Too much hype

It is too early to measure the impact of reform movements in the Middle East, writes Omayma Abdel-Latif

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An ad on the United States-funded TV channel Al-Hurra opens with a shot of an Iraqi middle aged woman, dressed in a black chador and carrying a ballot box with the word intikhabat (elections) written on it. This is followed by a smiling Mahmoud Abbas casting his vote during the Palestinian elections held last January. A third sequence depicts Lebanon's much celebrated demonstrations in Martyrs' Square. Finally, the words "New horizons, free horizons" fill the screen.

For those familiar with the euphoria which swept the Western media -- particularly in the US -- following recent events in Lebanon, the ad was yet another propaganda stunt presenting developments in the Middle East as a success story for the Bush administration.

There is "a spring of democracy in Arabia", according to one Canadian writer, "a democratic spirit awakening in the Middle East", according to a British commentator. In The New York Times German writers Volker Windfuhr and Bernhard Zand stretched the argument even further: "The global spirit of democracy residing in Washington appears to be marching forward inexorably."

Triumphalism, and at times vindication, has dominated the media and painted a picture of a Middle East rising from the ashes of dictatorship and violence. Not only that, it has left commentators on both sides of the Atlantic wondering whether Bush was right after all.

On the ground, though, things look very different. The Western media's portrayal of recent developments in the region is, says one Arab analyst, "a complete misrepresentation of facts".

"It is more an indication of an administration that is desperately seeking good news from the Middle East than a sign of any real shift taking place in regional politics," Ragheed Al-Solh, a prominent Lebanese intellectual, told Al-Ahram Weekly.

"It seems that wherever people rise up against tyranny in the region it will be thanks to Bush's disastrous policies."

Most observers, from the Middle East at least, believe it is too early to assess the ripples of reform and safely conclude that they will result in a political climate in which people power will reign supreme. Which is not to say that Arab politics does not now revolve around one main theme -- change.

"At no time have conditions been more ripe for change," Abdul-Hadi Al-Khawaga, a Bahraini human rights activist, told the Weekly.

Both Al-Solh and Al-Khawaga dismiss suggestions that the US invasion of Iraq is responsible for calls for democratic change across the Arab world. The seeds of change were already planted, said Al-Khawaga, citing the example of Bahrain which began reform initiatives long before the invasion of Iraq.

The same argument can be extended to other Arab countries which have undergone major changes in the past two decades.

One Arab analyst involved in monitoring democratisation in the region traces current changes back to the 1980s when Jordan, Algeria and Morocco were transformed from one-party to multi-party systems.

Palestinian and Iraqi elections and the Lebanese opposition rallies are the three, much hyped events used by the US administration and media to argue their case. Ironically, say many analysts, they are precisely the three events that cannot be ascribed to US foreign policy.

The situation differs in each Arab country. In Palestine "every time Arafat wanted to conduct the elections the Israelis stood in the way," explained Ahmed Barqawi, professor of law at Damascus University, while in Lebanon popular discontent was triggered by Rafiq Al-Hariri's assassination.

Zaid Al-Ali, an Iraqi analyst, claims that the Iraqi elections mark a US success story are a crude deception. "We should not forget that those who voted for the United Iraqi Alliance did so because the number one item on their agenda was to secure a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops."

"The Americans only began to speak about democracy building when they failed to find the weapons of mass destruction they had originally used to justify their attack on Iraq," Al-Solh said. It was, he added, a classic case of post-event rationalising of US imperialist designs.

According to Al-Solh the notion such media campaigns seek to promote is that it is the occupation of Iraq that has lent impetus to democracy in the region. Only there is one problem. "People realise that the US army is not here to spread democracy."

Even analysts who credit the US with instigating some movement in the region find the idea that the Middle East is undergoing a Prague Spring disturbing. While acknowledging the region does suffer a democracy deficit current changes, they argue, are the result of the convergence of long standing local calls for reform and international pressure.

"This notion of exporting and spreading democracy insults democratic forces in the region", Al-Khawaga explained. "It suggests that democracy cannot be home grown."

Al-Khawaga, whose long standing advocacy of human rights in Bahrain resulted in imprisonment, believes such a view belittles the sacrifices made by many of the region's activists.

Al-Khawaga is not alone in believing that prospects are far from rosy for nationalist forces committed to establishing democratic rule without allying themselves to the Western agenda. On the one hand the West, and particularly the US, claim to back such nationalist forces "but then proceed to hijack the struggle to serve a skewed agenda".

"The US uses the reform stick to pressure governments not because they want them to be democratic but to force them to make concessions, particularly with regards to their relationship with Israel."

Tunisia, says one Tunisian human rights activist, is a perfect example of this skewed agenda. Opening channels with Israel becomes a reason for the US to turn a blind eye to the abhorrent human rights record of President Zeine Al-Abdine Ben Ali. "He is no longer the dictator we know. And any talk about the need for reform is buried when he sucks up to Israel," said the activist.

"The programmed course for democracy the Bush administration has set for the region is not so much about empowering the people to choose their own rulers since more often than not those choices will undermine US interests in the region. The focus is therefore on individual freedoms such as women's rights and gay rights," said Al-Khawaga.