WSJ: Condi in Cairo - In the heart of the Arab world, a call for democracy.

opinionjournal.com ^ | June 22, 2005 | Editorial

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...Ever since President Bush settled on a policy of promoting democracy in the Middle East, he has been repeatedly lambasted for his alleged hypocrisy: Why advocate democracy for Iraq and Lebanon, say the critics, but not for autocratic U.S. allies such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia? In this telling, "democracy" is said to be just an alibi for the pursuit of narrow U.S. interests, especially a steady supply of oil.

Well, so much for that view. On Monday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice traveled to Cairo and then Riyadh and, in soft tones, delivered a stark message: America would no longer pursue "stability at the expense of democracy." The U.S. will now notice when peaceful Egyptian protestors are brutalized by government security goons, or when Saudi citizens are imprisoned for "peacefully petitioning the government"; and the future of both countries as American allies rests on the seriousness of their commitment to democratic reform....

The challenge now is to maintain the momentum for reform. Lebanon's parliamentary elections, which have brought an anti-Syrian slate to power, will mean little if politicians there feel their lives are constantly in jeopardy. The U.S. and France, which forced the withdrawal of Syrian troops in April, should apply maximum pressure on Damascus to ensure the withdrawal of all its agents and to encourage the resignation of Lebanese president Emile Lahoud, a puppet of the Syrian regime.

In Saudi Arabia, we can turn up the volume--previously dim--of our public diplomacy, to spotlight the plight of pro-democracy activists. As for Egypt, the U.S. might also reconsider its policy of not speaking to the banned Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood, it's true, has been a breeding ground for terrorists. But it also represents a genuine Egyptian political movement that the U.S. cannot ignore while still advocating the cause of democracy....

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Quotations by Dr. Condoleezza Rice, speaking Monday at the American University, Cairo

"The Egyptian Government must fulfill the promise it has made to its people--and to the entire world--by giving its citizens the freedom to choose. Egypt's elections, including the Parliamentary elections, must meet objective standards that define every free election."

"It is time to abandon the excuses that are made to avoid the hard work of democracy. There are those who say that democracy is being imposed. In fact, the opposite is true: Democracy is never imposed. It is tyranny that must be imposed."