48 Middle East & Africa The EconomistFebruary 22nd 2020
2 signed a truce last month.
But it is too soon to celebrate. Mr Kiir
has not simply restored South Sudan’s ten
original states, as Mr Machar had demand-
ed. Instead he wants to form ten states and
three “administrative areas”. One of these
will be Ruweng, a Dinka enclave in Unity,
Mr Machar’s home state. As it happens, Ru-
weng holds about 80% of South Sudan’s
oil—the country’s only sizeable export.
On February 17th Mr Machar flew to Juba
with Lieutenant-General Abdel Fattah
Abdelrahman Burhan, the head of Sudan’s
sovereign council, in a last-ditch attempt
to reach a compromise with Mr Kiir. Even if
one is reached, Mr Machar needs convinc-
ing that he can safely return to Juba. Wary
of what happened in July 2016, when the
government sent helicopter-gunships to
kill him, Mr Machar wants a 3,000-strong
joint protection force. “He considers hav-
ing military manpower in Juba the same as
having political power,” notes Ahmed Soli-
man of Chatham House, a think-tank in
London. Although the government has
agreed to this joint force, it is reluctant to
remove its own troops from the capital. Al-
ternatives such as peacekeepers supplied
by African governments would require
lengthy discussions.
Still, a unity government is most likely
to take shape in the coming weeks. The
question then is how long it will last. The
process of integrating rebels into the na-
tional army, which is far behind schedule,
will be fraught. “How are you going to get
83,000 men who have spent more than six
years slaughtering each other to work to-
gether?” asks Peter Martell, the author of a
recent book on South Sudan.
The bigger issue is that the latest deal,
like those before it, aims to do little more
than restore the balance of power between
the president and his rival. “We’re essen-
tially trying to reset the button to 2013—
back to the very problem which kick-start-
ed this war,” says Mr Martell. 7Yet another handshakeW
hen it comesto Egypt’s Jewish com-
munity, President Abdel-Fattah al-
Sisi says all the right things. Only a minus-
cule fraction of the 80,000 Jews who once
lived in Egypt remain in this Arab, Muslim
country. Nonetheless, Mr Sisi promises a
resurgence of local Jewry. He has invited
back Jews who were pushed out after Isra-
el’s invasion in 1956. He has listed dilapi-
dated Jewish cemeteries as heritage sites
and spent millions of dollars restoring
what was once the world’s largest syna-
gogue, Eliyahu HaNavi, in Alexandria.
On February 14th about 180 Jews of Alex-
andrian origin returned to rededicate the
synagogue. They hammered a mezuzah
onto its walls, danced with the Torah
scrolls and sang psalms to the tune of “Inta
Omri”, the anthem of Egypt’s most famous
diva, Umm Kulthum. Old men sipped
espressos at nearby Café Delice, still play-
ing Edith Piaf’s “Non, je ne regrette rien”,
and swapped faded wedding photos taken
on the synagogue’s steps. They cried over
memories of leaving Egypt, surrendering
their passports and signing documents
promising not to return. The service that
followed was the largest in the synagogue
for 60 years. The men promised to return a
year later for a wedding—the first step to
rebuilding a community which a century
ago attracted more Jews than Palestine.
Security was tight at the event, for good
reason. In recent years jihadists with links
to Islamic State have targeted another reli-
gious minority: Christians. A phalanx of
security vehicles with blaring sirens fol-lowed the Jews wherever they went. But the
authorities also seemed keen to tamp
down the celebration. Goons in balaclavas
carrying machineguns kept the Jews more
or less quarantined. They denied access to
Muslims hoping to join their former class-
mates for the rededication. The American
ambassador, who is Jewish, was prevented
from attending the Torah reading.
Having spent so much money restoring
the synagogue, it may seem odd for the
government to mute its reopening. But, de-
spite Mr Sisi’s words, the authorities re-
main ambivalent towards Jews and their
sites. Egypt’s synagogues and Jewish ceme-
teries are perpetually locked. Over a decade
ago the government restored the yeshiva of
Moses Maimonides, the scholar who
founded Orthodox Judaism in Cairo in the
12th century (and served as Saladin’s phys-
ician), but it is closed to the public. There
are no signs directing people to the site.
Many Egyptians with Jewish ancestry re-
main fearful of disclosing their origins.
Morocco, another Muslim country, of-
fers an alternative model. Its Jewish com-
munity also shrank when the Arab-Israeli
conflict was at its peak. But the Jews who
remained now practise openly. King Mu-
hammad VI has restored scores of syna-
gogues and regularly hosts the diaspora at
festivals where imams and rabbis sing to-
gether. Last month he inaugurated a Jewish
heritage centre by touching the Torah and
praying. “It was a first for a commander of
the faithful [the royal title] in Islam,” says
Andre Azoulay, the king’s Jewish adviser. 7ALEXANDRIA
The Egyptian government is sending Jews mixed signalsJews in EgyptWelcome back, sort of