A revolutionary upsurge in the Middle East

By S.P.SETH

Tunisia is becoming a byword for hopeful resurgence in Arab countries. Who would have thought that Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, its president, who had mastered ruling by dictate for 23 years, would just fall by the way in a matter of days. Not only that, the people’s power that brought him down, do not want any vestige of his regime. They want them all to go lock, stock and barrel and start the new era with a clean slate. The country is in the midst of great anticipation and expectation from a new order that has still to arise.

However, the developments in Tunisia have created a new wave of people’s power sweeping or threatening to sweep much of the Middle East. In a sense, the Arab world is experiencing a surge of revolutionary expectations. In other words, it is not just a national movement affecting Tunisia but has regional ramifications.

But let us put all this in the context of recent Arab history. In the post-colonial period around the fifties, there have been tumultuous events in some of the Arab countries, the most important, perhaps, was the overthrow of Egypt’s King Farouk in 1952 led by a group of army officers under the nominal leadership of Brigadier Mohammed Neguib. The real leader behind the putsch was Colonel Gamal Abd al-Nasser, who managed to depose Naguib in 1954.

Nasser was not only the new hope of Egypt but also the trailblazer for Arab nationalism. It looked like the days of Arab monarchies were almost over; such was the political environment of the time. And this period also saw increasing hostility toward the newly created state of Israel that had annexed more territory to its domain following the defeat of Arab forces in late 1940s.

But what created a wave of Arab anger (and in much of the world) was the joint invasion of Egypt by Anglo-French-Israeli forces in 1956 to undo the nationalization of Suez Canal by the country’s Nasser-led government. Nasser became an instant Arab hero with his determination to stand up his ground against, what looked like, insurmountable odds of facing three powerful enemies.

Nasser was unwittingly helped by the United States because it came out against the joint attack, forcing the aggressors to withdraw. The US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, was enraged that UK, France and Israel had the audacity to undertake the invasion without the knowledge or approval of the United States, still harboring dreams of their colonial days. The United States was now the undisputed leader of the “free world” as the Cold War started to hot up between the Soviet Union and the United States and its allies.

The Suez Canal saga, with Nasser leading the charge of Arab nationalism, emerged as a unifying force of sorts in a region that had not seen anything like this before. Such surge of popular enthusiasm scared the day lights out of the region’s monarchs. At the same time, Nasser’s Egypt got sucked into the Cold War, having to depend more and more on the Soviet Union for economic and arms aid as it was not forthcoming from the United States.

Arab nationalism was also perceived as a serious threat to the US oil interests concentrated in the oil producing countries ruled by kings and the likes. In the same way, the US commitment to Israel started to become more pronounced as the United States’ most reliable ally in the region, beefed up by the work of the US Jewish lobby in the United States.

Even as this surge of Arab nationalism was worrying the United States, Nasser was feeling increasingly confident riding a wave of popular support after his success in nationalizing Suez Canal and the humiliation of its attackers. And in his rallying cry for Arab solidarity, Israel increasingly appeared as the next challenge to restore Arab pride.

Nasser was a great Arab leader but also a demagogue. His 1956 success had given him a false sense of confidence hoping that such feats can be replicated again without necessary military preparations to take on the Israelis. The resultant six-day war in 1967, with Israel launching a surprise attack, finished off Egyptian air force, as it lay exposed on the ground. As part of the then rising Arab nationalism, Jordan and Syria were Egypt’s military partners. They all suffered humiliating defeats, with Israel occupying large chunks of their territories and creating the new issue of occupied Palestine.

The six-day war put to rest, for the time being at least, the surge of Arab nationalism triggered by the nationalization of the Suez Canal. Israel emerged from this a much stronger power than it ever was, and its support base in the United States expanded further embellishing its credentials as the United States’ most reliable and strongest ally in an unstable region.

By the same token, the region’s reining monarchs got a new lease of life with the United States’ as their protector. Another attempt at rescuing Arab pride also failed disastrously in the Yom Kippur war of 1973, with Arab forces once again suffering a humiliating defeat. Which finally convinced some of them, like Egypt and Jordan, to make peace with Israel.

The Arab world has been in doldrums ever since, ruled by aging kings and despots clinging to power at any cost. During such times, the events in Tunisia have an entirely new meaning. Although, it is still early days but the collapse of the first Arab dictator under popular revolt is the first of its kind in the Arab world for as long as one can remember. And the message is uplifting for all Arabs. It also shows how thin and frayed are the threads that tie together the different arms of every repressive regime. They tend to buckle under when enough popular pressure is applied.

For instance, in Tunisia, the army that should have been the bedrock of Ben Ali’s dictatorship decided to stand aside, refusing to slaughter civilians to save his political hide; leaving him no choice but to find asylum with another kindred dictatorship in Saudi Arabia.

Egypt, Yemen and Algeria are also under pressure, with popular demonstrations seeking the removal of their rulers. After Tunisia, Egypt appears to be the next domino to fall. Its dictator, Hosni Mubarak---now 82--- has been in power for thirty years, and reportedly has plans to engineer his son’s succession. His government seems determined to tough it out, even if it means killing its own people and youth of the country. Imagine the prospect of another scion of the Hosni Mubarak lineage ruling over Egypt for another 30 years.

Mubarak’s only claim to fame/notoriety is that he has presided over his country’s stagnation, and brutal political repression. He is, in so many ways, the King Farouk of today, and his people need redemption from a relic of the past. If his people overthrow him, this could be similar to the beginning of a new resurgence in the Arab world, not unlike the overthrow of King Farouk in 1952. But the United States would hate to lose him. Over the years, he has fitted ideally into the US regional strategic plans, including support for Israel. An important example of Egypt’s docility is that it has kept effectively closed its border with Gaza to help Israel choke up its people.

And in Yemen, it is the same old story of a dictator, President Ali Abdullah Saleh, presiding since 1978 over his country’s journey to nowhere. In Algeria, just when the Islamists were about to win elections in early nineties, the military stepped in to quash any such prospect and have been presiding ever since in an on-off fratricidal war.

While the popular movement is building up in Arab countries against their despotic and repressive regimes (it is reported that in a region of 333 million people, nearly 325 million live under the yoke of unelected leaders), helped by Tunisia’s example and the dexterous use of social media like Twitter, Facebook etc, it is not going to be all that smooth and easy.

There are several reasons for this. First: these countries lack institutional alternatives. It is in the nature of dictatorial regimes to destroy all alternative political structures so they do not become a rallying point for opposition to the regime. Therefore, while at the popular level people hate their rulers they lack organized alternatives to concretize their aspirations. Hence, there is danger that even if the spontaneous popular upsurge in Arab countries does manage to overthrow the tyrants this could result in some sort of anarchy without credible leadership and institutional back up.

For instance, the immediate power transition in Tunisia, after Ben Ali’s flight, involved, more or less, the old government without the old chief. How the events in Tunisia or, for that matter, in any other Arab state in that situation, will eventually work out will be a painful process.

Second, in this transitional phase of months, or even years, there will be enough scope for the revolution’s enemies to create mischief and subvert the new hopeful trend. Here, the United States and its allies will have an important role to play, as we know from the past. For instance, in 1953, the CIA and British intelligence operatives played a decisive role in the overthrow of Iran’s nationalist Prime Minister, Muhammad Mossadeq, and the restoration of the Shah as the country’s ruler to serve US interests. Which, in turn, brought into power the clerical regime of Ayatollah Khomeini and his successors in 1979, pitting them against the US and its Western allies in, what looks like, a never-ending US-Iran saga.

Similarly, the Hamas’ election victory in Palestine in 2006 was extremely unpleasant for Israel and its Western supporters, leading it to be dubbed a terrorist organization. Algeria too experienced a similar situation in the early nineties when the Islamists had almost won elections. But it was not palatable to the West. The generals in Algeria stepped in to quash the elections.

In other words, if any of the alternative political order emerging from Tunisia, Egypt or elsewhere in Arab lands, is unacceptable to the United States, it will do its best, with its allies and hangars-on in the Arab countries, to subvert the emerging revolution.

The United States is unlikely to tolerate any alternative political order (democratic or otherwise) that is perceived to threaten its oil interests, and compromises perceived Israeli security; not withstanding Barack Obama’s reported congratulation to the youth of Tunisia for having the courage to revolt.

Look at what Washington’s behind-the-scene power structure has done to Obama’s message of reaching out to the Islamic world as spelled out in his Cairo speech, soon after he came to power. The Palestinian Papers released by Al Jazeera disclose the sordid doings of all those involved in or facilitating peace negotiations between the Mahmoud Abbas administration and the Israelis.

The mess in the Middle East, where people have no say in how they are governed, has created a sense of hopelessness and utter frustration. One great positive of the Tunisian uprising is that it has shown that people can overthrow their tyrants if they put their collective minds and energies to the task. This will have the effect of lifting that sense of desperation about a future just like the past, and worse.

If the United States wants to be part of a new future in the Middle East, it should not, like in the past, obstruct its course to make it fit into its own narrow interests. That has only perpetuated the stagnation and tyranny that is today’s Middle East. And this cannot continue, especially after the events in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere. Therefore, the lesson for the West is to welcome the birth of a new Middle East and help it with political support and economic aid to lift itself from its morass.

At the same time, the US shouldn’t panic if Islamic elements manage to win elections here and there. Because, the historical process of transition in the Middle East has to go through a process of twists and turns for it to eventually become a stable region. Even the Islamists will have to provide jobs for their constituents to lift many of them out of poverty and destitution. This is probably the biggest problem with the young populations of the Middle East without work and no future. They too, as governments, will need to interact with the world at large for trade, aid, diplomacy and other needs of governance.

The situation at present, though, is so murky that it is not possible to see a clear picture. But things are starting to move, and that surely is a good thing.

Note: This article was first published in Daily Times