Egyptian candidates label Israel an aggressor in debate

Egypt’s presidential front-runners have pledged to revise the 1979 peace treaty with Israel, using a pre-election debate to denounce Israel as an “aggressor” and an “enemy.”

Amr Moussa, a liberal nationalist, and Abdul Monheim Aboul Fotouh, a moderate Islamist, criticized Israel during an event that riveted Egyptians. Prospective voters thronged cafes to watch the four-hour exchange, the first such event in their history and believed to be the first in any large Arab country.

Each candidate attempted to present the other as weak on Israel, with Aboul Fotouh challenging his rival to declare whether or not he regarded Israel as an “enemy.”

Moussa, a former secretary general of the Arab League, responded cautiously. “It is a country that advocates an aggressive stance but I do not want to choose these emotive expressions.”

Aboul Fotouh was more forthright, baldly declaring: “Israel is an enemy.”

Such rhetoric, a regular feature of the Egyptian political scene since last year’s overthrow of Hosni Mubarak, has caused alarm in Israel. But government officials there were phlegmatic about the debate.

“It is quite obvious the populist thing to do is to bash Israel as strongly as you can,” said an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman. “we will only know when the political situation stabilizes what their intentions really are.”

Opinion polls indicate that a narrow majority of Egyptians regard the peace treaty positively. Both candidates have said they support the pact and want only to revise aspects of it restricting the number of troops Egypt can station in the Sinai region.