On July 12, the Obama administration asked the Egyptian military to free deposed president Mohammed Morsi. According to AFP, Egypt’s interim government claims to be holding Morsi in a “safe place,” but the U.S. believes Morsi should be released.
State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said, “We’ve expressed concerns from the beginning… about his arrest, about the politically motivated arbitrary arrests of Muslim Brotherhood members… We still continue to view these as politically motivated arrests, and still continue to believe that they should be released.”
As my colleague Joel Pollak has shown, diplomacy has faltered to such a degree under Obama that he is confused over when to use power and when to use diplomacy–or how to use power versus how to use diplomacy.
Egyptian General Sisi has someone Obama wants freed–former president Morsi–and we have something Sisi wants–four F-16 fighter jets. It seems a diplomatic approach would involve the use of leverage here.
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.
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