I saw A Mighty Heart last night, the movie about Daniel Pearl‘s abduction and murder, and I was surprised. First, I liked the movie and expected not to. Second, it was not the anti-Muslim screed I’d expected it to be. If anything was a subject made for exploitation Hollywood style it was this story. An American-Jewish reporter goes to Pakistan to report on the teeming world of Islamic extremism. He goes seemingly with an open mind and American values of inquisitiveness and tolerance. His values are met by jihadi hatred, kidnapping and ultimately beheading. Could you have any better recipe for a suspense potboiler full of leering, evil Arabs?
Yet, Michael Winterbottom the director, chooses to avoid this obvious pitfall (and he faces many others as well). He decides he is going to try to write a story about two idealistic children of the world (Daniel and Marianne Pearl) thrown into the maelstrom of third world poverty, desperation and religious hatred. Despite being tested in the deepest and most painful ways it is possible for a human to be tested, the Pearls both retain their humanity intact. This is a hopeful movie. But its hope doesn’t come cheaply or easily. It is hope wrested from violence and suffering. Perhaps this is the only type of real hope there is–hope based on adversity.
The main element of this film is confusion. Everything and everyone is a swirl of movement and emotions. Hardly anything remains in one place very long. The camera sweeps through the teeming streets of Pakistan’s fetid urban centers providing the full panoply of human energy and misery. The crowded slums actually become a character in themselves in the film. Winterbottom does this in an ingenious way. He doesn’t really have to tell you about the social conditions in third world Muslim countries that serve as the breeding ground for Islamic extremism. No characters have to engage in long conversations about it to explain it to the audience. The camera does it for you.
But there is one element I felt the filmmaker didn’t explore fully enough. You have to admit that the decision by a young American Jewish journalist to accept an assignment in Pakistan, hotbed of some of the most rabid anti-Israel, anti-western sentiment in the world, strikes one as quixotic or perhaps even nuts. Why did Pearl do it? What were his reasons for taking this assignment? What was the Wall Street Journal’s thinking in making this assignment?
I’d like to know more about Daniel Pearl. What did he believe both as a journalist, a Jew and human being. What were his private thoughts about the imams, sheikhs and jihadis he covered in Pakistan? The movie doesn’t covey much of this and I wish it did more. It would’ve explained much to me that is lacking in the motivations of the key characters.
On a less momentous note, I wish the character of the Pakistani police inspector had been more explosive and energetic. The role as written portrays a genial, humane, soft-spoken man. What about someone who shrieks, who loses his temper, who hits people, who curses, who is wily, but still retains his humanity? Personally, I think it would’ve added to the drama of the situation.
I was struck by one element of the plot. At the end in voiceover, Marianne Pearl tells us that just before he was beheaded Daniel looked into the camera and said he was a Jew and that a street in Bnei Brak (Israel) is named for his grandfather, who founded the town. This is Pearl reaching back into his Jewish soul for something he is proud of, something that will mark his life, something he can leave after his death for others to know what was important to him as he faced his fate. It was also the ultimate act of rebellion against his captors–saying to them: “you can kill a Jew, but my grandfather helped build a Jewish country and it will live on after me despite your hated and violence.”
I am grateful that A Mighty Heart didn’t lapse into parody or propaganda. It portrayed a confusing, multi-faceted event with admirable nuance and emotional complexity.
Enjoyed your review, Richard. You have made me want to go and see it. With right-wing bloggers hating it and you liking it the film could not get a better recommendation. One minor additional point. Pearl was a dual Israeli/US citizen. Not only the Israeli media but a few in the US were aware of it and wisely kept quiet till after he was murdered. His killers never found out.
Sol Salbe
Melbourne Australia
I have not as yet seen this film but hope to do so at some later date.
Your observation, Richard, on the hazards that part of the world holds for someone of Mr. Pearl’s religious persuasion and nationality is well taken. Locating his own reasons for being there in the first place may present something of a puzzle but, nevertheless, he was there and what happened to him was a crime against all the laws of Man and God.
These laws, although held in common by all faiths and peoples throughout the world, were not enough to save Mr. Pearl. One wonders then what kind of law would?
Imagine if Mr. Pearl had been, say, a frenchman and I, an englishman, had taken it into my head to treat him in like manner for some perceived insult or wrong his countrymen had done me or mine. If I knew that, as a result, I personally would never be brought to book for my actions, I might go ahead. But if I also knew that, in consequence, a significant parcel of Sussex could be annexed and then legally become an extension of France, I should not be too surprised to find a long line of angry southerners outside my door the next morning. That being the case, I might very well think twice about the whole affair.
When Daniel enters the lion’s den, what will it take to stop the lion from eating him? Perhaps only the prospect of a very painful bout of indigestion for dessert.
http://yorketowers.blogspot.com
John Yorke
Please note: Nothing personal here against France or the French. Indeed, territorial exchange is now becoming quite the norm here on both sides of the channel. Maybe Sussex might well prefer to be part of France anyway. Particularly with all this terrible weather we’re having just at the moment.
Thanks Richard,
I’ll watch out for it!. One point I have though, I would have loved to see a different actress in the part of Marianne Pearl. I am not really an expert on the US market in this regard. But from a German point of view, I would have chosen somebody like Barbara Becker, Boris Beckers ex-wife. Doesn’t the choice of his partner tell us a lot about Daniel Pearl the man?
But this might well be an overly female point of view, and a very German one too.
Maybe I am misunderstanding you, but how do you figure that Daniel Pearl’s abduction and murder was a “morally ambiguous event”?
Barb: YOur point is well-taken & that’s NOT what I meant to say. I’ll edit that for clarity & thanks for pointing that out. What I meant to say is that the ferment going on in the Arab world is a complex phenomena. While it is easy to sort out the bad guys in the Islamic terrorists, there is so much poverty & misery for the militants to thrive on. And economic conditions are a prime motivator or such extremism. We must give people in the Third World things to live, rather than die for.
uh, why do *we* have to give them something to live for?
The solution is for them to make the same educational and ethical investments in the next generation as we do.
But that won’t happen.
So, as I see it, the only *peaceful* solution (to achieve both peace and approximate equality, for reduced tension) would be for the West to take it upon itself to educate a generation of their kids. But that won’t happen either.
So most likely there won’t be a peaceful resolution. I’m still hoping though.
… and I hope no one says that they can’t because they’re poor. Caring doesn’t take money. Israel was built up in a single generation by poor people, with few ties to the West.
I’m sure parents in the Third World care about their kids’ futures too; but overall, they don’t take sustained action for them the way we do.
This is a personal impression across a lot of varying data; but that’s my view: this is what leads to the disparity of opportunity, which generates the envy and animosity, which culminates in violence.
It’s hard to imagine a realistic near- or medium-term solution to something based on such broadly ingrained cultural traits.
Well, from the sound of it you believe it’s simply a matter of a lack of will or virtue on their part. Do you think the issue of third world poverty is something solved by the snap of a finger?
The situation regarding Israel is entirely diff. than what besets third world countries. Israel had the commitment of worldwide Jewry to help financially, not to mention the largess of the U.S. government backing it. It IS true that Israel’s government was more competent, proactive and interventionist (in a good way) than yr avg. third world nation. And that helped a lot. But comparing Israel to other 3rd world countries in order to find them lacking just doesn’t ring true to me.
I object to yr claim that third world destitution is based on “cultural traits.” This is racist or at least borderline racist. There are deep institutional factors at work that sentence people to lives of such desperation. Blaming their culture for it is pretty lame.
Why would I go see a white woman portray a black woman? It has been a long time since I saw an Al Jolson movie, and I don’t intend on seeing one anytime soon.
I didn’t know Marianne Pearl was black. And I don’t defend Hollywood casting decisions. But it is a conventional Hollywood casting notion that you’ve got to get a big star to make a splash & get audience interest in a film. That’s undoubtedly why Jolie was chosen.
There are many films which portray Jewish characters who are not played by Jewish actors. I often feel this detracts from the realism of the portrayal. But I’d never refuse to see such a film based on this criteria alone.
But hey, I get yr pt. & it is legitimate to a point.
UPDATE: My friend Sol Salbe points out that you’re not quite right. Here is Wikipedia describing Pearl’s ethnic background:
Based on this, I don’t have too much of a problem with Jolie portraying her. And presumably Pearl herself had at least some say in casting or could at least have screamed bloody murder if the notion of Jolie playing her bothered her.
Thanks, Richard, so I was possibly influenced by a net piece leaning heavily towards simplification? Admittedly I hadn’t noticed it before and simply wondered why? But does it really matter?
The Daniel Pearl case is admittedly one of the most touching stories in the larger War on Terror, I would like to know much more about. Who was Daniel Pearl, what kind of articles did he write, and what did he investigate before he was murdered.
But maybe I should read Mariane’s book, not just see the film. I hesitate to read Levy’s admittedly since for many reasons I am not sure, if I want to read a fictionalized rendering in this context. Maybe since I am not sure what to think of all the rumors surrounding: Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh. Rumor and fiction are pretty close, fiction may in fact aggrandize rumors.
But what do I know.
Leander: The film’s official website linked in my post actually has Pearl’s writings. There’s also the Daniel Pearl Foundation website which you can visit which may provide more info. Reading Pearl’s book is a good idea too though I haven’t done so.
“I’m sure parents in the Third World care about their kids’ futures too; but overall, they don’t take sustained action for them the way we do.”
Definitely not true of the parents of my students. Actually, people need not only education, but opportunities to use their education.
Zhu Bajie, American teaching in China
Anecdotes aside, I defer to your experiences in China, Zhu.
I should have said the stagnant and/or “we hate the West” Third World, the Third World that is home to the violent tendencies that we were discussing … in particular the Arab/Muslim Third World.
I’m speaking in generalities here, so of course there are exceptions everywhere.
Ah yes, ever the Muslim hater. So predictable…Muslims don’t care about their children or their future. They’re all too busy fighting for jihad to care about things that all civilized & decent human beings here in the West care about. Right??
Richard, here is a quote you make:
——————–
I object to yr claim that third world destitution is based on “cultural traits.” This is racist or at least borderline racist. There are deep institutional factors at work that sentence people to lives of such desperation. Blaming their culture for it is pretty lame.
——————-
I fail to see what the difference between “cultural traits” and “institutional factors”. Why is it that “progressives” view the idea that different groups around the world think differently than each other as “racist”? For example, do you have a problem with pointing out that Arabs view clan relationships as far more important than Westerns do? This explains a lot of what we see going on in the Arab world. If you don’t accept that, than how do you explain the problems , most especially the fratricidal slaughter, we see in so many Arab countries?
I am reading a biography of Argentina’s Juan Peron. There he is considered a great hero to a large part of the population (another part hates him to this day), whereas in the US, a politician who acted like him would have been laughted out of town before ever coming to power. Isn’t that due to the very different mentalities of the populations of those countries?
Physicist Richard Feynman ( a bona-fide progressive) noted in his last book that when he visited Trinidad, the Indian population was wroking hard and saving money to send their children to the US to receive a higher education and he saw poor, simple tailors and craftsmen whose children were Professors and Doctors, whereas a large part of the the black population didn’t save money like that and didn’t push their children to study in the same way as the Indians, and they were condemning the next generation to remaining like their parents. Why is it racist to point out that cultural differences (and NOT some sor to “external racist coercion”) and different ways of thinking and different values were causing these major differences?
“Poverty” doesn’t explain everything. South Korea was extremely poverty stricken after the Korean War. They have built themselves up, and they are NOT Westerners. So did Israel. India is now building itself up, and it was very poverty strickent (and still is in some places).
It is time that we outgrow these Marxist ideas that “everything is determined by economics” which proved themselves long ago to be way overly simplistic.
Right, imjudy. To give you just one data point, there are more books translated into Greek every year than into Arabic, although the number of Greek speakers is minuscule by comparison. That’s how culturally and educationally isolated the Arab world is. And pointing that out as a root cause is not racist.
It’s also not racist to point out that, although most Muslims are not terrorists, most terrorists are Muslims.
I clearly said in my last posting that there are many exceptions. But the self-willed isolation of the Arab/Muslim world is proven by a very fair, accurate, and consistent set of statistics.
Lint,
Curiosity killed the cat. I tried to check the information on the UNESCO site but was unable to find the relevant table. You say: “there are more books translated into Greek every year than into Arabic”. Can we have a source please (and the relevant figures (if that’s not too much to ask)?
Sol
Some of these may be derivative, but at least the first is reputable, I believe
1.
http://www.worldpress.org/Mideast/663.cfm
“Interestingly, the report found that the total number of books translated into Arabic yearly is no more than 330, or one-fifth of those translated in a small country like Greece.”
2.
http://www.jewishsf.com/bk030207/sf25.shtml
“The number of books translated yearly into all the languages of the Arabic world is less than the number of books translated into Greek.”
3.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2501/is_2_26/ai_n8706604/pg_3
“Five times as many books are translated into Greek (spoken by
just 11 million people) as Arabic.”
… or just do your own web search …
If you still question this statistic (I’ve been under the impression that it was well established), I can look for a rock-solid source.
This is an entirely bogus statement. There are terrorists & violent extremists in Europe, Sri Lanka, Africa, China, Russia and many other countries. Even Israel has its share (Jewish terrorists that is). Pls. provide ANY sort of solid evidence to prove this ridiculous claim is true.
Your claim about books translated into Arabic is based on a single UN report and none of the sources you provide actually quote what the report really says nor link to it. How can anyone make a sweeping claim regarding the number of books translated into Arabic over a 1,000 yr. period (“the total number of books translated into Arabic during the 1,000 years since the age of Caliph Al-Ma’moun to this day is less than those translated in Spain in one year”)? Where would you even begin to find the information you’d need to make such a statement? It strikes me as a patently bogus statistic.
You have once again misunderstood my views & those of progressives. Of course diff. groups think & behave differently. What I object to is the notion that the thoughts or actions or cultural norms of Muslims betray any inferiority to those of westerners.
Say what? Clan relationships explain fratricidal slaughter? You’ve lost me on that one. Do you mean the Sunni-Shiite split in the Arab world? If so, you’ve reduced an extremely complex issue to absurd oversimplicity.
Again, what is wrong is to presume to say that those blacks are somehow inferior because they make diff. choices than the Indians.
Richard-yes, clan relationships do explain fratricidal slaughter in the Arab world. What I meant, and didn’t explain clearly is that in the Arab world, one’s primary loyalty is to the clan (or tribe) and not to the nation-state or any other larger entity, and that in general, different clans are in a state of friction to a greater or lesser degree with each other. All societies began this way and clan warfare was a problem in the West as well (the feuds between the Hatfields and the McCoy’s or the Montagu-Capulet war, for example) but over the centuries, the development of the nation-state in the west brought about a revolution in how the individual views himself in relation to the rest of society. This has NOT happened in the Arab world. Almost all the nation-state entities in the Middle East are artificial (Egypt being a notable exception) and they have not succeeded in changing and breaking down the clan/tribe identity of their citizens and getting them to identify with the larger national entity.
In Israel, where democracy was imposed on the local level to the Arab population, voting patterns have not changed over the last 60 years, almost everyone in the Arab community votes for the party his clan supports, regardless of ideology, religious identification, etc. And once in power, those of the dominant clans use their position to favor those of their own clan or those whom they are in alliance with. This is a primary reason why so many Arab local authorities are in a permanent state of disfunction and bankruptcy. (Ha’aretz ran an article some years ago about this but I don’t have a link to it).
The New York Times has reported extensively on the war in Iraq and they are always pointing out how this mentality has made it virtually impossible to set up a national government that has broad-based support…..the Shi’ite clans today are dominant (although there is considerable friction amongst themselves that has particularly caused serious problems in Basra as the British are attempting to hand over control of the city) and this is very difficult for the formerly dominat Sunni clans to accept.
Much of the conflict among the Palestinians between FATAH and HAMAS is explained the same way. It is not necessarily primarily a “religious split”..those clans favored by Arafat and FATAH shifted their support to HAMAS in order to get what they consider to be a fairer share of available resources.
I utterly reject the notion that the west has developed the sine qua non of human governance and that Arabs are somehow backwards human beings because they take a diff. view on the subject.
And I utterly reject the notion that blames all Arab municipalities governance failures on the Arabs themselves. I have heard almost precisely the same propaganda here fr. anti-Arab commenters before. You neglect to mention the virtual penury which Israeli budgetary policy imposes on Israeli Arab towns. Ah yes, the propagandists claim they receive no money because they are corrupt. How convenient a means to sweep economic racism under the carpet. In countries where governments are corrupt there are means to remove them. You mean to tell me that Israel has no ability to clean up Arab corruption if it does indeed exist?
Again, you blame the Iraqis for the civil war when it was the U.S. which set the entire maelstrom in motion with our invasion. Even if we HAD invaded, we had countless lost opportunities to prevent this bloodshed. Bush availed himself of none of them. Iraqis are responsible for the current bloodshed, but we are more responsible because we did nothing to avert it when we could have.
Again this is preposterous. It reduces two political movements to a primitive set of family interrelationships. You may rest comfortable in the notion that you can reduce Palestinian politics to such primitiveness. But you paint a picture that is your projection, rather than reality.
Richard-you stated the following:
————————————
I utterly reject the notion that the west has developed the sine qua non of human governance and that Arabs are somehow backwards human beings because they take a diff. view on the subject.
————————————
I ask you to compare the state of human rights in Western countries as compared to the Arab countries (I specifically mean “Arab” countries as opposed to Islamic countries in general).
Which of the two lives up to the UN Charter of Human Rights more clesely, in general? Or do you view the UN Charter of Human RIghts as a “Western” document which it is not fair to compare to Arab standards?
Where is corruption more prevalent? Where are governments peaceably changed by elections? Who has more economic development? Where are rights of minorities respected more? WOULD YOU RATHER LIVE IN A WESTERN COUNTRY OR AN ARAB COUNTRY?
Regarding your claim that the Israeli gov’t “discriminates” against the Arab municipalities, there is no question that it did occur in the past, but since 1992 many Israeli gov’ts in power have been dependent on the Arab Knesset members (this includes Sharon’s last Likud gov’t which was dependent on the votes of the Arab MK’s) , so this discrimination has been eliminated.
The Arab municipalities have a lower rate of “arnona” (municipal tax) collection for the reasons I stated. This is the reason for their constricted budgets, NOT “discrimination”. Regarding your comment about “cleaning up corruption”, just recently one of the Arab municipal councils was dissolved by the Interior Ministry for the very reason you gave. The Supreme Court would intervene if there really was ethnic discrimination in handing out budgets.
Leaving aside the fact that the argument between Richard and Lint has somehow moved round to education in the Arab world, when the Pearl film is set in Pakistan, this comment:
… and I hope no one says that they can’t because they’re poor. Caring doesn’t take money. Israel was built up in a single generation by poor people, with few ties to the West.
I’m sure parents in the Third World care about their kids’ futures too; but overall, they don’t take sustained action for them the way we do.
Deserves comment because it assumes that there is a straight line between parents and the state coffers, ie. governance. That such a line does not exist in the Arab world is at least partially the result of American support for “stable” regimes such as that of Egypt, which since they rely on a security apparatus for power rather than popular consent, are always going to invest more in American-made armaments than they do in the very risky business of sending their youth to universities where they might well start to wonder about why they don’t have access to the levers of government.
As for the view expressed earlier that Arabs’ political choices within a nation-state are still primarily a function of clan loyalty, in order to test such a sweeping statement it would be necessary to provide an environment in which it was possible for the full spectrum of choices to be made. That is a long way from happening in most Arab countries. As genuine choices became available, Arabs would most likely start to opt for them. It is hardly surprising that nation-states which do not offer such choices do not command a transfer of allegiance.
I should say however that in my opinion the dichotomy between living for something and dying for it, while important, is not as straightforward as Richard’s initial remark might suggest. What is extreme about the extremists in this case is their murder of Daniel Pearl, not whether they choose to live or die for their beliefs.
Maher-you say that the nation-state frameworks the Arabs don’t allow them a full-range of choices to opt for a more “modern”, or, if you like, “Western”-type identity that would transcend their current clan-based loyalty system that is the cause of so-much of the fragmentation that is plaguing the Arab world. However, my question to you is “doesn’t the current system REFLECT the values they have”? Take Nasser, for example. He was wildly popular, yet his regime was a typical repressive, corrupt Arab-style government with an all-pervasive “Mukhabarat” (secret police)? He used Marxist-socialist-type propaganda to try to enforce national unity, but in the end, he didn’t change Egyptian society very much (and Egypt is one of the few nation-states that does generate a relatively strong sense of identity among the population.
The fact is that in the Arab world, unlike almost the entire rest of the world, there is NO meaningful liberal, pro-democracy movement. I am well aware that Westerners can not expect societies in the Middle East to be carbon copies. of the west. There will be less emphasis on individualism, there will not be a strict separation of religion and state, but they are far from anything remotely representing a sincere concern for basic human rights, free speech and the such. The fact is that if truly free multi-party elections were held in the Arab world, radical Islamic movements would take power in most states, setting up dictatorial regimes not unlike those that currently exist.
It should be remembered that Africa too has been plagued by tribalism, colonial exploitation (far worse than the Arabs have experienced), poverty and corruption, YET, in spite of this, there are liberal, pro-democracy movements that have made considerable progress, and the population there is not wrapped up into the rage and self-pity that the Arab masses feel and which is strongly reinforced by their media, both “free” (Al-Jazeera, for example) or state-controlled. Similarly, the Far East, although very different than Western societies, have managed to improve in the field of human rights and economic progress.
Thus, I would maintain that societies get the kind of goverment that if fitting for the mind-set of the ruled and since we see that there are 20+ Arab states, all of which are either dictatorships (some more iron-handed, some less) or failed states (e.g. Somalia, Lebanon, the Palestinians, Iraq) we can only include that a basic pathological societal inertia is holding the Arab world (and NOT necessarily the entire Islamic world-do not confuse the two) back.
“Almost the entire rest of the world” has “meaningful, liberal pro-democracy” movements? Really? Tell it to Russia (marginally democratic), China (with a weak pro-democracy movement), African states galore, etc. Why should the Arab world be judged inferior because they don’t possess the type of government you deem best for the world? I would agree w. you that it would be better if liberal democracy reigned in the Arab world. But unlike you, I’m not prepared to beat them with a stick for not having such governance. Secondly, you should remember that democracy doesn’t flourish overnight. it must be cultivated over decades & promoted incrementally (look at the states of the former Soviet Union and all the relatively new Latin American democracies). The fact that you condemn the Arab world for their backwardness indicates you don’t have the requisite patience for this process.
How convenient: Arab states are not democracies & therefore bad. And even if they were democracies they would revert to dictatorships merely by holding a vote. I guess you’ve fixed their wagon pretty good. Damned if they do, damned if they don’t. Why even try?
What do you know about African “rage and self-pity???” And how do you know there isn’t any? Do you know about the heinous killings that went on in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Congo, and now Sudan? Oh that’s right, you’ve conveniently omitted them fr. yr. travelogue of African successful democracy.
Ah, yes it must be all those democratic winds of change blowing in from China, Singapore, Myanmar and N. Korea.
Ah yes, the old “you get what you deserve” rule.
This is not only stupid and offensive, it is racist. I could easily say a “basic pathological inertia” is holding Israel back from making peace with the Arab world. This would be a lot more accurate than yr statement.
Maher-you say that the nation-state frameworks the Arabs don’t allow them a full-range of choices to opt for a more “modern”, or, if you like, “Western”-type identity that would transcend their current clan-based loyalty system that is the cause of so-much of the fragmentation that is plaguing the Arab world.
Dear imjudy
Let’s be quite clear about what I said.
1) I said that the claim that Arabs make political decisions based on clan loyalty was a sweeping statement and in many cases untested.
2) I did not say that I thought that, given more choices, they might opt for a more Western identity (or a more modern identity, and I do not equate the two). I said that allegiance with the nation-state depends on more than simply whether or not people have transcended clan identity.
3) I certainly did not say that clan loyalty is the cause of so much fragmentation in the Arab world. Apart from Somalia, which is peripheral to the Arab world as a whole, I would be interested to know of another place where clan loyalty (and I do mean clan loyalty, and not sectarian or ethnic ties, which are different again) is the major cause of fragmentation.
However, my question to you is “doesn’t the current system REFLECT the values they have”? Take Nasser, for example. He was wildly popular, yet his regime was a typical repressive, corrupt Arab-style government with an all-pervasive “Mukhabarat” (secret police)?
Once again, the use of the word “reflect” here implies a direct relationship without input by outside parties which simply does not conform to the known history of Egypt or any of the other Arab countries in the 20th (or indeed the 19th or 21st) century. Abdel Nasser was widely popular despite the secret police, not because the secret police “reflected” the
kind of society Egyptians wanted for themselves.
He used Marxist-socialist-type propaganda to try to enforce national unity, but in the end, he didn’t change Egyptian society very much
I think most people would agree that Abdel Nasser changed Egyptian society far more than the regimes that preceded and succeeded him. But Egyptian society was also changing in response to global and regional factors that had nothing to do with Abdel Nasser.
The fact is that in the Arab world, unlike almost the entire rest of the world, there is NO meaningful liberal, pro-democracy movement. I am well aware that Westerners can not expect societies in the Middle East to be carbon copies. of the west. There will be less emphasis on individualism, there will not be a strict separation of religion and state, but they
are far from anything remotely representing a sincere concern for basic human rights, free speech and the such.
I think this overstates the case. There are human rights groups in many Arab countries, operating under severe strictures and mostly ignored by Western media, but they are out there. Once again, broad political movements that are liberal-democratic would require a public space that could not be obtained from the present state structures without a fight. Rather than suggesting future courses for Arab society, this is also starting to sound like an attempt to affix blame to a single actor.
The fact is that if truly free multi-party elections were held in the Arab world, radical Islamic movements would take power in most states, setting up dictatorial regimes not unlike those that currently exist.
Another sweeping and untested statement. Truly free elections themselves presuppose a totally different environment than that in which the current vogue for Islamism has developed. In any case, is the Dawa Party a “radical Islamic movement”?
It should be remembered that Africa too has been plagued by tribalism, colonial exploitation (far worse than the Arabs have experienced) . . . and the population there is not wrapped up into the rage and self-pity that the Arab masses feel and which is strongly reinforced by their media, both “free” (Al-Jazeera, for example) or state-controlled. Similarly, the Far East, although very different than Western societies, have managed to improve in the field of human rights and economic progress.
This reminds me of something Hannah Arendt used to say:
What public opinion permits us to judge and even to condemn are trends, or whole groups of people – the larger the better – in short, something so general that distinctions can no longer be made, names no longer be named.
I’m afraid that categories like “Africa” and “the Far East” are close to useless when we are talking about the sentiments of millions of different people and the way their media behaves. Parts of Africa have experienced worse exploitation than the Arab world, but other parts have in fact been quite free of the sort of sustained political interference the Arab world
has had to put up with because of its oil resources. Parts of “the Far East” have made less economic progress than many Arab countries. Generalisations like this don’t help us understand anything.
As for talk of rage and self-pity, I should like to know how much actual experience of the Arab world you have.
…. we can only include that a basic pathological societal inertia is holding the Arab world (and NOT necessarily the entire Islamic world-do not confuse the two) back.
I have three things to say to this:
1) Where did you get your “we”?
2) When you say “do not confuse the two”, you create the rather unfortunate impression that I have trouble making the distinction. I am an Arab, and a journalist who has worked for years trying to impress the distinction (and the overlap) upon Western journalists. I do not have trouble making the distinction. That is precisely why I noted that the Pearl film
is set in Pakistan, which I have also covered extensively as a journalist. What is more, I would insist on more distinctions – between Arabs and Arabs, Africans and Africans, etc – than you have made so far.
3) I am afraid that I regard the idea of pathologies (a medical term) that inhere in people according to their ethnic origins as unacceptable. The factors that hold Arabs back are many and varied and include cultural, societal and political problems. None of these problems are “inevitable” or “inherent”. So no, the conclusion you come to is far from being the only
one possible.
imjudy asks richard:
Or do you view the UN Charter of Human RIghts as a “Western” document which it is not fair to compare to Arab standards?
I cannot presume to speak for Richard, however it is worth pointing out that it was Rene Cassin (a Frenchman) who felt that the charter should not attempt to encompass the world’s women as this would draw resistance from predominantly Muslim countries, and Bedia Afnan (an Iraqi woman) who insisted that the charter must explicitly include equality for women.
Richard-when I stated that there is are significant “pro-Democracy movements”, you pointed out that many states around the world are not democracies. You misunderstand what I said–I am well aware that Russia and many countries are not democracies…but I was referring to MOVEMENTS, i.e organized groups lobbying for years or even decades for liberal democratic reforms and human rights. I am aware there are a few in the Arab world, e.g. the Ibn Khaldum group in Egypt (I believe that is what it is called), but these groups have little public support. In almost all Arab states, the only large opposition movements are Islamic and they don’t have true democracy and human rights as their main objective, e.g. the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Algeria had a truly free multy-party election in 1990 and what was the result?…a bloody civil war. Same in Iraq….the election merely exacerbated existing religious and clan tensions that were repressed in Saddam’s period, but existing just under the surface.
Regarding the rage and self-pity the Arabs seen to nourish, it was claimed “these exist in Africa as well”. NOT AT ALL THE SAME THING. A poll you might have seen a few days ago in the New York Times said a large majority of Africans are cautiously optimistic about the future. As I pointed out, Africa has a lot more reason to be angry at Western culture and the White man, but they DO NOT indulge in blaming others for their predicament, and their political and religious leaders don’t go around encouraging violence and suicide bombings against whites, or Europeans or Americans because of the injustices they suffered in the past. Africa also has significant pro-democracy movements in many countries which have had significant successes in reforming many countries that were not democratic. In the Far East, Taiwan and South Korea managed to reform repressive anti-Communist regimes into real democracies. India, which was under British colonial rule for centuries and which suffered from traditional values and attitudes such as the caste system (similar to the clan loyalties of the Arab world) and governmental corruption, still managed to create a functioning democracy. Please explain to me why not one of 20+ Arab states, which were under European colonial rule for a maximum of a few decades can’t seem to do this. Yes, I know that they were under Ottoman rule for a long time, but the Ottoman homeland, Turkey, today is an Islamic democracy. As a matter of fact, in places like Egypt, Iraq and other places, European influence led to the building of semi-democratic institutions like a free press and a parliament (although the parliaments had little or no real power), yet when Nasserist or Ba’athis pan-Arabism swept them away leaving the suffocating dictatorships like Saddams’, Egypt’s, etc. Thus, blaming outsiders for the poor condition of the Arab world is just making excuses for bad leadership in all these countries.
I am aware there are a few in the Arab world, e.g. the Ibn Khaldum group in Egypt (I believe that is what it is called), but these groups have little public support.
I assume imjudy is talking about this:
http://www.eicds.org/english/publications/saadarticles/2005/despotism.htm
And we can see almost immediately that Dr Ibrahim does not dismiss the Islamists as a valid source of democratic discourses.
Algeria had a truly free multy-party election in 1990 and what was the result?…a bloody civil war.
This is a bowdlerising of the historical record. What caused the war was the refusal of the state apparatus to relinquish power to the democratically elected legislature, not the fact of elections themselves. As for talk of clan tensions in Iraq, I’d like an example.
As I pointed out, Africa has a lot more reason . . . and their political and religious leaders don’t go around encouraging violence and suicide bombings against whites, or Europeans or Americans because of the injustices they suffered in the past.
“In the past” would seem to be the key words here. Can you name an African country where the injustice is 1) ongoing and 2) clearly supported by American money?
India, which was under British colonial rule for centuries and which suffered from traditional values and attitudes such as the caste system (similar to the clan loyalties of the Arab world) and governmental corruption, still managed to create a functioning democracy.
But the caste system still exists, as does voting according to clan allegiance and rampant corruption! The idea that democracy involves a turning away from all these things is given the lie precisely by the Indian experience. India also has plenty of terrorism.
Please explain to me why not one of 20+ Arab states, which were under European colonial rule for a maximum of a few decades can’t seem to do this.
Well clearly it isn’t to do with “societal inertia”. India has plenty of that too.
Yes, I know that they were under Ottoman rule for a long time, but the Ottoman homeland, Turkey, today is an Islamic democracy.
This is made to sound like a fabulous fait accompli. Yet Turkey has also in the 80-odd years of the republic experienced rule by the military, frightful persecution of minorities, torture, persecution of leftists and Islamists. The democracy is not as secure as this rather trite statement would suggest. Only recently the chief of staff of the armed forces felt he was within his rights to interfere in the appointment of the president. And Turkey does not consider itself “an Islamic democracy”.
How the pattern that imjudy describes – of quasi-democratic institutions under European tutelage being replaced by nationalist command regimes in the immediate post-colonial period – is different from the African or Latin American experience I don’t know. To say that functioning democracies haven’t emerged is quite different from saying that something inherent in Arabs prevents them from doing so. I presume that Lebanon isn’t a functioning democracy by imjudy’s definition – and the main obstacle to this is a system of communal representation devised by … Europeans.
Oh, and the Algerian election referred to took place in late 1991, not 1990.
The Algerian National Assembly elections of 1991 were cancelled by a military coup after the first round, triggering the Algerian Civil War
The war was not the outcome of elections. It was the outcome of the cancellation of elections by the military. And did France take the side of the voters or the military? I can only assume the former, given the “inherent” commitment of French society to democratic norms. Alors! Ce n’est pas comme ca? Quel dommage.
Yes, I noted the same problem with imjudy’s comment about Algeria. But there’s a similar problem here. It was not the Iraqi elections that exacerbated inter-religious tensions in Iraq. They were already superheated by the botched American occupation of Iraq which did nothing to alleviate such tensions in the immediate aftermath of the toppling of Saddam. We had ample opportunity to attempt to work with Iraqis of the old regime who might’ve provided some continuity in the new one. Instead, we swept all the Baathists and the former Iraqi army officers out & attempted to start fr. scratch w/o knowing where to turn or what we were doing.
Some reading:
http://www.eicds.org/english/publications/reports/Annual-Report-EN07.pdf
I would recommend pages 23-25. The whole thing is 218 pages, and I shall be very interested to see how much of it is about clan systems in Arab countries.
Maher-you keep eluding the point I am making. Yes, India has intercommunal violence, Yes there is violence and anti-democratic governments in Africa. Yes, Turkey has had a war with the Kurds and difficulties in developing democracy. But the point is that none of the states or regions I have mentioned have someone like the Saudis and other oil-rich sheikhs spreadiing their poisonous antisemitic and anti-Western propaganda in networks of mosques and other communications media around the world. Neither have an extremist ideology committed to overthrowing the world system. Neither have a belief that their religions have to be spread around the world, by force if necessary. Now, you are going to jump up and say “it is only a minority of Arab/Muslims extremists that believe these things”. So then what are the moderates doing to counteract these extremists? Take independent television Al-Jazeera. They spread extremist ideas around the world. The point is that the general feeling in the West is that the majority of the Arab world has at least some sympathy for the extremism and terrorism that we see coming out of that part of the world. It was Arab/Muslim extremists that carried out 9/11 and Muslim extremists that did the 7/7 attacks in London.
And a big cause of this is the disfunction condition of the Arab states who can’t seem to deliver national economic development and whose leaders seem to think blaming the US and Israel for all their problems will get them off the hook (e.g. Qaddafi saying that doctors and nurses sentenced to death in the HIV case were “Zionist agents”).
Maher-you keep eluding the point I am making.
No I don’t. I keep asking questions about your reasoning, none of which you have so far seen fit to answer, whereas I have quoted you at length.
But the point is that none of the states or regions I have mentioned have someone like the Saudis and other oil-rich sheikhs spreadiing their poisonous antisemitic and anti-Western propaganda in networks of mosques and other communications media around the world.
And your contention is what? That this is caused by them being Arabs? That it is caused by their attachment to the clan system? What?
Neither have an extremist ideology committed to overthrowing the world system.
Do the Saudis have this? I can’t say I had noticed. Once again, I would point out the Pearl movie is set in Pakistan, formerly part of British India. It was in India under British rule that the Khilafat movement and the Deobandi school of Islam first emerged. It was in India under British rule that Abu al-Ala Maududi declared jihad to be “the sixth pillar of Islam” and founded Jamaat-i-Islami. Were all these people secretly Arabs?
The point is that the general feeling in the West is that the majority of the Arab world has at least some sympathy for the extremism and terrorism that we see coming out of that part of the world.
My point is that “general feeling” is not a sound basis for conclusions about what is going on in the Arab world. Can you find a survey of public opinion in the Arab world that bears this view out? The way that people in the Arab world view “extremism” is certainly different from the way people not in the Arab world view it. As I have said already, this is to do with ongoing political realities, not inchoate rage or self-pity.
It was Arab/Muslim extremists that carried out 9/11 and Muslim extremists that did the 7/7 attacks in London.
And the conclusions you draw from this are what? That there is something particularly screwed up about Arabs? Your second example doesn’t involve Arabs. It involves young British men of South Asian descent who attended training camps in … Pakistan.
Are you starting to see my point?
Please don’t try to generalise about the Arab world using Gaddafi as an example.
And my point, for those other than imjudy who might still be reading this exchange, is not that there is something inherently screwed up about Indian and Pakistani Muslims or their culture, either. It is that looking for “pathologies” in a particular culture is itself a misguided approach. Those who attempt to say the “pathology” lies in the common religion of the two cultural groups will be back to “confusing the two”, something imjudy has already warned us against.
And a big cause of this is the disfunction condition of the Arab states who can’t seem to deliver national economic development and whose leaders seem to think blaming the US and Israel for all their problems will get them off the hook
If this is an attempt to explain why young men resorted to terrorism in the attacks against Britain, Madrid, the United States and Bali, it is laughably inadequate and has more holes in it than a golf course. A brief examination of the life of Mohamed Atta or Ziad al-Jarrah would be enough to dispel this fog.