AJE: “A Question of Arab Unity”

Al Jazeera English has started airing a nine-part series on Arab unity, of which the first two episodes have already aired and are available on Youtube. I’ve watched the first one (below) and while it’s nicely produced, it lacks some detail and makes some historical mistakes, such as saying the Egyptian Free Officers’ coup in 1952 was the first military coup in the Middle East (that honor goes to Hosni al-Zaim’s 1949 takeover in Syria). Still, they interview interesting people like Fawaz Trabulsi and Saad Eddin Ibrahim who provide first-hand reminiscences about the period.

It’s also an interesting topic at a time when the Arab world is more politically divided than it has ever been, yet has surprising figures uniting much of public opinion, such as Hassan Nasrallah of Hizbullah. I hope later episodes will look at the road not taken of a gradual version of pan-Arabism focused on building institutions rather than charismatic leaders.

Here is the second one aired thus far.

0 thoughts on “AJE: “A Question of Arab Unity””

  1. It quite ironic that an Iranian fiundamentalist demagogue like that Nasarallh creature maintans a positve image among wide portions of Arab populations. It proves how unconscious, ill-informed Arab are . They happen to be under the spell of either a cruel culturally and politically desructive American media or a medival Saudi-irani media which is seemingly conflicting, however both Saudi Arabia and Iran are leading the Arab world towards the same end point.

    Nasarallh,the creep declared that occupation of Iraq and the killing of one million Iraqi has rid the region of an evil!!! of Course, he must say so as the americans have handed Iraq on golden plate to the medival retarded Iranians. What is worse, he is directly inviolved in training the pro-Iran death squads in Iraq as well as providing political consultancies to them!

    His uncalled for bizarre war launched on Israel in 2006 served nothing but diverting attention of Arab street form the Iranian crimes in Iraq, highlighting the criminal Iran as power of dissent in the region- while it worked to discredit the Iraqi resitance through a double pronged tactic. First Nasarallh became highly credible in Arab street so that his crack down on Iraqi resistance and the heroic genuine clean Arab nationalist- Saddam Hussien was easily bought by many. Secondly, by painting a positive image of the Irani gangs in Iraq and portraying the Iranian occupation of Iraq ( which was done under the blessing of the U.S) as mere Sunni-shite sectarian strife, something that is completely untrue

  2. First of all, where do you live?

    Your post is nothing but anti-Iranian bullshit. There is no “Saudi-Irani” media. What media are you watching??

    Secondly, Nasrallah didn’t start any war. Hezbollah kidnapped some Israeli soldiers, which in my opinion, and I suppose in most Arabs’ opinions, is not such a huge crime considering all the Arabs in Israeli prisons.

    Also, “medieval retarded Iranians”. ??

    “Heroic genuine Arab nationalist Saddam Hussein” ???? Are you mad??

    I’m 100% for Arab unity, but Saddam was a dog and a killer. I suppose that doesn’t matter because he killed Iranians and Kurds right?

    Lastly, I support Arab nationalism and I especially support Arab-Irani cooperation. Supporting Nasrallah doesn’t make Arabs ill-informed.
    Being a rabid anti-Iranian Saddam-supporting moron, however, does.

  3. May I know why you reject my objective reply to the 673……. while you tolerate the uswe of this dirty langauge on his part directed towwards me and the symbol of Arab unity.

    I wonder if this qualifies as bigotry or what?

  4. 673,

    Sadddam was a dog and killer!!!!! well it is the dirty Ayatollah khomeini and the rest of the baboons council in qum- Ali Khanmeini and co. Leaving alone, the magget shrimp Ahmadi Najad.

    Saddam didnt kill Iranians. Iran th revolution in 1979 reisted Iraq’s attempts to modernise and secularise the south, given that 50% of top Baathists were shiites! Bani sadr- the first post revolution president- Bani Sadr, stated that revolution w stated that revolution will only stop in Baghdad. Iraq had no choice but to break the back of Iran so as to secure the stabilty and tremndous priogress of the countr. ASs for Kurds, well,Kurds in Iraq were entitled to the same rights as the Iraqis. Iraqi Kurds cultural specifity was more acknowleded by the state than that of those in Turkey, Iran and Syria. Saddam built the Solemeniya university whereteaching was in Kurdish. He enforced the Kurdish language as a secondary one in all Iraqi schools.
    However, some factions of their rebels opted to join the Iranian enemy, in 1987 they inflitrated an Iranian special forces unit behind the Iraqi lines inside the Iraqi depth. In the meanwhile Iraq was facing an existentialistc threat posed by the persian hords in the south.
    There was no other alternative but to use all possible means, to prtect the terrotorial integrity of an Arab country.

    By the way, how do you think the U.S would react in case of a mexican invasion. Or how do you think the Brits would have reacted towards an Iraish invading army landng on the British Isles in 1941

    How the peaceful totally Americanised unarmed, Japanese Americans were treated during world war two?

    How German Americans wwere treated in world war 1?

  5. I shall list out the incidents of international recognition of Saddam’s achivements- Saddam Hussien recieved a medal from the the UNICEF in 1982 for wiping out illiteracy in Iraq.In 1989 he recieved a certificate from the WHO staing that health care system in Iraq was the best in the midle east.A united nations development programme issued a report in 1989 prognosing Iraq to reach western European standards in terms of , GNP per capita, health care, access to education and women rights.
    notwithstanding all thses solid tangible accomplishments, Israeli and Iranian propaganda is distorting the reputation of the man. No wonder, the pan Islamic Mullahs Iran is the best ally of the U.S in its war against the most secular and developed Arab state. What else would Isael want but an Arab world dragged down by medival ideologies and religous fanaticism

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