The Syrian stalemate and the Lebanese (mis)givings

Posted on October 19, 2011 | Comments Off on The Syrian stalemate and the Lebanese (mis)givings

By Scarlett HADDAD | 20/10/2011
(L’Orient-Le Jour- Lebanon Translated from french)

While the mediation of the Arab League is heading for a clinical death, the situation in Syria continues to divide the Lebanese between those who believe that the fall of the regime is inevitable, even imminent, and those who think that Bashar al-Assad almost got over it. The reality, as is often the case elsewhere, however, is between these two extremes.

Back from Syria, visitors report that the regime is in total control of the situation in large cities, particularly Aleppo and Damascus, where incidents occur regularly, but are quickly contained.
In remote areas, the situation is more confused. Small communities have often to deal with robbers and other troublemakers that are not necessarily with the opposition but take advantage of the fact that the police are busy elsewhere.

At present, the real problem for the Syrian authorities is concentrated in Homs where a security chaos is prevailing. In this socially diverse city, the police have no control over entire neighborhoods, which are in the hands of the opposition. But authorities remain broadly confident, preferring to let the opposition exhaust itself or sink into violence, which to them would only serve to discredit them to the people. Besides, everyone (almost) now recognizes that violence is the fact of both sides.

According to many Lebanese figures who visited Syria recently, the regime of Bashar al-Assad is more serene, confident that the situation is bound to evolve in its favor.
It considers itself protected from foreign intervention and sanctions of the Security Council of the United Nations by the Chinese and Russian veto, which is part of the long-term strategy of these two states and is therefore not subject to a sudden change. Similarly, it considers itself protected internally by the strength of its institutions, including the army and security forces that did not suffer from significant defections, seven months after the start of the insurgency.

Turkey, which represented a real threat to the Syrian regime with its plan to create a buffer zone at the border and thus give a bastion to the Syrian opposition, is currently immersed in its own problems with the Kurds but also with the various components of its social fabric.
Spearhead of European-American plan to destabilize Syria, Turkey is now virtually paralyzed, and the harsh statements of its leaders against the Syrian regime and their considerable support for the Syrian opposition do not constitute a real threat to Assad.

As a matter of fact, the real problem of the Syrian regime is elsewhere. It lies mainly in the deepening of the divide between the community components of the Syrian society, especially between Sunnis and Alawites.
Now, members of both communities are openly critical of each others, while for many years, the religious approach was apparently non-existent in Syria. If there is actually a plan of confessional destabilization through the exacerbation of sensitivities between Sunnis and Shiites, as the camp hostile to the Americans believes, it is scoring points in several countries in the region, particularly Syria.
This new reality hinders the process of reforms intended and announced by the Assad regime. Thus, in a climate as exacerbated, if the reforms were to occur through an electoral process, the regime may fall. It’s obviously what it does not want. Therefore it would be in a kind of impasse, convinced of the need for reforms, but reluctant to give them shape and risk its survival.

This allows us to reach the following conclusion: the system is therefore still the reins of the country and is not seriously shaken. But there is no end in sight to the internal crisis.

The authority has shown that its security approach widely criticized has allowed it to remain in place and push the opponents to resort to violence, but has not yet found a solution that allows it to calm the opposition.
Faced with such findings, many Western governments believe that the Syrian crisis would take more time and that its outcome is uncertain.
The Lebanese that are waiting for an early resolution to this crisis will be disappointed, and the Lebanese political class that have been waiting for the evolution of in Syria to move in one direction or the other would need to change its plans and approach.

The Syrian regime seems here to stay, even if it has less time to spend on local developments in Lebanon. It would be a positive development if the Lebanese of all affiliations, stop keeping an eye on Syria before making a decision about them. Not to mention their watches, set permanently on the Syrian hour

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Posted in Lebanon, Syria, Syrian Opposition, Turkey-Syria

In Crowded Cairo Quarter, Islamist Try to Seize Mantle of Revolution

Posted on October 17, 2011 | Comments Off on In Crowded Cairo Quarter, Islamist Try to Seize Mantle of Revolution
By

CAIRO — In one of Cairo’s most crowded quarters, where streets are so filled with trash that bulldozers scoop it up, the Muslim Brotherhood has opened not one but two offices. Its most conservative counterpart has followed suit. An Islamist do-gooder with forearms as broad as the Nile has vowed to win a seat in Parliament.

Egypt’s parliamentary election may be nearly two months away, but the contest has already begun in the neighborhood of Imbaba, where the arc of the Egyptian revolution is on display. The clarity of the revolt has given way to the ambiguity of its aftermath, and Islamic activists here who failed to drive the popular uprising — some, in fact, opposed it — are mobilizing to claim its mantle amid the din of protests, confusion and, last week, violence.

Imbaba may not be Cairo — it is more like a distilled version of the city — but it says a lot about where an anxious country may be headed as it approaches an election that will help decide the future character of an unfinished revolution.

From the caldron of frustration the revolt represented, Islamic activists here have built on their formidable charity across a landscape where liberal and secular forces have made almost no impression. Residents debate programs but often have only the agendas of religious parties to go on. Even the most secular voices — the few there are — wonder if it is not time to give the Islamists a chance.

“They’re the only ones organized, and they’re the only one who deliver to people in need,” Amal Salih, a 24-year-old resident of Imbaba, said with a measure of regret.

Ms. Salih came of age when Imbaba was in the throes of militant Islamists, who earned her neighborhood along the Nile the nickname of the Islamic Republic of Imbaba. Embarrassed, the government eventually deployed 12,000 troops, arrested a man called Sheik Gaber who had imposed his notion of order here and occupied the neighborhood for six weeks. The government offered promises that typically proved illusory; just a year before the revolution, a leading official promised that Imbaba would soon look like Cairo’s most upscale neighborhoods.

It never did, and by the time the revolution began, Ms. Salih joined the protests against her parents’ wishes.

She wears a veil, but she calls herself secular. She laments the resurgence of religious forces, but she clings to the hope that her time in Tahrir Square symbolized.

“We can’t be impatient,” she said. “Every revolution in the world takes time.”

In Imbaba, as elsewhere in Cairo, those memories of Tahrir Square represent an ideal that seems to grow more pristine the longer the ruling military council delays the transition to civilian elected government. During the revolution in Imbaba, youths made the point that religion rarely drove their demands, even in a pious locale like this one. As security collapsed, neighborhoods banded together, almost spontaneously, to face any provocation, imagined or otherwise.

Residents said a rich businessman who operated boats on the Nile helped organize popular defense committees. In a neighborhood named for blacksmiths, family elders abstained from their usual evenings over coffee in cafes and set up checkpoints. A spice seller named Sheik Salama and butchers from the Qut family helped organize guards for a stretch of street that hosted a branch of Bank Misr and the Munira Police Station.

“It was spontaneous,” said Magdy Obeid, a young academic in Imbaba. “We participated as Egyptians. We did not know someone was puritanical, Muslim Brotherhood, or whatever. We were just Egyptian, and there was no distinction between us.”

Mr. Obeid sat in a dingy apartment that was dark but for the glow of the late afternoon. He sipped a soft drink as he remembered those days, then turned to the present. “Now it’s only the Islamic currents,” he said, nodding. “Without a doubt, until now, they’re the only ones who have emerged. No one else is on the scene.”

Imbaba is as proud as it is crowded — by some estimates, it is three times denser than Manhattan. One resident estimated its population at 15 million, a vast overstatement given that Cairo itself is only 18 million or so. But the exaggeration underscored the sheer challenge of bringing relief to a neighborhood where no one walks a quiet street. Three-wheeled motorized buggies known as tuk-tuks ply the streets. Since the revolution, builders have ignored codes, piling floor atop floor on red-brick buildings never too high to escape the din.

In February, some of the most puritanical Islamists here handed out fliers urging people to support President Hosni Mubarak; with his fall, they seek to replace him with one of their own. Posters on mosques outline a program no different than any liberal agenda, save for item No. 1 — Islamic law — and a number listed at the bottom reserved for female callers.

“The people here are poor, and they have no idea about democracy or politics,” said Ayman Abdel-Wahab, a Brotherhood member sitting in the group’s office, which opened here in July. “They’ll side with whomever they think can offer them help.”

On the walls of mosques like Furqan and Tawba, posters beckon residents to come and get to know the Brotherhood, still the most potent of Egypt’s Islamist currents. Mr. Abdel-Wahab said the group tried to serve as an intermediary between residents and overwhelmed local officials, and regularly distributed sugar, oil and rice to hundreds of the most needy. A banner hangs over one of Imbaba’s main thoroughfares trumpeting a Brotherhood celebration of the neighborhood’s best students. (Each received a watch and certificate.) Youths are offered summer trips to beaches. Other Islamist charities provide monthly payments — $15, sometimes a little more — to widows.

Of course, there is nothing new in Islamist activists taking the lead in offering charity in Cairo, but only now is it so intertwined with the fortunes of coming elections.

“Some people say that the services I provide are equivalent to that of 50 members of Parliament,” declared Yasser Suleiman, known by everyone here as Sheik Yasser.

In an office adorned with a plaque that reads “The Koran and nothing else,” Sheik Yasser oversees a staff of 20 employees providing help to 1,500 orphans with a budget, he says, of $330,000. His short-sleeve shirt reveals arms that seem too stout to belong to the accountant that he is. A failed candidate in the last election for Parliament, he is determined to win this time around, campaigning on his 25 years of charity work here.

“That’s the fruit of freedom and democracy,” he said.

Under Mr. Mubarak’s long rule, the divergent currents of Islamists were often grouped under the rubric of “the religious.” That is no longer the case. The Brotherhood now openly competes with groups that have lately become more assertive: the Salafists, the most puritanical current, along with the once-militant Islamic Group, which renounced violence in the late 1990s. Not even the Brotherhood claims to know the relative weight of each, though some residents blame the Salafists for a new current of intolerance in Imbaba as well as sectarian clashes that erupted this summer with Christians. Rumors are traded furiously of Salafists administering vigilante justice. In one version, a youth stealing tuk-tuks had either his hand amputated or his ear sliced off.

Ayman Abdel-Aziz, a pharmacist whose office abuts the new headquarters of the Salafist Nour Party, nodded with approval at the story. Though calling himself secular, he had grown weary of the crime wave in Cairo; even his business had been broken into.

“These days, you have to deal with those people and instill fear,” Mr. Abdel-Aziz said. “Yes, it’s savage, but it’s the perfect way to deal with all those thugs among us.”

He vowed not to vote for the religious currents, but he understood the logic these days. After decades of repressive rule sometimes conflated in the street with the notion of secular liberalism, he said, people were willing to consider alternatives, however austere.

“The argument goes like this,” he said. “Give them a chance. Let’s try them out.”

On a night in which an autumn breeze offered respite from Cairo’s pollution, Sayyid Abdel-Khaleq joined his friend Khaled Said on a trip to the Brotherhood’s office. In the past week they had paid visits to two liberal parties and the Nour Party, as they tried to figure out whom to vote for in December. The liberals seemed dated, they said, and the Salafists felt as though they were still “in the kindergarten of politics.” That left the Brotherhood, although Mr. Abdel-Khaleq said “a lot can happen between now and then.”

“During the revolution, we adhered to no membership,” he said. “We were motivated by ourselves, for ourselves, and we were driven by what was inside us.”

“Now,” he added matter-of-factly, “it’s the time for parties.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/world/middleeast/in-cairo-quarter-islamists-try-to-profit-from-revolution.html?pagewanted=print

 

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Truth and falsehood in Syria

Posted on October 17, 2011 | Comments Off on Truth and falsehood in Syria
There are at least 23 reasons why we should be careful about uncritically accepting Western views of the insurrection in Syria, writes Jeremy Salt* in Ankara

As insurrection in Syria lurches towards civil war, the brakes need to be put on the propaganda pouring through the Western mainstream media and accepted uncritically by many who should know better. So here is a matrix of positions from which to argue about what is going on in this critical Middle Eastern country.

1. Syria has been a mukhabarat (intelligence) state since the redoubtable Abdel-Hamid Al-Serraj ran the intelligence services as the deuxième bureau in the 1950s. The authoritarian state which developed from the time former Syrian president Hafez Al-Assad took power in 1970 has crushed all dissent ruthlessly. On occasion it has either been him or them. The ubiquitous presence of the mukhabarat is an unpleasant fact of Syrian life, but as Syria is a central target for assassination and subversion by Israel and Western intelligence agencies, as it has repeatedly come under military attack, as it has had a large chunk of its territories occupied, and as its enemies are forever looking for opportunities to bring it down, it can hardly be said that the mukhabarat is not needed.

2. There is no doubt that the bulk of the people demonstrating in Syria want a peaceful transition to a democratic form of government. Neither is there any doubt that armed groups operating from behind the screen of the demonstrations have no interest in reform. They want to destroy the government.

3. There have been very big demonstrations of support for the government. There is anger at the violence of the armed gangs and anger at external interference and exploitation of the situation by outside governments and the media. In the eyes of many Syrians, their country is once again the target of an international conspiracy.

4. Whatever the truth of the accusations made against the security forces, the armed groups have killed hundreds of police, soldiers and civilians, in total probably close to 1,000 at this stage. The civilian dead include university professors, doctors and even, very recently, the son of the grand mufti of the republic. The armed gangs have massacred, ambushed, assassinated, attacked government buildings and sabotaged railway lines.

5. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad has a strong base of personal popularity. Although he sits on top of the system, it is misleading to call him a dictator. The system itself is the true dictator. Deeply rooted power in Syria — entrenched over five decades — lies in the military and intelligence establishment, and to a lesser degree in the ruling Baath Party structure. These are the true sources of resistance to change. The demonstrations were Al-Assad’s opportunity to pass on the message, which he did, that the system had to change.

6. In the face of large-scale demonstrations earlier this year, the government did finally come up with a reform programme. This was rejected out of hand by the opposition. No attempt was even made to test the bona fides of the government.

7. The claim that armed opposition to the government has begun only recently is a complete lie. The killings of soldiers, police and civilians, often in the most brutal circumstances, has been going on virtually since the beginning.

8. The armed groups are well armed and well organised. Large shipments of weapons have been smuggled into Syria from Lebanon and Turkey. They include pump action shotguns, machine guns, Kalashnikovs, RPG launchers, Israeli-made hand grenades and numerous other explosives. It is not clear who is providing these weapons but someone is, and someone is paying for them. Interrogation of captured members of armed gangs points in the direction of former Lebanese prime minister Saad Al-Hariri’s Future Movement. Al-Hariri is a front man for the US and Saudi Arabia, with influence spreading well beyond Lebanon.

9. Armed opposition to the regime largely seems to be sponsored by the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. In 1982, the Syrian government ruthlessly crushed an uprising initiated by the Brotherhood in the city of Hama. Many thousands died, and part of the city was destroyed. The Brotherhood has two prime objectives: the destruction of the Baathist government and the destruction of the secular state in favour of an Islamic system. It is almost palpably thirsting for revenge.

10. The armed groups have strong support from outside, apart from what is already known or indicated. Exiled former Syrian vice-president and foreign minister, Abdel-Halim Khaddam, who lives in Paris, has been campaigning for years to bring down the Al-Assad government. He is funded by both the EU and the US. Other exiled activists include Burhan Ghalioun, backed by Qatar as the leader of the “National Council” set up in Istanbul. Ghalioun, like Khaddam, lives in Paris and like him also, lobbies against the Al-Assad government in Europe and in Washington.

Together with Mohamed Riyad Al-Shaqfa, the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria, he is receptive to outside “humanitarian intervention” in Syria on the Libyan model (others are against it). The promotion of the exiles as an alternative government is reminiscent of the way the US used exiled Iraqis (the so-called Iraqi National Congress) ahead of the invasion of Iraq.

11. The reporting by the Western media of the situations in Libya and Syria has been appalling. NATO intervention in Libya has been the cause of massive destruction and thousands of deaths. The war, following the invasion of Iraq, is yet another major international crime committed by the governments of the US, Britain and France. The Libyan city of Sirte has been bombarded day and night for two weeks without the Western media paying any attention to the heavy destruction and loss of life that must have followed. The Western media has made no attempt to check reports coming out of Sirte of the bombing of civilian buildings and the killing of hundreds of people. The only reason can be that the ugly truth could well derail the whole NATO operation.

12. In Syria the same media has followed the same pattern of misreporting and disinformation. It has ignored or skated over the evidence of widespread killings by armed gangs. It has invited its audience to disbelieve the claims of government and believe the claims of rebels, often made in the name of human rights organisations based in Europe or the US. Numerous outright lies have been told, as they were told in Libya and as they were told ahead of the attack on Iraq. Some at least have been exposed.

People said to have been killed by state security forces have turned up alive. The brothers of Zainab Al-Hosni claimed she has been kidnapped by security forces, murdered and her body dismembered. This lurid account, spread by the TV channels Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya amongst other outlets, was totally false. She is still alive although now, of course, the propaganda tack is to claim that this is not really her but a double. Al-Jazeera, the British newspaper The Guardian and the BBC have distinguished themselves by their blind support of anything that discredits the Syrian government. The same line is being followed by the mainstream media in the US. Al-Jazeera, in particular, having distinguished itself with its reporting of the Egyptian revolution, has lost all credibility as an independent Arab world news channel.

13. In seeking to destroy the Syrian government, the Muslim Brotherhood has a goal in common with the US, Israel and Saudi Arabia, whose paranoia about Shia Islam reached fever pitch with the uprising in Bahrain. WikiLeaks has revealed how impatient it was for the US to attack Iran. A substitute target is the destruction of the strategic relationship between Iran, Syria and the Lebanese Shia group Hizbullah. The US and the Saudis may want to destroy the Alawi-dominated Baathist regime in Damascus for slightly different reasons, but the important thing is that they do want to destroy it.

14. The US is doing its utmost to drive Syria into a corner. It is giving financial support to exiled leaders of the opposition. It has tried (and so far failed, thanks to Russian and Chinese opposition) to introduce an extensive programme of sanctions through the UN Security Council. No doubt it will try again, and depending on how the situation develops, it may try, with British and French support, to bring on a no-fly zone resolution opening the door to foreign attack.

The situation is fluid and no doubt all sorts of contingency plans are being developed. The White House and the State Department are issuing hectoring statements every other day. Openly provoking the Syrian government, the US ambassador, accompanied by the French ambassador, travelled to Hama before Friday prayers. Against everything that is known about their past record of interference in Middle Eastern countries, it is inconceivable that the US and Israel, along with France and Britain, would not be involved in this uprising beyond what is already known.

15. While concentrating on the violence of the Syrian regime, the US and European governments (especially Britain) have totally ignored the violence directed against it. Their own infinitely greater violence, of course, in Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan and other places doesn’t even come into the picture. Turkey has joined their campaign against Syria with relish, going even further than they have in confronting the Syrian regime.

In the space of a few months Turkey’s “zero problem” regional policy has been upended in the most inchoate manner. Turkey eventually lent its support to the NATO attack on Libya, after initially holding back. It has antagonised Iran by its policy on Syria and by agreeing, despite strong domestic opposition, to host a US radar missile installation clearly directed against Iran. The Americans say the installation’s data will be shared with Israel, which has refused to apologise for the attack on the Turkish ship the Mavi Marmara, plunging Israeli-Turkish relations into near crisis. So from “zero problems”, Turkey now has a regional policy full of problems with Israel, Syria and Iran.

16. While some members of the Syrian opposition have spoken out against foreign intervention, the “Free Syrian Army” has said that its aim is to have a no-fly zone declared over northern Syria. A no-fly zone would have to be enforced, and we have seen how this led in Libya to massive infrastructural destruction, the killing of thousands of people and the opening of the door to a new period of Western domination.

17. If the Syrian government is brought down, every last Baathist and Alawi will be hunted down. In a government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, the status of minorities and women would be driven back.

18. Through its Syria Accountability Act, and through sanctions which the EU has imposed, the US has been trying to destroy the Syrian government for 20 years. The dismantling of unified Arab states along ethno-religious lines has been an aim of Israel’s for decades. Where Israel goes, the US naturally follows. The fruits of this policy can be seen in Iraq, where an independent state in all but name has been created for the Kurds and where the constitution, written by the US, separates Iraq’s people into Kurds, Sunnis, Shias and Christians, destroying the binding logic of Arab nationalism. Iraq has not known a moment’s peace since the British entered Baghdad in 1917.

In Syria, ethno-religious divisions (Sunni Muslim Arab, Sunni Muslim Kurd, Druze, Alawi and various Christian sects) render the country vulnerable in the same way to the promotion of sectarian discord and eventual disintegration as the unified Arab state the French originally tried to prevent coming into existence in the 1920s.

19. The destruction of the Baathist government in Syria would be a strategic victory of unsurpassed value to the US and Israel. The central arch in the strategic relationship between Iran, Syria and Hizbullah would be destroyed, leaving Hizbullah geographically isolated, with a hostile Sunni Muslim government next door, and leaving Hizbullah and Iran more exposed to a military attack by the US and Israel. Fortuitously or otherwise, the “Arab spring” as it has developed in Syria has placed in US and Israeli hands a lever by which they may be able to achieve their goal.

20. It is not necessarily the case that a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated government in Egypt or Syria would be hostile to US interests. Wanting to be seen as a respectable member of the international community and another good example of “moderate Islam”, it is likely and certainly possible that an Egyptian government dominated by the Brotherhood would agree to maintain the peace treaty with Israel for as long as it can (i.e. until another large scale attack by Israel on Gaza or Lebanon makes it absolutely unsustainable).

21. A Syrian government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood would be close to Saudi Arabia and hostile to Iran, Hizbullah and the Shia of Iraq, especially those associated with the Shia leader Muqtada Al-Sadr. It would pay lip service to the Palestine cause and the liberation of the Golan Heights, but its practical policies would be unlikely to be any different from the government it is seeking to destroy.

22. The Syrian people are entitled to demand democracy and to be given it, but in this way and at this cost? Even now, an end to the killing and negotiations on political reform are surely the way forward, not violence which threatens to tear the country apart. Unfortunately, violence and not a negotiated settlement is what too many people inside Syria want and what too many governments watching and waiting for their opportunity also want. No Syrian can ultimately gain from this, whatever they presently think.

Their country is being driven towards a sectarian civil war, perhaps foreign intervention and certainly chaos on an even greater scale than we are now seeing. There will be no quick recovery if the state collapses or can be brought down. Like Iraq, and probably like Libya, looking at the present situation, Syria would enter a period of bloody turmoil that could last for years. Like Iraq, again, it would be completely knocked out of the ring as a state capable of standing up for Arab interests, which means, of course, standing up to the US and Israel.

23. Ultimately, whose interests does anyone think this outcome would serve?

* The writer is an associate professor of Middle Eastern history and politics at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey.

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Posted in Syria, Syrian Opposition, US Middle East Politics, US-Syria

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The Lebanese civil war and the role of Syria

Posted on October 15, 2011 | Comments Off on The Lebanese civil war and the role of Syria

JC 14 october 2011

Depending on whom you talk to, the Lebanese Christians, principally the Maronites allied with pro-Israel Geagea, will tell you the the Syrians massacred them, while the others, Greek orthodox, Armenians and Maronites now allied with Aoun and Frangie will tell you that the Syrian saved them from the Druze, the Sunni militias and the Palestinians.

The civil war in Lebanon was such a messy and complex war that violence, killings and excesses came from all the protagonists independently of their religion and political affiliation.

When the Maronites were on the verge of defeat in front of the Palestinians,the Druze and Sunnis militias, the Maronite Lebanese president Frangie called on Syria to intervene.
“In October 1976, Syria accepted the proposal of the Arab League summit in Riyadh. This gave Syria a mandate to keep 40,000 troops in Lebanon as the bulk of an Arab Deterrent Force charged with disentangling the combatants and restoring calm” (wikipedia)

The huge mistake was that the mandate was not limited in time and the Arab league never asked Syria to withdraw its troops.

Therefore the Syrian army “pacified” the country and settled in Lebanon. Some Syrian leaders, like Abdel Halim Khaddam, found that Lebanon was a good place to make money with corrupted Lebanese and intervene in the political directions of the country.
With time, the gratitude faded away and the resentment grew against Syria and the abuses and interference of its representatives in the political life of the country. We know the rest….

The Syrians responsible of crimes during that war were never indicted. The same applies to Christian Lebanese leaders responsible of horrendous massacres. In addition some of them are shamelessly still active in Lebanese politics. There has not been any thorough judicial investigation of the terrible crimes that happened during and after this war. This is why the murder of Hariri rallied the Lebanese who thought that finally some kind of justice was coming to their country.

Therefore the obituaries presented by Antoine of Christians killed should be completed by the obituaries of the Moslems, Druzes and Syrians soldiers who died during that war.
Then we could have the whole picture of the victims of that dirty war that no Lebanese want to remember.

http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12492&cp=7#comment-278667

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Tunisia: Islamist Al-Nahda comes to power with ‘modern’ outlook

Posted on October 13, 2011 | Comments Off on Tunisia: Islamist Al-Nahda comes to power with ‘modern’ outlook
 Thursday 13 Oct 2011–
On the eve of elections in Tunisia, Ahram Online spoke to Rashed Al-Ghanoushi, whose Islamist party Al-Nahda appears set to lead the next government.

Ask anyone in Tunisia and they will tell you that Islamists, represented by their largest organisation, Al-Nahda Party headed by Sheikh Rashed Al-Ghanoushi, are going to be partners in ruling the country following the January revolution.

Taxi drivers, who habitually have their radios tuned to the Quran, a station ironically established and owned by businessman Sakhr Al-Matri, son-in-law of deposed President Zein Abidine Ben Ali, average citizens in cafes or on the street, and even politicians and intellectuals agree. Al-Nahda, which was banned since its creation under the name “Islamist Outlook Movement” in 1981, until the revolution of 14 January 2011, will be the leading party in Constituent Council elections on 23 October.

Today, Al-Nahda issues its own weekly newspaper Al-Fajr, and the party’s main headquarters on a side street off Kheireddin Pacha Street in the capital is located in a six-storey building once owned by a wireless telephone company. The front of the building is modern and elegant, the glass covered façade reflects the open space before it. In the entrance lobby is hung a picture of Al-Ghanoushi’s books lined up.

Al-Ghanoushi, 70, studied philosophy at Damascus University and is a prominent thinker of “political Islam” in our times. His books are for the first time being sold in public in Tunisia and with locally printed editions.

Al-Ghanoushi met me in his office. He spoke slowly, as if weighed down by years of exile and travel that lasted 21 years and finally ended in London. He avoided answering direct questions about the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, although all his answers, in my opinion, challenged the Brotherhood’s posture and its nascent Justice and Freedom Party.

The founder and leader of Al-Nahda Party (which dropped “Islamist” from its title) began his answers by invoking the religious phrase praising the Prophet Mohammed. Then he said:

“I was honoured to be in Egypt as a young man in my 20s to study in a country that represented the aspirations of the youth in pan-Arabism, authenticity and pride. I emigrated there in 1964 and registered to study at the Agricultural College at Cairo University, but this did not last long because of political circumstances.

“Relations between Abdel-Nasser and Borqeba (Egypt’s and Tunisia’s presidents, respectively, at the time) were tense and we benefited from this dispute, but soon they reconciled and about 40 Tunisian students in Egypt paid the price—and I was one of them. The Tunisian embassy in Cairo asked for the names of students who rebelled against the Westernisation tendencies of the time. Borqeba was keen on sending students to the West not the East, which he viewed as a source of suspicion and revolution. As Tunisian students in Egypt, we found ourselves expelled from university although we were very enthusiastic and greatly admired Nasserist Egypt. Then they began handing us over to the embassy for deportation; some went back while others — like me—fled elsewhere.”

Al-Ghanoushi went to Damascus and studied philosophy, remained a devout Nasserist, and joined a Nasserist group called “The Socialist Union” until it became a political Islamic group after the 1967 defeat, according to his autobiography The Islamist Movement Experience in Tunisia.

When referring to Borqeba you used the term “Westernisation”, but some people in Tunisia do not view him as secular. What’s your opinion and what is your definition of secularism?

Borqeba was a secular fanatic, not a moderate. Secularism does not necessarily mean that it opposes religion, but in many cases it co-exists with religion such as the Anglo-Saxon culture. The French roots of secularism, however, have a heritage in opposition of religion which makes it biased. In such a scenario, the state is not neutral towards religion but in conflict with it. Hence, for example, the hijab problem and banning the head scarf was never an issue in Western secular thought except in France. In Britain, on the other hand, they designed Islamic police uniforms for Muslim female officers.

Borqeba’s secularism was extremist and even fascist; it did not believe in democracy but the dominance of the state over society and dismantling its religious structure and identity. This is completely different from a neutral stance by the state towards religion.

So you believe the state should maintain a neutral position towards religion?

I believe the state should sponsor all religions and express the will of society, and not be a guardian over society.

Did you revise your position regarding your proximity to Ben Ali at the beginning of his rule, as stated in the book by Nicolas Beau and Jean Pierre Tuquoi, Notre ami Ben Ali?

When Ben Ali deposed his boss Borqeba on 7 November 1987, our necks were almost in the noose with 10,000 men behind bars. The country was being led by a senile old man and we were in something similar to a civil war and political life was being strangled. We were among the opposition movements that welcomed change but were more pessimistic than optimistic. We knew that the man had previously served as chief of security and former minister of interior, which meant that he took part in the suppression campaigns of 1978, 1984 and 1987. But he came in declaring there is no presidential term for life and promised to reinstate democracy, pan-Arabism and release political prisoners.

When Ben Ali received me on 6 November 1988, he promised to recognise the Islamist movement but asked for some patience. I believed him until the 1989 elections, and the people began to sympathise with the Islamist movement which threw things off balance — it even took us by surprise. The people punitively voted against the ruling party; we misread that, we admit it. Not only were we mistaken about our optimism about Ben Ali, but we were also mistaken because we did not practice democracy was well as we do today.

I will also add, yes, Ben Ali deceived the Islamist leadership and grassroots.

Your campaign in the Constituent Assembly elections seems more modern and open to society, the world and the age. But my observation of the tone of Al-Nahda leadership is contrary and dissimilar to the beliefs of its base and supporters, some of whom are calling for an Islamist state while others want Friday to be the weekend holiday, not Sunday. How is that?

The modern outlook that you noticed is not a decision by the leadership, but the natural progression of the Islamist Outlook Movement and Al-Nahda Movement. In the founding statement of the Outlook Movement in June 1981, there is a clear position for adopting democracy without discrimination or elimination of any party or trend, including the Communist Party. That was an unusual position for an Islamist group to take in those days.

At the time, we were asked at a news conference what would we do if the Communist Party was elected by the people? We did not hesitate and responded: “We have no other choice but to accept the outcome of the ballot box. Then we will go to the people and ask them to revise their choice in the next elections.”

In reality, since the end of the 1970s, we have been coordinating with the leaders of the opposition, including the communist, socialist and democratic parties. Although we suspended coordination for a while because Ben Ali coerced some secular currents and convinced them to fear what he called “Islamist terrorism”, there is consensus among all Tunisian political hues about the type of society, equality between sexes, pluralism that does not exclude anyone and building a civic state. I believe the moderate Islamist trend in general in Morocco, Algeria and even Egypt is heading in this direction, despite differences between one party and another.

The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, for example, currently support a civic state.

But some of their leaders are still calling for the application of Sharia.

I believe what they mean is that Sharia is the main source of legislation, but the civic state will issue the laws. After the Brotherhood in Egypt proposed the creation of a body of Al-Azhar scholars to revise laws, they withdrew the idea and adopted the notion of a civic state. This means that the people are represented by members of parliament who will write and debate laws. In all honesty, in Islam there is no authority to govern over the people, which is why Sharia is a philosophical and intellectual source for MPs, thinkers and scholars to rely on, but without the guardianship of any entity.

Your campaign does not mention that Sharia is the source of legislation.

The constitution which Tunisians agree on does not mention a secular state but an Islamic state! The previous constitution (of 1959) states that “Tunisia is a free independent state; Arabic is the official language and Islam is the official religion.” No one wants to change this text. Hence, our constitution states that the state’s religion is Islam; it is not a state without religion, which means that religion is a source of all policies and all cultures.

At the same time, no one has the right to claim he represents religion; neither Al-Nahda nor anyone else. Society, through its own dynamic, is the one to formulate and translate religion into policies, laws and culture. The door for debate remains open when we need legislation or policies. This dynamic continues until there is consensus about the opinion of religion on this issue and that. This is a form of interaction with religion that is open to individuals and groups.

In your writings you make it clearer by stating: “There is no religious state in Islam, but a civic state”.

No one in the Islamist trend, at least among the moderates, is calling for a religious state — namely a state that speaks in the name of God. An Islamic state is not a religious one, meaning that it is the state of a Muslim people who are keen for the policies and laws of the state not to contradict the beliefs and values of the citizens, but enforce them. But no one is saying they can be the sole interpreters, or that they speak in the name of Islam.

Are you satisfied with the transition to democracy since the 14 January revolution?

Tunisians today agree on this path. There is consensus that translating the goals of the revolution requires the election of a Constituent Council to write a new constitution. This body will be formed soon. In the year of independence in 1956, the Tunisian state began its work by electing a constituent assembly, and today we all realise that the path we took since that date [1956] was mistaken, misguided and led us to disaster when it concluded by creating a dictatorship, and even a “mafia” type regime.

When Tunisians realised that conditions were beyond reform they revolted; we needed major surgery to rebuild the state to excise single-handed rule. Al-Nahda believes in a parliamentary regime to avoid the causes that led the independent state to the disaster of single-handed rule, although unfortunately this format is rooted in our heritage.

As for the transition after 14 January, I believe that despite criticism progress is being made towards a bright place and decisive period, the election of the constituent assembly. If we arrive there safely, Tunisians will have successfully passed the test.

What are your predictions about the assembly’s composition?

It will be divided among many forces because of the many differences on the political scene and as a result of the electoral system that encourages that.

How many votes will you receive?

We believe we are undoubtedly the largest party, and everyone agrees. All polls state that. How many votes will we win? That will depend on the reliability of the electoral process.

How many do you deserve, in your opinion?

If elections are honest and according to legal procedures, it is not unlikely that we would win the majority of votes; more than 50 per cent of ballots. How will this be translated into seats, I don’t know. According to the electoral process you might need 80 or 70 or 60 per cent to have 51 per cent of the seats on the constituent assembly.

There is ambiguity about major issues in the political arena. There is almost no discussion so far (end of September) about the outline of the new constitution and how institutions will operate in the second interim phase, which begins after the assembly is elected and the constitution written within one year.

The major political forces signed an agreement called the “roadmap” (the Declaration of the Transitional Path) for 24 October, the day after elections day. According to this document, Interim President Fouad Al-Mobzie will invite the Constituent Assembly to convene, and the assembly will choose its chairman and decide on the new transitional administration for the country. It can also elect a new president or approve the incumbent.

The president would then ask the leader of the majority bloc in the council to form a government that would be presented to the Council and offer its programme there for approval. Within one year, the Constituent Council must conclude its mission [of writing a new constitution] as well as monitoring the government and approving the budget.

What is your vision of the features of the new constitution, institutions and regime, and guarantees for public and individual freedoms?

These are all up to the Constituent Council, and no one in Tunisia is willing to repeat the model of an all-powerful president. The only debate is between those calling for a parliamentary system, like Al-Nahda, and others who want an amended presidential system that guarantees balance between powers.

What will the president’s mandate be during the new interim period?

The state administration decree will decide the outline of this stage. The Constituent Assembly will issue this decree that will feature the mandate of the president and cabinet.

Will you propose any ideas on this topic at this point?

No, but we will not go to the Constituent Assembly on 24 October empty handed or without ideas. We will make proposals and a plan for government policies. I believe the cabinet will be formed on 26 October. Anyone who feels they could win must prepare their vision. Already, dialogue has started about the formation of a coalition government, and we are active in this. We believe the country needs a coalition government led by Al-Nahda Party.

What is the point of convergence or consensus for such a cabinet?

The notion of democracy is unanimous; second, is confronting the unemployment problem. These are two fundamental issues for the country.

Do you believe in a free economy?

We prefer a free economy within a humanitarian social framework. Members of the new government must find common ground in the programmes of the three or four parties that will form the government and draw up a plan.

Concerning regional and international conditions, do you feel that the Tunisian experiment in transitioning to democracy, and participation by Islamists in the regime, could be unsettling? Do you feel any pressure?

I doubt any new cabinet will make any serious changes in foreign policy. The top priority will be to address domestic issues such as unemployment, security and development. No doubt, the government will uphold Tunisia’s international agreements; it might amend some things but this is not a priority in any way. The priority now is creating an investment-friendly environment to attract local and foreign capital, and reassure everyone.

There is a sense that the interests of the Tunisian revolution right now are similar to the interests of foreign powers, including Algeria, where the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) won the elections in 1991 but the results were voided and the country launched into a long civil war.

Yes, Algeria included. The solution is to stabilise conditions in Tunisia. Stability benefits everyone and there is no alternative or guarantee in the shadow of a police or military state. Stability is the only way to ensure the transition to democracy will be successful. It would be a disaster if the process fails and the state collapses.

Hundreds of thousands of young Tunisians will go to the other bank of the Mediterranean (Europe). This is unacceptable and unbearable. Hence, there is a joint interest for everyone to make the democratic transition in Tunisia a success.

Are there open channels between Al-Nahda and the Algerian authorities?

I visited Algeria in August and met with officials there. I sensed that they keen on making our march to democracy a success.

Will this be reflected in the relationship between the Algerian regime and the banned FIS?

That is up to the Algerians. I told them that the Tunisian revolution is not for export, and even if we were to export it, it wouldn’t be to Algeria because Algerians already have a deep culture of revolution, and they don’t need any more input.

The US is said to have given a green light to Islamists in the region and reached compromises to safeguard its interests.

We don’t need a green light from anyone. In our meetings with the Europeans and Americans we reached a common conviction that making the democratic transition successful is in everyone’s interests. The alternative is disastrous.

When did you realise that the Americans want to have a dialogue with you?

After the revolution the Americans began sending messages and contacts were made. Everyone is betting on democracy.

Did they offer guarantees that they would uphold the outcome of elections?

Everyone said that, and they do not object to anyone who comes to power through the ballot box. There is no doubt, however, that everyone prefers a national coalition government that includes Islamists.

By everyone, you mean the Americans and French as well?

Yes. Europeans, in general.

http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/24061.aspx

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Posted in Middle East Geopolitics, Religion, Tunisia

The Syrian National Council recognition option

Posted on October 11, 2011 | Comments Off on The Syrian National Council recognition option

JC   1 september 2011 —

Recognizing the SNC is an act of war as this opposition is specifically asking the international community to condone the toppling of a government that of is part of the UN.
The TNC in Libya was recognized only by 30 countries only when NATO was appointed to ensure that the intended ‘regime change’ was implemented under a ambiguous agenda of a Human Rights issue by the UNSC resolution.

NATO is reluctant to act without a UNSC resolution and Russia and China are obstinate in rejecting any military action on Syria.
Therefore as long as the international community is not ready for a war, then the SNC will not be recognized, except by some die hard countries like France and some others.

Time is playing against the SNC: If the present Syrian government starts to seriously implement the reforms under Russia and Iran’s extreme pressure and succeeds, the only issue that the SNC could ask for is a human rights condemnation, nothing else.

The first major strategy of the hardline opposition as we are seeing today, after the failure of creating a massive popular uprising is to prevent any reform to be implemented. This is why they are resorting to targeted assassinations to stir the public opinion and exhaust the government to weaken it. Of course using intensively the media to accuse the government of these assassinations.

The second strategy is to create enough fear and confrontation in the villages and towns on the borders to create an influx of refugees in Turkey and Lebanon ( surprisingly there are no refugees reported in Jordan and Iraq). This will provoke a ‘humanitarian crisis’ like Libya and allow the UN to intervene.

The hardline opposition is aware that if the reforms succeed in diverting their calls for a regime change to a negotiation with the present government, they are finished and will need to leave the country in exile or just disappear. So, for them it is life or death issue.
Therefore I expect an increase of targeted killings and a tougher actions from the army as well as terrorists actions in villages on the border with a media campaign accusing the army of shooting at the villagers.
The limit date is the December election.

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Posted in EU-Syria, Russia, Syrian Opposition

Istanbul on the Nile: Why the Turkish Model of Military Rule Is Wrong for Egypt

Posted on October 9, 2011 | Comments Off on Istanbul on the Nile: Why the Turkish Model of Military Rule Is Wrong for Egypt

Steven A. Cook–

In the weeks and months since Egypt’s military officers forced then President Hosni Mubarak from power and assumed executive authority, the country’s military rulers have shown an interest in applying what many have taken to calling the “Turkish model.” Spokesmen for the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), along with some civilian politicians, have floated the idea of replicating in Egypt today aspects of a bygone era in Turkish politics.
Despite some similarities between the Egyptian and Turkish armed forces, Egypt’s officers would be ill advised to try to emulate their counterparts in Turkey. Not only would they be bound to fail but, in the process, would make the struggle to build the new Egypt far more complex and uncertain.

Egypt’s military commanders are not so much interested in the latest manifestation of the Turkish model, in which a party of Islamist patrimony oversees political and economic reforms as part of an officially secular state, but rather an older iteration of it. This version of the Turkish model was a hallmark of Turkey’s politics from the time of the republic’s founding in 1923 until the early 2000s. It offers a template for civil-military relations in which the military plays a moderating role, preventing — at times, through military-led coups — the excesses of civilian politicians and dangerous ideologies (in Turkey’s case, Islamism, Kurdish nationalism, and, at one time, socialism) from threatening the political order.
Turkey’s political system had a network of institutions that purposefully served to channel the military’s influence. For example, the service codes of the armed forces implored officers to intervene in politics if they perceived a threat to the republican order, and military officers held positions on boards that monitored higher education and public broadcasting. Meanwhile, various constitutional provisions made it difficult for undesirable groups — notably, Islamists and Kurds — to participate in the political process.
The most prominent among the military’s channels of influence was the Milli Guvenlik Kurulu, or National Security Council, (known by its Turkish initials, MGK). Turkey’s 1982 constitution directed civilian leaders to “give priority consideration” to the council’s recommendations so as to preserve “the existence and independence of the State, the integrity and indivisibility of the country, and the peace and security of the country.” The MGK’s directives were rarely defied. The officers who served on the council had a definition of national security that ranged well beyond traditional notions of defense policy, including everything from education and broadcasting to the attire of politicians and their wives.
In some ways, the SCAF would not have to do much to approximate the Turkish model on the Nile. The two militaries do share some important similarities. For example, like the Turkish General Staff, which worked tirelessly to ensure the political order that Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his commanders established after the end of World War I, the Egyptian officer corps has long maintained a commitment to the regime that its predecessors, the Free Officers, founded in the early 1950s. In both the Turkish and Egyptian cases, this sense of responsibility stems from a sense that the military, equipped with the best organization and technology, is set off from the rest of society and is the ultimate protector of national interests. This outlook tends to breed a suspicion — even hostility — toward civilian politicians.
In addition, both militaries developed robust economic interests directly tied to their countries’ political systems. In Turkey, the armed forces became part of an economic landscape that favored large holding companies controlled by a few established families whose economic interests were connected to the status quo. In Egypt, the military itself is directly involved in a wide array of economic activities, including agriculture, real estate, tourism, security and aviation services, consumer goods, light manufacturing, and, of course, weapons fabrication.
Both the Turkish General Staff and Egypt’s present-day officers have an aversion to politics and the day-to-day running of their countries. They prefer to leave the responsibilities and risks of governing to civilians, or, in Egypt’s case, to a delegate from the armed forces. This sort of arrangement is precisely what it means to rule but not govern.
Now, with the SCAF effectively in control of Egypt, there is evidence that some Egyptians, both civilians and officers, are studying the Turkish model and its political implications. Since assuming power in February, the Egyptian military has taken measures to shield commanders from prosecution in civilian courts, a protection Turkey’s parliament just stripped from its own officer corps. They have also floated proposals through non-military representatives to shield the defense budget from parliamentary oversight, maintain ultimate authority over defense policy, and even establish a National Defense Council that resembles features of Turkey’s MGK before that body was brought to heel in 2003 through constitutional reforms. And the participation of military officers in Egypt’s electoral commission looks a lot like the Turkish military’s surveillance of society through membership on various government boards.
If the officers’ moves seem like a backhanded way of creating the conditions favorable for an enduring political role for the Egyptian army, they are. Still, members of the SCAF have been careful to say that they will abide by Egypt’s new constitution when Egyptians ratify the yet-to-be written document. They say that whatever role the Egyptian people assign to them is the role that they will respectfully fulfill. Of course, if the Egyptian people want some approximation of the Turkish model, then the military is bound to discharge that mission.
Yet if the members of the SCAF truly want to be like their Turkish counterparts, they are going to have to be more directly involved in the constitution writing process. Although some of the intellectuals, judges, and other figures on the National Council who are charged with drafting constitutional principles favor the military’s continued presence in politics, their support is unlikely to be enough given the mistrust with which revolutionary groups and others view the military.
In Turkey, although the military was not directly involved in writing the 1961 constitution, the country’s officers stepped in a decade later to tighten up aspects of the document that they deemed to be too liberal. A little less than ten years later, Turkey’s generals stepped in again and directly oversaw the writing of a new constitution (which the country is now considering abolishing and replacing with a new document) that not only reinforced existing levers of military influence but also created additional means for the armed forces to intervene in the political system.
The development of a Turkish-style role for the Egyptian officer corps also presumes that there is broad elite support for such a system. In Turkey, the officers enjoyed the support of judges, lawyers, academics, the press, big business, and average Turks who were committed to the defense of Kemalism against far smaller groups of Islamists and Kurds who were long considered to be outside the mainstream.
Despite some high-profile advocates, such as the politician Amr Moussa and the judge Hisham Bastawisi, there are few influential supporters for the military becoming the arbiter of Egyptian politics. This does not bode well for the military should they seek to replicate the Turks. On the eve of recent protests intended to pressure the SCAF to meet various revolutionary demands, more than two dozen political parties demanded that the military outline when and how it will hand over power to civilians.
The only place where the military has support is among the Muslim Brotherhood. This is significant. Indeed, the Brotherhood was a central player in an effort to bring a million people into the streets last Friday to demonstrate their support for the SCAF. Yet as important as the Brotherhood’s support for the military may be, the officers should take little comfort from its embrace. The Islamists in the Brotherhood do not support the military as much as they want to undermine the revolutionary groups, liberals, and secularist parties that they oppose.
In addition, the Brotherhood and the officers are — just as they were in the early 1950s — competitors rather than collaborators. For its part, the Brotherhood can make claims to being better nationalists and potentially better stewards of Egypt than the armed forces, which are tainted by their association with the United States and Mubarakism. Whatever backing the Brotherhood is currently offering the military and the SCAF is surely tactical and does not extend to carving out a political role for the officers after a transition to civilian leaders.
Finally, the most important feature of Turkey’s system under the tutelage of the military was the Turkish officers’ singular ideological commitment to Kemalism. This was a motivating factor for generations of officers and their civilian supporters.
In contrast, it remains unclear exactly what the SCAF believes in. The Egyptians are not die-hard secularists, democrats, Islamists, or authoritarians. Other than generic platitudes about democracy and respect for the Egyptian people, the officers seem only interested in stability, maintaining their economic interests, and preserving the legitimacy of the armed forces despite having been the backbone of a thoroughly discredited regime for 60 years. As a result, the SCAF seems to be willing to hand over power to anyone who can guarantee those three interests. It is this kind of political opportunism that is fatal to a Turkish model on the Nile. Without a compelling narrative about what Egyptian society should look like and the role of the military in realizing this vision, it is unlikely that the officers will garner the kind of support necessary in order for elites to voluntarily give up their own potential power in favor of military tutelage.
For all of the political dynamism, energy, and creativity that Egyptians have demonstrated since Mubarak’s fall, the country is also wracked with a host of debilitating problems: persistent protests, economic problems, political intrigue, intermittent violence, and a general state of uncertainty. To some Egyptians, it seems that the military’s firm hand is necessary to keep all of the country’s political factions in line while building the new Egypt. After all, the Turkish officers tamed Turkey’s fractious and sometimes violent political arena, and the country is now freer than ever before.
But such analysis is backward. Turkey’s democratic changes, which remain far from complete, happened despite the military, not because of it. Regardless, attempts to replicate in Egypt aspects of Turkey’s experience would be met with significant opposition, increased political tension, more uncertainty, and potential violence, all of which create the conditions for the emergence of new authoritarianism. With the many potential drawbacks of trying to copy the Turkish armed forces, the Egyptian officers should not even bother trying.

_______________________________________________________________
STEVEN A. COOK is Senior Fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is the author of The Struggle for Egypt: From Nasser to Tahrir Square, to be published this fall. Foreign Affairs.

http://copticsolidarity.org/en/opinion/222-istanbul-on-the-nile-why-the-turkish-model-of-military-rule-is-wrong-for-egypt

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Is the Iranian’s political system suitable for Arab countries: View from a Blogger

Posted on October 9, 2011 | Comments Off on Is the Iranian’s political system suitable for Arab countries: View from a Blogger

http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12447&cp=all#comment-277513

I have many reservations about Iran’ system of Vilayat Vaqeeh, so I don’t necessarily agree with many of Ayatollah Khamenei’s views on the application of a similar religious system in countries with different history, culture and ethnic-religious composition.

Yet, I doubt Khamenei has in mind to have Al Azhar clerics in Egypt ruling the country. I just think these are just words aimed at deflating the influence Sunni Turkey is trying to have in the Arab world, that could stir dissidence in Iran.

As for Iranians, they have always had authoritarian regimes. They never tasted full freedom of expression in their country.
The Pahlavi ruled ruthlessly Iran for more than 50 years, trying to make it secular by force. As a result they got the Islamic revolution because the average Iranian, (like many average moslems in arab countries) who are fundamentally religious and practising rejected the excessive liberalization US made that the Shah was trying to impose.

The Islamic republic is 32 years old and the country has achieved much more in education (eradication of illiteracy,  wider access to education for women), artistic, self-sufficiency and military progress than during the Pahlavis or the previous Shah. In other areas, there are no success stories, unfortunately.

I think Iranians need more time to invent a system that suits them all. There are a lot of debates in Iran about that. Yet, while progressing slowly, the system is still holding on to its basic tenets.
One the reason is the short-sighted US’s foreign policies in the region that does not seem to change at all in 33 years!

Imagining that old countries can just change into a perfect system, with the snap of a finger because Hillary Clinton or Cameron or Sarkozy think so, is a fallacy.

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The internal political prospect in Syria: View from a blogger

Posted on October 9, 2011 | Comments Off on The internal political prospect in Syria: View from a blogger

From  a Blogger in SyriaComment.com
http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12447&cp=all#comment-277507

http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12447&cp=all#comment-277665

1. If Assad were such a reformer, why did he not entertain the idea of a multi-party polity before 2011?
This has been discussed at SyriaComment before. Assad did entertain it on and off over the years. Why didn’t he actually do it? Because he didn’t have to (that’s a non-trivial point). And because it wasn’t entirely clear what the multi-party polity would look like if he created one (it might’ve been dysfunctional in one or more ways; and doubtless he would’ve been unhappy with the whole thing if a religious conservative party won a big share of the vote). Foreign Minister Wallid al-Moallem has said recently that the regime didn’t do it because they were under pressure and distraction the foreigners accusing Syria of murdering Hariri, and other saber-rattling by foreigner powers. I don’t accept that. Presidental Adviser Bouthiana Shaaban said a few months ago that the regime would not have repealed the emergency law, and would not have introduced the reforms of this year, if it hadn’t been for protesters on the streets. The whole country knew that the protesters were unassailably right about the specific things that the regime has now agreed to change.

2. You have made it clear that you would vote for Assad in any future elections (were they to be held). What is it about his ‘manifesto’ that you find so compelling?
See below including point number (10).

3. What significant internal reforms has Assad instigated over the past ten years?
The most significant has been greater opening of the economy to the international marketplace and futher moves away from Statism and socialism. The process is far from finished and is proceeding at a pace of gradual, organic evolution, and certainly not revolution. Ehsani would like it to proceed much faster. There has been a risk that faster pace could cause tumults, dissolutions, hardships, in the economy and then more dangerously in the polity.

# 266 in the previous thread DIGGING FOR GOLD IN BOSRA asks pro-regimers: “Why do you think Assad would win a fair election?

Here’s a list of 16 grounds I have for thinking that the regime will easily win the fair parliamentary elections that are in all likelihood to take place in 2012 — fair except religious and tribal parties are banned. The list is incomplete and off the top of my head, in no particular order, some of it recycled, and I think I could expand it if I spent more time on it.

(1) The overall number of people who accepted the invitation to join anti-regime demonstrations was “small” (though no hard number is available).

(2) The educated classes did not join the anti-regime demonstrations. In every country every winning party needs substantial support from the educated classes. In Syria right now there is only one party that has such support. To illustrate, one of the two key reasons why the Muslim Brotherhood party is so much stronger in Egypt than in Syria is that it has attracted substantial support from the educated classes. You know the other key reason. During the past six months the Syrian educated classes had the opportunity to come out and complain about the latter, and they didn’t take it up.

(3) Most of the religiously conservative classes did not join the anti-regime demonstrations. Neither did the clergy; most of the Sunni clerical leadership went on record as anti-tumult and pro-civil-process. Most of the people who attended the mosque on Friday did not attend an anti-regime demonstration afterwards, not even if there was a demonstration conveniently available and on offer to them at the doorstep. Neighborhoods in Damascus with a high concentration of religiously conservative people had only small, and few, demonstrations over the six months. One of the regime’s core constituencies is people who are less religious or who have a more progressive, less doctrinaire, take on religion. So, it is a very big and important achievement that this regime has been able to maintain its support among most of the religiously conservative. Correcting myself, it is more cautious and prudent to say “the religious conservatives consented to the rule of the regime and did not rise up against the regime” instead of “the regime maintained their support…”. Alright, many of them may vote for another party in the elections. But since most of them don’t express alienation against the regime, you shouldn’t expect them to vote en masse against the regime.

(4) No representatives of agricultural or rural interests having been talking up an alternative to the Assad regime. There was very little or no movement of people from rural areas into the towns and cities to participate in demonstrations (despite some fake boasts from the fake revolutionaries to the contrary). Right now there exists no competitor to the regime for the rural vote.

(5) Once the reforms announced by Assad are completed, there will be no major disagreements between Assad and the general Opposition on the structure of the institutions of the State. On social and economic policies, major disagreements between Assad and the Opposition are confined to wings of the Opposition (such as the MB wing), not the whole Opposition. These various wings are known to have only small and slim political support in Syria. The general Opposition does not have a platform and agenda beyond the reform agenda that the Assad regime itself has declared itself in favour of implementing. That is, the anti-regime protests have not created a policy agenda or alternative forward vision that throws the regime on the defensive in the upcoming election.

(6) The demonstrators were predominantly from the poorly educated working class. Most of them did not have an agenda beyond wanting Assad to leave and wanting a breath of fresh air in the country of an unspecified kind. The great majority of the poorly educated working class did not join with them in the anti-regime demonstrations, and all those who didn’t join are likely to follow the lead of the educated classes in the elections. The educated folks will be creating and propagating the discourse of the elections contest.

(7) The various Syrian opposition parties are very weak today, their representatives are barely known or entirely unknown to the Syrian public, and I can’t see a route by which they can make themselves a whole lot stronger by election day. The attempt to unconstitutionally overthrow the regime has discredited swathes of opposition, and has increased the regime’s political support among previously neutral people who strongly desire civil process and no violence.

(8) The city Al-Bab, 50 kilometers northwest of Aleppo, is the eight largest city in Syria. The city Al-Safira, 35 kilometers southwest of Aleppo, is the tenth largest city in Syria. (Source). Those two plus Aleppo (all overwhelmingly Sunni in religion, btw) have had essentially or very nearly zero anti-regime demonstrations during this past six months. Opposition to the regime in that part of the country among the poorly educated working class is truly miniscule. Aleppo is Syria’s most populous province. The regime is also very stong in Ladaqia, Tartous and Sweida provinces, and Damascus City. You can appreciate that those regional strengths can be enough to win or nearly win, even if you’re not yet agreeing with a forecast of the regime winning almost everywhere.

(9) Everybody in Syria knows that the anti-regime crowd has been lying about security forces atrocities and that the regime has been telling the truth. (Foreigners don’t know it, since they don’t watch Syrian TV, but foreigners are irrelevant since they won’t be voting). More generally, the regime has been able to use its control over Syrian mass media especially TV news to strong effect. The State-controlled TV news puts out good quality products for the most part, which enjoy good credibility with the Syrian public, and have good market penetration.

(10) The next two numbered points are interrelated but distinct. They are both aspects of the spirit of the nation and nationalism. The first is that there will be people who will be voting not so much for the Assad party as for national unity. They want unity and Assad’s party is by happenstance the embodiment for it. The Assad party’s manifesto is vote for national unity. A vote against Assad’s party is a vote for discord and recrimination. (The Putin|Medvedev party in Russia enjoys a similar sort of status, and it also has to put up with dissidents who despise the basics and atmosphere of the unity).

(11) “Syrian society is nationalistic and the Assad regime has got a bone-crunchingly strong grip over how the nation and nationalism is defined. The definition of the nation that the Syrians are nationalistic about is the one developed and nurtured by the regime over decades. It is unchallenged and unchallengeable, and people are rallying around it at this time of stress.” Nationalism sells well in national elections and no challenger can outdo the regime in selling nationalism.

(12) (a) The regime is actually in touch with the pulse of Syrian sentiment, and makes it its business to be so. (b) The regime in policymaking is non-doctrinaire, and is responsive to popular sentiment.

(13) The regime’s core agenda, modernization, is supported by almost all.

(14) The trade sanctions imposed by the Europeans and Americans have alienated the Syrians, I say, and all winning parties will decry the trade sanctions in the election campaign, and candidates with endorsements from Europe or America won’t have a snowball in hell’s chance of getting elected, and I say more about the political effect of the trade sanctions at http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12429&cp=all#comment-277131

(15) Religious and tribal parties are banned in the elections. The permitted parties will be having to pretty much compete head-to-head against the regime on the regime’s own territory.

(16) Syrian society is dominated by a sociologically broad Establishment that covers all geographic parts of the country, nearly all religious sects, all age groups, all professional occupations, all big private enterprises, and the State. This Establishment has had only one political party for decades. Today it shows no inclination towards internal dissent or devisiveness such as would create two parties within one Establishment (such as the Western countries have).

Footnote: I’ve come across many commentators who think the Assad regime has a “narrow base of political support”. E.g. Joshua Landis thinks that “Syria’s chronic failing is that it lacks a deeply shared sense of political community. This explains why such a narrow regime as that led by the Assads….” In next year’s competitive elections we are going to see who’s right and who’s wrong regarding these two radically different interpretations of the same scene.

http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12447&cp=all#comment-277507

#142 Syrialover (who sounds like a straight-up anti-Syrian) says: “It’s about the economy, stupid”. It applies every time to every election everywhere, always. It’s also fuelling the Arab Spring uprisings. And if a genuine oppostion uses that slogan in a true election, the Assadists…. [will lose the election].

#157 DFGIB says in a similar vein: “I am sure that when people are presented with a credible plan for getting this country back on track they won’t be voting for Assad.” I’ve already explained why I disagree with that full sentence from DFGIB, but let me reiterate that the sentence’s first half is still very hypothetical. To illustrate:

Date 6 Oct 2011. A organization called “National Coordination Body to the forces of Democratic and National Change in Syria”, in a statement read out by its secretary-general Hassan Abdul-Azim, said it espouses the principle of national democratic change and a transition to a parliamentarian democratic leadership, and has stepped up its demands to topple the “security and tyrant regime.” The statement went on: “It’s too late to talk about reforming the regime due to its insistence since the eruption of the uprising to use violence and security and military solutions… in addition to brutal torture and wide arrests.” Banners inside the meeting hall read, “yes to the collapse of the security tyrant regime,” and “No to foreign military intervention … no to violence and no to sectarianism.” http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-10/06/c_131177091.htm

Thus, that organization is (a) still sincerely thinking that ordinary Syrians can be talked into going out onto the streets in very big numbers to chant for unconstitutionally toppling the regime, (b) still not talking about competing in next year’s parliamentary elections, and (c) still not talking about the economy. I say it’s a recepie for total failure.

I also insist, and I trust the regime and its security forces to insist, that the only way we’re going to have “Democratic and National Change in Syria” is by the 2012 parliamentary elections followed by the 2014 Presidential election.

The election is not going to be about the economy because, for one thing, the Opposition is devoid of fresh and saleable economic ideas; and in the unlikely event they did come up with something worthwhile and popular, the regime would appropriate it for itself. On questions of the economy, nearly all of the captains of industry are (and are going to be) supporting the Assad’s party. So are the Trades Unions. When we have the captains of industry, the trades unions and the government all reading out of the same prayer book, and we have an opposition with no real experience in economic development matters, I can’t see how the Assad’s party could get beaten on that issue. But anyway the election is not going to be about the economy. All signs say the Opposition is going to emphasize “tyranny” and “corruption”. (I already posted on this board some months ago about the regime’s exposure to the corruption allegation, but the post does not come up at google search — why not?).

Of the seventeen points I made at #121 above, here’s my favourite:

(17) Syrian society is dominated by a sociologically broad Establishment that covers all geographic parts of the country, nearly all religious sects, all age groups, all professional occupations, all big private enterprises, and the State. This Establishment has had only one political party for decades. Today it shows no inclination towards internal dissent or devisiveness such as would create two parties within one Establishment (such as the Western countries have).

As I see it the parlimentary election campaign will consist of sundry semi-anonymous and semi-disreputable dissent parties campaigning against the Establishment party. With that view, I must expect the Establishment party to win by at least as wide a margin as Mubarak’s party used to win by in Egypt under somewhat similar circumstances.

That reminds me of a totally different point, coming to mind by mention of Mubarak’s Egypt. I assume you know the place the MB and similar parties had in Egypt’s political landscape over the years. I now believe Syria’s political landscape is not going to see the appearance of a similar thing, because the Syrian Establishment — specifically the better educated Sunnis, who are the sole arbiters of this matter, I believe — have “opted for secularism to promote national unity”. A quasi-religious party would lack support from the society’s Establishment and would carry the millstone of sectarianism around its neck. Syria’s Grand Mufti Ahmad Hassoun recently said this year’s new legal ban on religious political parties is harmless to religion, a view with which I fully agree. You may well say that just because the Establishment has accepted that this is going to be Syria’s way, it does not follow that the wider masses have or will accept the same. You could be right. But I believe the masses will follow the Establishment. More fundamentally, I believe an Establishment is established.

http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12447&cp=all#comment-277665

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Syria: the Local Syrian OppositionTalks view on the expats’ Syrian National Council

Posted on October 9, 2011 | Comments Off on Syria: the Local Syrian OppositionTalks view on the expats’ Syrian National Council

Syria’s Manna: On Ghalioun and the Trinity of a Successful Revolt

By: Othman Tazghart [1]

Published Saturday, October 8, 2011

Syrian opposition activist Haytham Manna speaks about the “trinity” of a successful revolution in Syria, his take on the newly formed Syrian National Council and his recent fallout with prominent dissident Burhan Ghalioun.

Othman Tazghart (OT): What are your reservations about the recent Istanbul conference? Why have you refused to join the Syrian National Council formed as a result?

Haytham Manna (HM): This Council is the result of an initiative by a group whose identity is connected to one ideology. It was not authorized by the political opposition or the youth movement inside the country. This group spent 55 days promoting the need for such a council on the basis that it will bring the revolutionary youth out of this crisis, solve all their problems, and facilitate material help, international recognition, a no-fly zone, and so on. Over the last month and a half, there have been repeated attempts to introduce Libyan vocabulary into the Syrian revolution. The people who have done this are professionals, they do not belong to any known political group. They call themselves ‘independents’ or the ‘Independent Islamic Movement.’ This group has sought to impose their plan on everyone else from the beginning and they failed in their first two attempts in Istanbul.

There was a joint attempt by all the major political groups to form a ‘National Syrian Alliance’ that would include the real political forces within the country. But the Istanbul group tried to weaken this alliance by appealing to some of its members to join the National Council instead. They claim that the difficult part is forming the council, after which the world would recognize them and facilitate miracles, allowing the revolution to carry on and succeed, while reinforcing the role of the youth in it. Sale of this illusion went hand in hand with attempts to takeover the unified consensus work being carried out between various political movements. It gave the National Council a specific ideological coloring, where the Islamists were granted 60 percent of council membership, when their real weight within the opposition is a fraction of that.

Moreover, this council lacks modesty, because those who formed it assert that they represent the majority in the revolution, including the coordinating committees. They claim that they will save the revolution and change the course of history. This will certainly reflect negatively on them when people discover their real size, the limits of their representation, and their modest means; with all due respect to some who have supported them.

OT: Do you think that making Dr. Burhan Ghalioun, a man with genuine credibility, the president of the council will help guarantee against such pitfalls as militarization of the uprising or foreign intervention?

HM: I have said several times, particularly during my last visit to Tunisia, that the Tunisian revolution gave us three basic principles. The first is the peaceful nature of the revolution. The second is the absence of the idol. There are no idols or individual leaders, only working groups who offer democratic solutions and think in a collective manner and seek consensus and pluralistic mechanisms that respect the efforts of these people while limiting their power. The third principle is the secular nature of the collective movement. This trinity for me is pertinent when it comes to Syria. I do not believe that any one person, whoever they are, can prevent all mistakes, especially when his position changs several times in the last few days. We want to escape the individual dictatorship of Arab rulers, so it does not make sense to devote our work to dictatorship and individualism.

OT: You have close ties with Dr. Burhan Ghalioun. From the beginning of the protests in Syria you have agreed on the peaceful and secular nature of the revolution. What are the reasons behind the differences that have arisen between you lately?

HM: There were no differences until the last meeting in Berlin. Dr. Ghalioun had promised to attend the meeting of the National Coordination Committee in Berlin and we were waiting for him to arrive. We were surprised to find that he had changed course to Istanbul, with no apology, explanation, or even prior notice. We have not spoken since that day. I think that Dr. Ghalioun owes us an explanation. We need to understand why we should offer all these concessions to the Islamists in Istanbul when we are a country with 26 sects, creeds, and ethnic groups.

This means that this is a country where the relationship between religion and the state cannot be dealt with lightly. The Syrian Revolution of 1925 held that “religion is for God and the homeland is for all.” Today, minorities do not play an effective role, so we need a secular discourse to gain their confidence. The Syrian people are believers, but they don’t want any religious ideology to influence their constitution or their future. I wish that Dr. Ghalioun would not take that line. After the Hama massacre in the 1980s, Said Hawa, a major thinker in the Muslim Brotherhood, tried to explain the failures of The Fighting Vanguard, their military wing. He concluded that “the Syrian people love freedom, the republic, and democracy.” I hope that some people do not forget this lesson.

OT: Some are asking, is your opposition to the National Council because of the Muslim Brotherhood’s presence in it or because of the size of the representation they were given?

HM: It is well known that I worked hard to rehabilitate the Muslim Brotherhood with the other political parties in Syria. I facilitated their reconciliation with several political groups. I was one of the most prominent defenders of Islamist prisoners. Therefore, I have no problem with them. I see the Islamists as part of the political geography of all Islamic countries, not just Syria. But I believe that at most, 10 percent of Syrian society supports the Muslim Brotherhood. I do not understand why they are clambering for more representation.

I hope that they will be wise and rational enough to see that it is not in their interest or the interest of the revolution for them to exaggerate their role in the Syrian uprising. It is the dictatorship that is inflating their role to scare off international support. They’re serving this purpose by exaggerating their role at conferences and in the media.

OT: In one of your statements, you described the group who prepared for the Istanbul conference as the “Syrian Washington Club.” There is also talk of American funding of this meeting. What are the motives for this? Is it related to a specific political agenda?

HM: The American administration lost its battle with Hezbollah in Lebanon and with Iran over nuclear power. It is now seeking to turn the Syrian revolution into a sort of proxy war against Iranian influence in the region. It is no secret to anyone that America absolutely does not want to support a revolution which seeks secular democratic change in the Arab world. The democratic Syrian revolution is a true revolution, not a proxy war. There was definitely American funding behind the Istanbul group, official and unofficial. There was also funding from the Arab Gulf states. But I believe that money does not make or break a revolution. It affects revolutions negatively by reinforcing opportunism and conspiracy and weakening the role of the genuine fighters in certain phases. Money cannot change the course of history.

OT: Do you think that the Istanbul meeting and the National Council are in breach of the consensus document signed in Doha?

HM: Istanbul was a complete cancellation of what was agreed upon in Doha. In Doha, it was agreed that the Syrian National Alliance was the prime organizer of all efforts to later set up a Syrian political council. The agreement dictated that leadership for the national alliance should include the most significant political forces, on condition that greater weight be given to the opposition inside the country.

But this was circumvented when the Istanbul meetings were revived, after two failed attempts, by attracting some groups who are poorly represented at home, such as the Muslim Brotherhood and the Damascus Declaration signatories. The Brotherhood’s role in the revolution has been restricted to media work and sending aid, and the Damascus Declaration is no longer the force it once was. Moreover, the most prominent intellectuals behind the Damascus Declaration are now part of the National Coordination Committee and have not joined the Istanbul group.

OT: Are there differences between the Doha agreement and the Istanbul meeting on the issues of arming the revolution and foreign intervention?

HM: I have always sought to develop basic principles on which all the opposition agrees. We began by announcing the Oath of Dignity and Rights on June 17 as a supra-constitutional text that includes the basic principles of the Second Syrian Republic. This is definitely rejected by a large proportion of the Islamists, which is why this essential text was replaced in the National Council by a loose declaration. The National Council’s declaration is not based on a clear political program. All matters were left ambiguous so that each participant could explain them as they wished. One person speaks of military intervention, the other about humanitarian intervention, and another says no to foreign intervention in any form. For us, our program is clear, our loyalties are clear, and our demand for the downfall of the regime is clear. All these matters had been agreed on and there is no ambiguity or disagreement.

OT: How do you view the position of the opposition now? Do you think that differences within it are a type of democracy? Or do they deepen divisions and undermine the unity of the opposition?

HM: The Algerian Revolution was successful despite the fact that there were two separate liberation movements. This means that unity for unity’s sake is not a logical or rational program for change. We cannot accept agreement on any basis, just to preserve unity. The primary objective is a political program and finding common ground to conduct our work. I do not see this as the problem. It is the right of those who joined the National Council to try. Let them see for themselves how far this experiment can go. As for me, I believe it is my duty today to create a strong, civil, national, democratic axis, as it is the only guarantee for the revolution’s success. If the revolution becomes Islamicized, it will fail; if it becomes sectarian, it will fail; and if it becomes militarized, it will fail.

This article is an edited translation from the Arabic Edition.

Othman Tazghart
http://english.al-akhbar.com/print/1015

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