economy and then go out and borrow more to settle the national debt.

Also a head of state does not publicly criticize Ahmad Shafiq when legal proceedings against the presidential runner-up remain pending.

In truth, the Muslim Brothers assumed power and offered nothing. They simply kept leaping in the dark. And the wrong steps they took over the past four weeks risk plunging the country in civil war.

The Egyptian army is the people’s -- not the Emir’s – army. It is Egyptian nationalism’s godfather and brainchild. Its latest statement sounded the alarm, saying we are all at risk.

The Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood ought to come forward and address the people in person because what is taking place in Egypt gives the lie to the modern state and to transparency. Governing the country out of sight of the public is impermissible. Whoever holds the strings of power must be called to account by the public.

Islamist movements keep seeking their own demise

From L. clockwise: King Abdulaziz, Saladin, Imadaddin Zengi and Abu Hamed al-Ghazali

This think piece was penned in Arabic for al-Hayat daily by Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist now heading Saudi billionaire Prince Walid bin Talal’s Arabic news channel Al Arab launching at year’s end:

Why do many present-day Islamist movements always seek their own demise?

Why do they consistently insist on “all or nothing”?

Salafist jihadism today matches India’s Deobandi movement.

Salafis today are not even one.

It was King Abdulaziz, founder of the Saudi state that celebrated its 82^nd National Day recently, who revived contemporary Salafism. He was a true Salafi, but he was also a politician who cajoled the big shots and cultivated the minnows but always came out on top.

Before the distortion of Salafism and jihad through abuse by ultraconservatives of these two noble traits of Muslims, every Muslim activist sought to reconcile Salafism, or faith advocacy, and jihad.

Salaheddin el-Ayyoubi, better known in the Western world as Saladin, and Imadaddin Zengi before him, were like that – Salafi jihadists. Both used beyond measure tactics of modern-day Islamist movements to mobilize the faithful for jihad.

They propagated jihad through preachers and orators -- not only in mosques on Fridays but at all times and on all occasions.

They built efficient local administrations in Damascus, Aleppo and Cairo. They were merciful to people and gracious in their sermons.

They were benign in their promotion of virtue and prevention of vice.

They were also ruthless when they needed to.

Imadaddin Zengi was hard-hearted when fighting local leaders.

Saladin was not, by today’s standards, a democrat or believer in freedom of opinion and expression. Once he prevailed in Egypt (after overthrowing the Shiite Fatamids), he restored Sunnite orthodoxy in the country and stamped out Shiite jurisprudence in al-Azhar. (That’s why Saladin is more of a hero in the Arab world than in Iran). His strategic move bore a resemblance to the Islamist movements of the day, particularly the line of theologian Abu Hamed al-Ghazali as expressed in his writings, specifically his book “The Revival of Religious Sciences.”

In the end, Imadeddin Zengi and Saladin succeeded in building two nation-states that outlived them by years.

They laid the foundations for an Islamic revival movement. In addition to introducing administrative reform, they handed down a plethora of schools, hospitals, markets, castles and public facilities that are still standing today. (Some of these are currently being pulverized by the Syrian regime’s tanks and warplanes).

In other words, Zengi and Saladin did not simply lead a fleeting protest movement such as al-Qaeda and the likes that always seek their own demise.

In modern history, Abdulaziz al-Saud emulated Zengi and Saladin.

He surrounded himself with local leaders who outmatched him in wealth, political maneuver and international connections.

He was fenced in by a Great Power when turning east, south, north or even west to look across the sea to Egypt.

He also had to put up with a group seeking it own demise. His valiant military commander Faisal al-Dwaish kept striving to challenge the British, who were then protectors of the Gulf, Iraq and Transjordan.

Dwaish ultimately defied his leader and ended up dying in jail with history remembering his insubordination more than his military heroics.

I remembered King Abdulaziz when hearing the leader of Somalia’s al-Shabab pledge that his militiamen won’t stop their advance before reaching Nairobi and Addis Ababa, having overcome Ethiopian forces in their country in 2006.

Al-Shabab could have instead focused on building Somalia and sinking their roots deeper at home. Had they done that, they would probably have been ruling a stable and secure Somalia. The leader in question might have been negotiating with the Dubai Port Authority to build a port in Kismayo followed by a franchise fishing deal with a Japanese company.

Instead, he said last week his Islamist militants were abandoning their last major bastion, Kismayo.

This makes me wonder again: Why do many modern-day Islamist groups always seek their own demise?

They antagonize everyone far and near as soon as they score a victory.

In Libya, they trumped their opponents by joining the revolution. They then proceeded to desecrate graves at (Commonwealth) war cemeteries and attack the U.S. embassy.

By so doing they turned people against them, eventually losing their reputation, their weapons and their camps.

In Tunisia, they were released from jail, had a taste of freedom and enjoyed it, then abused it and decided that Tunisians, as apprentices in modernity, needed guidance. Those were the same Tunisians who a month earlier had voted into power a moderate Islamist party. They ended antagonizing Tunisians and their government who subsequently demanded their eradication.

In Yemen, they absented themselves from the transition process that removed the tyrant they were fighting. They failed to appreciate that the sea change taking place in the country presented them with an opportunity to end their cocooning. Instead, they want their jihad to last for all eternity. Their latest reaction was a suicide bombing in Abyan.

In Egypt, they stand out as first class debaters. They joined the constitution-drafting body (otherwise known as the Constituent Assembly). Instead of leaving their imprint on a historic legacy, they focused on such trivialities, as “girls can be married as soon as they reach puberty.” They will surely pay the price of their idiocy at the next elections.

I can go on recounting innumerable telltales from Mali, Afghanistan, Iraq and my own homeland Saudi Arabia. The self-interest of present-day Islamist movements invariably takes priority over the interests of the public.

In truth, these militant movements mandate acts of suicide in combat but take their own life in politics.

Mideast playmakers waiting for a reelected Obama

Obama and Turkey's Erdogan (top) and Iran's Ahmadinejad greeting Egypt's Morsi in Tehran

Like many other regional leaders, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Mohamed Morsi are biding their time, waiting on news of Barack Obama’s most likely re-election.

The Turkish premier and Egyptian president realize that before the United States president wins a second term on November 6, he won’t let any foreign policy issue interfere with his reelection campaign.

Frida Ghitis, a world affairs columnist for The Miami Herald and World Politics Review, wrote in a special comment for CNN last month: “If Barack Obama could make three wishes, he would probably ask for the crisis in Syria to go away…

“Unfortunately for Obama, and tragically for the people in Syria, history has brought the American presidential campaign and the Syrian revolution to the same pages of the calendar. That means Obama will do whatever he can, for as long as he can, to keep the carnage in Syria from interfering with his reelection plan.

“That means the killings in Syria could go on longer than if the uprising had erupted during a nonelection year…

“The Obama administration has put other major foreign policy issues on the back burner in order to avoid giving Republicans fodder for criticism, to prevent new risks to the economy, or simply to avoid stepping on a landmine while moving along a dangerous global landscape.

“A report in Britain's Sunday Times claims that the White House asked Israel to delay an attack on Iran until after November. Many fear that a war with Iran would send oil prices skyrocketing and hurt Obama's reelection prospects. Sometimes history has lousy timing. And presidents don't get to make three wishes…”

Erdogan

Turkish columnist Gökhan Bacik, writing for Today’s Zaman, says some six weeks before the U.S. presidential elections “Middle East politics has fallen perfectly silent.” It’s the sort of quiet you would expect in a waiting room.

Comparing the political lull in the region to an interval between the death of a pope and the election of his successor, Bacik notes that “all actors are waiting for the results” of the U.S. presidential vote. And “Turkey is no exception.”

Erdogan, he says, wants to retrace five issues with a reelected Obama: Syria, Turkish-Israeli relations, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Islamism in the region, and Iraq’s Nouri al-Maliki.

On Syria, some suggest a reelected Obama could take a strong leadership role to bring about regime change there. Others believe he could “at least help Turkey create some sort of security zone in northern Syria. Expectations vary, but there is one clear point: Ankara's first demand from Obama in his second term is to revisit the American position on Syria.”

On relations with Israel, says Bacik, Ankara expects the new Obama administration to prod the Jewish state to apologize to Ankara “for the deadly Mavi Marmara flotilla raid.”

Concerning the PKK, the anticipation relates to military matters. “In this area,” Bacik explains, “it is vital for Turkey to obtain more sophisticated technical support from the U.S. Ankara’s particular demand is for U.S.-made Predators that would help Turkey overcome its intelligence deficit in its struggle with the PKK. Similarly, serious military reform is needed, as there has been no substantive technological purchase in the last 10 years. Turkey is without even the necessary number of Cobra helicopters. Ankara knows very well that its military arsenal is far more limited than is ideal...”

Fourthly, “Ankara hopes Obama would help Turkey oust Nouri al-Maliki from office in Baghdad. For Ankara, Maliki has become the biggest structural threat to Turkey's regional position… Purging Maliki from politics is a main goal of Turkish foreign policy...”

Finally, according to Bacik, Ankara hopes a new Obama administration would continue supporting the legitimate participation of Islamists in the region’s political power play, “as in Egypt.”

Morsi

While it seems fair to say no world leader has a greater stake in Obama’s reelection than the Turkish prime minister, can the same be said of Egypt’s Islamist president?

Leading Lebanese political analyst Sarkis Naoum, writing for Beirut’s independent daily an-Nahar, detects signs of a disconnect developing between Obama and Egypt’s Islamist President Morsi.  

Asked if he considered Egypt an ally of the United States, Obama balked earlier this month. “You know, I don’t think that we would consider them an ally but we don’t consider them an enemy,” he said in an interview after protests outside the American Embassy in Cairo.

The State Department later reaffirmed somewhat awkwardly that Egypt is an ally. Egypt was designated by Congress in 1989 to be a Major Non-NATO ally along with Australia, Israel, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and New Zealand.

Naoum sees Morsi perhaps seeking to establish a foreign policy that is independent of Washington. “He has taken important steps that have already raised eyebrows in Washington.”

Among such steps, says Naoum, “were his visits, first to China and then Iran, and his participation in the Non-Aligned Movement conference in Tehran… when the U.S. is on a sharp collision course with the Islamic Republic” over its nuclear ambitions.

Wondering if Morsi would normalize relations and restore diplomatic ties with the Islamic Republic broken in 1980, Naoum writes:

“No one knows for sure. He might, especially if he felt Iran was prepared to abandon ambitions of becoming the region’s national, religious and economic hegemon and disown Syria’s Bashar al-Assad…

“But before taking such a step, Morsi has to take the following into account: (1) Iran won’t be feeding his country’s poor, or about 20-to-30 percent of his people, now living on average per capita income of two U.S. dollars per day (2) Iran won’t return tourism to Egypt (3) Iran won’t solve Egypt’s internal problem of sectarianism (4) Iran won’t settle mounting differences between Egypt’s moderate Islamist and Salafists (5) While Obama did not believe Egypt was an ally, Washington might end up designating it an enemy.

“Can Morsi bear such enmity?”

Film backlash is a Syrian revolution spoiler

Reuters photo of a young Syrian refugee on the Turkish-Syrian border

Syria’s allies -- chiefly Iran and its Lebanese offshoot Hezbollah -- are still whipping up a global Muslim outcry against the U.S.-made amateur film insulting Islam.

The obscure movie that ridicules Prophet Muhammad (see No one’s innocent in the film ‘Innocence of Muslims’) has no Syria links. But the September 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and the resulting outbreak of anti-American protests in the Muslim world shored up Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s political survival prospects.

Western media have since been parroting the Assad line that he is mostly facing al-Qaeda and Jihadists. The implication is they are staunchly anti-West in general and anti-American in particular.

K.P. Nayar, filing from Washington this week for Calcutta’s Telegraph, reports: “At a hurriedly arranged media teleconference by the U.S. State Department which wanted to put across its version of the events in Benghazi, the very first question was: ‘…I know Secretary (Hillary) Clinton said that this would not affect how the U.S. dealt with the Libyans, and that you would move forward. But certainly, it must make you start to think about any precipitous rush to support groups in any other countries such as Syria or the like because of the uncertainty of who is on the ground.’

“Three State Department officials participated in the teleconference, the ground rules for which prohibited reporters from identifying them. None of the three officials came forward to answer that question because the anti-U.S. backlash in Libya has added a new dimension to what will happen in Syria now.”

John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who is tipped to be the next secretary of state if Barack Obama is reelected in November, said the violence in Libya “will certainly give pause, or should give pause, to people who are pressing for a kind of involvement (in Syria)...”

All this is music to the ears of Russia.

In a recent Web article quoted by Russia Today, the chair of the Russian parliamentary committee for foreign affairs, Aleksey Pushkov, wrote that such a scenario would be almost certain to take place if Assad were ousted: “Instead of the secular rational state we had in Syria under Assad, where all ethnic and religious groups lived in peace and accord, we will get a second Iraq.”

The Russian politician went on to argue that Russia had repeatedly warned Western states, who are blinded by “the narrowness of their minds” and political calculations, and are incapable of heeding such warnings.

There are no guarantees that whoever replaced Assad would not immediately turn their guns against the United States, even though Washington is actively aiding rebel forces, Pushkov said. He cited the current situation in Libya as an example, claiming Libyans showed no gratitude for America’s role in the overthrow of the Muammar Gaddafi regime.

Alarabiya TV news channel supremo Abdel Rahman al-Rashed notes today that Russia is clapping with glee after the Benghazi attack let out of the bottle “the genie of al-Qaeda in Libya, jihadists in Sinai and Salafists in Tunisia.” But he hopes press reports of Obama consequently reappraising U.S. policy vis-à-vis the Syrian revolution are unfounded.

In his think piece for the leading Saudi daily Asharq Alawsat, Rashed writes, “It’s obviously difficult for me to explain briefly the importance of winning the great powers’ support for the Syrian people and their revolution – actually, for any revolution. Without great powers’ support, Syrian revolutionary organizations could be branded terrorist. They could be banned in Turkey and Jordan. It would be impossible for them to raise funds and arms in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. In practice, they would end up like the armed Kurdish movements that have existed for decades, but remain outlawed and under siege.”

Rashed continues:

I concede, the Syrian revolution has no fewer problems than Libya’s. Future risks after regime change in Syria can’t be overlooked. But it would be ill-considered if Western states looked at Syria through the prism of their fears of radical fundamentalism.

Syria is not Egypt and Assad is not Hosni Mubarak. Failure of the Syrian revolution is more hazardous than its success because armed Islamist radicals would mushroom since they feed on government failures and chaos. Overpowered and demoralized insurgents would rally around them.

In a year of armed conflict, the opposition has broken the back of the regime and its institutions.

To re-establish his authority, Assad would have to come down harder on citizens, the neighboring countries and Western interests. Western states would ultimately have to revisit Syria and take him on. We had a precedent in Iraq, where allies broke the Saddam regime’s back in the 1991 war to liberate Kuwait then left Saddam wounded but standing. The allies had to return in 2003 to finish him off. The outcome is the chaos we have today as we watch the Iraqi regime being eaten alive by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Furthermore, bringing down Assad’s regime is more important for Syria, the region and most of the world than toppling Saddam or Gaddafi.

The Syrian regime is Iran’s cat’s-paw in the Arab region. It has been sponsoring terrorist groups in regional and Western states for 40 years.

There is abounding evidence linking al-Qaeda to both the Syrian and Iranian regimes. The former was an accomplice in most terrorist attacks mounted in Iraq over the past eight years. And I suspect it might eventually emerge that Assad’s regime, or its allies, orchestrated the attack by al-Qaeda and the like on the American consulate in Benghazi – especially that the outrage was timed to coincide with 9/11 in order to intimidate the U.S.

Lastly, I don’t know of any cause paralleling Palestine’s over the past half-century other than Syria’s. The scope and intensity of sympathy in the Arab street for the Syrian people is immeasurable because of the untold crimes committed against them.

This is what turned most Arabs against Iran and Russia. Arabs are also angry that the West continues to sit on the fence.

Four firsts make Egypt’s elections historic

The 13 candidates (photo from Aljazeera)

Opinion polls are giving no clear pointers as to who will be leading Egypt after presidential elections set to be the freest the country has ever had.

Thirteen candidates are listed for the May 23 and 24 vote after a contentious disqualification process. If as expected no candidate takes an outright majority, a runoff between the top two will take place June 16 and 17, and a president would be declared on June 21.

The 13 presidential hopefuls (see “Meet the Candidates”) are:

1.   Abdelmoneim Abulfotouh, a practicing physician with extensive experience in relief work at an international level, a prominent Islamist activist, and a former leading Muslim Brotherhood figure

2.  Abdullah el-Ashal, an international law professor at the American University in Cairo, an Islamist thinker and a veteran diplomat

3.     Abul’ezz el-Hariri, a member of parliament and a socialist and labor activist for the last 45 years

4.    Ahmed Shafiq, a former commander of the Egyptian Air Force, diplomat and politician who was appointed prime minister in the final days of Hosni Mubarak’s rule

5.     Amr Moussa, a career diplomat who served as ambassador to India and to the UN in New York before being named foreign minister (1991-2001) first and then secretary-general of the Arab League (2001-2011)

6.     Hamdeen Sabahi, a veteran Nasserite opposition figure and former legislator

7.   Hisham el-Bastawisi, a prominent reformist judge who played a crucial role in the battle for judicial independence under Mubarak

8.  Hossam Khairallah, a career military officer with extensive experience in intelligence and international conflict resolution

9.    Khaled Ali, a well-known lawyer and activist who made a name for himself promoting social justice and defending the rights of workers, peasants and students over two decades

10.  Mahmoud Hossam Eddine Galal, a little known former police officer and businessman

11.  Mohamed Fawzi Issa, a 1964 Police Academy graduate who earned an additional law degree from Ain Shams University as well as a PhD in law in 1994

12.  Mohamed Mursi, an engineering professor who received extensive academic training in the United States and is now president of the Muslim Brotherhood

13.  Mohamed Selim el-‘Awa, Islamist intellectual, writer and prominent commercial litigator who holds diplomas in public and Islamic law and a PhD in philosophy from London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS)

At the time of this writing today, Friday, results of Egyptian expatriate voting in the United Arab Emirates, Austria, Washington, France, Sudan and Yemen were showing the race will come down to five candidates: Abulfotouh, Moussa, Sabahi, Mursi and Shafiq.

Earlier, the last weekly opinion poll by the Cairo-based Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies put Moussa in the lead, followed by Shafiq, Abulfotouh, Mursi and Sabahi.

The Baseera Center’s survey put Shafiq first, followed by Moussa, Abulfotouh and Mursi.

Another poll, by the Cabinet Information and Decision Support Center, had Shafiq, Moussa and Abulfotouh running neck and neck ahead of Mursi and Sabahi.

According to Gallup surveys released in Washington today, “Islamists appear to be losing steam in the lead-up to Egypt's presidential election next week. Less than half of Egyptians (42%) polled in April say they support the Muslim Brotherhood, a noticeable decline from 63% who said the same in February. Support for conservative Islamists, often referred to as ‘Salafis,’ is also down, but less dramatically.”

With the race so tight, a runoff vote seems inevitable, pitting one of the two Islamists (Abulfotouh or Mursi) against one of the three more liberal frontrunners: Sabahi, Shafiq or Moussa.

CBC TV channel's logo

Egyptian political analyst and the Middle East’s pioneer talk show host Imad Adeeb, in his daily column for Saudi Arabia’s Asharq Alawsat, gives his insight on the presidential elections after heading a panel that analyzed a series of presidential debates hosted by CBC (Capital Broadcasting Center) a free-to-air TV channel broadcasting from Cairo.

He hails the upcoming vote as a historic landmark for Egypt for four reasons. It is the first time in Egypt’s history, he writes, that:

One, presidential contenders are quizzed live by the media.

Two, candidates put forward diverse presidential platforms to address Egypt’s problems.

Three, each candidate tries to “market” himself and his platform on air.

Four, the Egyptian public does not know its next president just five days ahead of voting.

“The determining factor in these elections?”

In my opinion,” Adeeb writes, “the determining factor is the participation or abstention of the main body of apolitical and nonpartisan voters. They constitute at least 40 percent of voters. The higher their participation, the lower the chances of Islamist candidates. The greater their abstention, the more certain the victory of an Islamist.”