House Mideast Commitee Chair: If Muslim Brotherhood is in Egypt government, we'll cut off aid

The new chairman of the US House’s Middle East subcommittee blasted the Obama administration on Friday for not taking a tougher line against the Muslim Brotherhood and its possible inclusion in the next Egyptian government. “I think we ought to be very clear that the Muslim Brotherhood should not be part of a future government in Egypt,” Rep. Steve Chabot (R-Ohio), 58, told The Jerusalem Post in his first interview with an Israeli paper since becoming chairman of the US House Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia. The US should condition aid to Egypt – now at around $1.5 billion a year – on whether the Muslim Brotherhood ends up in the government, Chabot said.

“They’re about Shari’a law, they’re about suppressing women’s rights, and I don’t think that we ought to condone that, I don’t think that ought to be any part of the future of Egypt,” he said. “We might not have the power to implement the US program, but I think with our support – financial and otherwise – that we can maybe encourage things that would ultimately be in their best long-term interests, and Israel's and the United States’.”Chabot criticized the Obama administration for not being bold enough in its position on the Brotherhood, and argued that the US weakness on this issue has emboldened Iran and other enemies of America who were calculating how to take advantage of the unrest.

Read the rest in the JPost