MBZ…Best successors to a great predecessor

In the city of Abu Dhabi on the sidelines of a conference of leaders of counter-terrorism services outside the United States of America, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed welcomed us, and I still remember his sense of humor with me on that trip.

On a tour to watch the UAE Special Forces parade, His Highness asked me a denouncing question, and he said to me: Will you stop your support for the Muslim Brotherhood?

I was stunned for a moment and was distracted, I said maybe His Highness was confused by the name, and I remained silent for a while.. until he started laughing: I know you well, but I'm joking with you..

 Since then the man was able to dissolve the distances between us, and in the evening His Highness invited me to meet him, and the conversation touched on Egypt and the ambitions of the Brotherhood organization..

His Highness said the ambitions of this terrorist organization will not stop for a moment in Egypt, they will try again and again, but we will do our utmost to prevent them, because Egypt is the "pillar of the tent" for the Arab nation.

This was and still is the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, for Egypt.. I will not, of course, talk about his love for the Egyptians. Whoever went to the Emirates realizes the love of this generous people for the Egyptian people and their appreciation for them as professors, teachers, engineers and doctors who contributed to the renaissance of the entire Gulf region... Including UAE.

I remember after the victory of the great Egyptian people on June 30 and the emergence of the UAE’s great and broad support for the Egyptian revolution, we formed a popular delegation that included an elite of Egyptian patriots to meet His Highness Sheikh Mohammed, and thank him for what he did personally, and what the people of the Emirates did, for the benefit of Egypt and the Egyptians in their legitimate struggle To get rid of the rule of this terrorist group..

We went to thank him, and he gave us thanks for what each of us had done in defense of his country and in defense of the Arab nation.. Thus he told us: You did not defend your country only, you defended the entire nation, and he repeated the same sentence that he had previously repeated to my ears repeatedly. Egypt is the "pillar of the tent" and if it falls, God forbid, the entire Arab world will fall.

I will not be able, in this short space, as we bid farewell to a giant of the family of the late, God willing, His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, and receive another giant of the same blood as the third president of the state, to enumerate the virtues of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, but I only wanted to salute the choice of the Supreme Council of the Union for His Highness Sheikh Mohammed as Head of State, succeeding the sister of the late, God willing, His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed.. the best successor to the best predecessor..