Behind the Headlines Egypt and Libya: Proximity but Not Togetherness

As it turned out, the drama of the hijacked Japan Airline jet intervened to prevent Israelis sitting back and enjoying the climax of one of the funniest episodes the Middle East has seen in years. By the time-the news came through of how the Libyan invasion rolled through Mersa Matruh, smashing down the customs house as it went, and of how it was finally stopped by the resourceful Egyptian authorities who hauled a train across its path and let it be known that Libya’s leader Muammar al-Qaddafi had resigned yet again–by that time our hearts were with the innocent passengers of the JAL jumbo jet on their odyssey through the Mideast skies.

Israel radio’s Arab affairs expert, asked to explain the mass march, attributed it, in all seriousness, to the exceptional hot spell pervading the region. These were the psychological effects, he said, of long days of searing heat unrelieved by nighttime breezes.

But levity apart, Israeli observers quietly breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of the Egyptian-Libyan unity merger disappearing into the desert horizon. An Egypt backed up by Libya’s limitless cash and fanned to new heights of national pride and hostility to Israel by Qaddafi’s rhetoric, could have been a dangerous and unpredictable enemy indeed.

Anwar Sadat has now confirmed in his Revolution Day speech on Monday–if confirmation were necessary–that the union plan has suffered, as far as he is concerned, a drastic postponement. He had some critical comments too for the mass march which he called impetuous. And Qaddafi for his part has gone as far as to urge the Egyptian people to rise in Libyan style cultural revolt. Relations between the two neighbors will doubtless take many months to resume their former closeness.

REASONS FOR SADAT’S BACKDOWN

Why did Sadat draw back from the proposed union? Israeli observers detect two cogent reasons: both the Soviet Union and the United States let him know that they viewed it with disfavor. The USSR, for all Sadat’s complaints, is still his chief political patron and arms supplier. And the Soviet Union dropped the hint that it would not stomach his uniting with the man who dubs himself the sworn enemy of Soviet Communism. The U.S., for all Sadat’s bitterness and disappointment with Washington, still plays a role in his thinking. Washington hinted that it too would not take kindly to Cairo’s linking with America’s self-declared arch-enemy–Qaddafi.

The Israeli observers predict that the future will see Sadat turning increasingly to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states for the financial help he anticipated receiving from Libya.

Other reasons for Sadat’s reluctance to go head over heels into union may be found in his internal situation. A union might well have raised the now quiescent specter of the Moslem Brotherhood, the mysterious and fanatical right-wing Moslem underground which has troubled Egyptian rulers for decades. Qaddafi’s outlook is very much in line with the Brotherhood’s and he may have even encouraged them. On the perpetual tightrope which Sadat walks between the Brother hood on the right and the Syrian-backed Communists on the left there was no room to take chances like that.

UNION FROZEN FOR FORESEEABLE FUTURE

The upshot is that Sadat has effectively frozen the union for the foreseeable future, keeping Qaddafi at arms length while at the same time careful not to break with him entirely. A break, apart from the political repercussions, would have adverse affects for the 40,000-odd Egyptian technicians and teachers living and working in Libya. Sadat certainly does not want a labor force of this dimension thrown back onto his own fragile economy.

For Qaddafi the strongly ridiculous manner in which the union process was, literally, thrown into reverse is a severe blow to his prestige and pretensions as an Arab leader in the Nasserian mold. He saw himself as the strong vice-president of a huge and rich Arab state of 42 million. He must remain, for the time being, the ruler of a backward desert state, rich in oil but poor in population, in power and in influence.