Then and now
Thirty years after the 6 October War, the Arab press has much to recollect. Dina Ezzat surveys the remains and reminders of the day
The October war was promised by many to be the last of the Arab-Israeli wars. Peace was supposed to break out but 30 years later, as Israel continues to occupy Arab territories and continues its aggression against Arab peoples, the many signs of unfulfiled prophecy of peace cannot be missed. They are there in the Arab press every day of the week in each of the 22 Arab states.
This week, the Arab press marked the only war in which Arab military forces managed to record a victory against the Israeli army. Three decades after the "great October victory", as qualified in the Egyptian press, personal accounts of actual combat were few in number. Some, however, appeared in the Arab press as part of reviews of recent publications on the war and the diplomacy involved.
On Friday, the London-based daily Al-Hayat offered a review of several books recently issued in Israel on the war. According to Al-Hayat, in one book some Israeli soldiers admitted to the accidental killing of their co- servicemen after mistaking them for Egyptian soldiers.
For the most part, the Arab press this week marked the 30th anniversary by publishing several opinion pieces that recalled the spirit of Arab unity that made military victory possible.
On Monday, Teshreen, the Syrian daily, ran an editorial under the headline, "October: heroism, genius and lessons learned". Having recalled the days leading up to the war, the early hours of the initial attack and the all but paralysed Israeli reaction, Teshreen concluded that the October war will always be remembered for the heroism shown by Arab soldiers and Arab peoples and the genius of Arab military planners. "This is the lesson for all of us to remember," the semi-official Syrian daily stressed.
Syria was actually very much in the news this week. On Sunday, Israeli launched an air strike near Damascus, claiming to have targeted an Islamic Jihad training camp, in the first such attack on Syrian soil since 1973. On Monday, news of the raid and the Syrian reaction dominated the headlines of all the Arab press.
"An Israeli aggression on Syria", "Israel violates the rules of the game and attacks Syria for the first time in 30 years", "Wide Arab and international condemnation of the Israeli attack against Syria", "Israel warns of other attacks against Syria and other neighbouring states". The papers dedicated much space to statements by Syrian officials. The letter addressed to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan by Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq Al-Shara' was quoted in many Arab papers. "Syria is not incapable of creating a balance to bring about enough resistance and deterrence to get Israel to reconsider its calculations," Al-Shara's letter read. "Syria, however, chose to exercise maximum self- restraint because it is well aware of Israeli attempts to initiate a crisis to cover up for its own internal crisis."
On Tuesday, developments on the Syrian front continued to capture the attention of the Arab press which offered extensive coverage of the Syrian attempt to get the UN Security Council to issue a resolution condemning the Israeli aggression. The papers also reflected on the level of US involvement in the strike. On Monday, Asharq Al-Awsat quoted an anonymous US official as saying "Washington was informed by Israel about the strike hours before the attack".
And on Tuesday, Al-Hayat ran a full-page interview with Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad who reiterated his well- known position that the roadmap was "stillborn" and that the only terms of reference for any possible Arab-Israeli peace was that of the 1990 Madrid peace conference. In all events, Al-Assad stressed, "nobody believes that peace can at all be brokered with the current Israeli government".
The Israeli strike against Syria prompted many condemnations from Arab officials. It also produced many opinion pieces that attempted to analyse the reasons behind Israel's irrational conduct and what others called arrogance. Some commentators described the attack as "a strike by proxy" carried out by the Israelis on behalf of the Americans to force Damascus to succumb to US plans on Iraq. Others saw the strike as the work of an out-of-control Israeli prime minister who is taking out his anger and frustration at Islamist suicide bombings on almost everyone. For most commentators, however, the strike was a clear sign of the failure of the Arab countries to stand up to Israel the way they did 30 years ago.
The Syrian paper Al-Ba'ath argued that the one lesson that has to be concluded from the air raid is that the entire Arab world needed to recapture the sense of solidarity that gave it its strength and dignity back in October 1973. Under the headline, "The need to recapture the October spirit", Al-Ba'ath's editorial argued that the "eternal war [October] did not end the Arab-Israeli conflict... rather it opened up new vistas for resistance..."
On the same day, other Arab papers offered different perspectives on the meaning behind and the implications of the strike. The Kuwaiti daily Al-Watan argued that the strike was decided by [Israeli Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon who failed to carry out his threats to send Palestinian President Yasser Arafat into exile in retaliation for Saturday's suicide bombing that killed some 20 Israelis in Haifa. "Sharon felt he needed a propagandist military operation to cover up for his failure to carry out his threats against Arafat," Al-Watan opined.
A similar conclusion was reached by the Lebanese daily An-Nahar which attributed Sharon's failure to expel Arafat from the territories to the deteriorating health of the Palestinian president.
As-Safir, another Lebanese daily, was of the same view. However, in its editorial on Monday, it added that Sharon did not get all what he wanted out of the strike. The Israeli prime minister, according to the Lebanese daily, was hoping for an unbridled Syrian reaction that could have helped him fudge the developments on the Palestinian front. "So, the psychological target of this strike was not really fulfiled due to the restrained reaction of the Syrians".
The strike against Syria, plus the US occupation of Iraq and the ever deteriorating situation in the occupied Palestinian territories all had several commentators this week bemoaning Arab weakness. In the London daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Abdel-Bari Atwan lamented the decay of Arab solidarity, so much so that Arab capitals are now an easy target for military strikes. Sharon, Atwan argued, knew that Syria was "an easy target". "He knows full well that the Syria of today is not the Syria of 1973 and that the Arab world of today is not the same as it was on 6 October 1973".
The daily Omani Al-Watan said pretty much the same. In its editorial on Monday, Al-Watan argued that as much as the Israeli strike against Syria indicated the failure of Sharon to deal with his home-front problems it also reflected the failure of Arab countries to defend their interests.
The daily Al-Bayan of the United Arab Emirates took a much bolder stand on the issue. Again, on Monday, Al- Bayan ran an article by Hamad Suleiman called "The Arab house is burning". In his article, Suleiman stated that the Israeli strike against Syria was in fact "a slap on the face of the Arabs".
No commentator could have vented more anger this week against the poorly state of Arab solidarity than Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi. Qaddafi, who has for the past several years expressed bitter disappointment over the failure of Arabs to close ranks, used harsh language. Railed the Libyan leader, "The Arabs are a basket case... Libya should give up on the Arabs... they are horrible people... Arab solidarity and Pan-Arabism are things of the past."
Given the long historical relationship between Syria and Lebanon, the latter was also very much in the news this week. The Arab press reported Lebanese air space being violated by Israel and skirmishes on the Lebanese-Israeli border. The papers also reflected on the impact that the first Israeli strike against Syria in 30 years would have on the long military Syrian presence in Lebanon.
In An-Nahar Serkis Naoum predicted that the Israeli attack against Syria would give momentum to US Congressional steps to pass the Syrian Accountability Act under which Damascus would come under close US scrutiny and be the target of punitive measures. Once this happens, Naoum expected that the Syrian presence in Lebanon would then be questioned. "We have to start looking for ways to end Syria's political and military role in Lebanon. Lebanon must be able to retain its full sovereignty and independence," he argued.
Other news on the Arab-Israeli conflict in the Arab press this week included stories on the decision by several Israeli peace activists to move into Arafat's residence to prevent the Israeli army from launching an attack against the Palestinian president in retaliation for Saturday's Palestinian suicide bombing.
Moreover, the Arab press gave generous space to the growing defiance of members of the Israeli air force who have been refusing to carry out operations in the Palestinian territories. On Thursday, Al-Hayat ran the story of a letter sent by 200 Israeli scholars to the 20 Israeli army pilots who last month refused to fly air raid missions in the occupied territories. "We stand together in this crisis of ethics that has resulted from a continued unethical occupation," Al-Hayat quoted the letter as saying.
In an article published by Asharq Al-Awsat on Wednesday, prominent Arabist-Islamist commentator Fahmi Howeidy warned against what he feared was an increasing trend in some Arab quarters to throw the burden of the Arab-Israeli conflict on the Israeli peace camp. Conceding that there are some wise voices in Israel, Howeidy warned, though, that "these voices are not part of the decision-making process in Israel". Moreover, Howeidy stressed that it should be the Arabs who pursue their rights. To simply count on the internal power play in Israel, he argued, would be a clear manifestation of "Arab despair".
