Last Week Morsi Accepted Millions of American Dollars...but Now Video Surfaces of His Past Railings Against Doing Business with the U.S.

Secretary of State John Kerry and Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi at the presidential palace in Cairo on March 3, 2013. (Photo Credit: Khaled Desouki, Getty)

On March 3rd, Secretary of State John Kerry announced $250 million more in aid to Egypt during his visit to Cairo, a visit that included this chummy photo-op of the Secretary with President Mohammed Morsi. Now just one week later, video of a younger Mohammed Morsi is circulating among Arabic speakers online showing a not-so-chummy Morsi railing against those who cooperate, make deals or do business with the United States and against those who allow the Americans to “interfere in our business.”

The folks at Palestinian Media Watch examined the video for TheBlaze and provided us their translation which can be seen here:

TheBlaze reached out to Egypt-watchers who couldn’t tell us the date of the video, but said that Morsi was clearly using a series of rhetorical questions to attack then President Hosni Mubarak – without citing his name - whom the Muslim Brotherhood regularly derided for his warm relations with the U.S. and for respecting the Camp David Peace treaty with Israel. As a gesture to the Palestinians, Morsi was standing in front of a wall-hanging that depicts the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem.

Judging by Morsi’s more youthful appearance and the darker shade of his hair, the video was made a number of years ago, we just can’t say how many.

The editor of the video wanted to send a political message by ending the clip with the above photo of Morsi and Kerry. Juxtaposing the younger Morsi criticizing those who do business with the U.S. and President Morsi today doing business with the U.S. seems a clear attempt to suggest to the the viewer that Morsi is just another politician who has not stuck to his original anti-American and anti-Israel principles.

Here is a transcript of the translation as provided by Palestinian Media Watch (emphasis added by TheBlaze):

Who has pushed the nation into the margins? Who has misled it?

Who gave in to her enemies, her enemies?

Who tried to sell her (the nation) in the slave market?

Who did that? And who extended his hand to the Zionists?

Who has claimed that he wants to make peace with those (in order) to keep their chair, to remain in his place?

Who’s given those the chance to interfere in our business?

Who has brought the Americans here?

Who has given to them? Who is dealing (cooperating) with them?

Who’s making deals with them and works for them and is pleased with crumbs on their tables?

Who’s the one that knows them, who goes to them, who hosts them?

Who’s the one who knows their desires? Who knows their countries? Who knows their children? Who obeys them?

Who wants to continue having relations with them?

With all the regret (I) declare that they refuse.

Who has done all that? Has the Brotherhood done it? What have the Muslim Brothers done?

In an effort to gauge the significance of the video, TheBlaze contacted Eric Trager, Next Generation Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who is an expert on Egyptian opposition parties. He also tweeted out the Arabic video over the weekend.

“This video should remind Washington of the Muslim Brotherhood's unyielding hostility towards the United States.  We should remember that the Brotherhood has a long-term ‘renaissance’ plan, which calls for consolidating power in Egypt and then establishing a ‘global Islamic state,’” Trager said.

“Policymakers should thus watch this video and remember that the Brotherhood doesn't intend to maintain its currently cordial relations with Washington indefinitely, which is why we should be squeezing the Brotherhood rather than accommodating it,” Trager added.

The course of action Trager is suggesting has so far not been adopted, as reflected in a new revelation about the Obama administration’s Egypt policy. In an interview that The Hill published over the weekend, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) said Kerry had hoped to offer considerably more aid to Egypt than the $250 million he announced last week, but he was blocked by Congress from doing so.

Royce said: “This is not the aid package that the administration wanted to announce.” Royce added that though the administration wanted to bestow a “larger sum” on Egypt, it ended up bowing to Royce's committee and congressional appropriators. The Hill reports:

Royce wouldn't say how much Kerry had hoped to announce, but the State Department has been pressing Congress to greenlight $450 million in direct aid since last fall.

“Our approach is not the full-throttle administration approach of delivering all the aid that they wanted to deliver, but rather a measured approach of tying tranches to results as it pertains to the peace treaty with Israel, to cooperation with respect to smuggling [into Gaza] and with respect to economic reforms to guarantee civil rights and the rule of law within Egypt,” he said. “That's the pressure that we're applying.”

This is not the first tape showing Morsi in a less-than-diplomatic context. As TheBlaze reported in January, Morsi was caught on tape in 2010 calling Jews “the descendants of apes and pigs” and “bloodsuckers who attack Palestinians,” words Morsi’s spokesman later said were taken out of context.

Last October, Morsi was again caught on tape, this time seemingly mouthing “Amen” after an Islamic preacher called for the destruction of the Jews.

Itamar Marcus who heads Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) tells TheBlaze, "AT PMW we are not surprised by the duplicity of Morsi. PMW has stressed that an integral component of Muslim Brotherhood ideology is the necessity for preparation and timing of terror and violence. The MB has the identical goals of Al Qaeda – a world subjugated under Islam. But as opposed to Al Qaeda that preaches attack the infidels at all times at all costs, the MB believes that it must be timed for proper benefit."

"When Morsi preached hatred of the West in the past it is clear that it was an expression of his authentic ideology. Anything different today is because of the need for timing," Marcus added.

Palestinian Media Watch is a Jerusalem-based research institute that translates the Arabic media with the aim of educating Western policymakers about the messages to which Palestinians are exposed. Marcus wrote the book “Deception: Betraying the Peace Process” along with Nan Jacques Zilberdik in which the authors reviewed Palestinian government television and print items to try to discover if the Palestinian Authority is educating its public toward peace. By contrast, most of the messages it found were of an inciting and terror-glorifying nature. TheBlaze review of their book can be found here.

(H/T: Eric Trager, Washington Institute for Near East Policy)