Democracy and freedom
Struggles for democracy and freedom in Palestine, Iraq and Algeria predominated the Arab press this week, writes Amina Elbendary
Little faith developed this week in the roadmap for peace between Israel and the Palestinians, with most of the Arab press remaining sceptical about its future. The Palestinian daily Al-Quds remarked in its editorial of 5 July that unlike the American position, which is supportive of Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) and his efforts at implementing the deal, the Israeli side is eager to find any excuse to call the deal off and provoke the Palestinians. The Palestinians, the editorial cautioned, should be careful not to grant extremist Israelis the excuses they were looking for.
Abu Mazen's speech in the presence of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon received sharp criticism from Abdel-Bari Otwan in the London-based daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi on 2 July. Abu Mazen did not mention Jerusalem, the return of the Palestinian refugees or Israeli settlements in the occupied territories, all thorny issues of the Palestinian- Israeli conflict. Otwan also criticised Abu Mazen's characterisation of the conflict as a political one to be solved by political means, since this dismissed the sacrifices of many activists. In contrast to the unprecedented leniency on the part of Abu Mazen, Sharon had not offered any new compromises or flexibility, he argued.
Writing in the London-based Saudi Arabian daily Asharq Al-Awsat on 6 July, Bilal Al-Hassan stressed that contrary to the prevailing wisdom the Palestinian Intifada had not been defeated but had cost Israel a heavy economic price and that this could be a basis for negotiations.
Salama Akkour, writing in the Jordanian daily Al-Rai on 5 July, commented on the BBC's documentary detailing Israel's nuclear weapons capabilities, broadcast worldwide in late June, arguing that British Foreign Minister Jack Straw should have visited Tel Aviv to work on disarming Israel and not Tehran to pressure and threaten Iran. Fahmy Howeidy also wrote in the Lebanese daily As-Safir on 8 July on the BBC documentary. Israel's use of non-conventional weapons against the Palestinians had been well-documented by many including Salman Abu Sitta, he said. Why did the Arabs not collect these materials and make them into a documentary similar to the BBC film or into a book, Howeidy asked. Thus far, the Arabs had neglected such revelations, even though Iraq was invaded as a result of allegations that it possessed WMDs.
One of the main negative ramifications of the roadmap is its dismissal of the Right of Return (ROR) of Palestinian refugees to Palestine. In the London-based Lebanese daily Al-Hayat on 7 July, one of the main advocates of ROR, Salman Abu Sitta, wrote an article exploring the neglect of this fundamental right. Abu Sitta condemned the role played by some Palestinian figures, such as Sari Nusseibah, in joining with the Israelis and calling for the drop of the ROR from Palestinian demands. This had been the object of widespread opposition both inside Palestine and among Palestinians of the Diaspora, with advocates, such as Nusseibah, enjoying no credibility within Palestinian circles, he said.
The US announcement of a reward for the capture of Saddam Hussein and his sons and the subsequent airing of another tape by the former Iraqi president made many headlines this week. The usual guessing games erupted amongst commentators: was it him? And, if so, was he now dead or alive?
The dispute between Iraqi and other Arab intellectuals over past Arab support for the former Iraqi regime continued to take dramatic turns, making reconciliation an increasingly distant dream. On 1 July, a group of Iraqi intellectuals published a letter in Al-Quds Al-Arabi denouncing the paper's editorial policy and the opinions of its editor-in- chief Abdel-Bari Otwan. The paper, they argued, had been supportive of the former Iraqi regime and its support of continuing operations against Coalition troops was an extension of that and of its denial of the scale of the crimes committed by the regime.
The paper should not exaggerate such operations and hail them as examples of heroic resistance, the letter said. It was up to the Iraqi people alone to decide when and how Coalition troops should be evacuated. One of the signatories to the letter, Hisham Al-Aqabbi, responded to Otwan's criticisms of Iraqi intellectuals for allegedly acquiescing in, or even supporting, the US occupation of Iraq on 4 July. Iraqi intellectuals were not facing a dilemma as Otwan had argued, Al-Aqabbi wrote, but they were alienated from the people who had sided with Saddam and the fascist elements that had "legally" occupied Iraq for 35 years, even after the regime fell and its full atrocities were revealed.
A definition of occupation was needed, Al-Aqabbi argued, before such claims were made. The Coalition's presence in Iraq was not a traditional occupation, but a procedural and legal term. Al-Aqabbi asked rhetorically which was the occupying force: the one that had disempowered and exiled four million Iraqis, or the one that had allowed those four million to go back and revealed the atrocities committed against them?
Regardless of such support for the US occupation on the part of exiled Iraqi intellectuals, most commentators remained critical of it. Talal Salman, editor-in-chief of As-Safir, wrote on 4 July arguing that the occupation forces had indeed replaced Saddam Hussein's regime, if only in killing, looting and disempowering the people. It was only to be expected, he wrote, that the Iraqis would resent and resist the "American Saddam" as much as they had the Tikriti Saddam. Real, organised resistance would need time to develop, he argued, and it would owe its birth to the idiocy of US policies.
Abdallah El-Ashaal wrote on the legal and political aspects of Iraqi resistance to the occupation in Al-Hayat on 5 July, pointing out that the US attitude towards such operations was influencing its attitude towards the Palestinian resistance as well. Associating Iraqi resistance with the remnants of the Ba'thist regime granted legitimacy to American actions against the Iraqi people, he said.
Also in Al-Hayat on 8 July, Hazem Saghiya wrote on the invalidity of violence and resistance, having been an opponent of the Iraqi resistance to the US occupation since its inception. Saghiya differentiated between current acts, labelled as resistance, and their historical counterparts against European colonialism in the early 20th century. Unlike the latter, he argued, the current operations were working to tear the nation apart in a civil war rather than unite it against a common enemy.
There was a different context, he argued, especially since the Kurdish question remained problematic. Furthermore, he insisted, even if Saddam Hussein himself was not part of "the resistance" he was an integral part of it, which should remove any ambivalence concerning its nature. Saghiya recommended making Iraq and the Iraqi people's interests a priority, as opposed to causing harm to the Americans. The resistance would only provide the Americans in Iraq with more reasons to live up to the poor reputation they already had. It would give them excuses to continue the war and to refrain from establishing basic services.
In continuation of its policy of publishing the memoirs of former Iraqi officials, Al-Hayat introduced a new series by Abdel-Ghani Al- Rawi on 7 July, former Iraqi deputy prime minister. Al-Rawi revealed his role in a plan to oust Ahmed Hassan Al-Bakr and Saddam Hussein under Iranian patronage in 1970, in what was then termed the "Rawi conspiracy".
The release of the two leaders of Algeria's outlawed Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), Abbas Madani and Ali Belhadj, made front-page headlines in the Arab press, though commentators were slow to respond to this new development. Writing in Asharq Al-Awsat on 6 July, editor-in-chief Abdel-Rahman Al-Rashed argued that Belhadj should be given a chance to prove himself after spending 12 years in prison. Belhadj symbolised the Islamist movements more than Bin Laden did, he wrote, and his coming actions would influence the Islamist movements in general.
"If he turns into an acquiescing politician, this will mean that the Islamist parties will coexist with the status quo. But if he becomes a militant they will face the same fate as the Afghan Taliban." Writing in As-Safir on 8 July, Tawfiq Al-Madini argued that national reconciliation was the way to solve Algeria's problems. Allowing Belhadj and the FIS to share in political power would allow for the development of a democratic system and close the door to attempts to renew terrorism in Algeria. For their part, the Islamists should admit that they were only part of the political scene, he said, and not seek to displace other actors, instead of allowing for a plural political arena to develop.
For a while at least, the Arab press turned away from Iran in the east to Algeria in the west in its search for a way forward.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : 10 - 16 July 2003 (Issue No. 646)
Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/646/pr2.htm