The online article also contains lengthy accounts by Abu Omar, of his kidnapping and his arrival in Cairo, the torture he endured in Egypt and his situation now.
The Bush administration is again committing a blunder in the Middle East by supporting the Israeli government in its refusal to recognise a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas. This precludes any progress towards a peace settlement at a time when such progress could help avert conflagration in the greater Middle East.
The US and Israel seek to deal only with Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority president. They hope new elections would deny Hamas the majority it has in the Palestinian legislative council. This is a hopeless strategy, because Hamas would boycott early elections and, even if their outcome resulted in Hamas’s exclusion from the government, no peace agreement would hold without Hamas support.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia is pursing a different path. In a February summit in Mecca between Mr Abbas and the Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, the Saudi government worked out an agreement between Hamas and Fatah, which have been clashing violently, to form a national unity government. Hamas agreed “to respect international resolutions and the agreements (with Israel) signed by the Palestinian Liberation Organisation”, including the Oslo accords. The Saudis view this accord as the prelude to the offer of a peace settlement with Israel, to be guaranteed by Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries. But no progress is possible as long as the Bush administration and Ehud Olmert’s Israeli government refuse to recognise a unity government that includes Hamas.
[…]
There is now the chance of a political solution with Hamas brought on board by Saudi Arabia. It would be tragic to miss out on that prospect because the Bush administration is mired in the ideology of the war on terror.
Meanwhile, as expected, there is some movement in Europe towards dealing with the new government and ending the financial boycott, notably from Norway. Probably soon from France, too. I understand that Germany could be more flexible as well in dealing with Hamas, but is a bit tied at the moment as it performs EU Presidency. (Another problem is that the US anti-missile shield for Poland and the Czech republic complicates relations with Washington.)
If the EU dealt with the new government, as I think it should, it would probably not immediately make a difference on the international scene. The US and Israel would hardly be impressed. But it would for sure strenghten Hamas’ moderates (the two ideologues Zahar and Siam are already no longer members of cabinet) and improve conditions on the ground for the population.
I see no reason why a cabinet with moderate people such as Finance Minister Salam Fajad, Information Minister Mustafa Barghuti and Tourism Minister Abou Daijeh could not be dealt with.
On Israel, America and AIPAC – The New York Review of Books:
The pro-Israel lobby has been remarkably successful in suppressing criticism. Politicians challenge it at their peril because of the lobby’s ability to influence political contributions. When Howard Dean called for an evenhanded policy toward Israel in 2004, his chances of getting the nomination were badly damaged (although it was his attempt, after his defeat in Iowa, to shout above the crowd that sealed his fate). Academics had their advancement blocked and think-tank experts their funding withdrawn when they stepped too far out of line. Following his criticism of repressive Israeli policy on the West Bank, former president Jimmy Carter has suffered the loss of some of the financial backers of his center.
Anybody who dares to dissent may be subjected to a campaign of personal vilification. I speak from personal experience. Ever since I participated in a meeting discussing the need for voicing alternative views, a torrent of slanders has been released including the false accusation in The New Republic that I was a “young cog in the Hitlerite wheel” at the age of thirteen when my father arranged a false identity to save my life and I accompanied an official of the Ministry of Agriculture, posing as his godson, when he was taking the inventory of a Jewish estate.
AIPAC is protected not only by the fear of personal retaliation but also by a genuine concern for the security and survival of Israel. Both considerations have a solid foundation in reality. The same two factors were at play in the United States after September 11 when President Bush declared war on terror. For eighteen months thereafter it was considered unpatriotic to criticize his policies. That is what allowed him to commit one of the greatest blunders in American history, the invasion of Iraq. But at that time the threat to our national security was greatly exaggerated by the Bush administration. Condoleezza Rice and Vice President Dick Cheney went so far as to warn that the threat would manifest itself in the form of a mushroom cloud. In the case of Israel today the threat to national security, even national survival, is much more real. Israel needs the support of the United States more than ever. Is this the right time to expose AIPAC’s heavy influence in American politics? I believe this consideration holds back many people who are critical of the way AIPAC conducts its business. While the other architects of the Bush administration’s failed policies have been relentlessly exposed, AIPAC continues to be surrounded by a wall of silence.
His central argument is that US policy in the Middle East must stop being subservient to AIPAC and its allies and make an aggressive push for an Israeli-Palestinian peace. This means talking to Hamas on the foreign front and countering AIPAC’s negative influence on the home front, starting with countering what he terms as AIPAC’s “success in suppressing divergent views” among American Jews. Timed as Saudi King Abdullah’s peace initiative is once again on the table, let’s hope this can have some influence and that Soros will put his considerable amount of money where his mouth is.
As the walkout staged by opposition MPs shows, the current crisis over the constitution is perhaps one of the most serious in years. There are plenty of things that are dubious about the constitution, but the opposition has rallied around two major points: the amendments to articles 88 and 179, which respectively would reduce judicial supervision and cancel out constitutional protection of personal rights, giving police powers to search and conduct surveillance without warrants as well as detain prisoners without charging them. (I won’t go into the details — Gamal Essam Eddin covered them nicely in this story.)
In my opinion, there are two central things to keep in mind about the coming period. The first is whether the opposition can get its act together enough to either produce a “no” vote on the amendments (which of course could easily be changed into a “yes” by the authorities, if 2005’s referendum is anything to go by) or whether it should call for a boycott of the referendum. Currently, the opposition is split about what to do, as it is on the question of whether MPs should resign in protest. It seems unlikely that the opposition would be able to mobilize voters against the amendments, particularly as the NDP is preparing a major campaign (of course using the state’s resources as well as its own) for a “yes.”
Some are beginning to predict that President Mubarak will dissolve parliament after the referendum (most probably later this year), a move that would meet considerable opposition from many NDP MPs who spent a lot of money getting their seats. A new election, under a new (probably list-based) electoral law would probably greatly reduce the number of Muslim Brotherhood MPs (and thus the overall number of opposition MPs, even if secular opposition parties make modest gains). The endgame of all these maneuvers — ostensibly to consolidate power during the twilight years of Mubarak’s rule — is still uncertain. But Egypt’s deepening authoritarianism is getting much attention. Here’s a round-up of some recent stories:
Burying democracy further in Egypt – Amr Hamzawy and Dina Bishara on the escalation of the Mubarak regime against domestic opponents, especially the Muslim Brothers.
Crackdown by a clique – Muslim Brother Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh denounces the recent crackdown on the MB and the constitutional amendments, saying:
Stability cannot be achieved by depriving social and political leaders of civil justice. Nor can it be achieved by resisting democracy and excluding the largest political force in the country from political life. By closing the doors to dialogue, the state is opening a door to chaos and extremism. The consequences will be severe, not only for Egypt but for the entire Middle East.
Can that be interpreted as a fear that younger members of the Ikhwan might choose a more violent route than the leadership? It’s a point that is much debated around here.
More rights in Egypt, not fewer – NYT op-ed says “Washington should help independent groups organize in the event of such a vote. Dissenting voices are essential if there is to be any hope of free debate and democracy in Egypt.” O NYT op-ed writer, are you aware that most independent groups in Egypt hate the US and its policies in the region? Or that such help would be automatically be labeled as foreign intervention? Rather than suggest interventionist solutions (i.e. ones that involve interfering in other countries’ domestic affairs), how about lobbying for the severing of diplomatic relations or military aid programs or any other measures?
Imaging Otherwise in Cairo – Anthony Shadid traces the birth and death of the Kifaya movement. This is the first part. I’m not sure about his thesis, i.e. that Kifaya has died. Like many people, I think he fundamentally misunderestimates Kifaya’s impact. Without Kifaya, much of the growing dissent taking place today would not be taking place. It was never going to bring down the regime — only elements within the regime can do that. In the second part of the story, Shadid looks at the US backing away from pressuring Egypt. Again, I think he gets it wrong in exaggerating the role of US in creating that “Cairo Spring” of 2005 and in minimizing the prospects for political change (although not necessarily a transition to a Jeffersonian democracy) in the next few years. It is true that the opposition in Egypt suffers from the lack of clear leadership and political consensus, but it still early days. If there’s one thing that’s clear about Egypt today, it’s that nothing is certain.
I’m not trying to make fun of this — people can wear what they want — but why call it burqini? A burqa is a rather extreme form of fundamentalist gear that is not found in much of the Muslim world outside of Afghanistan and, to a much less degree, India and Pakistan. Is the Taliban what they want their product to be associated with?
Incidentally, this “burqini” is now standard issue for Muslim female lifeguards in Australia.
Israel’s struggle for peace is a sincere one. In fact, Israel desires to live at peace not only with its neighbours, but also and especially with its own Palestinian population, and with Palestinians whose lands its military occupies by force. Israel’s desire for peace is not only rhetorical but also substantive and deeply psychological. With few exceptions, prominent Zionist leaders since the inception of colonial Zionism have desired to establish peace with the Palestinians and other Arabs whose lands they slated for colonisation and settlement. The only thing Israel has asked for, and continues to ask for in order to end the state of war with the Palestinians and its Arab neighbours, is that all recognise its right to be a racist state that discriminates by law against Palestinians and other Arabs and grants differential legal rights and privileges to its own Jewish citizens and to all other Jews anywhere. The resistance that the Palestinian people and other Arabs have launched against Israel’s right to be a racist state is what continues to stand between Israel and the peace for which it has struggled and to which it has been committed for decades. Indeed, this resistance is nothing less than the “New anti- Semitism”.
Attacking Iran – UPI analysis of the impact of an attack on Iran on oil prices, and in part 2 on Russian involvement and the difficulty of assessing which facilities to hit.
A More Islamic Islam – Geneive Abdo on why the Western media wastes its time on “Muslim secularists” like Irshad Manji and Wafaa Sultan.
Four years on – Helena Cobban says “I told you so” about the war on Iraq.
Western Sahara between Autonomy and Intifada – a MERIP piece sympathetic to the Polisario sees a new generation of Sahwari activists emerging (encouraged by ongoing police repression) as long as Morocco can count on the support of the UN and major powers for its autonomy plan. It’s interesting to read next to the rather pathetic attempts by Morocco to link the Polisario with Islamist terror groups.
Hizbullah’s social services – an excerpt from Augustus Richard Norton’s new book, Hizbullah.
Mission délicate pour Javier Solana à Damas – Le Figaro says EU foreign policy supremo Javier Solana is trying to negotiate a secret agreement in Damascus to spare the Asad family from the scrutiny of an international tribunal.
In a March 10 post discussing efforts at obstructing a deal between the US, France and Syria over Lebanon, Landis counts Young as one of the intellectual obstructionists of such a deal (political obstructionists include Druze warlord Walid Jumblatt and US Ambassador to Beirut Jeffrey Feltman). Landis goes on to attack the obstructionist line as one that is dangerous for Lebanon and the region as a whole as well as one that puffs up a “Shia crescent” threat and gives Lebanese Shias “slave” status in a Christian and Sunni-dominated polity:
The only problem with this analysis is that it is has led to a long list of failures and the needless death of thousands of Iraqis and Americans. Michael Young recommended the invasion of Iraq in 2003, claiming that the “consociational” Lebanese model of government that has served his country so well would bring peace and happiness to Iraq and quickly be replicated throughout the Middle East. It has taken the West four long years of watching Iraq descend into ferocious civil war to come to grips with the short comings of this analysis. In 2006, Young advocated keeping the incompetent Lahoud as president of Lebanon rather than giving Michel Aoun a chance at elections. (Aoun was the most popular candidate in Lebanon at the time.) This obstructionism led directly to the summer war between Lebanon and Israel. With no prospects of a non-violent adjustment to Lebanon’s lopsided power-sharing formula, Hizbullah and its opposition allies fell back on the old formula of “resistance” and demonstrations. When war broke out, Young began excitedly prognosticating that Israel could break Hizbullah and international forces disarm it. He insisted the Shiite party did not represent authentic Lebanese demands, being merely a creature of Iran and Syria. Again, Young’s dreams didn’t materialize. Instead, the inconclusive war led to paralysis in Lebanon as Hizbullah and the Siniora government stand face to face, each unwilling to bow to the demands of the other. Rather that admit that he has misjudged the opposition or the ability of American and Israeli power to reshape the hearts and minds of Middle Easterners, Young continues to insist that Syria and Hizbullah will buckle if only the US will inflict a bit more pain on them.
Rather than come to grips with the real flaws of Lebanon’s democracy, Michael Young, like many other Lebanese, believes that the use of force by foreign powers can preserve the skewed status quo in Lebanon. He wants international forces to disarm the Shiites in the South, and the US to inflict more pain on Syria. The Lebanese obstructionist solution is to import violence into Lebanon and the region. They refuse to allow a “typically muddled but non-violent solution to the impasse.” Importing foreign armies to keep the Shiites in their place will only lead to further war and extremism on both sides.
What is wrong with the “consociational” system that is held up as the epitome of Lebanese democracy and power-sharing? Quite simply, it treats Shiites like slaves. In pre-civil war America, black slaves were counted as half a white person. In Lebanon they are accorded the same political weight. Although Shiites are estimated to make up some 40% of the population, the Taif Accords, Lebanon’s constitutional arrangement, permit the Shiites only 22% of the seats in parliament.
The defenders of Taif will scoff at this analogy between Lebanese Shiites and American slaves. They will say, “But we don’t treat Shiites as slaves. They can vote and they are allocated the third most powerful political office in the land: the President of the Parliament. All true, I admit, but this doesn’t obscure the simple fact that Shiites are accorded only half the political worth of other human beings in Lebanon.
That post (which is longer than what’s excerpted above) was obviously provocative and generated a lot of comments on Landis’ blog. He eventually posted a follow-up with some reader responses and said he wanted to let passions cool. He did mention that Young had responded but did not put up his response.
Young decided not to wait and wrote up his response in the Daily Star’s opinion pages, of which he is the editor. The response was much more aggressive in tone than anything Landis wrote against him, although arguably Young was the injured party thus far. The column was titled “the blogosphere’s foreign informant” and in it Young accuses Landis of being soft on the Syrian regime (he compares him to Patrick Seale, Hafez al-Asad’s biographer, whose book does rather soft-pedal criticism of the late Asad, although it remains a very good read.) He defends himself from some of the charges Landis made, notably denying that he ever said that he would leave Lebanon if Muslims were given more power in the confessional system. More seriously, Young accuses Landis of willfully putting Syrian dissident Michael Kilo in danger by revealing that he met with Syrian Muslim Brotherhood members in Morocco to strike a deal against the regime. Again, you should read the whole thing, but here is the most vitriolic part of Young’s article:
My theory, and take it for what it’s worth, is that Landis’ ambition is to be the premier mediator with and interpreter of Syria in American academic and policy-making circles – a latter-day Patrick Seale. In this context, and again this is just a coagulating hypothesis, Landis has frequently used his blog to prove his worth to the Syrians – perhaps to enjoy better access. He has also maligned those offering perspectives different than his own. In the post where he went after me, Landis harshly attacked the An-Nahar Washington correspondent, Hisham Melhem, as well. My conviction is that Landis felt he had to discredit us both, mainly because we fear that Lebanon will pay if the US engages Syria. As he once, revealingly, put it to me: “Your anti-Syrian line is the most coherent and best packaged.” I would dispute the term “anti-Syrian” and find his use of the word “packaged” peculiar. Perhaps I’m just not partial to Syria’s leadership.
Is court scribe really a role an academic should aspire to? And what does it say about Landis that he has consistently promoted the idea that the United States should sign off on renewed Syrian control over Lebanon in exchange for a deal with Damascus in Iraq? What kind of esteem does a scholar invite by wanting to return a recently emancipated, fairly democratic country to its former subjugation by a foreign dictatorship?
Now, some of the attacks on both sides seem a bit petty (but then again petty attacks and score-keeping appear to be a mainstay of Lebanese punditry) and some of the allegations are rather serious. It’s too bad to see two of the more influential opinion-makers on Syria and Lebanon (in the West, of course, they are non-entities in the Arabic-language media) get into a personal catfight like this.
I’m not going to take sides — not that either would car
e. I’ve long had concerns about bias in the writing of both, but still read both regularly and have learnt much from them. Being biased doesn’t mean you’re not interesting. I do think Landis, whose blog is an excellent resource, sometimes comes across as an apologist for the Syrian regime, although I don’t think he actually is and also airs negative opinions about it. Similarly, Young occasionally comes across as an apologist for the 14 March movement (or the Siniora government).
I actually do like the overall intent of Landis’ argument about Shias still being viewed by many Lebanese Sunnis and Christians as an underclass. Young appears to be saying that he agrees the Taif accords need to be scrapped, but he hasn’t exactly taken warmly to the way Shias (or at least those represented by Hizbullah) have pushed for that change, i.e. the street protests and occupation of Downtown Beirut. He’s also been an advocate of sectarianism of sorts. I remember this column (Daily Star subscribers can find it here) he wrote last December that surprised me:
Every few years the Lebanese must cope with an individual, party or community that ignores, disastrously, sectarian conventions. When the Maronites, the Sunnis and the Druze couldn’t get it right during the 1970s, the country descended into a 15-year war. Today, it is Hizbullah, as prime spokesman for the Shiite community, that is making a similar miscalculation. If conflict can be averted, then the party’s learning a lesson will have been worthwhile: better a weak Lebanese state where communal alignments can counterbalance the hegemonic tendencies of one side to a strong, purportedly non-sectarian state that will consistently drift toward a disputed, therefore unstable, authoritarianism.
That said, permanent, rigid sectarianism is not ideal. For any truly democratic order to emerge, the Lebanese must ultimately think as citizens, not as members of religious tribes. But wishing that away will not work. The only solution is to modify sectarianism from within, to provisionally accept its institutions while making it more flexible and opening up space for non-sectarian practices. The Taif agreement outlines the means to reach this end, and just as soon as Lebanon can break free of Syrian and Iranian manipulation, just as soon as Hizbullah agrees to a process leading to its disarmament, no matter how lengthy, sectarian negotiations will become possible and the road to reform can be taken.
That column was criticized here, but the point I would like to make about it is that it is hard to understand how Shias (who are, for better or for worse, mostly represented by Hizbullah nowadays) can make a push for a greater role within a sectarian system without going after some entrenched interests. Power is taken, not given freely.
Update: Landis has published a response to Young’s column.
There are several ways of understanding the regime’s current attack on the Brotherhood. First, the regime wishes to deflate the Brotherhood’s expectations after the past two years of emboldening political victories, which perhaps led to the miscalculation evident in the “Al Azhar Militias” incident. Second, Mubarak’s regime has relentlessly eliminated any potential alternative to itself for the past quarter century, which explains much of how it deals with any group possessing social legitimacy. Third, the regime is determined to guarantee a quiet presidential succession, whether after the end of Mubarak’s term in 2011 or in the event of any alternative scenario. The current crisis seems to be the labor pains accompanying the birth of the Fourth Republic (since the 1952 coup), which means that Egypt is entering a critical stage of political suffering as its rulers put their house in order.
For those in Egypt, pick up today’s al-Wafd for al-Enani’s op-ed titled “Burn it!” It’s about the constitutional amendments, and seems to capture a lot of the feelings about them in the opposition.
Also check out Florian Kohstall’s piece on education reform in Egypt and Morocco.
CAIRO, Egypt: Egypt’s judiciary chief has named the country’s first female judges despite opposition from conservative Muslims, according to a decree published Wednesday.
Mukbil Shakir, the head of the Supreme Judicial Council, gave 31 women judge or chief judge positions in Egypt’s courts, the official Middle East News Agency said, quoting Shakir’s decree.
The move is expected to give a boost to President Hosni Mubarak’s political and social reforms that have been widely criticized as too restricted. But others said the announcement still falls short of providing women equal opportunities.
There has been a rather depressing debate about why women are unfit to be judges, notably among judges themselves — turns out they are not the guardians of liberalism some thought they were. But that is the point, isn’t it, as Baheyya pointed out in her last post:
The third strategy portrays the regime as the progressive, courageous champion of women’s rights valiantly resisting sexist, exclusionary judges who preach democracy and reform but refuse to allow women entry into the judiciary. Women’s accession to the judiciary in Egypt has been a hot button issue among judges for at least 10 years, eliciting very strong feelings, with a minority of ardent supporters and a majority of variously motivated detractors. Marei has already selected 124 women legal officers for qualifying exams and training in the National Center for Judicial Studies in preparation for their admission into the profession. By playing the woman card, the regime burnishes its own reputation, casts doubt on the integrity of its judicial critics, and drives a wedge between pro- and anti-women judges within the judicial reform movement that the regime hopes will block further collective action.
This brings us back to another missed opportunity in the current constitutional reform process (it hardly deserves such an august title, mind you), to get rid of the reference to Sharia in the constitution which gives judges like the one quoted in the above AP story an opportunity to say naming women judges is against Sharia law, which is currently enshrined about the constitution. There was a brief flirting with changing Article 2 to either remove the reference to Sharia or make the text say Sharia is a source of legislation rather than the source of legislation. In today’s papers the government confirmed what’s been known for days — that there would be no change to Article 2 — but not before a populist storm was brewed up about the regime attacking Islam itself. One independent MP, in fact, says he is starting a “Popular Movement Against Secularism” to combat the ruling party’s notions of “citizenship” and the ban on religious parties. You can thank Anwar al-Sadat’s 1980 amendment to introduce Sharia as the source of legislation in the constitution and years of state Islamism under Mubarak for that kind of attitude in the political elite and society at large.
The lack of Arabic translators in Iraq appears to stem from a Bush Administration decision to outsource translation services to private contractors. Called “linguistic support,” these companies, two of the largest of which are Titan Corporation and DynCorp International, have received billions of dollars to provide language interpreters to the Iraq reconstruction effort. But many of the supposed “translators” sent to Iraq were untrained, had poor language skills, or couldn’t speak Arabic at all. In many cases the contractors appear to have conducted no screenings or interviews with prospective translators. And Titan Corporation interpreters are accused of involvement in two cases of prisoner abuse in Iraq and one case of espionage at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
. . .
So you had been out of Arabic from the mid-’90s to 2002 when they hired you to teach soldiers Arabic prior to their Iraq deployment.
That’s right, with zero experience. I’d never been to a Middle Eastern country.Do you feel you were qualified for the job?
Was I the right guy to teach the course? No.Did they give you any instructions?
I asked them, “What do you want me to do?” And they said, “You’re the expert.” Look, it was that REEP got the contract and then they sent an e-mail to me, because it looked like I spoke Arabic, asking me if I would come teach the course. That was it. There was no interview. There was no anything. No accountability. Nothing.How did they know you really spoke Arabic?
Because it said so on my resumé. Because I said so when they asked me.