President Donald Trump is looking to regroup American allies in the war against ISIS and there’s no better one than Egypt's president, the head of a Muslim American think tank said Monday on The Morning Answer radio show.
President Donald Trump met with President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on Monday, marking the first time Sisi was invited to the White House since he took control of Egypt four years ago. Sisi rose to power when the Egyptian military overthrew Mohamed Morsi – the country’s first democratically elected president and member of the Muslim Brotherhood. The military coup was led by Sisi – then a general, according to the New York Times. He rejected the idea that the military takeover was a coup, instead calling it “a national reconciliation."
Because Egypt is the second largest recipient of foreign aid from the United States – coming in just behind Israel – this was an important meeting, radio show host Dan Proft said. Proft is a principal of Local Government Information Services, which owns this publication.
M. Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum For Democracy and a former U.S. Navy Lieutenant, said Sisi will be a strong ally. He believes the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood is a terror organization and a danger to Egypt’s Coptic Christian community.
“As much as Sisi is not a Muslim Brotherhood fan, he has invoked some Sharia-type laws that has set his country back to the 20th, if not 13th century,” Jasser said.
He and Proft agreed that foreign governments seeking aid from the United States should hold to some American ideals, including religious tolerance and free and fair elections.
“I would just add not only free elections, but free speech,” Jasser said.
While Egypt may be one of the strongest allies America has, Jasser said Trump must test the friendship by offering to protect Egypt as long as they adopt similar stances of freedom and liberty.
An Egyptian president hasn’t visited the White House since 2009, according to the New York Times.
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