I disagreed with the popular and initially pro-freedom Egyptian blogger Sandmonkey back in the beginning of 2011, and had a public falling out with him over my insistence that the Muslim Brotherhood was very much a major player in the overthrow of Mubarak and whatever freedom Egyptians had enjoyed under his government. It wasn't pretty. I expressed my distress here. He hurled.
But now Sandmonkey is tacitly admitting that I was right all along. His attack on me is now nowhere to be found on the interwebs. And now he is conceding that the position I took was right all along, and that the "Arab Spring" in Egypt was not a secular democracy movement, but a push toward Sharia:
"We majorly failed," concedes Mahmoud Salem, a popular pro-democracy activist and blogger who tweets as "Sandmonkey." "The secular revolutionaries and leftists didn't focus on moving beyond Tahrir and engaging the streets, listening to the demands of the people. So right now, we have to reassess and plan before we move forward."
But here is what he wrote then:
This protest is not one made or sustained by the Muslim Brotherhood, it's one that had people from all social classes and religious background in Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood only showed up on Tuesday, and even then they were not the majority of people there by a long shot. We tolerated them there since we won't say no to fellow Egyptians who wanted to stand with us, but neither the Muslims Brotherhood not any of the Opposition leaders have the ability to turn out one tenth of the numbers of Protesters that were in Tahrir on Tuesday. This is a revolution without leaders. Three Million individuals choosing hope instead of fear and braving death on hourly basis to keep their dream of freedom alive. Imagine that.
And lots of schmucks jumped on the bandwagon (and derided me).
I am not holding my breath for an apology......
