Egypt’s Morsi Upsets Iran
The Egyptian president's visit to Iran has not pleased his hosts as much as expected, Al-Monitor's Barbara Slavin reports in Tehran. In a speech, Morsi highlighted the Syrian opposition’s struggle against the "oppressive system there," unnerving the Iranians, allies of the Syrian regime. Iranian newscasts omitted key bits in televised coverage.
TEHRAN — A resurgent and boldly independent Egypt on Thursday upset Iranian plans for a smoothly-oiled summit that Iranian officials hoped would demonstrate that the Islamic Republic has more friends than foes.
Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi — whose brief trip here was criticized in advance by Israel and the United States — delivered a nuanced speech that targeted some US and Israeli policies but also adamantly backed the Syrian opposition’s struggle to overturn “the oppressive system there.”
Morsi’s tough words in support of Syrian rebels unnerved his Iranian hosts — staunch supporters of the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Iranian newscasters omitted key bits in televised coverage.
However, reporters listening to a simultaneous translation of the speech to the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit heard the Egyptian president — who hails from the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood — refer a half dozen times to the struggle of the largely-Sunni Syrian opposition “for freedom and human dignity.”
