Is a Middle East Without Hosni Mubarek Good for Israel?

"Rabbi, what was it like to be in Israel during the protests in Egypt?"  I've been asked this question more than any other since I returned recently from Israel.  People are sincerely curious about how the tumult in Cairo, Alexandria and other major Egyptian cities was/is being viewed in Israel.

My answer has been and remains the same.  Israelis are deeply concerned about the unrest in Egypt.  At no time did I or anyone I talked with during my recent visit feel in any way endangered.  We walked the streets, shopped and dined with a sense of absolute peace and security.  That being said, Many Israelis were certainly glued to their televisions following the ever evolving situation in Tahrir Square.  News programs were filled with the commentary and analyses of Israel's top political experts.  And for the most part, those experts all shared the same concerns: how will the unrest impact Egyptian-Israeli bi-lateral relations?  If Hosni Mubarek falls will Israel's cold peace with Egypt come to an end?  Will an Egyptian government headed by the Muslim Brotherhood pose a grave threat on Israel's southern border?  Will Israel be able to find any friends in the Middle East now that Turkey and Egypt seem lost?

These are all serious and very real concerns, and they're held by average Israelis, not just by the foreign policy experts.  They also appear to be shared by the U.S. State Department and the Obama Administration.   They don't seem, however, to be shared by folks like Nicholas Kristoff and Thomas Friedman, both columnists for The New York Times.  Both have hailed the protests in Egypt as a harbinger of democracy in a long-standing autocratic state.  Kristoff has been so effusive in his admiration for those gathered in Tahrir Squar that he exclaimed in a recent column, "We are all Egyptians" (www.nytimes.com/2011/02/04/opinion/04kristof.html?_r=1&ref=nicholasdkristof).  I don't ever recall Kristoff claiming that "We are all Israelis" during the many years when Israel was the target of suicide bombers and katusha rockets, but that's another sermon.  Neither Friedman nor Kristoff have any real apprehension of an Islamist hijacking of the movement to oust Mubarek and replace his corrupt and oppressive government.  

I wish I could join these two venerable journalists in their naive political analysis.  The fact is the Muslim Brotherhood is a shrewd and politically adept organization; one which ably survived decades of suppression by the Mubarek government.  It knows that in its neighborhood it can say one thing while actually doing another.  I seriously doubt that the Muslim Brotherhood has jettisoned its hardline Islamist platform or its hatred of Israel.  If the Muslim Brotherhood successfully seizes control by taking advantage of Egypt's transition to "democracy" the consequences will be dire for the Jewish State.  With the exception of its eastern border Israel would be surrounded by hostile enemies bent on its destruction.  

As the facts on the ground in Egypt change with each and every minute we will soon know if Egypt will join Israel as the only other truly democratic nation in the Middle East or if it will pose an existential threat to that only democracy.