Of cameras. Join us at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Later a look at the doddfrank law and regulations. This is cspan3 with politics and Public Affairs programming throughout the week. And every weekend, 40 hours a people and events ,com,com ma telling the american story on American History tv. Get schedules in the past programs our website. You can join in the conversation on social media sites. Tomorrow a draft constitution by Mohammed Morsi. It would expand his constitutional powers. Supporters and opponents of president Mohammed Morsi. Next, well talk about developments in the country and security throughout the region with an expert on the Muslim Brotherhood and a former israeli ambassador to egypt. This is an hour and a half. Looking at the political competition with the egyptian and the egyptian society, what is likely to be the outcome, not just of the referendum, but the next step in the next several steps in this ongoing saga of the egyptian political transition. Looking more deeply inside the Muslim Brotherhood, looking at this in the regional perspective in terms of egypt and israel in the aftermath of the gaza conflict, which may seem like it was light lightyears ago, but it was only three weeks ago. So with that, let me briefly introduce our panelists. First, steve cook, a senior fellow for middle Eastern Studies of at the council on foreign relations. I take great pride in mentioning that when he was much younger, steve was a Research Fellow here at the Research Institute and we are very proud of him and his professional countless mens from that period up until today. Very happy to have you back at the podium. He can second will be eric trager. He is the washington institutes next generation fellow. He is a doctoral candidate at the university of pennsylvania where he completed a dissertation and he is going to give us some special insight into some of the details of Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood in the quest to achieve a constitution. And then we have third, i am pleased to introduce a diplomat of the area. He served in egypt for 2005 through 2010. Shalom cohen. He has considerable its aryans with the relationship and the politics we are seeing on the ground today. First we have steve and eric and then shalom cohen, and then we will open up the discussion for your questions and comments. Good afternoon. It is a tremendous ledger to be back at the washington institute. I feel a a little nervous, i feel like im performing for my first grade teacher again. But it is a great pleasure. This is where, as rob pointed out, my career began. Also, those of you who know me, this is where my family began. I am sure that many of you in washington can relate to what is going on in the middle east, rob is a pretty good matchmaker. Back in 1995 and 1996, i married one of the Research Associates that was there during the same year as me as well. We have been happy ever since then. I think it was five or six couples and define the outcome and not have resulted in divorce. You did an excellent job. [laughter] anyway, for those reasons, since the beginning of my career, i am forever in debt to rob and his organization. It is also wonderful to have been awarded this terrific goldmedal. The recognition from the institute of my work is truly an honor. I would like to thank rob and mr. Martin kramer did a great job demonstrating the lord. Before i get into this, i would like to recognize eric trager. He is a fellow penn graduate. It is nice to see someone else from penn in this town doing this kind of work and doing it in a cutting edge and great way. I also want to recognize ambassador cohen, who had the hardest job from israel. As a testament to his character. It is interesting to me that when rob contacted me about doing this, he wanted to call the session egypt on the brink. Not only does this have the benefit of being true yet again, but it is a particularly apt description of what we are likely to see in egypt for the foreseeable future. Not only is it what we see with the future, but perfectly consistent with egypts modern political history. In the central drama and egypts history. It could digress a little bit in the struggle. Because i think they reflect well on what is likely to happen. It is clear that what we are seeing now at this moment is a reflection of the fact that no party, not the Muslim Brotherhood were not the liberals and not revolutionaries, not anybody we see out there. That is part of a faction that you know is in there. Egyptian is meant for social justice represented in government. His demands had been perfectly consistent going back to the early part of the 20th century. No one has been able to answer these questions. They have never been able to answer the essential questions about what kind of principles of government, organizations of government, the relationships are critical between these countries for global egypts trajectory be . Both domestic and foreign policy. Despite everything that has been done, we have not been able to answer these questions with the vast majority of egyptians. The problem in egypt, a lot of people say, oh, the problem is november 22, president morsi cannot and he issued these degrees. The way in which he went about it, the way in which they thought to enforce it was depressingly similar to Hosni Mubarak. All of these kind of things look exactly like what had come before. But it is not just about that in which this is. It is not just about Mohammed Morrissey and Hosni Mubarak. Now, its a struggle over this constitution. The brotherhood comment given the circumstances, they are going to to achieve a consistent consensus on that. The posters of Hosni Mubarak and Mohammed Morsi i dont think it completely captures the wave of the Muslim Brotherhood views the world. They see themselves as a vanguard to know the depth of this country. We back in the summer, i spent some time out of cairo with members of the freedom justice party. Looking back, you can see it was clearly coming. If we could just clear way the underbrush and get rid of parts of the bureaucracy at the time the staff was still in this form, if we could just get rid of this, we would be able to transform this country virtually overnight. That is precisely what they tried to do on november 22. They thought that they were being revolutionary. They were wrong because something had happened in egypt. That is egyptians are not going to take these kinds of these creeps any longer. This worldview that we are vanguard and the we it is not it is not any longer tolerable to many egyptians. This seems like a noncontroversial point. But if you would suggest something along these lines. After all, there was a narrative that the brotherhood is clearly a force with democratization and change in progressive politics. If people actually looked at the data, what they were doing that we were going to come come to this moment. The brotherhood has been unable to impose its political will in way and the way they thought it would be able to. We are coming to this deeply profound and contested referendum. We were having a little discussion before. Im going to go with yes, i think that based on the referendum of march 2011, parliamentary elections, president ial elections, i think that the brotherhood is ultimately going to carry this day in this referendum. But it doesnt mean they would be able to advance their referendum. So we may see the situation deescalate for a time as the brotherhood claims a mandate, if in fact they win. I think you have taken note. It will be confronted by periodic spasms of instability and demonstration. The content of this constitution is such that combining with a genuine grassroots opposition movement, youre likely to see is the brotherhood seeks to implement this program, continuation of what we have been seeing over the course of the last few weeks, which is going to make egypt the very place to govern. A difficult place for the United States to engage. Overall, i think what youre going to see his we are going to enter a new stage in which the revolutionaries we are all going to continue to oppose the brotherhood. But the real thing will be what youre going to see here, the brotherhood on the constitution. Not that there isnt as crossover, with all three of them, but that is where the political dynamite is going to be. The only way to establish political control egyptians have demonstrated that they are not going to lie down and take this anymore. Who is going to do the Muslim Brotherhood who is going to pit one group against the other . I dont think the military has a real interest in getting involved until there is a serious threat to social cohesion. If you look at the constitution, in november 2011, it has been incorporated into this. On august 12, when Mohammed Morsi talked, it was to guarantee the new commander. There is a wave of violence that threatens egypt. The ministry can play any way that it would like. This is where the continuing instability comes from. What should washington do and what can i do . There are lots of ideas that have been talked about in the last 10 or 15 years. About what to do about egypt in general. Deeply invalid or about all these things. It is clear we have strategic interests. Who is to say Going Forward egypt will remain as strategically important. The consequences of an egyptian crash is far greater than anything we are seeing right now. But we seem to be stuck in the syndrome of aid and hope, even so, i dont think there is much that the United States can do. I think having a is not going to make much of a difference. Last weekend, two weekends ago, egyptians and writing their own history. There is a particularly apt way of putting it. Anything we do on the front is likely to be counterproductive. But i dont think that means we should sacrifice our principles. During the uprising, in may 2011, the administration said they said they were the right side of this thing. Would people who want more open and democratic societies. When president morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood proceeded with a clearly antidemocratic agenda, recognizing all these other tools that we think we have. We really dont have. But we do have those principles that have guided us here and make us feel all warm and fuzzy. Those people want to live in more open and democratic societies. It is incumbent upon us now. I will leave the. A few months. I am looking forward to the q a. We will be linked to eric to explain to us about the Muslim Brotherhood. Thank you. [applause] i think it is worth pointing out that the night before the revolution started in 2011, we all have coffee together at maria cafe. I had tea. It is just a warning that when the three of us are in the room, things get pretty interesting so what does the current episode tells about the Muslim Brotherhood and the way the brotherhood works. I am actually going to give you a spoiler. First, we have learned that right now it may seem very obvious. It is important to remember that this Current Crisis did not start, as rob said, about the constitution. That started about with horses constitutional declarations for which he sees as unchecked executive power. The brotherhood had used it, as a mechanism for pushing forward the constitution. That is not as kind of political ploy. That is something that has been important for very long time. Secondly, they coordinate their activities with president Mohammed Morsi. I laid out an organizational chart in the previous form that showed overlap between the Muslim Brotherhood in central leadership in the party, and the Mohammed Morsi presidency. At the time, my theory was these guys were coordinating with each other. But that is in fact happening. And we have learned and should learn and take note of this, president morsi is not a compromiser and i will explain what i mean by that. Personally, i want to take you back to this whole point about the Muslim Brotherhood warning in constitution. President morsi 22,010, this is what he said. [inaudible] [inaudible] [inaudible] okay, so its very important to focus in on a certain aspect of this. The constitution is not only a mechanism to implement this without sharia, but a mechanism for freedom. It is important to realize that it is the freedom to do whatever you want religiously. For the brotherhood, it is the freedom to have an Islamic State. An environment in which there is not an Islamic State engines against their freedom. We have to be free but having been on the constitution. This kind of hits on what steve was saying, the constitution should represent the peoples well. The brotherhood believes that egyptians are religious. There is a groundswell for an Islamic State. I wont comment on whether they are right or wrong. We dont have fantastic data on what exactly egyptians. This is propelling a lot of what they do to believe that this is what egyptians want in the constitution that implements this principle. This goes back historically. In 1938, the brotherhood founder focused on the constitution and he viewed it as maintaining personal freedom in every way, which again, its all within this islamic framework. He talked about limits on the rules authority, and also spoke of the constitution as a mechanism for implementing the teaching of islam. The system and rules in the form of governance. This is not just some interesting fact that im racing. This is something that the top leader mentioned on facebook the other day. This push for the constitution is very much part of the longterm agenda. So they talk in the product about the state should be a constitutional nation, not a military state. They viewed the constitution is not only implementing sharia principles, but something there is a groundswell for. Okay, so not just about implementing islamic principles, which the brotherhood has frankly never really defined since they have been focused on pursuing power than on any kind of specific ideological project. It is also about legitimating the brotherhood and their governance program. Legitimating their claims of power. The brotherhood is a majoritarian organization. The key slogan for the brotherhood during this push for the constitution has been out of sharia. They are to be different kinds of sharia. One of which is legitimacy, the type of political legitimacy. And the sharia islamic law. Despite the fact they could win a referendum, there could be a couple of reasons why they might not. It wont convince the masses. The constitution is not supposed to be a 15 plus one documentary that is supposed to be probably confront a world in which the winners and losers without those incentives, the losers could try to continue politics through other means. It is why we think even the pass referendum wouldnt solve this instability. The brother heard, of course, they wont care. The organizer of the public would reject it as well. Lastly, the brotherhood and Mohammed Morsi. Before i get to that, this is something that we saw in president morsis lyrical biography. From 2005, a member of parliament and the chairman of the Muslim Brotherhood parliamentary bloc. What has come out this past week is a lot of interesting details. When Mohammed Morsi was in parliament, they say that he would pocket it and then not sign off on on the topic until he talks to the other moslem brotherhood. Going to the Current Situation in which he is president , have been saying that they are our personnel overlaps is an president morsis president ial advisers two weeks ago i was on the air with a brotherhood leader, and he actually told me that i was right. The relationship between one of the main and major groups that supported him in his president ial offices virtue appointed advisers. It is an institution or to members of the justice party, which are also members of this as well. Let me just explain that. Basically, the president ial palace in the Advisory Team has about 60 members. There has been a lot of attrition during this crisis. It may well be down somewhere through seven and 10. We dont exactly know. Of course, we have 20 members. The overlaps is these two figures. This man was in Washington Week and half ago, meeting at the white house, and this is the top policy adviser. And this gentleman who is a behindthescenes player. How has this coordination work . Well, the appointment of governors and state media, this is a fact that came out this week as former president ial advisers were taking Mohammed Morsi out of office. They were both students in the United States and were both recruited through the brotherhoods network here. And a former brotherhood office number, again, the brotherhood that Mohammed Morsi appointed, for a five muslim brothers in the governorship, it started for a long process that was coordinated, we know for a fact, with the brotherhoods permission. Also, Mohammed Morsi runs policies every word. The most important thing is the brotherhood organization. There is one thing that you have to understand about the Muslim Brotherhood, becoming a muslim brother is not like checking out a box at the dmv. It is a fiber eightyear process involving multiple staging of membership, and the whole purpose of this process is to get muslim brothers to their commitment to the cause a