This sounds right to me:

When an Egyptian sees the autocracy, corruption, and tyranny of the Mubarak regime, the Muslim Brotherhood’s motto of “Islam is the solution” sounds all the more prescient. The idea that a dictator like Mubarak is a true countermeasure towards Islamic extremism in Egypt is ultimately flawed – if anything, Mubarak’s regime is feeding Islamic extremism in Egypt.

President Bush should make it clear that further foreign aid distributions to Egypt will be made conditional on Mubarak’s willingness to lay the groundwork for a democratic and free state. That process should begin by a demand for the freedom of the Egyptian bloggers arrested this week during a pro-democracy protest. If Mubarak is unwilling to tolerate free and peaceful dissent among his people, then he is undeserving of the $2 billion per year in US foreign aid he receives. If he wishes to have his son Gemal inherit his presidency rather than laying the groundwork for a truly open and democratic election, then we should not support that choice.

Our national interests are now best met by ending the system of autocracy in the Middle East that fuels resentment and terrorism. President Bush has been right in noting this link time and time again in his speeches. It is time for him to put his money where his mouth is.

It most certainly is. Check out, too, the Max Boot piece that Jay refers to. And elsewhere in the ME, there are other hopeful signs of a possibility of replacing realpolitik with reality:

JERUSALEM – Israel will give the Palestinians until the end of the year to prove they are willing to negotiate a final peace deal, and will unilaterally set its final borders by 2008 if they don’t, Israel’s justice minister said Wednesday.

The statement by Justice Minister Haim Ramon, a close associate of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s, was the first by an Israeli official to set a deadline for the Hamas-led Palestinian government to disarm and recognize the Jewish state.

The Palestinians’ moderate president, Mahmoud Abbas, of the rival Fatah party, has tried to persuade Israel to bypass Hamas and resume peace negotiations with him, but Olmert has made it clear that he is not prepared to negotiate with Abbas if Hamas doesn’t change its violent ways.

Hamas thus far has refused to renounce violence and recognize Israel’s right to exist, despite intense international pressure and the cutoff of hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid and Israeli transfer payments.

“Through the end of this year, 2006, there will be honest attempts to talk to the other side,” Ramon told Israel’s Army Radio.

“If it becomes clear by the end of the year that we really have no partner, and the international community is also convinced of this, then we will take our fate into our own hands and not leave our fate in the hands of our enemies,” he added.

And it’s about damned time, too, although regrettably I see a bit of waffle-room being left in play via that reference to the “international community.” The “international community” will never recognize the stark reality that the Paleostinians don’t want peace nearly as much as they want Israel destroyed (and that realization ought to be a qualifying requirement for any Israeli leader). To recognize the intractability of the Palestinians’ genocidal ambitions is to acknowledge the uselessness of further diplomacy, something the EUnuchs simply can’t do. But if Olmert sticks to his plan, it’ll all be rendered moot, and the Paleos can get on with either a futile fratricidal bloodbath, or joining the rest of us in the 21st century. Captain Ed says it well:

The Israelis have tired of the occupation game, waiting for the Palestinians to produce viable negotiators for peace. Hamas will only commit to a “long-term truce’ if Israel returns to the borders that Arab nations found so attractive for attacks twice in twenty years. The Palestinians won’t even negotiate for a formal end to hostilities or recognition of Israel. They want to keep their primary goal alive, which is the destruction of the “Zionist entity” and the acquisition of all the land to the Mediterranean.

The Israelis will not establish the long and nearly indefensible border positions that almost saw them pushed into the Mediterranean, nor should they. Israel occupies the West Bank because of the offensive war that Arab nations staged through that territory; they risked that territory and lost it. The Israelis have every right to reset its borders accordingly to ensure that they have a more defensible frontier, and if the Palestinians refuse to negotiate the terms, then Israel should set them, pull back behind them, and end the occupation and the debate.

Amen. But of course, the destructive naivete of Western diplodinks knows no bounds and suffers no reality. And so, as the Captain points out, we’re already reneging on our meaningless pledge not to fund terrorists:

Faced with global cries over the plight in which the Palestinians placed themselves by electing Hamas, the US and EU have agreed to start sending money again, although they claim the funds will bypass the Palestinian government…

I have no objection to sending food and medicine to the Palestinian people for humanitarian purposes. However, sending money and paying the salaries of those with Fatah and Hamas government sinecures undermines the entire purpose of isolating the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinians voted these people into power, primarily because they believed that they would not have to suffer the consequences of electing unreconstructed terrorists as their representatives. Just when that decision started to make a personal impact on the people who made that decision, the Quartet has performed their normal Deus ex Machina role, rescuing the Palestinians once again from their own folly.

If anyone wonders why this situation still has no resolution, this fecklessness on the part of the West is a prime example. The Palestinians have no stake in negotiating a final settlement in a two-state framework they don’t support. They want one state — theirs. They know that they can defy the West and still get their funding and sympathy. The Palestinians never have to face consequences for their decisions, and so continue to make bad decisions. When that pattern stops, they may finally have an opportunity to learn from their mistakes. Until then, we can expect a continuation of the post-Oslo dynamic in the West Bank.

Precisely so. Nothing more to add.