‘Egypt coup is just one of many to come’

The ousting of the Egyptian President brought mass celebrations to the streets, but stability is yet to follow and establishing a system is key, argues Saudi Princess Basmah Bint Saud.

The princess discusses the future of Egypt and Syria on RT’s SophieCo.

RT:We are witnessing a coup in Egypt, but half of the population, that’s millions of people, are celebrating. Is this a military coup or a victory of the people?

Basmah Bint Saud: It is both. The victory of the people is the victory of the army itself because maybe it is foreign to other people to know that army in Egypt has for so long protected the people rather than the government. So it is not something unusual for the army to abide by the people’s law.

Since Morsi has been in power by democratic election the army has fought very hard to be independent and Mr. Morsi has fought very hard to have the army under his power. It is just a very normal reaction from the army to be where he is, and definitely celebrating that the army certified his identity and cut away from the political game.

‘Muslim Brotherhood should not be surprised’

RT:What about the Muslim Brotherhood? It’s a very well organized political machine with millions of supporters. How do you think they will react to the coup and overthrowing of their man?

BBS: The Muslim Brotherhood up to ten years ago was considered a terrorist party and it hasn’t been recognized by the Islamic community in Egypt and the Arab world, except recently. We are not talking about a great party that has been in power for a long time. It has been considered a terrorist party for a long time.

The Muslim Brotherhood should not be very surprised about their short time being in power because they have not been supported by Egyptians themselves for a long time. Rather than celebrating the Muslim Brotherhood failure, I don’t think by any means that Muslim Brotherhood is a political movement, it is rather a religious movement, politicized by other powers in the world.

RT:It’s not just MB in Egypt. Political Islam in general – we see it taking up the vacuum of overthrown dictators of the Arab Spring states. Why is that?

BBS: Tyrants could never be tyrants if they are not backed by big powers. Systems cannot survive on their own in this globalized world. And the fight over the Middle East and its gas and its petrol has been going on for the last two centuries. We are just seeing the results of who wants more rights now, rather than any other meaning, which is superior and divine, which everybody have been singing for the last two – three years on the Arab spring. It has nothing to do with God, with quality or humanity. It has to do with who has more power on the ground. You take a tyrant, you put another. Nothing changes. If we don’t change the systems themselves, we can never actually change what is happening on the Middle East, whether now, or in ten years, or in twenty years. The people would still be rising, like in Iraq. Iraq had Saddam, and was broken down in the name of democracy. And in the 10 years after the fall of Saddam, what do we see in Iraq? Destruction, wars, bombs, fighting over your day to day bread, people are insecure, girls are being raped. And this was never happened in the time of Saddam. I’m not saying that Saddam was a good one. But I say: what is the alternative? We are making wars and revolutions, but we are not thinking about the consequences. What is the solution? Who can we put instead of Morsi, Mubarak and all this tyrants? They are all the same for me. They are all accessing the same power. If we don’t put a system in place, we are looking for a long-term revolutions in Middle East. It will never quite down. It will be another Afganistan, Iraq, Syria. So, we are just creating terrorism, as we are going along down the way in the name of democracy.

‘Economy is driving the revolutions’ 

RT:So, you think this coup, which just took place in Egypt could actually spill over in the region?

BBS: I don’t think it’s going to be the end in Egypt, it’s going to spill over the whole region. It's not only the whole region, it’s the whole globe, that is undergoing the shift. And economy, Europe, Spain, Greece, the States, South America, North America, Brazil. Look at the globe. What’s happening? You have to connect things together. You cannot just talk about Egypt, without talking about Syria, Brazil or Europe. Economy everywhere is driving the revolutions. And this is that nobody have seen. We are naming actually revolution by the religions, but basically its economic: unemployment, not giving the proper human rights, the social human rights, security, social security, environmental security, child security, government security, borders security. This is all our issues, which are really important for today's person. And we are not actually addressing this issues, we are looking at it in a very secular, political way. And we name the religion the cause of revolution. It is not, it is economic, and that’s what we are seeing right now.

RT:Qatar and Saudi Arabia today expressed no objection to a military court in Egypt, but there are supportive of a hard line in Syria, they are powering huge amounts of money, weapons into a country as part of a savage war.  Why such a dramatic difference in dealing with those states?

BBS:  I would like to ask that question to myself. There is so many contradictions. Even the States, I meant, when we look at President Obama’s remarks about bringing down of Morsi, and saying it’s undemocratic. Well, you can’t say anything except it contradicts every single vibe and any human being in the Middle East. Who should be saying, what’s democratic and what’s not. If I do not exercise democracy in my country, how can I ask it from other countries? There’s a lot of contradictions on the political scene. And everybody is confused and confusing the masses about the messages they are sending from the top P5 security club.

RT:Would you agree that the two countries Qatar and Saudi Arabia are actually competing in exporting hard line Islam to the region, and that is all comes out to control, who control the regions throw hard line Islam?

BBS: Saudi Arabia and Qatar could not do anything on their own. There is support from the different parts of the world for these things. As Russia supports Syria, Saudi Arabia is against. It’s like a game, like a football game. Everybody trying to put the ball in the other person’s goal. It’s a game of power.