Identity and Memory
Here are three pieces dealing with a central topic in ME affairs: identity narratives. The first is by obsolete relic and Pan-Arab propagandist, Patrick Seale. The second is by liberal Egyptian playwright, Ali Salem. I had alluded to it in my previous post. Finally, the third (Arabic) is by Syrian thinker Nabil Fayyad.
Seale's piece, if you can actually figure out what it's about, repeats age-old clichés of the Arab nationalists, especially the Pan-Arabists. It's also quite derivative in a more direct sense, drawing on other people's works, and not producing any coherent synthesis.
As usual, you have your musts:
"Indeed, Lebanon's problems - and its present dependence on Syria - are part of the general crisis which has afflicted the region since World War I, when Britain and France, to suit their own imperial interests, carved up the Arab provinces of the defeated Ottoman Empire. After World War II, these powers were forced to make way for the regional ambitions of the United States and of its local ally, the newly emergent state of Israel, which today, in their turn, seek to dominate and subdue the Arabs.
What further evidence of these ambitions is required than America's war in Iraq and Israel's ruthless oppression of the Palestinians, together with the inability of the Arab states to confront or contain either one or the other?"
Yawn...
And while we're high, let's add some more Arabist psychedelic hallucinations:
"The early fragmentation of the region into rival states, often harboring irredentist grievances against each other, as well as the repeated interventions by outside powers, have gravely compromised the Arab struggle for independence. Most Arabs would themselves admit that the goal of full independence has not yet been achieved, and remains tantalizingly out of reach."
This passage in a nutshell exemplifies how silly the Arabists and their cheer leaders (i.e. Seale et al.) are. It puts forth contradictory points, based on a common confusion between "independence" and "Pan-Arab unity."
Seale's basically complaining that the völkisch destiny of the "Arab nation" has been heretofore hindered by the "imperialists" and the "outsiders." Being the relic that he is, he hasn't realized that all this garbage is long gone. Sati' al-Husri is dead, thank the Lord.
Moreover, the notion that the imperial powers "fragmented the region into rival states, often harboring irredentist grievances against each other" is problematic on two levels: 1- it assumes that the region was/is a homogenous Arab geo-political whole, that was unnaturally broken up. 2- It's paradoxical and self-defeating as it runs counter to the earlier claim! If the states are rivals and "harbor irredentist grievances against each other" then the notion of an Arab nation marching towards its destiny rests on shaky grounds indeed!
But Seale is on a bad trip bent on reinventing Husri and all the Arabist fools. That's why he quotes the drivel by Raymond Hinnebusch:
"To many Arabs and Muslims, the struggle with imperialism, far from being mere history, continues, as imperialism reinvents itself in new forms. The Middle East has become the one world region where anti-imperialist nationalism, obsolete elsewhere, remains alive and where an indigenous ideology, Islam, provides a world view still resistant to West-centric globalization."
That must make nice tea-time conversation among idiotic principled Third-Worldists, but frankly, it's utterly boring.
Anyway, after all this standard sleepy-time trash, Seale jumps to what supposedly was the point of his piece -- Lebanon and Arabism. He just had to stop and recite the creed for an hour before actually coming to the point!
Once again relying on others' work, Seale regurgitates Raghid el-Solh's book:
"Solh describes how Lebanon developed from being a "foyer of French influence" and a "Maronite homeland," into a country with an "Arab face," as declared by President Bishara al-Khuri and Prime Minister Riad el-Solh, leaders of the first independent state in 1943."
There's a basic anachronism here. The Lebanon he's talking about is in fact two different political entities. The idea of a Maronite or Christian homeland was not extended to Greater Lebanon which included large numbers of Muslims. That's why Emile Edde was opposed to the annexation of, e.g., Tripoli and Sidon because they would create a demographical problem and eliminate the idea of a majority Christian homeland.
Seale moves on to recite Solh's story line of modern Lebanon:
"This formula was meant to "accommodate both the aspirations of the Lebanese nationalists for safeguarding the country's sovereignty and independence and the unionist aims of the Arab nationalists." But, as Solh explains, the "Arab face" formula left a door open to differing interpretations of Lebanon's Arabism.
Lebanese nationalists took it to mean that Lebanon was less Arab than other Arab states; for some it even implied being "non-Arab," an attitude which led to controversial alliances with other anti-Arab forces in the region. Fierce Lebanese particularism led, in addition, to attempts to exclude Arab nationalists from politics and Parliament, and thereby hampered the development of Lebanon's democracy and civil society."
Oh those nasty Lebanese nationalists (read Maronites)! I wish Seale would have given specific examples, as there were plenty of Arab nationalists in high places of government all along! Secondly, who exactly attempted to exclude Arab nationalists from Parliament!? Parliament members are elected not appointed. Was there a conspiracy in the elections aimed at excluding Arab nationalists!? What nonsense!
Furthermore, nowhere in Seale's cute historical sketch is there any mention of the attempts by Nasserist Arab nationalists at undermining the state. Of course not, because after all, that's the "Arab nation's destiny." Also, there is no exploration of why Lebanonists rejected Arabism as their identity, and the problems created by the pressure for Arabization.
Seale then enlightens us with Solh's simple cure for Lebanon's ills:
"Solh argues that for Lebanon to have developed into a foyer of democracy in the Arab world, it would have had to internalize and develop the principles and institutions of democracy, to create mass parties cutting across sectarian differences, and to play a more active role in the Arab collective system, especially in the 1940s, when the ruling elite in Lebanon was on close terms with the ruling elites in other Arab states."
I see. How wonderful, and so simple too! In fact, it's utterly simplistic and useless. Seale doesn't examine why there were no "mass parties cutting across sectarian differences." In fact, he doesn't even explain the meaning and function of "sectarianism" and how that functioned vis à vis the state, creating a consociational system of limited central government. Of course not, because Seale believes in the heavily centralized governments of the Arab order. But here again, he fails to elaborate. What on earth is "the Arab collective system?" Lebanon went in on the Arab League. But the charter of the Arab League itself reflected not the anti-imperialism that Seale is babling about. Rather, it reflected deep distrust among the members! It set forth rules and regulations on how no Arab state should interfere in the affairs of another. Of course, this went in opposition to the basic tenet of Pan-Arabism!
Needless to say, this agreement was never really implemented. That's why you had Nasser napalming Yemen, Syria bombing and invading Lebanon (and before that attempting to pressure Lebanon into the ill-fated United Arab Republic), and Saddam's Iraq invading and brutalizing Kuwait, etc. Further still, the war of 1948 was, as Joshua Landis and Elie Kedourie before him have argued, not a war against Zionists as much as it was a war (pushed for esp. by Syria) to counter a levantine Pan-Arabist dream by Abdullah!
But all this is brushed aside in an instant, as it interferes too much with Seale's hallucinatory trip. That's why he writes:
"The 1948 Arab defeat, in particular, was seen as a defeat of Arabism, which eventually contributed to the disarray of Lebanese Arab nationalists."
He brilliantly misses the point! The military defeat of 1948 per se was not the defeat of Arabism! The defeat of '48 was very much anticipated by Quwwatli, and his going to war was not to defend Arabism, but exactly the opposite: to prevent it from undermining Syria's independence. For Syria's role in 1948, see Landis' essay -- which is the best of the bunch -- in Eugene Rogan and Avi Shlaim (eds.), The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948 (Cambridge, 2001). A longer version of that article is available online, courtesy of Joshua Landis.
But Seale's incoherence continues:
"The chapter entitled "Greater Lebanon and the League of Arab States" is a masterly analysis of how the politician Henri Pharaon and other "Mediterraneanists" managed to bring down the government of Riad el-Solh, largely because they saw the Alexandria Protocol of 1944, which he helped draft, as a blueprint for an Arab supra-state or federation. In Cairo in 1945, when the Arab League statutes were being finalized, Pharaon, then Lebanon's foreign minister, managed to water down the protocol and replace it with a minimal form of Arab cooperation - no doubt a source of the league's present ineffectiveness."
So Riad el-Solh was working toward a Pan-Arab vision of sorts. Wait, I thought Arabists were kept out of Lebanese positions of power. He must have slipped in. Seale is once again playing the song of "nasty people cutting the wings of the Arab nation, preventing it from fulfilling its destiny." So Henri Pharaon is now singlehandedly responsible for the dysfunction of the Arab League! He basically did via peaceful diplomatic means what Quwwatli tried to do with a catastrophic war, doomed to failure! He tried to safeguard the Republic from a super-imposed Pan-Arabist arrangement. After all, that was the spirit of the Lebanese pact of '43 that Seale mentioned! But of course someone has to pay, and for Seale it's those "Mediterraneanists."
Then comes the great finale, the peak of vagueness and abruptness:
"However, Solh comments that Syria's "special relationship" with Lebanon was "not necessarily rooted in Arab nationalism." As they contemplate their future, Syrians and Lebanese should read and ponder Raghid el-Solh's rich text."
Marvelous. What the hell does this mean!? Seale provides no answer, ending his piece on this ambiguous note. He's only interested in snickering at the label "Mediterraneanist."
Unfortunately for Seale, that label is not restricted to "misguided" Lebanese Christians. Ali Salem resurrects and reformulates that very same label, that was once championed by Taha Hussein. Not only is it an alternative to Arabism, it doesn't have any of its hang ups toward the West:
"You may consider me one of its [the Mediterranean] followers or disciples, and definitely I'm one of its residents. I still remember that I used to stare at its surface looking to the far horizon, as if I wanted to see my neighbors there, in Italy, Greece, Spain and France. They are Europe and I'm Africa. We are neighbors, separated by two continents, unified by one sea."
It's a vision that's built on a far more complex understanding of identity. Salem has no problem incorporating Arabic into his construct, he simply doesn't agree that identity should be singular and homogenous, or exclusively Arab:
"The Arabs are my fathers, but the Egyptians are my forefathers; do you advise me to inherit from my fathers and ignore the treasures left to me by my forefathers?"
It's a vision that is also at peace with the pre-Arabo-Islamic era and heritage:
""Egypt itself is of the Mediterranean," I responded. "One day, thousands of years ago, this sea was just a lake, crossed by ships loaded by thoughts and art toward Greece, carrying the product of minds and souls, returning from there, loaded with other products of minds and souls.""
Later in the piece, Salem also invokes his love and appreciation of Pharaonic Egypt, and incorporates it into his Egyptian identity.
Notably, this is a vision that exalts a "globalization" of sorts, based on cosmopolitanism (cf. Adnan al-Atasi's attraction to the Greek Polis in his Azmat al-Hukm fi Souriya, "The Crisis of Government in Syria" (1951). I owe this reference to Joshua Landis) as well as international relations and trade of goods and ideas. As such, it's a vision that's strikingly similar to the Lebanese Mediterraneanists, or Phoenicianists. I mentioned Michel Chiha before, and his quasi Braudelian model based on the mountain and the Mediterranean, as well as mercantilism. Despite its problems, it resonates well with Salem's vision.
Like I said earlier, this is a reformulation of a vision championed by Taha Hussein. On that point Albert Hourani paraphrases Hussein:
"[S]he [Egypt] was herself one of the creators of Mediterranean civilization, and throughout ancient times the tide of influence flowed both ways between her and Greece." (Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798-1939, p. 331).
One crucial difference between this view and Arab nationalism, a difference that allows a complex construct of identity, is one that Hourani notices and that is that Arab nationalism is based on German ideas, while Mediterraneanism is based on French and even American models.
Indeed, Sati' al-Husri based his vision on Fichte and Herder and their language-based nationalism, while totally rejecting Renan's nationalité elective. Therefore, to anyone who had a more complex identity, or a varying narrative, Husri had this to say:
"Every Arab-speaking people is an Arab people. Every individual belonging to one of these Arabic-speaking peoples is an Arab. And if he does not recognize this, and if he is not proud of his Arabism, then we must look for the reasons that have made him take this stand. It may be an expression of ignorance; in that case we must teach him the truth. It may spring from an indifference or false consciousness; in that case we must enlighten him and lead him to the right path. It may result from extreme egoism; in that case we must limit his egoism. But under no circumstances, should we say: "As long as he does not wish to be an Arab, and as long as he is disdainful of his Arabness, then he is not an Arab." He is an Arab regardless of his own wishes. Whether ignorant, indifferent, undutiful, or disloyal, he is an Arab, but an Arab without consciousness or feeling, and perhaps even without conscience." (Translation from Adeed Dawisha, Arab Nationalism in the Twentieth Century: From Triumph to Despair [Princeton and Oxford, 2003] p. 72. See also Martin Kramer's "Arab Nationalism: Mistaken Identity".)
It is precisely this spirit that Salem's satire is making fun of, as well as the equally fascist spirit of Islamism:
""You didn't mention that you are an Arab," he pointed out.
"The Arabs are my fathers, but the Egyptians are my forefathers; do you advise me to inherit from my fathers and ignore the treasures left to me by my forefathers?" I asked him.
"I don't advise you, I order you."
"Who are you sir, to order me?"
"I'm the mohtasib (inspector) of the Nile Valley Street."
"Show me your papers."
"They are standing in front of you now. I'm the person and the document."
"Who gave you the right to ... ?"
"I gave it to myself."
"What is it that you want sir?"
"For you not to think of the Mediterranean," he replied.
"I couldn't do that, even if I wanted to."
"You are thinking in a dangerous way. You don't belong to the Mediterranean or to Egypt or to Africa. You belong to the kingdom of God and you are one of His subjects."
"The whole universe belongs to His Almighty Kingdom, but I have an address, a place of residence, a location, a site, a history, laws, a constitution ... I have rights.
"You have to forget the sea. Did you try to enjoy the charms of the sands?"
"Look sir, I love deserts, forests, lakes and valleys, but I'm mad about the sea."
"So I'm talking to a mad person."
"Yes, if that answer makes you happy.""
This is also in many ways a reenactment of the Husri-Hussein debate over Arabism (I owe this insight, as well as the reference below, to Lee Smith). Hussein correctly diagnosed Arab nationalism and its Pan-Arab vision as a fanatical reformulation of Islam, a charge that Husri vehemently denied. For a discussion, see Bassam Tibi's Arab Nationalism, pp. 186-88.
Nabil Fayyad also takes on the pillar of Husri's system, namely language, and its applicability to Syria (all my translation):
"[N]one of the aforementioned elements [i.e. language, religion, some common history] apply to Syria for us to say that it is a purely Arab country.
On the one hand Arabic is not the only dominant language in Syria. Kurdish for example is the language of hundreds of thousands of the Syrian people. Syriac-Aramaic is the language and origin of the Syrian people before the Islamic invasion. Add to that several important linguistic islands such as Armenian, Circassian, Dagestanian, and Turkmeni... etc."
Fayyad tries, with mixed success, to avoid the errors of Antoun Saade, which were the same errors of al-Husri (a unitary identity based on a völkisch organic view), saying:
"To talk about a singular identity for Syria misreads Syrian history, ancient and modern, and is blind to the Syrian demographic reality which is built on pluralism."
But he goes beyond that to address the same Mediterraneanist idea that Salem adopts, with its cross-cultural interaction:
"Syria has always been part of the Mediterranean civilization established by the Greek philosophers, who were in turn influenced by the ancient Syrian epistemological repertoire."
Fayyad, paralleling Salem's metaphors of attraction to the desert or the sea, concludes:
"Ethnic identity, in our opinion which we force on no one, is not based on linguistic silliness or religious fairy tales. Rather, its basic element is cultural-epistemological. What ties us culturally, as Syrians, across ancient times, with the Mediterranean civilized peoples such as the Greeks, the Italians and the French, is incomparably stronger than what ties us to the desert Wahhabists in the Empty Quarter and Yemen and Najd."
Clearly, this concept of Mediterraneanism has serious weaknesses and needs much refinement. However, it has several advantages over the poisonous Arabism:
1- It's not defined in terms of opposition to the West. Instead, it's based on a vision of cultural and economic interaction with it.
2- It's based on a more complex and textured understanding of identity, contrary to that of Husri's Arabism. In that same spirit, Amin Maalouf writes in his Les Identités Meurtrières:
"Lorsqu'on me demande ce que je suis 'au fin fond de moi-même', cela suppose qu'il y a, 'au fin fond' de chacun, une seule appartenance qui compte, sa 'vérité profonde' en quelque sorte, son 'essence', déterminée une fois pour toutes à la naissance et qui ne changera plus; comme si le reste, tout le reste -- sa trajectoire d'homme libre, ses convictions acquises, ses préférences, sa sensibilité propre, ses affinités, sa vie, en somme -- , ne comptait pour rien." (pp. 10-11). (Transl. "When they ask me who I am 'deep down inside', that assumes that there is, 'deep down inside' everyone, one single belonging that counts, his/her 'deep truth' of sorts, his/her 'essence', determined once and for all at birth and that will never change; as if the rest, all the rest -- his/her trajectory as a free human being, his/her acquired convictions, his/her preferences, his/her proper sensibility, his/her affinities, his/her life, in sum --, counts for nothing.")
This attitude allows for admission of, and reconciliation with, all that precedes, and follows, the Arab and Islamic advent. It's a vision of pluralism, and thus true acceptance of the other as other. It's a broad vision of enrichment, not a narrow vision of narcissism.
3- It's a vision that allows for a true concept of citizenship based on a finite political entity, a country. It's not hanging onto a utopian supra-national Volk.
4- As such, it's a liberal vision, based on French, British and American models rather than a Romantic German or a fascist one.
Therefore, Peter Speetjens completely missed the point! I'll hold off on him for now, hoping to pick up on his piece and its errors in the course of the ensuing discussion. Stay tuned!
Seale's piece, if you can actually figure out what it's about, repeats age-old clichés of the Arab nationalists, especially the Pan-Arabists. It's also quite derivative in a more direct sense, drawing on other people's works, and not producing any coherent synthesis.
As usual, you have your musts:
"Indeed, Lebanon's problems - and its present dependence on Syria - are part of the general crisis which has afflicted the region since World War I, when Britain and France, to suit their own imperial interests, carved up the Arab provinces of the defeated Ottoman Empire. After World War II, these powers were forced to make way for the regional ambitions of the United States and of its local ally, the newly emergent state of Israel, which today, in their turn, seek to dominate and subdue the Arabs.
What further evidence of these ambitions is required than America's war in Iraq and Israel's ruthless oppression of the Palestinians, together with the inability of the Arab states to confront or contain either one or the other?"
Yawn...
And while we're high, let's add some more Arabist psychedelic hallucinations:
"The early fragmentation of the region into rival states, often harboring irredentist grievances against each other, as well as the repeated interventions by outside powers, have gravely compromised the Arab struggle for independence. Most Arabs would themselves admit that the goal of full independence has not yet been achieved, and remains tantalizingly out of reach."
This passage in a nutshell exemplifies how silly the Arabists and their cheer leaders (i.e. Seale et al.) are. It puts forth contradictory points, based on a common confusion between "independence" and "Pan-Arab unity."
Seale's basically complaining that the völkisch destiny of the "Arab nation" has been heretofore hindered by the "imperialists" and the "outsiders." Being the relic that he is, he hasn't realized that all this garbage is long gone. Sati' al-Husri is dead, thank the Lord.
Moreover, the notion that the imperial powers "fragmented the region into rival states, often harboring irredentist grievances against each other" is problematic on two levels: 1- it assumes that the region was/is a homogenous Arab geo-political whole, that was unnaturally broken up. 2- It's paradoxical and self-defeating as it runs counter to the earlier claim! If the states are rivals and "harbor irredentist grievances against each other" then the notion of an Arab nation marching towards its destiny rests on shaky grounds indeed!
But Seale is on a bad trip bent on reinventing Husri and all the Arabist fools. That's why he quotes the drivel by Raymond Hinnebusch:
"To many Arabs and Muslims, the struggle with imperialism, far from being mere history, continues, as imperialism reinvents itself in new forms. The Middle East has become the one world region where anti-imperialist nationalism, obsolete elsewhere, remains alive and where an indigenous ideology, Islam, provides a world view still resistant to West-centric globalization."
That must make nice tea-time conversation among idiotic principled Third-Worldists, but frankly, it's utterly boring.
Anyway, after all this standard sleepy-time trash, Seale jumps to what supposedly was the point of his piece -- Lebanon and Arabism. He just had to stop and recite the creed for an hour before actually coming to the point!
Once again relying on others' work, Seale regurgitates Raghid el-Solh's book:
"Solh describes how Lebanon developed from being a "foyer of French influence" and a "Maronite homeland," into a country with an "Arab face," as declared by President Bishara al-Khuri and Prime Minister Riad el-Solh, leaders of the first independent state in 1943."
There's a basic anachronism here. The Lebanon he's talking about is in fact two different political entities. The idea of a Maronite or Christian homeland was not extended to Greater Lebanon which included large numbers of Muslims. That's why Emile Edde was opposed to the annexation of, e.g., Tripoli and Sidon because they would create a demographical problem and eliminate the idea of a majority Christian homeland.
Seale moves on to recite Solh's story line of modern Lebanon:
"This formula was meant to "accommodate both the aspirations of the Lebanese nationalists for safeguarding the country's sovereignty and independence and the unionist aims of the Arab nationalists." But, as Solh explains, the "Arab face" formula left a door open to differing interpretations of Lebanon's Arabism.
Lebanese nationalists took it to mean that Lebanon was less Arab than other Arab states; for some it even implied being "non-Arab," an attitude which led to controversial alliances with other anti-Arab forces in the region. Fierce Lebanese particularism led, in addition, to attempts to exclude Arab nationalists from politics and Parliament, and thereby hampered the development of Lebanon's democracy and civil society."
Oh those nasty Lebanese nationalists (read Maronites)! I wish Seale would have given specific examples, as there were plenty of Arab nationalists in high places of government all along! Secondly, who exactly attempted to exclude Arab nationalists from Parliament!? Parliament members are elected not appointed. Was there a conspiracy in the elections aimed at excluding Arab nationalists!? What nonsense!
Furthermore, nowhere in Seale's cute historical sketch is there any mention of the attempts by Nasserist Arab nationalists at undermining the state. Of course not, because after all, that's the "Arab nation's destiny." Also, there is no exploration of why Lebanonists rejected Arabism as their identity, and the problems created by the pressure for Arabization.
Seale then enlightens us with Solh's simple cure for Lebanon's ills:
"Solh argues that for Lebanon to have developed into a foyer of democracy in the Arab world, it would have had to internalize and develop the principles and institutions of democracy, to create mass parties cutting across sectarian differences, and to play a more active role in the Arab collective system, especially in the 1940s, when the ruling elite in Lebanon was on close terms with the ruling elites in other Arab states."
I see. How wonderful, and so simple too! In fact, it's utterly simplistic and useless. Seale doesn't examine why there were no "mass parties cutting across sectarian differences." In fact, he doesn't even explain the meaning and function of "sectarianism" and how that functioned vis à vis the state, creating a consociational system of limited central government. Of course not, because Seale believes in the heavily centralized governments of the Arab order. But here again, he fails to elaborate. What on earth is "the Arab collective system?" Lebanon went in on the Arab League. But the charter of the Arab League itself reflected not the anti-imperialism that Seale is babling about. Rather, it reflected deep distrust among the members! It set forth rules and regulations on how no Arab state should interfere in the affairs of another. Of course, this went in opposition to the basic tenet of Pan-Arabism!
Needless to say, this agreement was never really implemented. That's why you had Nasser napalming Yemen, Syria bombing and invading Lebanon (and before that attempting to pressure Lebanon into the ill-fated United Arab Republic), and Saddam's Iraq invading and brutalizing Kuwait, etc. Further still, the war of 1948 was, as Joshua Landis and Elie Kedourie before him have argued, not a war against Zionists as much as it was a war (pushed for esp. by Syria) to counter a levantine Pan-Arabist dream by Abdullah!
But all this is brushed aside in an instant, as it interferes too much with Seale's hallucinatory trip. That's why he writes:
"The 1948 Arab defeat, in particular, was seen as a defeat of Arabism, which eventually contributed to the disarray of Lebanese Arab nationalists."
He brilliantly misses the point! The military defeat of 1948 per se was not the defeat of Arabism! The defeat of '48 was very much anticipated by Quwwatli, and his going to war was not to defend Arabism, but exactly the opposite: to prevent it from undermining Syria's independence. For Syria's role in 1948, see Landis' essay -- which is the best of the bunch -- in Eugene Rogan and Avi Shlaim (eds.), The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948 (Cambridge, 2001). A longer version of that article is available online, courtesy of Joshua Landis.
But Seale's incoherence continues:
"The chapter entitled "Greater Lebanon and the League of Arab States" is a masterly analysis of how the politician Henri Pharaon and other "Mediterraneanists" managed to bring down the government of Riad el-Solh, largely because they saw the Alexandria Protocol of 1944, which he helped draft, as a blueprint for an Arab supra-state or federation. In Cairo in 1945, when the Arab League statutes were being finalized, Pharaon, then Lebanon's foreign minister, managed to water down the protocol and replace it with a minimal form of Arab cooperation - no doubt a source of the league's present ineffectiveness."
So Riad el-Solh was working toward a Pan-Arab vision of sorts. Wait, I thought Arabists were kept out of Lebanese positions of power. He must have slipped in. Seale is once again playing the song of "nasty people cutting the wings of the Arab nation, preventing it from fulfilling its destiny." So Henri Pharaon is now singlehandedly responsible for the dysfunction of the Arab League! He basically did via peaceful diplomatic means what Quwwatli tried to do with a catastrophic war, doomed to failure! He tried to safeguard the Republic from a super-imposed Pan-Arabist arrangement. After all, that was the spirit of the Lebanese pact of '43 that Seale mentioned! But of course someone has to pay, and for Seale it's those "Mediterraneanists."
Then comes the great finale, the peak of vagueness and abruptness:
"However, Solh comments that Syria's "special relationship" with Lebanon was "not necessarily rooted in Arab nationalism." As they contemplate their future, Syrians and Lebanese should read and ponder Raghid el-Solh's rich text."
Marvelous. What the hell does this mean!? Seale provides no answer, ending his piece on this ambiguous note. He's only interested in snickering at the label "Mediterraneanist."
Unfortunately for Seale, that label is not restricted to "misguided" Lebanese Christians. Ali Salem resurrects and reformulates that very same label, that was once championed by Taha Hussein. Not only is it an alternative to Arabism, it doesn't have any of its hang ups toward the West:
"You may consider me one of its [the Mediterranean] followers or disciples, and definitely I'm one of its residents. I still remember that I used to stare at its surface looking to the far horizon, as if I wanted to see my neighbors there, in Italy, Greece, Spain and France. They are Europe and I'm Africa. We are neighbors, separated by two continents, unified by one sea."
It's a vision that's built on a far more complex understanding of identity. Salem has no problem incorporating Arabic into his construct, he simply doesn't agree that identity should be singular and homogenous, or exclusively Arab:
"The Arabs are my fathers, but the Egyptians are my forefathers; do you advise me to inherit from my fathers and ignore the treasures left to me by my forefathers?"
It's a vision that is also at peace with the pre-Arabo-Islamic era and heritage:
""Egypt itself is of the Mediterranean," I responded. "One day, thousands of years ago, this sea was just a lake, crossed by ships loaded by thoughts and art toward Greece, carrying the product of minds and souls, returning from there, loaded with other products of minds and souls.""
Later in the piece, Salem also invokes his love and appreciation of Pharaonic Egypt, and incorporates it into his Egyptian identity.
Notably, this is a vision that exalts a "globalization" of sorts, based on cosmopolitanism (cf. Adnan al-Atasi's attraction to the Greek Polis in his Azmat al-Hukm fi Souriya, "The Crisis of Government in Syria" (1951). I owe this reference to Joshua Landis) as well as international relations and trade of goods and ideas. As such, it's a vision that's strikingly similar to the Lebanese Mediterraneanists, or Phoenicianists. I mentioned Michel Chiha before, and his quasi Braudelian model based on the mountain and the Mediterranean, as well as mercantilism. Despite its problems, it resonates well with Salem's vision.
Like I said earlier, this is a reformulation of a vision championed by Taha Hussein. On that point Albert Hourani paraphrases Hussein:
"[S]he [Egypt] was herself one of the creators of Mediterranean civilization, and throughout ancient times the tide of influence flowed both ways between her and Greece." (Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798-1939, p. 331).
One crucial difference between this view and Arab nationalism, a difference that allows a complex construct of identity, is one that Hourani notices and that is that Arab nationalism is based on German ideas, while Mediterraneanism is based on French and even American models.
Indeed, Sati' al-Husri based his vision on Fichte and Herder and their language-based nationalism, while totally rejecting Renan's nationalité elective. Therefore, to anyone who had a more complex identity, or a varying narrative, Husri had this to say:
"Every Arab-speaking people is an Arab people. Every individual belonging to one of these Arabic-speaking peoples is an Arab. And if he does not recognize this, and if he is not proud of his Arabism, then we must look for the reasons that have made him take this stand. It may be an expression of ignorance; in that case we must teach him the truth. It may spring from an indifference or false consciousness; in that case we must enlighten him and lead him to the right path. It may result from extreme egoism; in that case we must limit his egoism. But under no circumstances, should we say: "As long as he does not wish to be an Arab, and as long as he is disdainful of his Arabness, then he is not an Arab." He is an Arab regardless of his own wishes. Whether ignorant, indifferent, undutiful, or disloyal, he is an Arab, but an Arab without consciousness or feeling, and perhaps even without conscience." (Translation from Adeed Dawisha, Arab Nationalism in the Twentieth Century: From Triumph to Despair [Princeton and Oxford, 2003] p. 72. See also Martin Kramer's "Arab Nationalism: Mistaken Identity".)
It is precisely this spirit that Salem's satire is making fun of, as well as the equally fascist spirit of Islamism:
""You didn't mention that you are an Arab," he pointed out.
"The Arabs are my fathers, but the Egyptians are my forefathers; do you advise me to inherit from my fathers and ignore the treasures left to me by my forefathers?" I asked him.
"I don't advise you, I order you."
"Who are you sir, to order me?"
"I'm the mohtasib (inspector) of the Nile Valley Street."
"Show me your papers."
"They are standing in front of you now. I'm the person and the document."
"Who gave you the right to ... ?"
"I gave it to myself."
"What is it that you want sir?"
"For you not to think of the Mediterranean," he replied.
"I couldn't do that, even if I wanted to."
"You are thinking in a dangerous way. You don't belong to the Mediterranean or to Egypt or to Africa. You belong to the kingdom of God and you are one of His subjects."
"The whole universe belongs to His Almighty Kingdom, but I have an address, a place of residence, a location, a site, a history, laws, a constitution ... I have rights.
"You have to forget the sea. Did you try to enjoy the charms of the sands?"
"Look sir, I love deserts, forests, lakes and valleys, but I'm mad about the sea."
"So I'm talking to a mad person."
"Yes, if that answer makes you happy.""
This is also in many ways a reenactment of the Husri-Hussein debate over Arabism (I owe this insight, as well as the reference below, to Lee Smith). Hussein correctly diagnosed Arab nationalism and its Pan-Arab vision as a fanatical reformulation of Islam, a charge that Husri vehemently denied. For a discussion, see Bassam Tibi's Arab Nationalism, pp. 186-88.
Nabil Fayyad also takes on the pillar of Husri's system, namely language, and its applicability to Syria (all my translation):
"[N]one of the aforementioned elements [i.e. language, religion, some common history] apply to Syria for us to say that it is a purely Arab country.
On the one hand Arabic is not the only dominant language in Syria. Kurdish for example is the language of hundreds of thousands of the Syrian people. Syriac-Aramaic is the language and origin of the Syrian people before the Islamic invasion. Add to that several important linguistic islands such as Armenian, Circassian, Dagestanian, and Turkmeni... etc."
Fayyad tries, with mixed success, to avoid the errors of Antoun Saade, which were the same errors of al-Husri (a unitary identity based on a völkisch organic view), saying:
"To talk about a singular identity for Syria misreads Syrian history, ancient and modern, and is blind to the Syrian demographic reality which is built on pluralism."
But he goes beyond that to address the same Mediterraneanist idea that Salem adopts, with its cross-cultural interaction:
"Syria has always been part of the Mediterranean civilization established by the Greek philosophers, who were in turn influenced by the ancient Syrian epistemological repertoire."
Fayyad, paralleling Salem's metaphors of attraction to the desert or the sea, concludes:
"Ethnic identity, in our opinion which we force on no one, is not based on linguistic silliness or religious fairy tales. Rather, its basic element is cultural-epistemological. What ties us culturally, as Syrians, across ancient times, with the Mediterranean civilized peoples such as the Greeks, the Italians and the French, is incomparably stronger than what ties us to the desert Wahhabists in the Empty Quarter and Yemen and Najd."
Clearly, this concept of Mediterraneanism has serious weaknesses and needs much refinement. However, it has several advantages over the poisonous Arabism:
1- It's not defined in terms of opposition to the West. Instead, it's based on a vision of cultural and economic interaction with it.
2- It's based on a more complex and textured understanding of identity, contrary to that of Husri's Arabism. In that same spirit, Amin Maalouf writes in his Les Identités Meurtrières:
"Lorsqu'on me demande ce que je suis 'au fin fond de moi-même', cela suppose qu'il y a, 'au fin fond' de chacun, une seule appartenance qui compte, sa 'vérité profonde' en quelque sorte, son 'essence', déterminée une fois pour toutes à la naissance et qui ne changera plus; comme si le reste, tout le reste -- sa trajectoire d'homme libre, ses convictions acquises, ses préférences, sa sensibilité propre, ses affinités, sa vie, en somme -- , ne comptait pour rien." (pp. 10-11). (Transl. "When they ask me who I am 'deep down inside', that assumes that there is, 'deep down inside' everyone, one single belonging that counts, his/her 'deep truth' of sorts, his/her 'essence', determined once and for all at birth and that will never change; as if the rest, all the rest -- his/her trajectory as a free human being, his/her acquired convictions, his/her preferences, his/her proper sensibility, his/her affinities, his/her life, in sum --, counts for nothing.")
This attitude allows for admission of, and reconciliation with, all that precedes, and follows, the Arab and Islamic advent. It's a vision of pluralism, and thus true acceptance of the other as other. It's a broad vision of enrichment, not a narrow vision of narcissism.
3- It's a vision that allows for a true concept of citizenship based on a finite political entity, a country. It's not hanging onto a utopian supra-national Volk.
4- As such, it's a liberal vision, based on French, British and American models rather than a Romantic German or a fascist one.
Therefore, Peter Speetjens completely missed the point! I'll hold off on him for now, hoping to pick up on his piece and its errors in the course of the ensuing discussion. Stay tuned!
posted by Tony Badran at
9:11 PM
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