The euphoria over the Trump victory was in striking contrast to the downcast nature of international media coverage of the prospects for international stability following Trump's elevation to the White House. The US president-elect is, after all, a self-confessed protectionist who in his campaign made explicit anti-Muslim comments and a flagship election promise it build a separation wall between the US and Mexico. In the Egyptian media, though, Trump's victory was hailed as the beginning of the end of the “destructive scheme for the Middle East” of which outgoing President Barack Obama and his former secretary of state Hillary Clinton were the architects. Media publications closest to the regime could not resist adopting a triumphalist posture over what they see as the end of foreign meddling in human rights in Egypt, denigrating local human rights advocates for their disappointment over Clinton's loss by calling them “Hillary's widows”. They also crowed about what they view as an open invitation for all Middle East regimes to stamp out Islamists. But is their triumphalism justified? “We will have to wait and see what Trump actually offers once he is in the White House,” says political science professor Moustafa Kamel Al-Sayed. “Yes, Trump is anti-Islamist, but he has also said things that are anti-Muslim in general. And he has made it clear that he is not much concerned about human rights “. Trump's explicitly anti-Muslim statements were not missed by President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi ahead of his meeting with the then US presidential candidate in September on the sidelines of the United Nations' General Assembly (UNGA) in New York. But, as Al-Sisi told US TV anchors in interviews during his visit, what Trump was saying about Muslims was part and parcel of his campaigning, implying it carried little weight. Al-Sisi could not have been more offended by the cold treatment he had received from President Barack Obama, say Egyptian diplomatic sources, and was probably hoping for a Trump victory. The Republican candidate, who was harshly criticised by the US media, was described by Al-Sisi as a potentially great leader. And following Trump's victory, Al-Sisi was the first world leader to pick up the telephone and offer his congratulations. “In Cairo,” says Al-Sayed, “the feeling was that Hillary Clinton would have continued the cold-shouldering of Egypt which began following Morsi's overthrow in July 2013.” Sources in Washington say the Obama administration took days and a few good pushes from Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, to acknowledge the popular will behind the ouster of Mohamed Morsi three years ago. The same sources add that it was pressure from the same three countries that brought about Al-Sisi's one and only encounter with the US President, in September 2014 on the sidelines of the UNGA. Al-Sisi - “to his great dismay” according to the source close to the presidency – was never invited to the White House and only received a half-hearted handshake from Obama over a year later on the sidelines of an international gathering. In Washington and in CairoEgyptian officials are now busy preparing for what they hope will be an upgrade, based on better presidential rapport, in Egyptian-US relations. Egypt's diplomats are most keen to secure a first visit by Al-Sisi to the White House, possibly in spring, just a few months before Al-Sisi is due to announce whether or not he will stand for a second term in office. “It might not seem to be a big thing. Bilateral relations, after all, have been going well on so many levels, but it means a lot for the regime which was under the impression that the Obama administration was trying to shorten its sustainability, and this would have continued under Clinton,” says the independent source. Over the last three years US diplomatic sources have said repeatedly that the idea Washington was anxious to undermine the regime was “a conspiracy theory” that was entirely the product “of the Egyptian foreign policy makers”. The only thing the Obama administration had asked the Egyptian president, they say, is that he “works towards political participation to spare Egypt from unnecessary socio-economic and political hiccups”. Had the Obama administration really wanted to give the regime of Al-Sisi a hard time, the same diplomats argue, it would not have allowed political, military and economic ties to have continued more or less untouched. According to one Washington-based diplomat, the Obama administration put all its weight behind Egypt's application for a weight to help Egypt get the IMF loan and was a willing participant in three-way intelligence meetings - along with Egypt and Israel - to address the situation in Sinai. Egyptian experts and diplomats with experience of US-Egyptian relations agree that beyond the “lip-service” paid to human rights by the Obama administration Washington did little to irritate Cairo. What characterised the relationship was business-as-usual. Cairo-based European diplomats say Washington's failure to press the issue of human rights impacted their own agendas as concerns over civil liberties increasingly played second fiddle to security cooperation against radical Islamic groups like IS, and the influx of refugees from Syria. These are precisely the matters Al-Sisi would like to work with on with Trump, says an informed Egyptian diplomat. “They were the issues raised by both men during their meeting in New York on the sideline of the UNGA.” Egyptian experts and diplomats warn the situation is complicated by the anti-Iranian sentiments of Trump's campaign rhetoric which may presage a thaw in Washington's relations with Riyadh. Saudi Arabia and the Gulf, they say, will precede Egypt on the Trump administration's list of priorities, as will Israel. Talk of some assumed chemistry between Al-Sisi and Trump should be taken with a pinch of salt. And even if it does exist, it could well be undermined by Washington's other Gulf allies, especially if current tensions between Riyadh and Cairo persist. The same experts and diplomats also argue that while opposition to Islamists in Syria and agreement over support for the regime of Bashar Al-Assad might bring Cairo and Washington closer it is equally possible that Washington might be tempted, with a little persuasion from Israel, to let the war in Syria continue to unfold, thus depleting the energies of both Tehran and Moscow. Arriving at the Oval Office from outside the establishment Trump will need time to familiarise himself with international relations files. His choice of foreign policy and defence aides will also determine the choices and decisions he takes. “It may be that sooner than expected Cairo is faced with a US administration that has little room for discussion and only expects its allies to bow to its will on regional issues. This will not be good news for Egypt, no matter how opposed Trump is to Islamists,” said a former Egyptian diplomat who served in the US. Nor would it be unprecedented for Cairo to meet with unpleasant surprises from its assumed friends in the US capital. George W Bush's Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice openly criticised the arrest of secular figures Ayman Nour and the Egyptian-American sociologist Saadeddine Ibrahim. Obama, who was expected by the Mubarak administration to be a closer ally, stood by and watched the ouster of the Mubarak regime in the wake of the January Revolution. Morsi, who had hoped for a strong US reaction to his ouster in 2013, received a half-hearted attempt by the West to secure him house-arrest rather than jail time while facing a long list of charges that could end with a death sentence. Traditionally, however, Republican presidents – and Trump is by no means a typical Republican – have refrained from bringing up human rights. Democrats have traditionally done so but were always willing to compromise. Yet Cairo should not assume Trump will completely blank human rights from his Egyptian agenda. “He will not talk about Islamists' rights and will not ask they be included in the political arena as was the case with Obama and would certainly been the case with Hillary Clinton. But he will bring up - either directly or through the foreign policy establishment - violations of Coptic rights in Egypt,” says Egyptian-American Magdi Khalil. A writer and advocate of Coptic rights, Khalil is the founder of several Christian rights groups including the Middle East Christian Rights Committee which he co-launched with Walid Phares, one of the most controversial figures to emerge from the Lebanese civil war. Phares, a member of Trump's close knit circle of advisers, is thought to have influenced much of Trump's anti-Islamic thinking. “Unlike Egyptian-American Muslims who mostly voted for Hillary Clinton, Egyptian-American Copts mostly voted, like all other Christian Americans with Middle East origins, for Trump,” says Khalil. And in a democracy like the US, he adds, such demographic support will be reflected in the policies the administration adopts. A leading figure in the Coptic Solidarity Association (CSA), Khalil met with representatives of the Trump campaign last June when, he says, “they pledged support for Coptic rights”. It is an open secret that Walid Phares held several meetings with Egyptian officials before Trump's election and has received several calls since Trump's victory to the effect that while the new US president's support in the campaign against Islamists is guaranteed, he also expects guarantees from Cairo that it will improve the rights of Christians in Egypt. “I am very optimistic about what a Trump presidency means for Christians in the Middle East in general, and for Copts and other Christians in Egypt in particular,” says Khalil. “When the first encounter between Al-Sisi and Trump is scheduled we will be working alongside Trump's staff to table clear demands on Coptic rights,” he says. The dynamics of US politics and the role of the media and pressure groups which are largely liberal and vocally anti-Trump, is something that Egyptian diplomats and experts on the US are keeping an eye on. In the words of one: “It would be very wrong to overlook the role that these groups have on the tenor of Trump's Middle East policies.” He adds that while the Trump administration “could act to halt Qatar's financial support of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Turkey, it would be a mistake to rule out the impact another round of mass arrests and group death sentences might have”.“It should be remembered that Islamist groups in the US are very close to the liberal media circles.” It would be a mistake for Cairo to narrow its focus exclusively to Trump's anti-Islamism, warn diplomats and other experts. They argue that on the bilateral front Egypt will need to re-negotiate its ability to purchase US arms and on the regional front Cairo should prioritise a deal on Libya, a much more direct security threat to Egypt and one that is less problematic to resolve than Syria. “Unlike Obama or Clinton who would have insisted on participatory political rule in Libya along the lines of the Tunis rather than the Egypt regime, Trump might well be willing to support a Libyan regime led by a military figure if this means a firm grip on the state and an end to migrants fows,” said one former adviser to the president on relations with the US. The fact is, though, nobody is speaking with certainty about what Trump's election means for the world. What Egypt and the rest of the world have to keep an eye on, according to officials in Cairo, is how Trump's trade policies will impact the global economy. If a Trump administration follows through on its protectionist rhetoric then this could further derail already faltering growth and this would not be good news for Egypt's ailing economy. “I don't think Egyptian officials are unaware of the challenges that the Trump administration means for the world, and especially to the Arab and Muslim world, I just think that for now there are some in the regime only too happy to get rid of Obama and Clinton. They will rejoice today and worry tomorrow,” says Moustafa Kamel Al-Sayed .
