Linking Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) to Iraq’s former Baath Party has been a recurring subject in media discussion for years.
Whether backed by empirical evidence or sheer deduction, various reports suggest that Daesh is rooted and largely managed by officers in former Iraqi president Saddam Hussain’s pan-Arab nationalist party.
The Baath Party was banned and the Iraqi army was disbanded soon after the United States invaded and occupied Iraq in 2003. The country’s then new ruler, American Paul Bremer signed what became known as the de-Baathification law, which disbanded an army of 400,000, and also barred members from any government jobs and receiving pension. Saddam himself was hanged in 2006.
What the Americans rashly judged as a decisive victory and a clean break from Iraq’s past proved to be the very destruction of the very fabric of Iraqi society. The outlawing of the Baath Party (whose members were listed in the millions), the dissolution of the army and the marginalisation of the Sunni sect ushered in the start of yet another upheaval, one that was not only, and predictably anti-American, but also sectarian to the core.
The rise of the Shiite sect as the new dominant group in Iraq, against the backdrop of oppressed and marginalised Sunnis only served the interest of the US government in the short-term.
Homegrown resistance to the US occupation of Iraq began taking on new forms that also targeted anyone who was seen as a conduit to foreign presence in the once-powerful Arab country. Targeting of the Shiite soon grew to include killing of young police recruits, pilgrims and innocent civilians in busy markets. Unable to manage the mess it created, the US eventually redeployed its forces in and out of Iraq, leaving the country split between sects and ethnicities, and with enough arms and hatred to destabilise the entire region for years to come.
Predictably, the invasion of Iraq has yielded various violent phenomenons, the destructive presence of which is being felt largely in Syria but also in other parts of the region and the world as well.
But many insist on isolating these violent events in order to obfuscate the obvious links between today’s violence and yesterday’s illegal wars.
Not only was this view intellectually lacking, but dangerous too- the offshoots were addressed, but not the roots of the problem.
The Washington Post, among other mainstream news sources spoke about the need to examine the roots of Daesh. “The public profile of the foreign terrorists frequently obscures the Islamic State’s [Daesh’s] roots in the bloody recent history of Iraq, its brutal excesses as much a symptom as a cause of the country’s woes,” wrote Liz Sly in 2015. Other writers shared this view, the discourse of which aimed at linking the brutality of Daesh and Saddam’s Baath regime, not an acceptance of moral responsibility. In fact, to date, that discussion has yielded little by way of placing current problems in a fairly recent historical context.
Still, the fact that an Arab nationalist movement that was originally articulated by a Christian thinker, Michel Aflaq being linked to a fatalistic group with a poorly articulated religious discourse, is a realisation worth pondering on.
It seems that the roots of violence in the Middle East, which are now extending to the rest of the world, were never a matter of ideology or religion, but of circumstances which were shaped by a series of destructive wars and political decisions that invested in sowing the seeds of disunity and sectarianism.
While the US and its western allies must have the courage to confront its own misconduct in the region, the Arab world must reclaim a shared vision that transcends the tribalism of the sect, which is easily manipulated and mismanaged.
That shared vision is, unfortunately, lacking because the region that has given rise to the likes of Aflaq, George Habash, Rashid Al Gannouchi, Edward Said, and numerous others, has systematically muzzled its intellectuals.
Arab visionaries have either been co-opted by the exuberant funds allocated to sectarian propaganda, been silenced by fear of retribution, or are simply unable to articulate a collective vision that transcends their sects, religions or their political tribal affiliations.
This void created by the absence of Arab intellectuals has been filled by extremist voices tirelessly advocating a genocidal future for everyone, of which Arabs and Muslims are by far the greatest victims.
The debate in western media and among academics remains futile, yet pervasive — while the Islamophobes are eager to reduce Islam to Daesh, others insist on conspiracy theories regarding the origins of the group.
Much time is wasted in this vain discussion. But the roots of extremism cannot be found in a religion that is credited with uplifting Europe from its Dark Ages to an era of rational philosophy and the ascendency of science.
Instead it can largely be found in massively destructive foreign military interventions.
Oddly, foreign interventionists often cite ‘fighting extremism’ to further justify their meddling in other countries’ affairs, thus empowering extremists, allowing them to acquire more recruits, funds and popular validation.
It is a vicious cycle that has occupied the Middle East since the US invasion of Iraq.
While the relationship between foreign interventions, ensued chaos, and extremism is often missing in western media discourses, in the Arab world the challenge is somewhat different. There were times in which Arab intellectuals fought to articulate a unique narrative — a combination of nationalist, socialist and Islamic ideologies that had tremendous impact on the Arab — individually and collectively.
In recent years, however, the ‘marketplace of ideas’ has shrunk – the ‘intellectual’ is now bought and sold for a negotiable price, resulting in an intellectual vacuum which the likes of Daesh, Al Qaida and others have filled with their agendas
True, their agendas are dark and horrific, yet they are rational outcomes at a time when Arab societies subsist in despair, when foreign interventions are afoot, and when no homegrown intellectual movement is available to offer Arab nations a roadmap towards a future free from tyranny and foreign occupation.
Even when Daesh is defeated on the ground, its ideology will not disappear; it will simply mutate, for Daesh is itself a mutation of various other extremist ideologies.
Thus, it should come as no surprise seeing ex-Baathists involved in the formation of Daesh. While extremism existed prior to the US invasion of Iraq, the speed of its growth and rapidity of its transformation, can only be attributed to the massive upheaval and instability wrought by the West’s self-serving wars.
Yet, only the Arabs are capable of defeating Daesh and its likes, through the formulation of a true vision that is predicated on unity and inspired by their quest for freedom. The suppression of such a movement will leave no other alternative but more foreign intervention and extremism, feeding on each other, growing, mutating and destroying any chances for any future peace and stability.
Dr Ramzy Baroud is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His latest book is My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story.
