ʾAsad Crosses the Rubicon

Syria was in turmoil as I arrived in Damascus shortly after the Ides of March 2011. Demonstrators in Darʿā spearheaded a movement demanding nothing less than comprehensive reforms, including—but not limited to—removal of emergency laws, releasing political prisoners, clamping down on corruption, and dismissing venal officials. Some even raised sectarian banners and questioned the very legitimacy of the president. Within days, various regions in the country joined the upheaval, and the regime appeared more than ever on the defensive, fighting for its very survival.

Ḥāfiẓ al-ʾAsad faced a similar uprising starting in the late 1970s that culminated in the Ḥamā Massacre in February 1982, when he unleashed his armed forces on the city, killing thousands of people and leveling the center of the old town. Back then such wholesale repression was facilitated by a multiplicity of factors: Syria then enjoyed the protection of the still mighty Soviet Empire, her armed forces were in much better shape, and there was no Facebook, Internet, cell phones, or satellite TV. No photographs, let alone video clips, leaked out to tell the gruesome tale. ʾAsad Senior was brutal but efficient. The Ḥamā tragedy guaranteed his reign till the closure of the 20th century and provided for a smooth transmission of power to his son in the year 2000.

Baššār al-ʾAsad possessed none of the above advantages. The Syria of 2011 was surrounded by enemies. To the south loomed Israel and Jordan, to the east US-occupied Iraq, and to the west a Lebanon that no longer hosted the Syrian armed forces. Regionally Saudi Arabia pursued a hostile policy vis-à-vis the Syria-Iran axis, and globally the USA targeted ʾAsad with sanctions. The Soviet Union was a distant memory. Economically Syria suffered from poverty, a widening gap between rich and poor, dilapidated infrastructure, depleted oil reserves, water shortages, and overpopulation.

ʾAsad Junior could no longer let loose the army against the opposition without risking the wrath of the USA and NATO, as the case in Libya amply demonstrated; at the same time, he had to be proactive and shun the half-hearted incremental measures that sealed the fate of Tunisia’s president and Egypt’s despot. Bahrain’s monarch was luckier, but he enjoyed the favor and protection of the USA and Saudi Arabia. Syria's crisis called for tact and discretion so as to avoid repeating the mistakes that doomed Arab dictators elsewhere. Could Damascus pull a rabbit out of the president's worn-out hat?

To be sure, ʾAsad possessed some advantages. Contrary to his Egyptian erstwhile colleague, he still had the army as well as the security apparatuses firmly lined up behind him. Most Alawites and many Sunnis still supported him. The former to preserve their acquired advantages and the latter to avoid chaos and sectarian strife Iraqi-style that would likely follow reversal of fortunes. Christians certainly were in no mood to have Muslim extremists topple a relatively secular Alawite rule, and neither were probably Druze and Ismailis. Apart from the Kurds, minorities would by and large support ʾAsad, each for its own reasons.

Left to his own devices, ʾAsad surely has more assets than liabilities and would probably not have much more difficulty suppressing the uprisings than his old man did 30 years prior; his dilemma was that he could no longer count on outsiders leaving him in “peace,” especially after witnessing the USAF pounding Libya in the company of the British and the French. His options were sharply reduced to finding the magic formula of sufficient repression to intimidate the rebels without reaching a threshold that would invite outside intervention.

For more than a week, ʾAsad dealt with the opposition with relative restraint, avoiding large-scale bloodshed and leaving the task of keeping order to the police and security forces. The army surrounded Darʿā, to be sure, but stopped short of deploying its guns. He moreover delegated his spokesperson, Dr. Buṯaynā Šaʿbān, to announce imminent reforms, including the promise to increase the salaries of government employees. ʾAsad even released some political prisoners and let it be known that he would be addressing the nation soon. He was biding his time and prudently avoided commitment to a course of action with unforeseen consequences.

The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel appeared on March 27th as US Secretary of State Clinton called ʾAsad “a reformer,“ essentially ruling out military intervention against Syria. To be sure there was no shortage of condemnation of using violence against civilians by different influential figures in the US administration and Congress, but ʾAsad could safely ignore verbal attacks stripped of military force or the threat of its use. Secretary Clinton delivered precisely what he was asking for, and he could, at least for the time being, afford to talk and act with far more confidence than would be the case for someone under an American Sword of Damocles. Instructions were given to the powers that be to organize huge demonstrations in support of the regime, with tens of thousands filling the streets of major Syrian cities waving and repeating resurrected, worn-out slogans of undying loyalty to the president.

Thus emboldened, ʾAsad delivered on March 30th his long-awaited address to the obsequious People’s Assembly in Damascus. The speech blamed the disturbances on outside conspiracies and made no real concessions to the people’s demands, a few vague promises notwithstanding. It was a triumphant speech received by a standing ovation from a dependable audience and interrupted here and there by deputies outdoing each other in flattery and brown-nosing as ʾAsad appeared and sounded more relaxed than ever. It was veni, vidi, vici as Syria's president donned the mantle of Julius Caesar.　
　

The Ultimate Sacrifice

Somewhere in the 1990s, my dad and I had a discussion about his pension. Dad, bless his memory, worked as an engineer in Syria for about 40 years and, like many of his colleagues, regularly contributed money towards his retirement pension administered by the syndicate. I remember him telling me that the funds' managers had to cap the engineers' benefits at a certain level lest they exceed those of a general in the Syrian Armed Forces; after all, he rhetorically asked, an engineer is not better than a general, or is he!? I still remember myself answering him with not the least amount of hesitation: “But of course an engineer is better than a general!”

My dad never served in the Syrian Army; I have. Like countless young Syrians before and since, I joined the army to "serve the flag" right after graduating from Damascus University back in 1983. This national duty—in reality a tax—was, and still is, universally imposed on Syrian men with few exceptions. Unlike professional military men, those subject to this “national duty” receive no compensation worthy of the name. Instead, many have to pay in cash or kind to survive what practically amounts to two years (often more) of thinly disguised slavery.

For a professional school graduate like myself, life in the army was bearable, though not pretty. I got to meet interesting people from different religious, cultural, educational, and economic backgrounds. We all spoke the same language, of course, with wildly varied accents. The best way to classify those men, however, was simply on the basis of their military career, or the lack of it: were they professional soldiers or, like myself, serving their two years and counting the days and hours to put it all behind their back? Secondly, if they were professional soldiers, what was their rank?

Needless to say, rank was of utmost importance. At the very top, we had the colonel commanding the armored brigade where I served. Everyone feared and respected him. He was the ultimate bogeyman. No other person in the entire brigade had such an aura surrounding his person. For his subordinates, he was authority incarnate, and his word would send just about anyone to jail, where torture was not uncommon. Under this colonel came his deputy, also a colonel but with far less extensive powers; another colonel in charge of logistics; and several majors, captains, and lieutenants in charge of the different battalions and other departments. Quite a few of the professional officers, the very same ones brown-nosing to the colonel, were arrogant, condescending, and quite brutal in dealing with their subordinates, but what I found most interesting by far was that even the lowliest soldier somehow considered himself worthier than civilians. How could that be?

The colonel in charge of logistics was a kindly man in his fifties and about to retire. He once shared a dinner with a few young college graduates serving in the army, myself included. He was in a good mood and dealt with us almost as equals, referring to himself by his nickname, Abu Raymond. He told us about the many years he spent in the army and how he studied to upgrade his status from that of an NCO to an officer. He then proceeded, with no solicitation on our part whatsoever, to tell us that “absolutely no one” who could manage a trade or profession would opt for a military career. Those who join the army, he emphatically stressed, do so as a last resort when all other doors are practically shut.

Abu Raymond’s honesty was admirable, of course, but he did no more than say loud and clear what everybody knew. The army in Syria facilitates social mobility for poor young men. Some of those young men are very intelligent and genuinely want a military career—I happen to personally know one or two exceptions to Abu Raymond’s rule—but those are few and far between. The vast majority were average and below average and could therefore not realistically hope to apply for medical or engineering schools, traditionally the turf of the best and brightest. Add to that that they were economically disadvantaged, so they had no means with which to start a business.

The army offered an opportunity for formerly disenfranchised young Syrians. Is there anything wrong with this? one might reasonably ask. Who would decline a venture that promised money, prestige, a secure job, and other benefits well-nigh impossible to get elsewhere? The answer is, of course, not many. Who knows? I might have done the same thing if I were in their shoes. The issue here is not what made those young men join the military; it is rather what makes them feel superior to other mortals and where their mentality of entitlement came from. Do they really believe that a general is better than an engineer? Do they really believe that a military man is better than a civilian?

For, you see, their narrative is quite different than the one I outlined above. After all, how could one look at himself in the mirror knowing that he joined the military out of despair of other and likely brighter alternatives? No. The reason one chooses to soldier on has to do with totally altruistic, lofty, and noble motives. He is making THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE. He is risking life and limb for the sake of his country. It is thanks to him, and only to him, that the rest of us civilians can sleep soundly at night. Without him, predators would devour the fatherland, kill its men, rape its women, and terrorize the helpless populace. He dies that we may live and prosper. We owe him our freedom, prosperity, and existence.

This refrain has been repeated so often and for so long that it convinced many people and, quite likely, even those who invented this twisted logic. The army has, after all, dominated Syrian politics since 1949, more often directly than indirectly. Armored vehicles roam Syrian cities driven by reckless drivers never held accountable for the accidents they provoke. The army sucks the economy dry and has lost a few major battles with tragic consequences (magically peddled as victories), and no one batted an eye. Power resides with the army and its minions. The civilians in Syria would simply have to put up or shut up.

But what does the army really do that is so praiseworthy? I guess one might argue that its sheer presence might dissuades potentially aggressive neighbors, though this is highly questionable. Another role would be to keep law and order, but shouldn’t that be the job of the police? The truth is perhaps less romantic. The army exists mainly to protect the regime, period. It is another version of Caesar’s Praetorian Guard, Napoleon’s Old Guard, or Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guard.

This applies to many armies, perhaps most armies, not just to those of banana republics. There exist many variations, of course, depending on when and where, but the general rule still applies. In most countries that have large standing forces, the army is to a lesser or greater extent a parasite. The larger the army, the more resources it usurps. Often for meager return. This is not the worst part, to be sure. Large and powerful armies have throughout history led their countries to disaster. The major dilemma remains that armies, like the rest of us, have to show that they’re worth the huge investment in treasure and sweat. In other words, they have to show that they work hard for their money, harder than anyone else since they are willing to immolate themselves in an ultimate sacrifice. Since the only “work” that they know how to do is warring and killing, one need not be a diviner to imagine the consequences. Mighty empires were brought to their knees following the reckless adventures of their generals. Modern warfare has, if anything, made the enterprise costlier than ever. Even when the military “wins,” average men almost always lose. Make no mistake about it: large militaries would fight ferociously to defend their privileges. When they run out of real foes, they invent imaginary ones. When they lose to external opponents, they often make up for this setback by oppressing their own people. Rather than defending the freedom of their countrymen, they become its worst enemy.

The ultimate sacrifice is an illusion and a fraud. The real heroes are not the ones with military garb. They are loving mothers, schoolteachers, factory workers, entertainers, lawmakers, health care providers, scientists, and many other “unknown soldiers.” The real glory lies not in bombing, invading, and killing. It lies in constructing, inventing, maintaining, and upbringing. Crafty Odysseus was a thug; mighty Achilles and his Myrmidons were cold-blooded murderers.

The great Victor Hugo loved France but was no fan of Bonaparte. Here is the introduction of his L'expiation (la retraite de Russie):

Il neigeait. On était vaincu par sa conquête.
Pour la première fois l'aigle baissait la tête.
Sombres jours ! l'empereur revenait lentement,
Laissant derrière lui brûler Moscou fumant.

　
　
　

On Human Inertia

The Cause was lost. The Imperial Guard was surrounded, outnumbered, and outgunned. The victorious British magnanimously offered to accept the surrender of the surviving remains of the elite French troops when General Cambronne famously retorted, “Merde”! La Garde meurt, elle ne se rend pas!” Only then did the British cannons deliver the coup de grâce.

What made the French sacrifice so many young lives so gratuitously? What makes many men and women persist in a course of action long after its foolishness has amply been demonstrated?
Countless other examples could be cited; for the sake of brevity, I will restrict myself to two.

Winston Churchill made a sagacious observation in his WWI memoirs entitled "The World’s Crisis" when he marveled at the short-sightedness of the German leaders in the aftermath of their victory in the East. Russia was knocked out of the war and lay prostrate as Germany, early in 1918, forced its politicians to cede vast territories in Eastern Europe, eclipsing any potential gain on the Western Front. Wouldn’t the best course for Germany be to negotiate a peace settlement with the Western Allies, even at the cost of some territorial concessions to Belgium and France? Would the Allies, bled white in four long and murderous years of ruthless warfare, have rejected such an offer? We all know what happened next. Ludendorff opted instead for a last throw of the dice and launched his ultimate attack in the West in the spring of 1918. It ended in disaster and Germany’s unconditional surrender.

More mundane, though not any less relevant, is a dilemma created by modern medical technology, which has made it possible to fight terminal illnesses ever more tenaciously, though at a tremendous financial, physical, and psychological cost. Time and again you see or hear about a hopelessly ill patient fighting the complications of metastatic cancer for months in a row, shuttling back and forth between a regular hospital ward and the intensive care unit when everyone knows that he or she is dying. The stated goal is, of course, to prolong life. Towards achieving that objective, the medical team tries to keep the patient’s oxygen level within range, his heart pumping, his lungs ventilating (or ventilated), his kidneys (or a dialysis machine) operating, etc. The patient becomes a “heart,” “lung,” kidney,” magnesium,” “potassium”… The larger picture, the patient himself, is lost to sight. Doctors brief the family about “winning battles” against bacterial infections and internal hemorrhage when everyone knows, deep down, that the war is irremediably lost. Rather than prolonging life, the process becomes, in reality, prolonging death. It’s almost as if some people actually believe in the possibility of deflecting Death forever. An anecdote attributed to Ǧuḥā comes to mind. He borrowed a pot from his neighbor and returned it the next day with a smaller one, adding, to his neighbor’s delight, that it “gave birth.” The next time he told the same person that the pot “died,” the neighbor was beside himself with rage, as if, all of a sudden, it dawned on him that Ǧuḥā was lying.

That brings me back to the theme of this post. What makes individuals, peoples, states, and empires persist in a demonstrably bankrupt course time and again? How could Homo sapiens be so conceited, blind, and downright stupid? Wouldn’t it make much more sense to invest the resources spent on weapons and conflicts in the welfare of our planet? What about devoting a fraction of the sums spent on prolonging death to promote education and child welfare? I think the answer is best sought in the principle of inertia. Inertia in physics — Newton's First Law of Motion — is defined, according to Dictionary.com, as

“the property of matter by which it retains its state of rest or its velocity along a straight line so long as it is not acted upon by an external force.”

To return to the two examples quoted above, the Imperial Guard—an extreme example, to be sure, but nonetheless a valid model for many fanatics—knows how to fight but not much else. It obeys orders even if those no longer make sense. It abdicated logic to mob frenzy and paid the ultimate price. The panic-stricken bulk of the French troops were perhaps less valiant but more human when they clamored, "La Garde recule. Sauve qui peut!" Cowardly perhaps, but much more sensible.

As for the WWI vignette, it certainly was possible, hypothetically at least, for Germany to return Alsace and Lorraine, along with the other conquered territory, to France in return for an honorable peace and a free hand in the East—an offer almost impossible for the Allies to resist, again at least in theory, especially since we know, with the wisdom of hindsight, that, in the end, Germany gave up all this territory and much more after hundreds of thousands more of young men on both sides were needlessly immolated to Ares.

But was it psychologically possible for the German leadership to even privately consider returning lands to France and Belgium, let alone dare submit such a suggestion to their public, for years subsisting on a diet of militaristic patriotism, especially in light of their recent brilliant victories in the East? Here the Principle of Inertia could be seen at full force: absent a force majeure, that is, “an external force,” the Kaiser and his generals were fated to continue “along a straight line” towards their doom. The Allies provided this “external force." What was unthinkable for Germany became inevitable. 

As far as our hypothetical patient is concerned, at what point do we give up? Where should the line be drawn? Isn’t death just as predictable as birth? Does anyone really presume the ability to interrupt the life cycle? In general terms, the “external force” here is more than just cancer, heart attack, respiratory failure, or infection. Thanatos has been lurking behind a corner near the end of the human journey from time immemorial.

　
　

　
　
　

Hath not an Arab Eyes?

Back in 1974, at the then prestigious school “al-Ḥurrīyā,” founded by the Mission Laïque Française and rebaptized as the Institute of the Martyr Bāsil al-ʾAsad in the mid-1990s. The school is a relic of the French sojourn in Syria in the first half of the twentieth century and a testimony to an often overlooked benevolent aspect of colonialism.

I was 15 years old at the time and had just started high school. We were attending an Arabic language class, and that day’s assignment was Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice.” The teacher, Mr. ʾAnṭūn Nuʿayyim, assigned me the role of Shylock, and I had to perform in front of an audience almost evenly divided between Christians and Muslims with one notable exception: there was one Jewish student in the mix (yes, there were few Jews left in Damascus at the time). Luckily, he was spared the embarrassment of participating in the play.

The inclusion of a translated Shakespearean play under the rubric “Arabic Language” was, of course, a pathetic and misguided attempt by the Syrian government to recruit whatever elements deemed useful to its strategy vis-à-vis the Arab-Israeli Conflict, including religious hatred. Officially, Syria repeatedly stated that its struggle was aimed at Israel and Zionism; practically, its approach was quite schizophrenic, as it allowed, if not encouraged, all sorts of anti-Semitic literature to flood the country. Unsurprisingly, the main source of this literature was European, and it would be superfluous to name examples.
  
Here is some of what I had to read aloud, in translation of course, in front of my classmates, including the lonesome and hapless young Jew:

He hath disgrac'd me and hind'red me half a
million; laugh'd at my losses, mock'd at my gains, scorned my
nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine
enemies.
And what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes?
Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections,
passions, fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons,
subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed
and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is?
If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we
not revenge?“

I know not how this play affected the young students’ assembly as a whole, but you need not be Nostradamus to predict the effect on the young Jew, whose ancestry had probably resided in Damascus for generations. I remember that one Muslim student was kind enough to say something nice to him after the class. Something about universal brotherhood and tolerance. I’m not sure the Jew believed him, but it was a nice gesture nonetheless.

What Shakespeare intended when he wrote this play is beyond my grasp. The aim of Syria’s Ministry of Education, however, was unmistakable: indoctrinating the students against Israel in particular and Jews in general. Lest anyone have a doubt about it, not long ago Syria’s Minister of Defense authored a ridiculous book about the Damascus Affair in 1840. Sadly, there exists no shortage of gullible consumers of this trash.

Something inside me hesitated at accepting Shylock as the villain Shakespeare possibly intended him to be, the infamous “pound of flesh” notwithstanding. I felt his anger against Antonio was understandable and justified. I also felt that the punishment he was to endure at the conclusion of the play was tendentious, unwarranted, and vindictive. There clearly were two different standards for justice, one for Christians and another for Jews, likely for all “others”.

 But the title I chose for this essay was not about a Jew; it was about an Arab. Actually, you can insert whatever denomination you want, and it would still be valid, provided we are talking about either a minority member or an underdog. What applies to a Jew would, mutatis mutandis, apply to an Arab. You can’t legitimately complain about the mistreatment of Arabs and Muslims (terms often confused in the West) in America and Europe when you tolerate the abuse of minorities at your own place. Stereotyping Jews is the mirror image of stereotyping Arabs, hence my choice for this title.

Arab Americans

On August 2nd, 1990, Saddam Hussein unleashed his disastrous invasion of Kuwait. Bush XLI immediately drew a “Line in the Sand,” and Operation Desert Shield followed suit. The reaction on the Arab street in the Middle East is not the subject of this essay. I will restrict myself to very briefly describing the dilemma that all of a sudden faced Arab Americans.

To be sure, Saddam enjoyed some support in certain Arab American circles, disillusioned with American policy in the Near East and readily willing to applaud any challenger of the status quo. Prominent Arab American leaders, however, quickly and wisely denounced the Iraqi leader’s reckless adventure, hoping against hope to contain the crisis through diplomacy before it was too late. Their efforts, along with those of liberal Americans, however, were promptly frustrated by POTUS, hell-bent on war as a convenient way out of his domestic difficulties. Desert Shield duly mutated into Desert Storm as Arab Americans, overwhelmingly against striking Iraq no matter how they felt about Saddam, watched from the sidelines with shock and disbelief.

American Middle Eastern policy often clashed with Arab aspirations. One American administration after another reflexively supported Israel against its Arab neighbors. What happened during the fateful 1990-1991 Kuwait crisis, however, was QUALITATIVELY and QUANTITATIVELY different and unprecedented. For the first time the USA directly attacked a major Arab country and on such a massive scale as to render Israel’s raids puny by comparison. It has kept going from bad to worse since. Desert Storm begat the sanctions, the sanctions begat the Iraq Liberation Act, and the latter in time culminated in “Operation Iraqi Freedom” in 2003, direct US occupation at a time when men believed that old-fashioned colonialism belonged in the dustbin of history. Where have Arab Americans been hiding? How could they allow Arab fortunes to sink that low? Were they really that helpless? I shall try to answer some of these questions.

According to the Arab American Institute, Arab Americans number about 3.5 million. They are mostly of Levantine ancestry and Christian faith. The oldest and most assimilated communities originated in Syria—for the most part from modern Lebanon—and settled in North America about a century ago. The great Ǧibrān was one of them. The legendary surgeon Michael DeBakey was another. Some of them chose a political career: James Abourezk, Ralph Nader, John Sununu, Spence Abraham, Darrell Issa, and quite a few more. More recently, the percentage of Muslims from Arab ancestry has been rising through immigration and a higher birth rate. To summarize, Arab Americans constitute a little more than 1% of the US population. This may not sound like much until you remember that the far more vibrant and influential American Jewish community is not much larger, about 5.3 million (the actual population of Arabs & Jews in the USA varies depending on the source). What is the secret behind the ascendancy of American Jews, and can Arab Americans ever hope to catch up with those formidable rivals? Should they even try? And more pertinently, should they even consider American Jews as rivals?

The achievements of American Jews are impressive. At a governmental level, they are all over the executive, legislative, and judiciary. The sheer number of US Jewish congressmen, senators, and Supreme Court justices is mind-boggling given the size of their community. Jewish scientists, doctors, lawyers, financiers, writers, and philanthropists have written brilliant chapters in the history of mankind. American Jews make their country proud. Their status was well earned, and it has not been obtained overnight.

Like Arab Americans, American Jews mostly started as immigrants with limited resources. Their parents went out of their way to provide for the education of their kids, and in time it paid dividends. Like Arab Americans, they were, and still are, a small minority in this great country. What they lacked number-wise, however, was amply compensated by dedication and hard work. They supported each other while loyally serving their adopted country. Theirs was a success story, an epic.

American Jews span the political spectrum. They certainly are not a monolith, and they disagree on numerous issues. They are, of course, unanimous on fighting anti-Semitism and helping their less fortunate brethren overseas, as is the case of the Russian Jews. Most of them, though by no means all, support Israel. Often with passion.

Arab Americans’ assets, in theory at least, are far from negligible. Many, if not most, are fully assimilated and have been present in this country for generations. All are enfranchised. And, as stated above, several are active in politics and should, in theory at least, be able to influence American political discourse. Certainly some tried, but with such modest results as to border on irrelevance. What went wrong?

A major stumbling block, in my opinion, has to do with the identity of Arab Americans. Do they really have more in common than is the case of the Arab countries from which they originated? If not, then calling them a community would be a stretch, possibly a huge exaggeration. Aside from religious and cultural differences—themselves quite significant—they have different and sometimes contradictory agendas. It is true that the rank and file of Arab Americans more or less agree about Israel-Palestine, but this, alas, is no longer the only issue and, judging by modern trends, may soon be delegated to the background as other tragedies unfold. Besides, it is not enough to agree to oppose something, say Israeli aggression; what is sorely missing is a positive common agenda.

Back to the basics. Should an Arab lobby be created? Should an Arab-centered political pressure group copy and paste the Israeli lobby’s tactics, reflect them in a mirror, and project that reflection on Capitol Hill and elsewhere? Perhaps, but...

Arab Americans are, and should emphasize at every turn that they are first and foremost loyal Americans. Responsible citizens who abide by the law, cherish the Constitution, pay their taxes, vote regularly, and see that their kids get the best possible education. First things first. Political influence can wait. Meanwhile, here are a few measures that could be feasible:

1. This can’t be overemphasized: vote! Voting is a privilege we were denied in our birthplace and, used judiciously, could potentially be a powerful tool. Voting “tribal” is wrong and counterproductive. Vote not for a congressman just because he or she happens to be an Arab American. Before you deploy your vote or donate to an electoral campaign, look at the candidate's voting record. We live in the age of information technology, and your representative’s votes are relatively easy to track. You would be surprised to find self-proclaimed Arab American lawmakers voting for the Iraq Liberation Act, the Patriot Act, and the Syria Accountability Act, not to mention money for Israel’s military machine.

2. There is nothing wrong if you happen to be a Conservative Arab American. Indeed, it helps if Arab Americans spread across the political spectrum, but a word of caution: we are a minority, and historically speaking, minorities belong on the left side of the aisle. What applies to Jews, African Americans, and Muslim Americans, would also apply to Arab Americans. That leads me to the next point.

 3. Jews are also divided between the Right and the Left, but the majority of them are quite leftist and liberal. Just like Arab Americans, they are only too conscious of their minority status and are therefore mostly sympathetic to other minorities. Let me carry this argument to its logical conclusion: there are far more in common between Arabs and Jews in the USA than there are differences. No, we don’t have to agree on Israeli-Palestinian politics, though quite a few liberal Jews are indifferent, critical, and sometimes even hostile to Israeli policies, but we can agree on much else. Jewish leaders have often championed the cause of Arab and Muslim Americans before and after the tragic events of September 11. How about trying to enlist Jewish support to deal with the Iraq tragedy? It might be well worth the effort.

4. By enlisting Jewish support I of course mean joining the cause with the liberal Jewish establishment. Jewish hawks and warmongers certainly exist, and it goes without saying that they are natural enemies to all liberals and not just Arab Americans. By the same token, you don’t have to join Ms. Darwīš’s "Arabs for Israel, ”and you definitely don’t have to seek membership in the Reform Party of Syria—it hardly has any members besides Mr. Ġādrī himself, a Quisling by any objective measure. One more thing, never conflate Israeli and Jewish. This has been a deliberate policy of the Israeli government, and there have been too many gullibles among the Arabs to oblige.

5. One day there would hopefully be peace in the Near East. One blessed day mankind would hopefully abandon religious fanaticism and national jingoism. One day Arab and Jew would hopefully live in peace everywhere. We can only hope… until then, let's join hands with our fellow Americans, all Americans, but mostly the liberals and progressives, to build a better world for our children and grandchildren.

 An Arab lobby, if and when it sees the light, should concern itself as a matter of priority with the welfare of Arab Americans. A dignified and prosperous Arab American community could then serve as a bridge between the Old World and the New to the mutual benefit of both.

Syria’s Quest II

Caught doing something that he shouldn’t, any child—and perhaps most adults—would react by either innocently denying that he did what he did—that is, you are supposed to trust his word and disbelieve your own eyes—or immediately shifting the blame to someone else, typically another child. Two classic defense mechanisms as delineated by Anna Freud: denial and projection. In Arabic there is a saying roughly translated like this: “He hit me and cried; he preempted me and complained.” To watch a kid doing it is funny. To watch your own kid doing it, you would probably find it cute, even adorable. The sight of an adult behaving in such an immature manner could be appalling and contemptuous. How about the spectacle of legions of intellectuals, historians, and literati doing precisely that, year after year after year?

Syria’s history has unfortunately been written in this manner and with this mentality. Did I say SYRIA’S HISTORY? Pardon me. What I meant, of course, is the HISTORY OF THE ARAB HOMELAND (al-Waṭan al-ʿArabī). For you see, the Syrian social studies and school curricula in the second half of the twentieth century acknowledged no Syrian identity. Syria was but a region (quṭr) of the vast Arab Homeland, and its geography and history were not really much more important to Syrian students than, say, the geography and history of Egypt, Iraq, Palestine, etc. There was no Syrian nation, be that actual Syria (made in France) or the Greater Syria peddled by the SSNP. What existed was an ARAB NATION (al-ʾUmmā alʿarabīyyā) and an Arab homeland. Modern Syria was a product of European colonialism. The Arab Homeland, on the other hand, was the genuine item. At least that was the official narrative back in the 1960s and 1970s. Though largely discredited in the eyes of many since, it has not quite died out as of yet.

Let’s trace the myth back to its very beginning. Who are those Arabs collectively grouped in one nation? Where did they come from? How did they conquer a vast empire to edify their prodigious civilization? And how did this brilliant Arab nation and Arab homeland disintegrate?

One might be tempted to link Arabism and Islam together and therefore designate the career of Muhammad and the Arab Conquests in the 7th Century CE as the point of departure for the Arab’s Eternal Mission (the Baath’s slogan). That’s wrong, of course. The Arab Nation is much older than that. The Semites, after all, were Arabs, all of them: Amorites, Canaanites, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Egyptians, etc. Those were the good guys. The bad guys, that is, the guys who fought the “Semite Arabs” and invaded the “Arab Homeland,” were the Hebrews (the Hebrews were of course Semites since the term “Semitic” refers to a language family that also includes Arabic and Aramaic), Persians, Romans, etc. The “Semite Arabs” built brilliant civilizations: they spearheaded the Agrarian Revolution, created the world’s first alphabet, pioneered the pottery wheel, etc. The invaders, on the other hand, left chaos and mayhem. Sargon of Akkad, Ashurbanipal of Nineveh, and Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon were great conquerors. Not so with Cambyses of Persia or Pompey of Rome, evil invaders and usurpers.

So the tale is something like this: in the beginning, the Semite Arabs led the Ancient World with their prowess and innovation until others, outsiders, overwhelmed the Arab Homeland and subjugated the Arab Nation. The Greeks were succeeded by the Romans and then the Byzantines in the West, whereas Persia loomed large in the East, starting with the Achaemenid Cyrus all the way to the Sassanid Khosrau.

But the Arab Nation staged a brilliant comeback in the 7th century CE as benevolent warriors thundered out of Arabia to deliver their Semitic brethren throughout the Near East from Byzantine and Persian yoke and reestablish justice and prosperity wherever they went. In no time a vast empire was created stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to Turkestan in the east and from Asia Minor in the north to the Indian Ocean and the African Sahara in the south. Mankind could not be happier under Arab’s enlightened rule, as the caliphs judiciously promoted science, commerce, agriculture, justice, order, etc. 

This utopia lasted about 200 years, from the mid-7th century to the mid-9th century CE, when the Abbasid Empire fell victim to conspiracies orchestrated first by a cabal of back-stabbing Persians and secondly by ungrateful, barbarous Turkish soldiers. Naturally the Arabs tried to fight back, as, for example, when Hārūn ar-Rašīd massacred the fire-worshipping Barmakids, but in no time the Hydra grew more heads, and Arab dominance virtually ended when Ṭāhir brought al-ʾAmīn’s head to his caliph and master, al-Maʾmūn. Muʿtaṣim tried to counterbalance the Persians’ menace by importing soldiery from Tukistan. It worked for him, but a generation later, al-Mutawakkil was killed by his Turkish Praetorians. The death of al-Mutawakkil sealed the fate of Arabs’ glorious history for hundreds of years to come. Myriads of foes unleashed their murderous hosts on the Arab Homeland. To the Turks were added the Mongols, the Crusaders, the Mamelukes, and many more. The Middle Ages ended with an under siege Arab Nation.

The European Renaissance, followed by the great geographical discoveries and the Rise of the West (a classic book by William McNeill), announced the beginning of the end for the Islamic civilization, of which the Arabs were no longer the leaders and torchbearers. Of course Arabs were not to blame. Centuries of “occupation” by Crusaders, Mongols, Mamelukes, and Ottomans suffocated the Arab genius and impoverished the Arab homelands. Arabs were ruled by greedy, reactionary, and unscrupulous despots. They were overtaxed and oppressed. Towards the end of Ottoman rule, there were even malevolent attempts to stamp out Arab identity and “Turkify” the Arab Nation.

 Arabs sought Europe’s help against the Ottomans. The British promised Arab independence in exchange for Arab collaboration in the Great War against Turkey. Arabs fulfilled their part of the bargain only to be betrayed to the British. The Ottoman occupation gave way to European colonization. The British and the French divided the Arab homelands among themselves and looted Arabs’ natural resources. Next came Zionism and neocolonialism, a.k.a. imperialism. Arabs' age-old struggle against occupation and injustice goes on. It is an almost four thousand-year story.

Pseudo history, romantic naïveté, and outright self-deception aside, this is not an effort on my part to exonerate “them.” Syria, the “Arab Homeland” or whatever else one might want to call it, was indeed invaded by countless adventurers, and the affair was more often than not quite bloody. I just have a few reservations to make:

1. There are no heroes or villains in the saga. Arabs also invaded other lands as well as each other. Their wars, contrary to the official narrative, were often just as bloody as that of their rivals. The epithet as-Saffāḥ was coined for a reason, to give but one example.
 2. To engage in a blame game is an exercise in futility. Of course others have their interests, and they more than likely would attempt to achieve them at your expense. You have to assume that they are rivals and plan accordingly. Their intentions are not important, good or bad. The important part is their capacity to harm and their deeds; consequently, what counts is your own capacity to dissuade would-be aggressors. Let them concoct all the conspiracies they want; if you’re strong, it won’t matter.
3. Projection is the bane of modern Arab thinking and politics. It is little but an excuse to sit idle and blame everyone else for your shortcomings. It is a recipe for inaction. It is time to discard this useless attitude and adopt a new one. How about "Perhaps I did something wrong; let me see what I can do to correct my mistake”?

I would like to conclude with this anecdote. Not too long ago I watched an altercation on al-Jazīrā TV between a Syrian “progressive” and another guest. The exchange was moderated by Fayṣal al-Qāsim. What was interesting about it was that, according to the Syrian guest, “our” backwardness was mostly due to the nefarious effects of the barbarous Arab invasions! Great! Not only do we have Persians, Romans, Ottomans, Europeans, Zionists, and imperialism to blame, but we also now have Arabs, the new villain of the day. Everyone is after us. The thing is, who is “us”?

Syria’s search for an identity goes on.

Are Alawites Muslims?

You’ve got to love the Internet. At last modern technology allows one to bare  body and soul—provided, of course, you hide your face and real name—and suffer virtually no consequences. This is, by the way, what I am about to do today. Please bear with me, and my intentions will soon reveal themselves as I strip naked, metaphorically of course, piece by piece.

Once upon a time, I was surfing the net. I felt bored and drifted to YouTube to run into what was at the time a new clip of Dominique Hourani with the cute name of “Khashooka”. Dominique is certainly no Fairuz, not by a long shot; she nevertheless has what it takes to attract a fairly wide audience in the Arab world thanks to her pleasing voice, playful antics, and youthful beauty. Like many of her peers, she can fluently sing in different accents: Lebanese, Egyptian, Khaliji, and perhaps more. Her clips are fun to watch, particularly after a long and tiresome day.

Watching the girly dances of Dominique and listening to her singing, the last thing to come to mind, at least as far as I’m concerned, would be religion and politics. Yet, this is exactly what I bumped into that day as an added bonus to watching the clip. Allow me to elaborate.

I don’t know about you, but I often look at the number of viewers of a particular clip that interests me and, very briefly, browse through the comments. With a young woman of Dominique’s type, the vast majority of the comments are adoringly enthusiastic; few are negative, needless to say. By the way, I do not, as of yet, have a YouTube account and therefore do not post comments on that site. My comment on that particular clip, or rather my comment on some of its comments, I hereby confine to this blog. Sorry for the lengthy introduction. Let's proceed into the theme of this essay without further ado.

For that particular clip, Khashooka, Dominique chose an accent that I could not readily identify. One commentator (A), evidently smarter than I am, opined that she was singing with a Syrian accent (mind you, Syria has a multitude of accents). A second one (B), not to be outdone, objected that she was using not a Syrian but a Nuṣayrī accent! A third one (C) furiously retorted something very close to “So Alawites are not Syrians then? We will continue to lord it over you for the rest of your life, you animal." 

Now I found, and still do, this brief exchange fascinating. Commentator B, echoing no doubt quite a few Sunnis (perhaps ultra-Sunni, Salafis, and/or Wahhabis), NOT ONLY DID NOT CONSIDER ALAWITES MUSLIMS, HE EVEN RULED THEM OUT AS SYRIANS. Well, at least it sounded this way to Commentator C and yours truly! Viewed through this prism, the outrage of Commentator C was fully justified, his foul language notwithstanding. I might add that it should not take an Alawite to resent and abhor such a racist and bigoted attitude. This is sad, but unfortunately that is the way it is.

Let’s put this little story in its proper context. Back in 1973, a Syrian constitution was proposed that failed to specify that the president should belong to the Muslim faith. There was enough restlessness in the country that President Ḥāfiẓ al-ʾAsad felt obliged to take two landmark steps: the first was to amend the constitution in order to calm the Sunni opposition, and the second was to get the late Imam Mūsā aṣ-Ṣadr of Lebanon to issue a fatwa acknowledging the Alawites as Šīʿā Muslims. Syria has been living with the consequences of those decisions ever since, with no sign that the issue would be buried any time soon.

So let’s resume from the very beginning. The Alawites are certainly Syrians in the full meaning of the word, and, with all due respect to Commentator B, to claim or even imply otherwise would be preposterous, to put it very politely. What about their Islamic identity?

This may sound like a more relevant question, and, excuse me, gentle reader, if I disappoint you, I will not provide an answer, and here are my reasons as to why:

1. It is up to the Alawites, and only to the Alawites, to define their own identity. If they choose to wave the flag of Islam, any sect of Islam, that would be enough for me to consider them Muslims. Should they state that they are Alawites and not Muslims, I would have no objection to that whatsoever. Were they to hide their faith altogether or to have no faith at all, I would not find it problematic in the least. I am a firm believer in liberal values, and to me, everyone should be able to define who he or she is. I will go further and say that an Alawite should also be able to choose the way to be called. If he finds the label Nuṣayrī offensive, for instance, then it behooves me to abstain from using it.

2. It is a disgrace that the Syrian Constitution should address the president’s faith at all. OK, so Alawites are Muslims; what about Christians, Yazidis, Druze, Ismailis, atheists, agnostics, and Jews (hardly anyone of the latter group is left, but that’s another story)? Are they second-class citizens? Since Syria is mostly Muslim, it is unlikely that a non-Muslim would assume the presidency anytime soon, but why does the Constitution have to specify it in writing?

3. Syria is supposedly a modern secular state and is admittedly more tolerant of its minorities than most countries in the Near East. Wouldn’t the logical next step be to separate church from state?

4. The Muslim Brotherhood and similar Sunni groups resent being ruled by what they consider a heretical minority. This is the wrong way to oppose the Syrian regime. There exists no shortage of legitimate objections to the way Syria is governed, its president’s faith (or the lack thereof) is not and should not be one of them. The President owes Syria’s Sunni community respect, not more or less than he would any other Syrian community. He should not have to bow and prostrate in the mosque if he does not want to. Many, if not most, West European leaders are declared atheists, and their peoples don’t seem to mind (to be sure, this is not so in the USA; all American presidents are at least officially devout Christians, some, from all available evidence, genuinely and deeply so, but I digress)*.

To conclude, I would add that the Near East has not moved beyond the religious state yet. We have a Jewish state (Israel), a Wahhabi state (Saudi Arabia), and a Šīʿā state (Iran), to name but a few. Religion as a remedy, however, is bound to kill the patient in Syria, the mosaic of which is such that imposing conformity would shatter an already fragile sectarian balance and quite likely lead to an Iraq- or Lebanon-like scenario. A nightmare to contemplate, let alone live through. I very much doubt that my arguments would impress Commentator B and his ilk, but I felt I had to add my two cents.

* US President George W. Bush and Jacques Chirac of France reportedly once had a discussion about Iraq when Mr. Bush told his French counterpart that a dream-like vision of Gog and Magog was one factor in his decision to invade/liberate Iraq. Monsieur Chirac had to confer with some theologians to understand what the American president was talking about.