WASHINGTON, DC — One of the frightening lessons one learns from spending time in Washington, DC is that most of the men and women who make or influence American policy in the Middle East actually have little or no first-hand experience in the region. They know very little about its people, or its political trends at the grassroots level — as the Iraq experience reconfirms so painfully.

American policy-making throughout the Middle East remains defined largely by three principal forces: pro-Israeli interests and lobbies in the United States that pander almost totally to Israeli government positions; an almost genetic, if understandable, need to respond to the 9/11 terror attack against the United States by politically and militarily striking against Middle Eastern targets; and, the growing determination to confront and contain Iran and its assorted Sunni and Shiite Arab allies.

A significant consequence of Washington’s deep pro-Israeli tilt has been to ignore public opinion throughout the region, which in turn generates greater criticism of the United States. It is not clear if American policy-makers ignore Middle Eastern public opinion because of ignorance and diplomatic amateurism, or because of the structural dictates of pro-Israeli compliance.

This is a regrettable situation, given that we now know quite well the sentiments of the majorities of people in most Middle Eastern lands. A significant factor in people’s attitudes to the United States is its policy towards Israel and Palestine. Other issues also influence how Middle Easterners see the United States — such as Iraq, oil, and promoting democratic-or-autocratic regimes — but the Palestinian-Israeli conflict remains a huge determinant of America’s standing in our eyes.

Also, a historic new mindset has developed in recent years as a result of the consistent and often growing criticism of the United States and Israel: a penchant for militancy and defiance that continues to spread around the region, transcending Iranian-Arab, Shiite-Sunni, or secular-religious divides that are so often highlighted and exaggerated in Washington’s distorted view of the Middle East.

I have argued for years now that a new spirit of populist defiance, resistance and self-assertion is the single most important strategic development in the Middle East. Large numbers of Arabs, Iranians and Turks — hundreds of millions of people — have shed their legacy of passive acquiescence in their own suffering, weakness, marginalization and victimization. Instead, they are determined to take their fate into their own hands, and to challenge and checkmate those who would keep them in their previous vulnerable, dehumanized state.

At the domestic level, more and more people around the Middle East actively demand, and when possible work to craft, a life and society that offer them more human dignity and citizen rights. These include such basic issues as security, opportunity, socio-economic needs and expressing their cultural or political identity. At the regional level, this spirit of self-assertive defiance is more difficult to manifest or actualize, but it comes through very clearly in people’s attitudes, which are now well captured in public opinion polls.

A powerful new analysis of this phenomenon has just been published in Washington by the Brookings Institution, and deserves close study by anyone interested in the Middle East. The study by Dr. Shibley Telhami, the respected University of Maryland professor and senior fellow at the Brookings’ Saban Center, is entitled Does the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict Still Matter? Analyzing Arab Public Perceptions. It reviews public opinion polling data from six Arab countries during the period 2002-2008.

He concludes that, “the Arab-Israeli conflict remains a central issue for most Arabs…. [and] the prism through which most Arabs view the world.”

He adds that the Arab public consistently and overwhelmingly judge the United States according to its policies, not its values, and that the role of the Arab-Israeli conflict in forming people’s view of the United States remains very important. Most of the Arab public believes that the United States attacked Iraq in order to help strengthen Israel, and Arabs see Israel and the US as their two main threats. Israel and the United States are connected in the minds of most Arabs “in a way which makes anger with one hard to separate from the other.”

The leaders of Hizbullah, Hamas, and Iran rank highest among those whom Arabs respect, Telhami explains, primarily as a sign that Arabs like militants who defy the United States and Israel. This sense of defiant militancy seems to be spreading throughout the region. The gap between “militant” publics and conservative regimes also is growing in the Arab world, he says.

The importance of these findings is their consistency over time, and their verification through multiple questioning methods.

Of course, Washington policy-makers and think tank zealots who prefer to ignore these realities, and instead act mainly on the basis of pro-Israeli inclinations or arm-twisting, are free to do so. The cost, however, becomes more obvious for those who wish to see the real world as it is: massive, region-wide militancy and defiance, anchored squarely in resistance to American-Israeli aggression.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 07 July 2008
Word Count: 822
—————-

WASHINGTON, DC — The November presidential election looms as a moment when the United States may seriously review its approach to many issues in the Middle East without any clear indication today as to which policy direction will prevail. Between now and then, however, the Bush administration seems increasingly pressed to decide what to do about Iran’s growing nuclear technological capabilities, especially its uranium enrichment facilities.

The striking aspects of US foreign policy in the Middle East these days, compared to a decade or two ago, are the sheer scale and complexity of American involvement throughout the region — which is almost exactly mirrored by Iran’s web of military, ideological and economic ties with many partners around the same region.

This makes it much more difficult for the United States (or Israel) to strike militarily against Iran’s nuclear facilities in the near future. Yet it is hard to see tough guys like George W. Bush and Dick Cheney simply slip out of office and retire to their respective ranches in January while Iran’s 3000+ cascaded centrifuges are furiously spinning away and producing the enriched uranium that is vital for a nuclear industry — whether that industry produces electricity, bombs or anything else of value.

The US dilemma in Iran is compounded by two other factors. First, it is likely that in 2009 the United States will start gradually withdrawing its troops from Iraq, and, second, the six principal diplomatic mediations now taking place in the Middle East (involving Lebanon, Syria, Hamas, Hizbullah, Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, in various combinations) are all occurring without major or direct American involvement.

So is the United States a rising or a receding power in the Middle East? What should the Bush administration do in its last six months in office, especially vis-à-vis Iran? These questions recur in many conversations in Washington among both those who are knowledgeable and ignorant about the realities of the Middle East. My sense is that most basic US foreign policy goals in the Middle East are not being achieved, as Washington finds itself bogged down in an ideological stalemate with a combination of antagonistic indigenous forces led by Iran, Syria, Hizbullah and Hamas.

A stalemate is not a defeat that requires retreat; it is a balance of power between two sides that are roughly evenly matched. This may change, and the big question is whether change might occur due to military action, or diplomatic initiatives.

A report in the New Yorker magazine this week says that the Bush administration continues to fuel and fund anti-regime operations in Iran, with the approval of senior congressional leaders. At the same time, an Israeli military exercise last week has been widely interpreted as a signal that Israel cannot forever watch Iran develop its nuclear capabilities without trying to knock out those facilities.

Diplomatic activity by Israel on four fronts — Syria, Hizbullah, Hamas and the Palestinian National Authority — may simply be a trick to give the impression of diplomacy triumphing over militarism, some analysts believe. These skeptics expect Israel or the United States to attack Iran soon.

I suspect that this is unlikely, because Iran has already achieved that which it says it seeks: full mastery of the nuclear fuel cycle, including uranium enrichment. Since this is the season for guessing and predicting in the Middle East, given the paucity of hard facts or credible knowledge of the main players’ intentions, I would expect the US and Israel to finally accept the reality that a military strike, no matter how punitive, would only temporarily set back Iran’s nuclear capability — because the technological knowledge is already in Iran’s hands and cannot be destroyed with bombs.

Furthermore, the destabilizing consequences for the Middle East, and for global energy and economics, are so massive that it is difficult imagining this scenario unfolding. The alternative is diplomatic negotiations that would meet the legitimate and reasonable needs of the key parties, namely Iran, the United States, Israel, Europe and the Arab neighbors. Iran could continue to develop its existing nuclear industry, but with stringent international inspections and safeguards under the rules of existing treaties and conventions that prevent the development of nuclear weapons.

The political enmity among Iran, Israel and the United States could be dealt with through serious political engagement, starting with a negotiated resolution of the Arab-Israeli crisis. The framework for an Arab-Israeli peace settlement is available. It only requires more seriousness and fairness from Israel and the United States. Israel’s three most serious enemies in the neighborhood — Syria, Hizbullah and Hamas — are in fact negotiating with it already.

For the United States or Israel to attack Iran now would seem foolhardiness of the greatest magnitude — something these two countries have proven themselves capable of doing over and over again. The rational cost-benefit analysis today, however, seems to favor a diplomatic solution.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 02 July 2008
Word Count: 807
—————-

OSLO — The confrontation between Iran and many Western and Middle Eastern countries reflects a number of different contentious issues that are unlikely to be resolved soon, or to be resolved at all by American or Israeli military attacks against Iran’s nuclear facilities. It is striking how little contact there is between Americans and Iranians, let alone Israelis and Iranians. Much of what we hear about Iran is filtered through usually biased Western media.

So it was a real treat for me earlier this week to listen to former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami speak at a conference I attended in Oslo, and then sit down with him and some colleagues after his talk to share some pretzels, orange juice, and good conversation.

Khatami is important for several reasons: his sensible and humane ideas, his reformist Islamist ideology, and his determination to engage with the West and the world in a frank and mutually beneficial dialogue. Most importantly, though, he is not a lone voice. He was twice elected president of Iran (1997-2005) and, according to Iranians who closely follow public opinion trends within the country, he still enjoys significant support among the public.

My occasion to chat with him was the sixth Oslo Forum Network of Mediators, sponsored by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Geneva-based Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue. This annual gathering brings together several dozen of the world’s most experienced mediators and conflict resolution practitioners, for off-the-record discussions on the craft and politics of making peace and resolving conflicts.

Khatami was an appropriate guest, both for his efforts to promote reconciliation and for his country’s stressful relations with many in the West. While he is unlikely to run for president again — the dominant ruling elite would almost certainly prevent that from happening — his views deserve wider attention, because they offer important insights into sentiments among many, perhaps most, ordinary Iranians.

He spends much of his time these days fulfilling his duties as founder and president of the Foundation for Dialogue among Civilizations, and also serves on the UN Secretary-General’s High Level Group for Alliance of Civilizations. Both of these lofty groups focus their work on improving relations between Islamic and Western societies.

His main message is about the importance of dialogue, which he distinguishes from debate and negotiations, as a means to improve mutual understanding. Here’s where it starts to get slightly mushy — but remember, this is the twice-elected president of Iran — when he says that “the basis of dialogue is kindness and fellowship.”

The relationship between some Western powers and the Islamic region is badly distorted and a cause of tension and conflict, he believes, because of two unfortunate phenomena. The policies of some leading Western powers are characterized by hegemony, double standards, and violence, while much of the Islamic region suffers humiliation, backwardness, and dictatorships. This makes peace an impossibility.

Khatami suggests two things necessary to overcome this confrontational situation: a feeling of justice instead of fear and subjugation, and a culture of understanding instead of hostility. The West must see the Islamic East as a partner, not an adversary, with the security of both enjoying equal weight. Dialogue and negotiations should start without preconditions, he feels, and should reflect several common factors.

The East and West have common worries about insecurity in their worlds, and both can share the common goal of a world of peace, without aggression. If such common factors can be activated, he suggests, and both sides are prepared to talk to one another on the basis of mutual respect — rather than domination — we could define a common roadmap to achieve democracy, peace and security.

“Democracy must serve the interests of its own people, not foreign powers,” he adds, noting that it needs time to take root. “The West needed 400 years to establish democratic societies, so we should not expect Islamic societies to have instant democracy after an election or two.”

Khatami is a charmer and a dreamer, but that is not why we should listen to his words carefully and ponder his challenges seriously. We should do that because his views may reflect the sentiments of a majority of Iranians. Yet those majority sentiments do not drive Iranian government policies these days, which are defined rather by the more hardline policies of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

If most Iranians share Khatami’s penchant to “let the voice of wisdom, democracy and justice in Islamic societies be heard in freedom,” it would seem worth the effort for the major Western and Arab powers to craft foreign policies that test those sentiments and let them emerge. Foreign powers and the Iranian people seem to suffer the opposite reality: Pressures, sanctions and threats against Iran allow the hard line leadership to consolidate its power, and to silence the majority’s more benign tendencies.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 30 June 2008
Word Count: 803
—————-

WASHINGTON, DC — I do not usually take my cue for columns from the US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights and Oversight. But today I make an exception. I want to publicize the findings of a report the subcommittee just published, based on ten hearings it held. The report, “The Decline in America’s Reputation: Why?” is the first of three the subcommittee will publish (the others are on the “impact on US national interests” and “recommendations”).

The subcommittee members concluded that they hoped the Bush administration would take their comments and suggestions in a spirit of partnership for which they were intended, and that “the media would remind foreign audiences that this sort of interaction is typical of the complex competition of views that creates our democratic foreign policy.”

So, yes, sirs and ma’ams of the Committee, this particular member of the media is delighted to spread the word about the strengths of the American political system when it is working well: This report is a symptom of a deeper and wider phenomenon that I have encountered during my current extended stay in the United States, a refreshing self-assessment and soul-searching taking place in Washington about US foreign policy and the world’s perception of the United States.

The United States seems finally to be turning a corner in the war of ideas — also called “the battle for hearts and minds” — that it has been waging for some years. This change is from the self-deceiving fake contest that intellectual charlatans such as Tony Blair, Karen Hughes, and Donald Rumsfeld have trumpeted for some years now — with their combination of hapless mediocrity, collective failure, and eventual removal from office. The battle now is to face important issues with intellectual honesty and realism — rather than romanticism — as drivers of global policy, and of the integrity of America’s assessment of itself, its policies, and its role and place in the world.

In discussions with several former senior government officials and a few others who still serve the Bush administration, a common theme and tone prevailed in their willingness to assess that which the Washington power structure and the prevalent American media mindset have refused to touch since September 2001: Why is criticism of the United States rising steadily around the world?

This capacity to ask the right questions about hard issues like one’s own global ostracism and self-marginalization reflects the best in American political culture and personal values. Policy self-correction is a central element in successful democracies, and an important reason why most people around the world respect the American system, while vehemently disliking many of its specific foreign policy actions.

The promise of a new American administration in January, regardless of who is elected president, signals an opportunity to fix what is wrong and build on what is right. This report (available at www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/11042566.pdf) lists eight main factors that the subcommittee identified about “the levels, trends and causes of international opinion of American policies, values and people.” The eight findings are:

• It is true that United States approval ratings have dropped swiftly around the world;
• This decline is driven by opposition to specific American policies, not to America’s values or people;
• It also reflects a sense that the United States has hypocritically ignored its own democratic values in its foreign policies;
• American unilateralism has aggravated criticism of the United States;
• American domination of others lingers for years, and discredits current policies;
• Visitors to the United States, especially students, have more positive views of the country than non-visitors;
• the often heavy-handed visa and immigration experience creates the impression that Muslims, in particular, are not welcome;
• The combination of all these factors causes many Muslims to feel that the United States is using the “global war on terror” as a cover for its attempts to destroy Islam.

The report notes the silver lining amidst the world’s criticism of Washington’s policies: Because its core values are respected, the United States has something to work with to turn around the dramatic decline in its global standing. It also notes the “key finding that emerges from the data… that substance matters, of course, but style does too.”

It makes the point that aggressive rhetoric impacts on perceptions of others, especially when it is backed up by unilateral action.

This is an important report for what it reveals about America and its place in the world — both the criticism that the United States receives, and the respect that it elicits. This is not an easy exercise for any country. Those political leaders and systems that do subject themselves to honest self-criticism emerge stronger for it.

This is one reason millions want to emigrate to the United States, Germany and Canada, and why we have few reports of young men or entire families trying to sneak into Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Iran or Algeria.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 25 June 2008
Word Count: 810
—————-

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The balance of talk and action in the Middle East has not swung from war-making to peace-making, but it is inching in that direction — testing the negotiating waters. I am less skeptical than most observers on the meaning of simultaneous Israeli negotiations respectively with Syria, Hamas, Hizbullah, and with the Palestinian Authority – not to mention Israel’s offer to negotiate directly with Lebanon.

But beware simplistic or extreme interpretations: This is neither a dramatic, purposeful shift from wasteful war to a humane approach of nonviolent conflict resolution, nor a meaningless, coincidental convergence of happy negotiators. A few things do stand out in the current situation:

First, this is the third time in three years that Hamas has forced Israel into accepting a cease-fire, after Israel tried every aggressive, punitive, and occasionally barbaric, means to compel Hamas to surrender and change its ways, including starvation, strangulation, mass imprisonment, hundreds of assassinations, severe political sanctions, and ostracization. Three times in three years, David Hamas has forced Goliath Israel to sit down and talk — the stuff of biblical epics.

Second, Hamas’ performance and posture are indicative of wider trends and have probably pushed Israel into exploring diplomatic possibilities instead of relying mainly on its ability to kill and colonize Arabs and relying on Washington’s blind support, which verges on criminal complicity in Israel’s disregard of international law and UN resolutions.

The technical and political dimensions of this seem obvious: At the technical level, Hamas has clearly improved its prowess in protecting and hiding its rocket launchers, giving it the ability to keep firing rockets at Israel despite the repeated Israeli attacks. At the political level, Hamas has absorbed important lessons from Hizbullah, Syria, and Iran in terms of standing up to and absorbing Israeli-American attacks and ultimatums, without collapsing.

Third, Israel seems to have grasped the fact that Washington’s advice is lethal – maybe even fatal — and best ignored when real Israeli national interests are at stake. The United States has persistently pushed Israel either to boycott or attack Hizbullah, Hamas, and Syria, and instead Israel is now negotiating with all three of them at once.

The assertion of Israeli perspectives over American ones in this realm is healthy — because Israeli policy will always be shaped by realistic and existential dictates, while American policy towards the Arab-Israeli conflict is largely dictated by a stunning combination of spinelessness, shamelessness and senselessness.

These are historic new developments in Arab-Israeli relations. We will find out in the coming months if the current penchant for negotiation will expand into a serious regional peace process. Many domestic and external factors will determine the outcome of current negotiations. One thing is certain, though: The Palestinian-Israeli conflict will reassert itself as the core issue that must be resolved if we hope to transform a troubled, violent region into a place where people can live more normal, peaceful lives.

All the peace talks taking place these days will eventually stall and collapse if the Palestinians remain split and Israeli-Palestinian negotiations come to an end. The urgent need to re-establish order, efficacy, and legitimacy in domestic Palestinian governance is now the single most important issue facing the Arab world, because it could impact positively on so many other regional issues.

With the Hamas/Gaza-Israel ceasefire in effect, now is the time for Palestinians to move quickly to resolve their internal disputes, reconfigure a single, credible Palestinian government, and revive a serious peace negotiation with Israel. Palestinians should take advantage of the current ceasefire, act on the lessons learned from the last ten years of Israeli-Palestinians dynamics, and explore again the possibility of negotiating an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

This requires two critical elements that are now missing: a unified, credible, legitimate and efficacious Palestinian government with a clear strategy for negotiating with Israel; and, renewed integrity of the political unity of the entire Palestinian people.

The first requires a Hamas-Fateh unity government that also draws in other key domestic players. This is widely demanded by the Palestinian people and should not be hard to achieve — if the political leaders act like adults rather than children. Various Arab parties would welcome the opportunity to host talks to achieve a unified Palestinian government.

The second element requires reviving the institutions of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and consulting with Palestinians in the diaspora, including those living in refugee camps throughout the Arab world. Only a unified Palestinian government that legitimately speaks for all the Palestinian people has a chance of achieving meaningful progress towards a negotiated and fair peace with Israel.

The Arab Peace Plan is there as an agreed, reasonable negotiating context, and Hamas has already made it clear that it will abide by the democratic decision of the Palestinian people on the issue of coexistence with Israel.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 23 June 2008
Word Count: 795
—————-

WASHINGTON — Like everyone else in the world, Americans care about how they are perceived by others. Unlike most other countries, though, the United States is characterized by three distinct attributes: It is the world’s single most powerful country; it uses its economic, military and diplomatic power to try and change conditions around the world for the better (to promote freedom, democracy and prosperity, it says); and it is widely disliked and feared in many parts of the world.

How those three attributes relate to one another remains an enduring issue of debate here in Washington and around the world. Is the widespread criticism the United States elicits a function of the Bush administration’s policies, or is it a structural problem that any global power is fated to suffer, mainly due to envy?

More and more global polling data helps us clarify this. The just released Pew Global Attitudes Project’s seventh global poll since 2002, covering 24 countries, shows that the Iraq war since 2003 still gives the United States a negative image abroad, in the Arab-Islamic world and also among some Western European allies (France, Germany and Spain). Iran also was viewed negatively, so Washington is in good company.

Positive views of the United States have increased sharply in a few countries (Tanzania, South Korea, Indonesia, China, India, and Poland). In about half the countries, favorable views of the United States have increased modestly in the past year. Partly this reflects positive expectations that American policy will improve when George W. Bush is no longer president — dubious cause for celebration in the White House.

In the case of the Middle East, the US image problem seems anchored in its policies, not envy of its status. Take a look at the tattered balance sheet of where Washington has succeeded or failed in its goals, and what impact its policies have had on the Middle East.

In only two and a half areas has the United States clearly achieved its Mideast policy goals: preventing another major terror attack on American soil; promoting more liberal economic policies, including more free trade agreements with Arab countries; and, implementing the international tribunal to try those to be accused of assassinating Rafik Hariri and a dozen other public figures in Lebanon (this is only half a success because Syrian influence in Lebanon has not been eliminated).

In virtually every other area, Washington’s Mideast policies have failed to achieve their goals, or have backfired spectacularly and made things worse for US interests and allies.

Democracy promotion has led to a regression in democratic freedoms in most Arab countries and Iran, causing most native democrats in the region to shun any involvement with the United States. To make democracy promotion with American assistance a dangerous endeavor for Middle Easterners is an astoundingly amateurish foreign policy.

Washington’s pressure on Syria and Iran has not caused either of the latter to change their policies significantly, but rather has prompted them both to become more defiant. Iran is developing a full nuclear fuel cycle, and who knows what Syria is trying to do behind the scenes. Worse yet for Washington, its close ally Israel has ignored its advice to boycott Syria, Hizbullah and Hamas, and instead Israel has entered into negotiations with all three of them simultaneously (and wisely so, given the ineffectiveness of Washington’s sanctions-based approach). The Israeli-Hamas ceasefire announced this week is good news for both sides, and a gigantic bellyflop for Washington.

The Islamist movements the United States has actively opposed — including with military force by US proxies — have become stronger in recent years, politically and militarily. Hamas and Hizbullah have both forced Israel to accept cease-fires in recent years, and play major roles in governing their countries. The conservative Arab leaderships that are central allies to the United States remain in autocratic mode, often losing ground at home to Islamist, tribal, nationalist, democratic and other forces. Iran continues to make inroads among Sunni and Shiite Arab groups.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan did overthrow the previous regimes, but did not replace them with stable democracies, and led to a significant increase in the power of Islamist groups close to Iran, or warlords, or narcotics syndicates.

Terrorism in the Middle East is worse now than it was seven years ago. Arab-Israeli peace-making remains flaccid, while Israeli colonization continues apace, oblivious to US rhetorical slaps on the wrist. The United States has steadily marginalized itself as a diplomatic actor and mediator, where once it was the central protagonist. And, the oil-based energy world is in shambles, along with the US’ own economy, heavily due to American war-mongering and destabilizing activities in the Middle East.

The list of American foreign policy failures and weaknesses in the Middle East is long, and grim. People in the region notice, and they react critically when a major power helps to make their societies increasingly violent and dysfunctional, adding fuel to the fire of the Middle East’s own intemperate statehood and mediocre governance systems.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 18 June 2008
Word Count: 831
—————-

WASHINGTON — The 9/11 attack against the United States happened nearly seven years ago — time enough, you would think, for the United States to come to grips with the causes and nature of terror. I am puzzled by how American society as a whole, with few exceptions, continues to react to the terror phenomenon with heated anger, rather than the cold analysis required to understand and defeat it.

As Americans conduct their foreign policy with the expressed aim of reducing terrorism, their policy often has precisely the opposite effect of increasing and stimulating terror in a whole new generation of youth.

Americans tend broadly to express understandable anguish about terror that emanates from Islamic societies. They point to conditions — poverty, dictatorship — and institutions — radical mosques, madrasas — that they see as the main cause of terrorism. Having lived in predominantly Islamic societies most of my life, my sense is that a more useful approach would be to ask why individual Muslims occasionally become radicalized to the point where they engage in terror, including suicide bombings where they take their own life, while the overwhelming majority does not accept or practice terror.

A healthy debate is underway in the United States on this issue, as more and more Americans undertake the hard research and analysis required to grasp what transforms ordinary young men and women into inhuman killers. One important discussion revolves around the argument by Marc Sageman, author of the books Understanding Terror Networks and the more recent Leaderless Jihad. Sageman, a sociologist and forensic psychiatrist, argues that the major terror threat around the world today does not emanate primarily from Al-Qaeda and its centrally planned spectacular operations.

Rather, he says the new wave of terrorism that more urgently requires our attention “is composed of homegrown young wannabes who dream of glory and adventure, who yearn to belong to a heroic vanguard and to root their lives in a greater sense of meaning. Inspired by tales of past heroism, they hope to emulate their predecessors, even though, for the most part, they can no longer link up with al-Qaeda Central in the Pakistani badlands. Their potential numbers are so great that they must now be seen as the main terrorist threat to the West.”

The key to Sageman’s analysis is his understanding that the process of radicalization of ordinary young men and women comprises two elements: their own life conditions, and their outrage at seeing other Muslims mistreated around the world. His book Leaderless Jihad offers strong evidence for the fact that we now witness a “third generation” of Islamist jihadi warriors or terrorists who see themselves as defending the entire Islamic community of believers: after Osama Bin Laden and colleagues in Afghanistan, and then the young men who conducted the 9/11 operations.

Today’s third generation comprises individuals who do not connect with Al-Qaeda, but become radicalized in their home communities all over the world, and hook up with others through networks mainly organized on internet chat forums. Sageman summarized his analysis concisely in a recent newspaper op-ed article: “The process of radicalization consists of four prongs, which need not occur in sequence. Here’s the recipe: having a sense of moral outrage; seeing this anger as part of a ‘war on Islam’; believing that this view is consistent with one’s everyday grievances; and mobilizing through networks.”

One of the terrible ironies of the past seven years has been that governments purporting to fight terror actually may be promoting it. The American-led global war on terror, heavily pro-Israeli Middle Eastern policies, and invasion of Iraq, plus the increasingly repressive police and security operations of Arab and Asian regimes, and the many Arab-Asian domestic political systems chronically frozen in their autocratic mode all play a role in the radicalization of a new cohort of terrorists.

The most potent intersection of radicalizing vectors is between an Arab citizen’s mistreatment by his or her own government, and seeing other Muslims assaulted, mistreated, jailed and killed in their own homes by American, Israeli, or other foreign armies. This is compounded by leading Western political leaders who routinely speak of radical Islamic violence and terror as being the greatest threat of this generation. That exaggerated nonsense, demagogic political rhetoric, and dangerous confluence of ignorance and vengefulness by leaders who appear totally obsessed by an ugly phenomenon is what baffles Arabs (and terrorizes their own Western citizens).

And these Western leaders only aggravate the terror threat by adding to it their own fear-mongering politics, moral mediocrity, and intellectual confusion.

Important breakthroughs are being made in scholarly analyses of terror threats in the United States and other lands, but the parallel political and policy advances that could help to alleviate the terror phenomenon remain largely absent in the United States. It is no surprise that terror remains a global growth industry that is changing shape, but not losing force.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 16 June 2008
Word Count: 806
—————-

For rights and permissions, contact:

rights@agenceglobal.com, 1.336.686.9002 or 1.212.731.0757

WASHINGTON, D.C. — On my first day in Washington, D.C. at the start of a two-month summer fellowship, I was reminded of the special and unique qualities that define erratic foreign policy-making in the United States. A story in Monday morning’s Washington Post reviewed remarks last week by former State Department senior official Elizabeth Cheney to the leading pro-Israeli lobby group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

What was striking about her remarks was her capacity to continue out of office the same intensity and breadth of incompetence and failure that defined her years as principal deputy assistant secretary of state until early 2006. The gist of her comments included statements that the Annapolis peace process was misguided. The United States had not pressured Syria enough. The United States was at its best when it was tough and decisive. And the United States was “fundamentally mistaken” to push for elections in Gaza in 2006 that were won by Hamas.

Here’s a particularly representative quotation: “In my view, this administration has gotten it right when we have been bold, when we have been decisive, when we have been focused, when we have used our military force when necessary.”

The amazing but troubling thing about this sort of thinking in Washington is that it perpetuates an aura of toughness, while disregarding the catastrophic consequences to America’s standing and influence abroad as a direct result of these failed policies that rely so heavily on guns — instead of sensible analysis and quality diplomacy. Elizabeth Cheney is like an intellectual and ideological cluster bomb that keeps exploding, and killing and injuring people, years after it has been dropped and fallen out of sight.

She is not alone, of course, for her views accurately reflect those of a once robust population of neo-conservative political leaders and obsequious technocrats in Washington, which has been severely depleted by defections, indictments, and dismissals. The neo-cons’ greatest legacy, to date, has been a collective failure that many of them simply refuse to grasp.

Here’s another Cheney gem from her AIPAC remarks: “I think that getting back to a situation where our enemies in the region understand that America will stand up for its friends, that America will stand up for its principles and that we have red lines is critically important.”

This sort of blindness to the realities of the real world is not inherited from her father, Vice President Dick Cheney, who holds similar views. No, this is self-made madness. The misguided nonsense that she espouses is so profoundly wrong and so intensely inane that it has to be generated by a life-long process of adult intellectual regression and political chicanery. Her father will not do it, so someone among her circle of friends should take her aside and quietly tell her that while she gets the accolades of the AIPAC audience, virtually the entire rest of the world reacts to this sort of performance with a combination of personal embarrassment for her, and deep political disdain for her capacity to insult us with this sort of blind buffoonery.

The reality is precisely the opposite of what she portrays. The United States’ insistence on using power unilaterally in the Middle East, and “standing up” for its friends by stoking domestic battles and mini-civil wars in the Middle East, has turned the region into a cauldron of intemperance and violence. It is precisely when the United States has been “bold, decisive and focused” that it has generated enormous resistance to its policies throughout the region, put its allies in more vulnerable situations, strengthened the forces of Islamist militancy, stoked the furnace of terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and even given democracy a bad name.

It is incomprehensible to me that someone like Elizabeth Cheney, whose responsibilities included promoting democracy and human rights, would argue against holding elections in the Palestinian territories. Now she argues that it was a mistake to push for the elections, when in fact the real mistake was for Washington to spinelessly fall in line with Israeli dictates and boycott the victorious Hamas party.

The right thing to do would be to honor the essence of the democratic process, and bring Hamas and Israel into an honorable diplomatic process that aspires to achieve the equal rights of both people. Only once did I meet Elizabeth Cheney while she was in office and watch her perform, and what I saw and heard then was frightening in her misdiagnosis of the cause of the tensions in the Middle East, and brutal in its misdirected intellectual violence. It is saddening to see her persist in this same vein. She is among the last of a dying breed, these few performers on a horror show stage that has been largely deserted by its public audience, and thankfully is soon to be shut down forever.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 11 June 2008
Word Count: 806
—————-

For rights and permissions, contact:

rights@agenceglobal.com, 1.336.686.9002 or 1.212.731.0757

BEIRUT — Now that the Republican and Democratic parties in the United States have chosen their presidential candidates, we might expect some thoughtful discussion of the issues that concern the American people at home and abroad. Viewed from the Arab world and the wider Middle East — including Turkey, Israel and Iran — the results of the American election will have enormous impact on the condition of this region.

The people and leaders of the Middle East follow the US election with special interest, for three main reasons: 1) America’s presence, policies and potential, i.e., its wide, deep and growing military presence and ideological ferocity in the region; 2) the Arab-Islamic-Iranian resistance to these; and 3) the potential for constructive, mutually beneficial American-Middle Eastern engagement.

The American presence in the Middle East today is much more extensive, complex, and varied than it was a few decades ago when the Arab-Israeli and the Cold War conflicts were the only defining parameters of its engagement. Today the United States fights, and foments national transformations in Iraq and Afghanistan; rhetorically nudges Arab autocrats to reform (without resorting to any real muscle or sincerity); fights Islamist movements everywhere; and, essentially gives Israel everything it seeks — militarily, economically, and diplomatically.

The United States is not a foreign actor in the Middle East, but a leading local player. It has toppled two regimes along with their entire political orders and state structures in Afghanistan and Iraq. It has sanctioned several others in Iran, Syria, Sudan, and the Hamas-led part of Palestine. And it has made clear that it plans to stay, and throw its weight around, for many years. Its strategic aims go well beyond the traditional ones of protecting Arab allies, preserving Israel’s dominance over everyone else in the region, and ensuring the free flow of oil.

Rather than a sentinel watching over the area to protect its interests, Washington now operates more like a brain surgeon or software engineer, penetrating deep into the inner workings of Middle Eastern state and governance systems, to transform them into something more compatible with US values, interests, and worldview.

With dozens of military bases in the region and 170,000 troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States is the leading regional player. Along with Israel, Turkey and Iran, it is the fourth party of the quadripartite security architecture of the Middle East, and the most aggressive one in many respects. The next US president could well determine if and which Middle Eastern societies go the troubled way of Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine and other fractured lands.

Consequently, the Arab-Islamic-Iranian people of this region have not remained docile in the face of this new reality. A few people fight back militarily when they encounter direct American or Israeli military occupation. But most react peacefully and politically.

The most available and meaningful option available to them is to join mainstream Islamist, tribal, or political movements that are primarily defined by their opposition to the United States, Israel, and the dominant ruling Arab regimes. The single most powerful political force in the Middle East in the past decade, consequently, has been Islamo-Arab nationalism.

This is predominantly a reactionary movement, defined by resistance to the prevailing rule of Arab-American-Israeli political ideologies, which touches the concerns and fears of many ordinary Arabs and Iranians. But it probably has a limited lifespan, because it does not provide a clear, credible policy program for constructing stable, prosperous, liberal and tolerant societies that the majority of people in this region aspire to.

Defiance and resistance are exhilarating short-term stimuli and endeavors but they are not sustainable, long-term policy programs or national visions. They will persist, however, as long as American-Israeli and most Arab regime policies continue in their current form, resulting in sustained violence and waste for all concerned.

This need not be the case. Tensions between the United States and assorted Middle Eastern governments are offset by considerable convergences in the values, behavior and aspirations of the people of both societies. Numerous public opinion surveys — not to mention everyday experiences among those Americans, Arabs, Iranians and Turks who live together in the Middle East — indicate beyond doubt that these peoples suffer no serious cultural clash of values.

The existing problems reflect deep differences over policies, not values. More sensible and democratic Arab and Iranian state policies, along with less violent and predatory American and Israeli policies, would quickly reverse the recent trajectory of anger, fear and violence that has defined many US-Middle East dynamics (such as the policy changes, for example, that transformed the American-Vietnamese relationship in the past generation).

The people of the Middle East and the United States have enormous pent-up demand — and a strong inclination — to embrace each other in the political, economic, social and even security fields, once they all enjoy state policies based on respect and equality, rather than the current horror show of Arab autocracy, Iranian thugocracy, American militancy, and Israeli colonialism.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 09 June 2008
Word Count: 819
—————-

For rights and permissions, contact:

rights@agenceglobal.com, 1.336.686.9002 or 1.212.731.0757

CAIRO — The Egyptian parliament’s decision last week to extend emergency rule for another two years — including sweeping emergency powers to detain citizens indefinitely — reflects an exaggerated reliance on heavy-handed police methods to govern and keep the peace. Visiting Cairo this week, I became more convinced that this is a counter-productive approach, and one that Arab governments should quickly reconsider before they do irreparable damage to their societies.

One-party ruling elites that have been in power for three to four decades find it easier to clamp down quickly, or even preemptively, on troublemakers and opposition forces, than to seek stability through orderly politics, equitable economic growth, and the rule of law. Beyond the few wealthy oil-producing welfare states, the double stresses of steady prices increases and persistent political autocracy are causing grave damage to the Arab national fabric. They lead to a slow fraying at the edges of social orders, economic forces and political systems that had held steady in most Arab states since the 1920s.

The political institutions that should provide a mechanism for resolving disputes, solving problems, and agreeing on consensus policies are slowly degrading in most Arab countries. Parliaments, political parties, elections and most civil society and non-governmental organizations have all suffered from steadily eroding credibility and declining impact.

This is partly due to the phenomenon that is so visible here in Egypt, where the state uses heavy-handed security measures to crush any potential opposition, including jailing thousands of opponents. The Muslim Brotherhood, the largest opposition group, claims that 50,000 of its members have been repeatedly arrested, tried, jailed and released since the start of the emergency laws era in 1981.

The continued use of emergency laws for 27 years non-stop suggests that the basic institutions of Arab governance are decaying. This is also reflected in other recent developments in Egypt: violence between police and demonstrators during labor strikes and food price protests in the Nile Delta town of Mahalla, and clashes between Muslim and Christian citizens in the Minya region, in Upper Egypt.

Egypt is not an isolated case. Many top-heavy, security-focused Arab governance systems end up breeding increasing frustration at the community and household levels, instead of fostering order and stability.

Ordinary Arab citizens who endure the prolonged, self-inflicted decay of their governance institutions have no real options. Even those who turned to Islamist movements have seen some of those groups lose credibility, when they proved unable to break through the hardened firewall of political control that the ruling elite erected around them in many countries. In the past year Islamist parties that had previously done well in elections fell back in countries like Jordan and Morocco.

This is a troubling sign, because it reflects one of two things that are equally dangerous: Either the state is fixing the elections and gerrymandering the electoral districts to strangle the Islamists, or masses of ordinary citizens have lost confidence in the Islamists’ move into electoral politics. When security clampdowns, emergency laws, fraudulent elections, and heavy-handed and preemptive arrests are normal operating procedures for Arab political systems, most citizens slowly drift away from civic and political engagement. They seek refuge in tribal, family, communal or religious identities. Some embrace the corruption of the prevailing system. A few emigrate legally or illegally. An even smaller number join terrorist groups.

The bulk of the citizenry, with no real options, become passive, indolent, and angry, in some cases feeling dehumanized that their own societies treat them with the same disdain that they had experienced previously from foreign colonial occupiers.

The most dangerous consequence of states and governments turning to security-based governance and control — when a rule of law system would do much better — is that this makes violence first routine, and then the norm. This is compounded by the fact that all native and invader governments in this region — Arabs, Israeli, Turkish, Iranian, American and British — now routinely use violence against their own people or their foes.

The lesson for all, however, should be that the gun does not produce security, stability or docility. It only turns once law-abiding citizens into numbed and angry people who feel they have little stake in a system that does not treat them like human beings. Agitated, demeaned, pauperized and fearful for their children’s future, they start to resist and defy their own power elite. Ultimately, some strike back, initially with passive resistance, strikes, and peaceful protests; when those outlets are blocked, they use the violence that they see being used against them by their governments and their governments’ foreign backers.

The Arab world is destroying itself from within by relying more and more on emergency laws, when it needs more rule of law and independent judiciaries.

Rami G. Khouri is Editor-at-large of The Daily Star, and Director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, in Beirut, Lebanon.

Copyright © 2008 Rami G. Khouri

—————
Released: 04 June 2008
Word Count: 786
—————-

For rights and permissions, contact:

rights@agenceglobal.com, 1.336.686.9002 or 1.212.731.0757