Undoubtedly, there are positive outcomes of the popular uprisings that swept across some Arab countries three years ago. Yet, the negatives are still prevailing over the region and preventing the emergence of the real change sought by the Arab masses who took to the streets demanding democracy and political changes in favour of Arab unity and identity, and maintaining the resistance approach against Israel.
Three years after the beginning of the Arab uprisings, the situation on the ground only serves Israel and its foreign allies, while encouraging division and fragmentation among Arabs. There are growing fears in Arab countries, which witnessed popular uprisings, over the integrity of their territories and the unity of their people, as well as over their security and political and social stability.
Such fears are legitimate since the Arab region has become an open arena for competing and conflicting interests of regional and international powers. Unfortunately, this comes amid the total absence of any Arab strategy and national project, and in the presence of non-Arab projects for the future of Arab nations.
When both the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions broke out in early 2011, I wrote that revolutions are just means whose success is linked to the availability of faithful leaderships, clear-cut goals and the proper organisational structure.
The negative outcomes of the Arab uprisings prompt me to recall my stand as an Arab intellectual and writer. In the first week of the outbreak of the Libyan revolution, I appealed to the Arab League, specifically to Egypt, to intervene in favour of the revolution and the Libyan people, as well as to thwart any foreign interference and save Libya from the threat of internationalisation and partition.
Of course, neither the Arab League nor Egypt listened to such calls, leaving Libya an open arena for international power struggle — which led to its present state of chaos.
The Arab world is facing threats, including Israeli attempts to weaken Arab revolutions by dividing people and countries. This is apart from Israel’s ongoing attempts to fuel strife and conflicts among Arab people and countries on the eastern front, to weaken the resistance in Lebanon and Palestine.
The major challenge facing Arab revolutions is the social structure in these countries, which is based on sectarian, ethnic and tribal grounds. There is no national unifying framework to protect these countries from the evil of some local powers and foreign parties that share the common goal of creating inter-state troubles and internal conflicts in each country.
Bearing in mind that the Arab region was and still is in a state of conflict and differences among governments, changes in Egypt have not led to the restoration of Arab solidarity.
The absence of a minimum level of solidarity will ensure that the Arab world will be empty of any Arab vision or strategy in the face of regional and international machinations. This clearly means that the Arab region is now caught between both the American and Israeli strategies, which have points of commonality but have differences as well.
The Israeli plan still rests on an Arab-Iranian conflict at the regional level, as well as on inter-Arab sectarian, ethnic and tribal conflicts, to safeguard its security and interests in the region.
The malicious Israeli designs are aimed at creating enemies among the Arabs themselves and between them and their neighbours, such as Iran. This is a clear approach adopted by Israel to eradicate the Palestinian cause and promote the “alternative homeland” concept, which stipulates that Jordan would be an alternative homeland for the Palestinians, as an acceptable idea. Israel’s plan will make Arab uprisings a force for the destruction of entities, not only for the toppling of governments.
The current American plan rests on making the most of Arab revolutions and changes for the American political project in the Middle East as a whole. This project is based on putting an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict on all fronts and the declaration of a Palestinian state, thus allowing for the emergence of a new situation in the entire Arab region, where there will be no reasons for resistance or for having special relations with Iran.
The US is planning to reach an American-Israeli-Arab accord, including all Arabs from the Atlantic Ocean to the Arabian Gulf. This clearly means that security, economic, commercial and political agreements will be concluded between Washington and all capitals of the region, in return for comprehensive Arab normalisation with Israel. This is meant to enhance the Middle Eastern identity as a substitute for national and religious identities that accompanied the Arab conflict with Israel and the West.
Of course, the realisation of either the Israeli or the American plan will depend on the peoples of the region. If the people of the region and their governments embrace the approach of violence and are dragged into civil wars, they will definitely serve the “Israeli design”. This is simply because the Zionist project is mainly based on the division of the whole region into small states, and the dissolution of all the existing Arab states in order to permit “Israel regional superiority”.
Yet, if the Arabs respond positively to the “US option of settlement”, currently being introduced by the US administration, especially given that the American strategy shares some of the goals of the Israeli plan, the region’s countries will totally be affiliated to the US.
The problem is that the US truly believes that its dominance of the region and its natural resources is the strategic guarantee for it to remain the world’s sole superpower.
These are the options for the region now in light of the absence of a unified Arab strategy and in an unhealthy environment, where divisions and differences are prevail.
Washington’s plan for the region during the era of former US president George W. Bush and the neo-conservatives was based on the creation of a new Middle East through wars and “creative chaos” as well as the call for federal democracies that would divide each country and then restructure it to take the “federal” shape. This malicious plan was aimed at ensuring weakness and fragmentation of the Arab world, and the continuous domination and control over its natural resources and decisions.
The invasion of Iraq and the division of Sudan are the true examples of the malicious American scheme in the region. The same scenario will be implemented in Yemen, Libya and Syria.
In fact, no matter who is in the White House, he only cares about American interests. He might support regime change in one country while opposing it in another, depending on each country’s conditions and the nature of US relations with existing institutions there, especially with the military.
This year is very important for President Barack Obama, who is in his second term in office. This is because there are a host of issues on the US agenda, including: the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the fate of the supposed “Palestinian state” and the future of Arab-Israeli “peace process”.
Among important issues is also the fate of the international agreement with Iran, and the possibility of reaching a political settlement to the crisis in Syria. On all issues, there is a level of understandings between Washington and Moscow.
Now, the Obama administration will try to make the most of settlement proposals before next autumn, which coincides with the midterm US elections, in which the Democrats should win the majority of both the House of Representatives and the Senate. This will enable Obama to complete his administration’s agenda locally and internationally.
Although it is true that both international and regional parties are playing influential roles in fuelling divisions among Arab countries, the Arabs themselves are responsible for the huge chasm and rift between and within Arab communities.
Before the outbreak of the popular uprisings, there was a risk that each Arab country would be divided along ethnic and sectarian grounds. This means that the Arabs have always been afraid of themselves more than being scared of the occupiers of their lands, who were seeking to seize control over their wealth and natural resources.
The weakness of the Arab nation derives from the weakness of its heart - namely Egypt. It is also a result of rigid thinking and unchanged thoughts that ignite strife and division, instead of solidarity and unity.
A question that is repeated by the Arabs today is: Where is Egypt, given what is happening now in the Arab region? Is it true that Egypt’s domestic condition prevent it from taking action to save the region from sliding into the brink of internationalisation or division, or both?
Arab uprisings did not wait for the evolution of domestic affairs in Egypt .
Egypt has always had a special place in the hearts of the Arabs, who pin hopes on it because it has always been the key Arab force in the face of any confrontation throughout the Arab nation’s history. The Arab region was always subject to the influences of Egypt, both positive and negative. But history also confirms that the security of Egypt is the security of the Arabs. Hence Egypt’s stability and progress depend on what is happening in its geographical surroundings.
Sobhi Ghandour is head of Al Hewar Centre, Washington, USA.
