During a visit to Cairo last month, when I met with several leaders and activists of the Muslim Brotherhood, I told them—only somewhat jokingly—that they owe the Salafists a big favor. The specter of increased Salafist influence in Egypt has made U.S. officials, long wary of the Brotherhood, suddenly less hostile. Now they view it as a counterweight to more conservative strains of Islamism. Brotherhood leaders have met with U.S. ambassador Anne Patterson and Deputy Secretary of State William Burns, among other officials, in recent weeks. And when Americans working for pro-democracy NGOs were detained in Egypt in February, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham conferred with Muslim Brotherhood leaders, who assured the senators that they wanted to change the laws and allow NGOs to operate freely.

A delegation from the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) is in the United States this week to explain the party’s views and attempt to counter lingering skepticism about its commitment to moderation. While the group’s big electoral gains (it won 47 percent of the seats in Egypt’s parliamentary elections) confer immediate legitimacy as a political force, American audiences remain unclear about the Brotherhood’s position on sensitive issues. Unfortunately, their recent performances in the American media are not helping. For example, Sondos Asem, editor of Ikhwanweb.com, the Brotherhood’s official English-language website, was asked yesterday on CNN about Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel. She said that the FJP remains committed to the treaty—“unless there is a popular will to change that.” You can view the video here:

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Tunisia's new President Moncef Marzouki (left) shakes hands with interim President Fouad Mebazaa as he leaves the Carthage Palace in Tunis December 13, 2011 (Zoubeir Souissi/Courtesy Reuters).

Six weeks after Al Nahda swept elections for the national constituent assembly, a former human rights activist and leader of the liberal party, Congress for the Republic (CPR), Mancef Marzouki, was elected by the body as the interim president of Tunisia. The fourth president since Tunisia’s founding, Marzouki’s election is a remarkable step in the evolution of the uprising in Tunisia, though critics note that the power structure in the interim government will favor the prime minister, who will most certainly be a member of Al Nahda. Marzouki has 21 days to form a government, and then must turn to addressing the myriad challenges that Tunisia faces: rebuilding its tattered economy, finding jobs for its 800,000 unemployed citizens (over a quarter of whom have college degrees), and redefining the social contract by improving governance and curbing corruption. So far, Al Nahda, which will have a large hand in shaping Tunisia’s response to these challenges, has espoused pragmatism. Read more »

Earlier this month, Pervez Musharraf, former president of Pakistan, visited the Council on Foreign Relations in a bid to burnish his image in advance of his intended re-entry into politics next year. Last week, I hosted Dr. Asma Jahangir, a remarkably courageous lawyer and activist, the recent president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, a relentless critic of Musharraf, and a stalwart champion of democracy in her country. The back-to-back meetings made for quite a contrast. Read more »

Former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf at an interview in London in January 2011 (Stefan Wermuth/Courtesy Reuters).

What has Pervez Musharraf been doing since he resigned, in the face of impeachment, from Pakistan’s presidency in 2008? Well, he’s been busy living in self-exile in London, making the talk show rounds (check him out with Jon Stewart on the Daily Show in July), and building up a new political party, the All Pakistan Muslim League. Despite numerous legal issues dogging him at home, Musharraf vows to return to Pakistan next year to contest the presidency. Yesterday, he visited the Council on Foreign Relations for an on-the-record conversation with Jim Shinn, the co-author of a recent Rand monograph, Afghan Peace Talks: A Primer, that clearly lays out the possibilities and obstacles to a negotiated settlement in Afghanistan. Read more »

France's President Sarkozy; NTC Chairman Mustafa Abdel Jalil; Mahmoud Jibril, head of NTC executive; and Britain's PM Cameron address a news conference in Tripoli, Libya, September 15, 2011 (Anis Mili/Courtesy Reuters).

In this week’s Missing Pieces, Charles Landow highlights developments from Guatemala to Nigeria, with several stops along the way. Please share your views on these or other stories from the past week. Enjoy!

• Libya After Qaddafi: Prime Minister David Cameron of the UK and President Nicolas Sarkozy of France became the first Western leaders to visit post-Qaddafi Libya on Wednesday. They received a warm welcome from officials of Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC). The visit comes as the NTC seeks to consolidate its authority and launch a successful transition. Various groups are jockeying for position, revealing fault lines over regional influence, Islamism, and the role of leaders who returned from abroad vs. those who resisted Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi from within. The BBC and the Los Angeles Times report this week on the NTC’s struggle to assert control over the militias that effected Qaddafi’s ouster. The New York Times has a piece on the controversial influence of Islamists. But the Economist thinks the authorities are off to a “remarkably hopeful start,” with even Islamists such as Tripoli’s military commander, Abdel Hakim Belhaj, making moderate noises. What will be the international role in aiding Libya’s transition? Cameron and Sarkozy pledged continued help for the government and people. In a Washington Post op-ed on Monday, the Libyan ambassador to Washington, Ali Suleiman Aujali, requests technical support for democratic institutions and the economy, as well as the unfreezing of Libyan assets abroad. And on CNN.com, Blair Glencorse urges international actors to help Libya build a strong legal system and government institutions that can competently manage its wealth, among other priorities. Read more »

In his major speech yesterday on the Middle East, President Obama acknowledged that while the protests gripping the region have been driven largely by politics, economics have also played a prominent role. I discussed some of the economic challenges facing the region in this video interview:

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