A refresher course, Methinks!

Madiba.
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By Stephen Zunes, AlterNet


1. Who are the Arabs?

Arab peoples range from the Atlantic coast in northwest Africa to the Arabian
peninsula and north to Syria. They are united by a common language and
culture. Though the vast majority are Muslim, there are also sizable
Christian Arab minorities in Egypt, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Palestine.
Originally the inhabitants of the Arabian peninsula, the Arabs spread their
language and culture to the north and west with the expansion of Islam in the
7th century. There are also Arab minorities in the Sahel and parts of east
Africa, as well as in Iran and Israel. The Arabs were responsible for great
advances in mathematics, astronomy and other scientific disciplines, while
Europe was still mired in the Dark Ages.
       Though there is great diversity in skin pigmentation, spoken dialect
and certain customs, there is a common identity that unites Arab people,
which has sometimes been reflected in pan-Arab nationalist movements. Despite
substantial political and other differences, many Arabs share a sense that
they are one nation, which has been artificially divided through the
machinations of Western imperialism and which came to dominate the region
with the decline of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th and early 20th century.
There is also a growing Arab diaspora in Europe, North America, Latin
America, West Africa and Australia.

2. Who are the Muslims?

The Islamic faith originated in the Arabian peninsula, based on what Muslims
believe to be divine revelations by God to the prophet Mohammed. Muslims
worship the same God as do Jews and Christians, and share many of the same
prophets and ethical traditions, including respect for innocent life.
Approximately 90 percent of Muslims are of the orthodox or Sunni tradition;
most of the remainder are of the Shi'ite tradition, which dominate Iran but
also has substantial numbers in Iraq, Bahrain, Yemen and Lebanon. Sunni Islam
is nonhierarchical in structure. There is not a tradition of separation
between the faith and state institutions as there is in the West, though
there is enormous diversity in various Islamic legal traditions and the
degree to which governments of predominately Muslim countries rely on
religious bases for their rule.
       Political movements based on Islam have ranged from left to right,
from nonviolent to violent, from tolerant to chauvinistic. Generally, the
more moderate Islamic movements have developed in countries where there is a
degree of political pluralism in which they could operate openly. There is a
strong tradition of social justice in Islam, which has often led to conflicts
with regimes that are seen to be unjust or unethical. The more radical
movements have tended to arise in countries that have suffered great social
dislocation due to war or inappropriate economic policies and/or are under
autocratic rule.
       Most of the world's Muslims are not Arabs. The world's largest Muslim
country, for example, is Indonesia. Other important non-Arab Muslim countries
include Malaysia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey and the
five former Soviet republics of Central Asia, as well as Nigeria and several
other black African states. Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in
the world and scores of countries have substantial Muslim minorities. There
are approximately five million Muslims in the United States.

3. Why is there so much violence and political instability in the Middle
East?

       For most of the past 500 years, the Middle East actually saw less
violence and warfare and more political stability than Europe or most other
regions of the world. It has only been in the last century that the region
has seen such widespread conflict. The roots of the conflict are similar to
those elsewhere in the Third World, and have to do with the legacy of
colonialism, such as artificial political boundaries, autocratic regimes,
militarization, economic inequality and economies based on the export of raw
materials for finished goods. Indeed, the Middle East has more autocratic
regimes, militarization, economic inequality and the greatest ratio of
exports to domestic consumption than any region in the world.
       At the crossroads of three continents and sitting on much of the
world's oil reserves, the region has been subjected to repeated interventions
and conquests by outside powers, resulting in a high level of xenophobia and
suspicion regarding the intentions of Western powers going back as far as the
Crusades. There is nothing in Arab or Islamic culture that promotes violence
or discord; indeed, there is a strong cultural preference for stability,
order and respect for authority. However, adherence to authority is based on
a kind of social contract that assumes a level of justice which -- if broken
by the ruler -- gives the people a right to challenge it. The word jihad,
often translated as "holy war," actually means "holy struggle," which can
sometimes mean an armed struggle (qital), but also can mean nonviolent action
and political work within the established system. Jihad also can mean a
struggle for the moral good of the Muslim community, or even a personal
spiritual struggle.
       Terrorism is not primarily a Middle Eastern phenomenon. In terms of
civilian lives lost, Africa has experienced far more terrorism in recent
decades than has the Middle East. Similarly, far more suicide bombings in
recent years have come from Hindu Tamils in Sri Lanka than from Muslim Arabs
in the Middle East. There is also a little-known but impressive tradition of
nonviolent resistance and participatory democracy in some Middle Eastern
countries.

4. Why has the Middle East been the focus of U.S. concern about international
terrorism?

       There has been a long history of terrorism -- generally defined as
violence by irregular forces against civilian targets -- in the Middle East.
During Israel's independence struggle in the 1940s, Israeli terrorists killed
hundreds of Palestinian and British civilians; two of the most notorious
terrorist leaders of that period -- Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir --
later became Israeli prime ministers whose governments received strong
financial, diplomatic and military support from the United States. Algeria's
independence struggle from France in the 1950s included widespread terrorist
attacks against French colonists. Palestine's ongoing struggle for
independence has also included widespread terrorism against Israeli
civilians, during the 1970s through some of the armed militias of the
Palestine Liberation Organization and, more recently, through radical
underground Islamic groups. Terrorism has also played a role in Algeria's
current civil strife, in Lebanon's civil war and foreign occupations during
the 1980s, and for many years in the Kurdish struggle for independence. Some
Middle Eastern governments -- notably Libya, Syria, Sudan, Iraq and Iran --
have in the past had close links with terrorist organizations. In more recent
years, the Al Qaeda movement -- a decentralized network of terrorist cells
supported by Saudi exile Osama bin Laden -- has become the major terrorist
threat, and is widely believed to be responsible for the September 11
terrorist attacks on the United States. Bin Laden himself has been given
sanctuary in Afghanistan, though his personal fortune and widespread network
of supporters have allowed him to be independent on direct financial or
logistical support from any government.
       The vast majority of the people in the Middle East deplore terrorism,
yet point out that violence against civilians by governments has generally
surpassed that of terrorists. For example, the Israelis have killed far more
Arab civilians over the decades through using U.S.-supplied equipment and
ordinance than have Arab terrorists killed Israeli civilians. Similarly, the
U.S.-supplied Turkish armed forces have killed far more Kurdish civilians
than have such radical Kurdish groups like the PKK (the Kurdish acronym for
the Kurdistan Workers' Party). Also, in the eyes of many Middle Easterners,
U.S. support for terrorist groups like the Nicaraguan contras and various
right-wing Cuban exile organizations in recent decades, as well as U.S. air
strikes and the U.S.-led sanctions against Iraq in more recent years, have
made the U.S. an unlikely leader in the war against terrorism

5. What kind of political systems and alliances exist in the Middle East?

       There are a variety of political systems in the Middle East. Saudi
Arabia, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Morocco and
Jordan are all conservative monarchies (in approximate order of absolute
rule). Iraq, Syria and Libya are left-leaning dictatorships, with Iraq being
one of the most totalitarian societies in the world. Egypt and Tunisia are
conservative autocratic republics. Iran is an Islamic republic with an uneven
trend in recent years towards greater political openness. Sudan and Algeria
are under military rulers facing major insurrections.
       Lebanon, Turkey and Yemen are republics with repressive aspects but
some degree of political pluralism. The only Middle Eastern country with a
strong tradition of parliamentary democracy is Israel, though the benefits of
this political freedom is largely restricted to its Jewish citizens (the
Palestinian Arab minority is generally treated as second-class citizens and
Palestinians in the occupied territories are subjected to military rule and
human rights abuses). The largely autocratic Palestinian Authority has been
granted limited autonomy in a series of non-contiguous enclaves in the West
Bank and Gaza Strip surrounded by Israeli occupation forces.
       All Arab states, including the Palestinian Authority, belong to the
League of Arab States, which acts as a regional body similar to the
Organization of African Union or the Organization of American States, which
work together on issues of common concern. However, there are enormous
political divisions within Arab countries and other Middle Eastern states.
Turkey is a member of the NATO alliance, closely aligned with the West and
hopes to eventually become part of the European Union. The six conservative
monarchies of the Persian Gulf region have formed the Gulf Cooperation
Council (GCC), from where they pursue joint strategic and economic interests
and promote close ties with the West, particularly Great Britain (which
dominated the smaller sheikdoms in the late 19th and early 20th century) and,
more recently, the United States.
       Often a country's alliances are not a reflection of its internal
politics.  For example, Saudi Arabia is often referred in the U.S. media as a
"moderate" Arab state, though it is the most oppressive fundamentalist
theocracy in the world today outside of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan;
"moderate," in this case, simply means that it has close strategic and
economic relations with the United States.
       Jordan and Egypt are pro-Western, but have been willing to challenge
U.S. policy on occasion. Israel identifies most strongly with the West: most of
its leaders are European-born or have been of European heritage, and it has
diplomatic relations with only a handful of Middle Eastern countries. Iran
alienated most of its neighbors with its threat to expand its brand of
revolutionary Islam to Arab world, though its increasingly moderate
orientation in recent years has led to some cautious rapprochement. Syria, a
former Soviet ally, has been cautiously reaching out to more conservative
Arab governments and with the West; it currently exerts enormous political
influence over Lebanon. Iraq under Saddam Hussein, Libya under Muammar
Qaddafi and Sudan under their military junta remain isolated from most of
other Middle Eastern countries due to a series of provocative policies,
though many of these same countries oppose the punitive sanctions and air
strikes the United States has inflicted against these countries in recent
years.

6. What is the impact of oil in the Middle East?

       The major oil producers of the Middle East include Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Iraq, Iran, Libya and Algeria.
Egypt, Syria, Oman and Yemen have smaller reserves. Most of the major oil
producers of the Middle East are part of the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries, or OPEC. (Non-Middle Eastern OPEC members include
Indonesia, Venezuela, Nigeria and other countries.) Much of the world's oil
wealth exists along the Persian Gulf, with particularly large reserves in
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. About one-quarter of U.S.
oil imports come from the Persian Gulf region; the Gulf supplies European
states and Japan with an even higher percentage of those countries' energy
needs.
The imposition of higher fuel efficiency standards and other conservation
measures, along with the increased use of renewable energy resources for
which technologies are already available, could eliminate U.S. dependence on
Middle Eastern oil in a relatively short period of time.
       The Arab members of OPEC instigated a boycott against the United
States in the fall of 1973 in protest of U.S. support for Israel during the
October Arab-Israeli war, creating the first in a series of energy shortages.
The cartel has had periods of high and low costs for oil, resulting in great
economic instability. Most governments have historically used their oil
wealth to promote social welfare, particularly countries like Algeria, Libya
and Iraq, which professed to a more socialist orientation. Yet all countries
have squandered their wealth for arms purchases and prestige projects. In
general, the influx of petrodollars has created enormous economic inequality
both within oil-producing states and between oil-rich and oil-poor states as
well as widespread corruption and questionable economic priorities.

7. What is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict about?

       The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is essentially over land, with two
peoples claiming historic rights to the geographic Palestine, a small country
in the eastern Mediterranean about the size of New Jersey. The creation of
modern Israel in 1948 was a fulfillment of the goal of the Jewish nationalist
movement, known as Zionism, as large numbers of Jews migrated to their
faith's ancestral homeland from Europe, North Africa and elsewhere throughout
the 20th century. They came into conflict with the indigenous Palestinian
Arab population, which also was struggling for independence. The 1947
partition plan, which divided the country approximately in half, resulted in
a war that ended with Israel seizing control of 78 percent of the territory
within a year. Most of the Palestinian population became refugees, in some
cases through fleeing the fighting and in other cases through being forcibly
expelled. The remaining Palestinian areas -- the West Bank and Gaza Strip --
came under control of the neighboring Arab states of Jordan and Egypt, though
these areas were also seized by Israel in the 1967 war.
       Israel has been colonizing parts of these occupied territories with
Jewish settlers in violation of the Geneva Conventions and UN Security
Council resolutions. Historically, both sides have failed to recognize the
legitimacy of the others' nationalist aspirations, though the Palestinian
leadership finally formally recognized Israel in 1993. The peace process
since then has been over the fate of the West Bank (including Arab East
Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip, which is the remaining 22 percent of the
Palestine, occupied by Israel since 1967. The United States plays the dual
role of chief mediator of the conflict as well as the chief financial,
military and diplomatic supporter of Israel. The Palestinians want their own
independent state in these territories and to allow Palestinian refugees the
right to return. Israel, backed by the United States, insists the Palestinians
give up large swaths of the West Bank -- including most of Arab East Jerusalem
 -- to Israel and to accept the resettlement of most refugees into other Arab
countries.
       Since September 2000, there has been widespread rioting by Palestinians
against the ongoing Israeli occupation as well as terrorist bombings within
Israel by extremist Islamic groups. Israeli occupation forces, meanwhile,
have engaged in widespread killings and other human rights abuses in the
occupied territories.
       Most Arabs feel a strong sense of solidarity with the Palestinian
struggle, though their governments have tended to manipulate their plight for
their own political gain. Neighboring Arab states have fought several wars
with Israel, though Egypt and Jordan now have peace agreements and full
diplomatic relations with the Jewish state. In addition to much of the West
Bank and Gaza Strip, Israel still occupies a part of southwestern Syria known
as the Golan Heights. The threats and hostility by Arab states towards
Israel's very existence has waned over the years. Full peace and diplomatic
recognition would likely come following a full Israeli withdrawal from its
occupied territories.

8. What has been the legacy of the Gulf War?

       Virtually every Middle Eastern state opposed the Iraqi invasion and
occupation of Kuwait in 1990, though they were badly divided on the
appropriateness of the U.S.-led Gulf War that followed. Even among countries
that supported the armed liberation of Kuwait, there was widespread
opposition to the deliberate destruction by the United States of much of
Iraq's civilian infrastructure during the war. Even more controversial has
been the enormous humanitarian consequences of the U.S.-led international
sanctions against Iraq in place since the war, which have resulted in the
deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, mostly children, from malnutrition
and preventable diseases.
       The periodic U.S. air strikes against Iraq also have been
controversial, as has the ongoing U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia,
other Gulf states and in the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea. Since Iraq's
offensive military capability was largely destroyed during the Gulf War and
during the subsequent inspections regime, many observers believe that U.S.
fears about Iraq's current military potential are exaggerated, particularly
in light of the quiet U.S. support for Iraq during the 1980s when its
military was at its peak. In many respects, the Gulf War led the oil-rich GCC
states into closer identification with the United States and the West and
less with their fellow Arabs, though there is still some distrust about U.S.
motivations and
policies in the Middle East.

9. How has the political situation in Afghanistan evolved and how is it
connected to the Middle East?

       Afghanistan, an impoverished landlocked mountainous country, has
traditionally been identified more with Central and South Asia than with the
Middle East. A 1978 coup by communist military officers resulted in a series
of radical social reforms, which were imposed in an autocratic matter and
which resulted in a popular rebellion by a number of armed Islamic movements.
The Soviet Union installed a more compliant communist regime at the end of
1979, sending in tens of thousands of troops and instigating a major bombing
campaign, resulting in large-scale civilian casualties and refugee flows. The
war lasted for much of the next decade. The United States sent arms to the
Islamic resistance, known as the mujahadin, largely through neighboring
Pakistan, then under the rule of an ultra-conservative Islamic military
dictatorship. Most of the U.S. aid went to the most radical of the eight
different mujahadin factions on the belief that they would be least likely to
reach a negotiated settlement with the Soviet-backed government and would
therefore drag the Soviet forces down. Volunteers from throughout the Islamic
world, including the young Saudi businessman Osama bin Laden, joined the
struggle. The CIA trained many of these recruits, including bin Laden and
many of his followers.
       When the Soviets and Afghanistan's communist government were defeated
in 1992, a vicious and bloody civil war broke out between the various mujahadin
factions, war lords and ethnic militias. Out of this chaos emerged the
Taliban movement, led by young seminary students from the refugee camps in
Pakistan who were educated in ultra-conservative Saudi-funded schools. The
Taliban took over 85 percent of the country by 1996 and imposed long-awaited
order and stability, but established a brutal totalitarian theocracy based on
a virulently reactionary and misogynist interpretation of Islam. The Northern
Alliance, consisting of the remnants of various factions from the civil war
in the 1990s, control a small part of the northeast corner of the country.

10. How have most Middle Eastern governments reacted to the September 11
terrorist attacks and their aftermath?

       Virtually every government and the vast majority of their populations
reacted with the same horror and revulsion as did people in the United
States, Europe and elsewhere. Despite scenes shown repeatedly on U.S.
television of some Palestinians celebrating the attacks, the vast majority of
Palestinians also shared in the world's condemnation. If the United States,
in conjunction with local governments, limits its military response to
commando-style operations against suspected terrorist cells, the U.S. should
receive the cooperation and support of most Middle Eastern countries. If the
response is more widespread, based more on retaliation than self-defense, and
ends up killing large numbers of Muslim civilians, it could create a major
anti-American reaction that would increase support for the terrorists and
lessen the likelihood for the needed cooperation to break up the Al Qaeda
network, which operates in several Middle Eastern countries.
       While few Middle Easterners support bin Laden's methods, the principal
concerns expressed in his manifestoes -- the U.S.'s wrongful support for
Israel and for Arab dictatorships, the disruptive presence of U.S. troops in
Saudi Arabia and the humanitarian impact of the sanctions on Iraq -- are
widely supported. Ultimately, a greater understanding of the Middle East and
the concerns of its governments and peoples are necessary before the United
States can feel secure from an angry backlash from the region.

Stephen Zunes is an associate professor of politics and chair of the Peace &
Justice Studies Program at the University of San Francisco. He serves as a
senior policy analyst and Middle East editor for the Foreign Policy in Focus
Project.

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