Tower of the Sun: Stories From the Middle East and North Africa by Michael J. Totten

behalf as I narrowed my eyes at the officers’ backs.
    “They are poor, and good people,” he said. “The state does not pay them. Look after the poor, and God will look after you.”
    They did seem like nice enough gents in the nine seconds I saw them in action, as long as I didn’t think about the fact that Mohammad, rather than the government that ostensibly employed them, paid their salary. Since they were armed men of the law, I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened if Mohammad hadn’t given them any money, and I remembered the shouting match he had earlier with the enraged policeman with the gun and the whip.
    We got back on our horses and rode leisurely toward the Sphinx. Mohammad rode silently, but he seemed to be in a pleasant enough mood.
    “What do you think of the Muslim Brotherhood?” I said.
    “Those are bad words, my friend,” he said.
    “Bad words?” I said. “Why, exactly?”
    “They are bad people who know nothing,” he said. “I have no school. But I know war is terrible and that we should take care of our country.” I hadn’t said anything about war, but it was the first thing he thought of when I mentioned Islamists. He wore a somber look on his face now.
    He was a simple man and probably charged too much money to lead me around on a horse, but he seemed a decent enough fellow, and I did not get the sense he was jerking me around and telling me only what I wanted to hear. Some Middle Easterners in the tourism business say “I love America!” in the most unconvincing voice possible. It’s obvious fakery. I can tell when they do it just for form’s sake. Mohammad didn’t seem the type to pull that with me.
    “What do you think about Hosni Mubarak then?” I said.
    “He is a good man,” he said.
    “Hmm,” I said.
    “What?” he said, aware that I didn’t agree. “What do you want to say? Tell me what is in your heart.”
    “He’s a dictator,” I said. And an asshole , I wanted to add. Mubarak had been in charge of Egypt for decades, and the place was in terrible shape. It wasn’t his fault that the country was not liberal, but he was certainly to blame for persecuting the liberal minority that did exist. It guaranteed his rule, sure, but it also guaranteed that the main opposition to his rule was the Muslim Brotherhood, since they could organize in mosques no matter what the state did. The liberals had no such sanctuary and couldn’t compete, couldn’t even attempt to convince their neighbors and fellow Egyptians that neither Mubarak nor the Brotherhood had the answers. He did it on purpose so he could tell his supposed friends in America that he was all that stood between the Islamists and an Iranian-style regime. He may have been right, but it was partly his fault.
    “I understand what you mean,” Mohammad said and nodded. “In America you change presidents without fighting. Here if we change presidents we could have a war.”
    “Maybe,” I said. “And maybe not. It’s awfully convenient for him that you think that.”
    “Listen, my friend,” he said. “If we have a president who is not from the army, we will have another war. Only the officers know how to keep us at peace.” I presumed he meant only the officers know better than to humiliate Egypt by picking another losing battle with Israel. Perhaps that was true, but even Syria’s Bashar al-Assad knew better than to go full tilt against Israel. He fought Israel indirectly through Hezbollah in Lebanon.
    The pyramids were much bigger than I had imagined, but the Sphinx was a great deal smaller. It looked especially tiny with the gargantuan pyramids as a backdrop. Only in close-up photos does it take on much size.
    As we got near the Sphinx, the angry policeman from earlier returned on foot. He cracked his whip on the sand again and stared holes through Mohammad and me with his black eyes. He didn’t look like a starving policeman to me. He was fat, actually, and his rosy cheeks made him look