Baggage of the Middle East

On October 1 2000, 12 year old Mohammad Doura was killed in crossfire between Israelis and Palestinians. His picture of being shielded by his father and then both falling dead would remain etched in the minds of people for a long time. Not because he was a Muslim or he was not a Jew, but because it defined the point of no return for the intifada which Yaser Arafat started after returning from Camp David.
This picture started the recent middle east crisis after considerable tranquility of the 90s in the region. And if you think about the whole incident, it's nothing more than a picture of a frightened kid caught in the crossfire. Hundreds of kids get killed caught in crossfires in war zones across the world.But what this picture definitely did was leave an indelible impression on the mind of Palestinian public and Arab world in general.There have been stamps released capturing this picture and the baggage just kept getting heavier before it exploded in the incidents of the last 13 days.
I wonder what would it take to make these parties sit down and leave behind the past. Israelis have the problem of being always in the self sympathesizing mode where they think that all their actions are legitimate for what has happened to them from historic times. Palestinians and other Arab states like to talk only about the world before the 1948 war and don't want to look at the modern day reality.

I read a Tom Friedman book called "From Beirut to Jerusalem". The book starts with a very interesting introduction and I would type it here as it is. This generation in the Middle East has just too much of this baggage to do anything about the problem. Read on..this story from Mark Twain which is the introduction to Friedman's book illustrates this baggage problem really well:

"Did you want to kill him, Buck?
"Well, I bet I did"
"What did he do to you?"
"Him? He never done anything to me."
"Well, then what did you want to kill him for?"
"Why, nothing-only it's on account of the feud."
"What's a feud?"
"Why, where were you raised? Don't you know what a feud is?"
"Never heard of it before--tell me about it."
"Well," says Buck," a feud is this way: A man has a quarrel with another man, and kills him;then that other man's brother kills him;then the other brothers, on both sides, goes for one another; then the cousins chip in--and by and by everybody's killed off, and there ain't no more feud. But it's kind of slow, and takes a long time."
"Has this one been going on for long, Buck?"
"Well,I should reckon! It started thirty years ago, or som'ers along there. There was trouble 'bout something and then lawsuit to settle it; and the suit went against one of the men, and so he got up and shot the men that won the suit--which he would naturally do, of course. Anybody would."
"What was the trouble about,Buck?--land?"
"I reckon maybe--I don't know."
"Well, who done the shooting? Was it Grangerford or a Shepherdson?"
"Laws, how do I know? It was so long ago."
"Don't anybody know?"
"Oh yes, pa knows, I reckon, and some of the other old people; but they don't know what the row was about in the first place."

Making Abbas Irrelevant

Palestinian problem is going through a very tumultuous phase. I don't say that because I am with Israel or Arabs. I say it because in the long run, it is in the interest of all of us that there is an amicable solution to this problem. Recent open support of US and Israel to Mahmoud Abbas in the power struggle between Fatah and Hamas factions of the movement is not good for the region. Israel, in an open gesture of support to Abbas, transferred 100 million dollars of withheld taxes to Abbas. Though it would help pay salaries to a lot of people in occupied territories, it also makes Abbas a western stooge. Palestinians, at least for two generations, would not forget the atrocities which Israel has committed in the last one year and when they will see Abbas standing side by side with Olmert, it is anyone's guess what they will think. Better would have been to funnel that money through Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Jordan. Next time when the elections happen, Hamas and Ismael Haniya would shout at their loudest about what Abbas did and who helped him.

I am sure that this administration is not that foolish to not realise what it is doing. By making Abbas irrelevant amongst Palestinian public, there would be no legitimate partner left for peace. And then it would be easy to say that we cannot deal with Hamas which is a terrorist organization. American foreign policy has truly gone for a toss and someone needs to kick out the dogs from the foreign secretary's office. We need the foreign policy of Clinton and Carter to kick start the peace process again, this administration hasn't got the guts or the wits to do it.

Don't cry for Saddam

Saddam Hussein is dead but not before a lot of drama. Lets quickly read the final conversation which happened between him and his executioners:
"""
Saddam: Prayers be upon the Prophet Mohammad and on his family and glorify the mighty and curse his enemy.

Voice: Muqtada,Muqtada,Muqtada
Saddam: Muqtada? Is this how you show your bravery as men? Is this the bravery of Arabs? Saddam: Long Live Mohammad Baqir Sadr
Voice: Straight to Hell
Some other Voice: Please, I am begging you not to, the man is being executed
Saddam starts reading the Shahadah( first of the five pillars of Islam which all Muslims take as their creed)
Saddam:I bear witness that there is no god but god and that Mohammad is the messenger of god and I bear witness that""""
...at this point, Saddam was hanged to death....he was not able to read the full Shahadah.

Though the video is obviously disturbing, there are some interesting aspects to this whole hanging episode:

1) I am a huge opponent of capital punishment but still cannot see why Saddam should not have been hanged for his crimes. Anyone who thinks that Saddam was a martyr needs to go to a doctor and this includes all the Muslims around the world who demonstrated after his death. There cannot be any reason for anyone to mourn Saddam. If people have problem with America, that does not give them a reason to say that Saddam did not get justice.

2) Even during his last moments, Saddam did not stop playing his pranks. Notice that Saddam says "Long Live Mohammad Baqir Sadr". Grand Ayatollah Baqir Sadr who was the father of radical cleric Mutada Sadr was killed by Saddam's agent!!! But that is the beauty of this whole drama. Even in his final minutes, Saddam had to prove how much he cared for Iraq, its people and their unity. Good you are gone Mr. Hussein...Bye Bye

3) Finally, America fucks it up again...only the current administration could have made a martyr out of Saddam!!! This war truly has been a litany of mistakes on the part of this arrogant and ignorant administration...Abu Ghraib, Haditha killings, leaving Muqtada Al Sadr alive after it was clear that he was responsible for the murder of Abd Al-Majid Al-Khoi, a pro-US cleric after the war....and now the way this video came out. No doubt, this video is gross and doesn't help at all in whatever same people are trying to achieve in the country.

Exiles Feed On Hope

Kurds presently number more than 30 million and form a sizable chunk of Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria. Most of them are Sunni but are neither Arab nor Persians. Though they have not wandered in search of homeland for as long as Jews, the wait has been long enough.

Historically, they have been abandoned by all major powers. They are most recognized as ferocious fighters, PeshMerga( meaning those who face death) and they truly have faced mass death time and again. In 1946, Soviets tried to trump up Kurds to stand up to Shah's regime only to pull out later. Thousands of them were slaughtered. U.S. and Iran did the same to the Kurds of Northern Iraq only to leave them to be killed at the hands of Saddam Hussein. It again happened when Saddam gassed 5000 of them in Halabja in 1988. Combine this with daily oppression in Turkey and Iran.

Kurds today have some reason to start hoping again. They have sufficient power in Iraq today to create enough headache, at least to begin with, for the Turkish government. They probably are amongst the biggest beneficiary of the war in Iraq besides Iran.The more the anarchy in Iraq, more chances of the possibility of a separate Kurd state in the north( with all the oil wealth of cities like Kirkuk) and more trouble for Turkey and Iran.

Do you hear the song...I wandered far away from home, Now I'm coming home.....

Gaddafi's Demise..

The persona of Muammar Gaddafi is dying. Its ironic when you compare him to the other leader who proclaimed his right to carry the Arab banner. Saddam Hussein would soon become a thing of the past. In some ways, so will Gaddafi even though he might be physically present for some more years to come. By giving up his plans to develop weapons of mass destruction, whatever teeth he had and Libya had, even they are gone. For a lot of time, Libya was considered to be a state which would stand up to the west....and in business language, that was their positioning statement. By become amiable to the West, Libya and Gaddafi have lost their reason to exist.

Lets look at Gaddafi's past. He came to power in a bloodless coup against King Idris in 1969 and thought that he was the next Gamal Abdel Nasser of the Arab world. In years to come, his achievements never reached the heights scaled by Nasser. Instead, Gaddafi became famous for authorising the bombings of Lockerbie and writing huge volumes of self aggrandization called Green Book( on the lines of Red Book written by Mao Zedong). He feels proud of coining a term called Jamahiriya( on the lines of Jumuhriya, which is rule by people), which essentially is rule by people's committees. His one reasonable achievement has been the formation of African Union. After being snubbed from Arab states, he turned to Africa and espoused the idea of United States of Africa. African Union is broadly formed around this idea.

Now all the sting, of whatever was left, of Gaddafi is gone. He will go into a quiet sunset after passing on the reins to one of his sons...Anyways, did anyone at any point of think that there would be some reason to remember Colonel Muammar Gaddafi?

Poker, Beirut Style

Pierre Gemayel was shot dead today in Lebanon. I am not shedding a lot of tears for the loss of Pierre who was also the Industry Minister of Lebanon because Gemayels have not been the victims all the time. Most of the times, they have been the ones delivering atrocities on the people in Lebanon. My concern is about what it would mean to the common man on the street in Beirut...all of us saw what Lebanese people had to go through after Hezbollah abducted Israeli soldiers. Most think it has been done by Hezbollah at the behest of Iran and Syria. Young democracy in Lebanon faces yet another challenge. Till now, it was a fight between Shia Hezbollah with Sunni parties led by Saad Hariri within Lebanon and Jews outside Lebanon. Now, Maronite Catholics also have a reason to become part of a very very messy situation.

Lets look at Gemayels first. In 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon and got Bashir Gemayel to become the president of Lebanon. He was going to be the person who would deliver Lebanon to Israel and solve the PLO problem. PLO after being expelled from Amman was now in West Beirut, primarily the refugee camps of Sabra & Shatila. Bashir was killed by a pro Syrian operative and that resulted in the massive massacre at the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps. Close to 1000 Palestinians were massacred in one day. Ariel Sharon is widely credited for those massacres but they were actually carried out by the Phalangists militia controlled by the Gemayels. Ariel Sharon just made sure that no one escaped the retribution at the hand of the Gemayels for the killing of Bashir!!! Amin Gemayel succeeded Bashir and continued the divisive Lebanese politics during the civil war. Whoever has killed Pierre has made the resumption of civil war a real possibility....and that is bad news.

The worst part about this whole deal is that Syria and Iran are now doing live experiments to check how far they can go. Their first experiment was getting Hezbollah to go into Israel and kill and kidnap Israeli soldiers. This one is the next experiment. I am sure that neither the US nor any other western power can do anything about this situation and this would mean that everyone would look up to the Syrians & the Iranians....something very similar to the Iraq situation. Isn't it awesome that Mr. Bush in one fine stroke delivered Iraq, Lebanon into the lap of Iran???