The Stockholm Journal of International Affairs - Middle East

THE STOCKHOLM JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFIARS

MIDDLE EAST issue 9 - with writing on syria, lebanon, egypt, iran and palestine by andrew freeman carl drott paul katsivelis simon rose alexandra bro arianna framvik malik erik sundblad daniel lundh linda lindberg

editorial team editor in chief ANTON AHLÉN editor ANDREAS CARLSSON art director ALEXANDER SVENSSON writers ANDREW FREEMAN CARL DROTT PAUL KATSIVELIS SIMON ROSE ALEXANDRA BRO ARIANNA FRAMVIK MALIK ERIK SUNDBLAD DANIEL LUNDH LINDA LINDBERG utrikespolitiska föreningen stockholm box 500 06 stockholm 103 05 organisation number 08 24 06 38 08 info@ufstockholm.se

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A WORD FROM THE EDITOR SALAFISM IN SYRIA BLOCKADE TAKE IT’S TOLL IN NORTHERN SYRIA ITINERARY OF A COLLECTIVE MEMORY OUR VISIT TO SHATILA REFUGEE CAMP STRATEGY FOR PROGRESS QAHERA AFTER EGYPT’S MILITARY COUP A NEW DIRECTION FOR IRAN EVERYDAY REALITY IN BETLEHEM THE GATEKEEPERS A FINAL WORD

THE STOCKHOLM JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

issue 9

MIDDLE EAST a word from the editor - ANTON AHLÉN

So, we’ve tailored a new costume for us. We’ve embraced – what one could claim to be – the intrinsic self-fulfillment of getting bigger, better, stronger. With eminent help from Alexander Svensson we’ve developed a completely new layout. The journal has also become more comprehensive which we hope will engender a bigger impression.

This autumn issue of the Stockholm Journal of International Affairs focuses on the Middle East. Once again we use a somewhat ambiguous geographical categorization when defining the theme. Nonetheless, the Middle East is a particularly relevant region. It is the place of some of the most extensive and dynamic conflict lines in modern history and since the wake of the Arabic spring it has been an arena for great change as well as severe struggles.

The Middle East is without doubt an international focal point.

The new format has allowed us to expand the content, and I am excited to present a variety of features ranging from academic analysis to comics, from Egypt in the west to Iran in the east. However, we reserve the right to not be able to include all perspectives, or take into account the different sides in the conflicts identified in this release. Given the complex sequence of events in several parts of the region, it seems necessary to emphasize that we have an unbiased approach, in line with our organization’s standpoint as a political and religious independent association. Having said that, I hope you will enjoy this issue.

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ISSUE 9 2013

SALAFISM IN SYRIA

by ANDREW FREEMAN

The continuing conflict in SYRIA will soon face its third winter. although the UN security council has agreed on a resolution to destroy SYRIA’s chemical weapons, there are few indicators of a constructive solution to the conflict. In this article, ANDREW FREEMAN, focuses on the JABHAT AL-NUSRA movement and their influence in the ongoing conflict.

Two years and one hundred thousand casualties later, the war in Syria looks no closer to ending as sectarian clashes continue to mount. Surrounded by Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon and Israel, and with violence spilling over into all of these countries, Syria’s location has ensured that fighting will continue as long the West and regional actors continue to play out their foreign policy aims. The result – rebel groups continue to grow, and with them comes a powerful Salafi strain that cannot be ignored.

Salafism itself is derived from the term al-salaf al-salih (the pious forefathers) and is generally taken to refer to the first three generations of Muslims who witnessed first-hand the rise of Islam. These generations are associated with the truest form of Islam, and are seen as examples of the proper way for future Muslims to live. Today, most people think of Salafis as hard-line extremists or Jihadis, however not all Salafis are alike, and the term includes a wide range of people, many of whom are misunderstood. When I spoke with Mohammad Tolba, a Salafi who co-founded ‘Salafyo Costa’ – an Egyptian movement aimed at promoting religious tolerance and challenging stereotypes, he told me that “when governments need an easy enemy to pass their misuse of power, or extending emergency laws, they 4

go to the easiest opposer.” It is not just governments that do this, but other Islamic movements too. According to Tolba “the Muslim Brotherhood would do the same, they want to promote that they are the moderate Islam and if you didn’t support them, the scary Salafis would come… ... which is a great lie, and to prove that you should see what happened in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood crazily went to the streets, while the Salafis (the Noor Party) decided to sit and be part of the political life.” The group’s motto “we always pay for your drinks” is a reference to the way that Salafis are traditionally used to take the blame for most issues within many Middle Eastern countries.

At the start of the Syrian conflict, Salafism was certainly used as a tool in this way. Bashar al-Assad’s regime were quick to point the finger of blame their way, hoping that this would scare Syria’s minorities and non-Islamist movements, as well as the West which would draw parallels with what happened in Iraq. The Political Opposition, on the other hand, first chose to ignore sectarian strife to preserve their image, and then blamed the regime of conducting jihadi missions to portray Assad’s government as stable. Unfortunately, it is irrefutable that the climate in Syria is perfect for more fundamentalist Salafi groups, where sectarian violence, access to jihadi military expertise, disillusionment with the West and funding from the Gulf all allow them to flourish. One group in particular, Jabhat al-Nusra (JN) has gained notoriety for both its military effectiveness and its ideologies.

MIDDLE EAST

soldiers on the frontline by CARL DROTT

“JABHAT AL-NUSRA BELIEVE THAT ANY GOVERNMENT THAT DOES NOT ENFORCE SHARIA LAW IS ILLEGITIMATE, AND IN THIS WAY SEE AN OPPORTUNITY TO ESTABLISH A SHARIA-BASED GOVERNMENT WITHIN SYRIA”

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SYRIA

Jabhat al-Nusra li-ahl as-Sham min Mujahedi as-Sham fi Sahat al-Jihad (The Front for Aid to the People of the Levant from the Mujahedin of the Levant in the Battlefields of Jihad), or Jabhat al-Nusra for short, first announced itself in January 2012. With around 5,000 members, it may not be the biggest rebel group fighting in Syria, but it is seen as the most effective. The group became notorious after being officially linked to Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) and being listed as a foreign terrorist organisation by the US State Department, which ironically, increased its popularity along with a belief inside Syria that not enough was being done by the West and the rest of the world to help. According to the Quilliam Foundation, a counter-extremism think tank, JN’s five main objectives in Syria are to: 1 2

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Establish a coherent group of jihadis To reinforce and strengthen the consciousness of the Isla mist nature of the conflict To build JN’s military capacity To create an Islamist State in Syria To establish a ‘Caliphate’ in the Levant

Jabhat al-Nusra believe that any government that does not enforce sharia law is illegitimate, and in this way see an opportunity to establish a sharia-based government within Syria. Whilst this all sounds daunting, JN have been incredibly adept at learning from the mistakes made by al-Qaeda in Iraq. Despite most news coverage of JN being focussed on their association with AQI and the fact that they are labelled a terrorist group, JN mainly target military rather than civilian targets, and do not bomb shrines like their al-Qaeda affiliates have done in Iraq. This can be seen best through events in Raqqa, in the North of Syria, where members of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) have been defecting to join both JN and the other AQI-affiliated group the ‘Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’ (ISIS, or sometimes ISIL), who emerged in April 2013 as a merger between JN and the Islamic State of Iraq – something which JN rejected. The merger was annulled, and ISIS now operates separately. As these defections have taken place, both the local population and rebel fighters have become fed up with ISIS’ actions on the 6

ground. Activists there have been kidnapped and extorted, and four car bombs were detonated in the city. On top of this, ISIS then fired RPGs into a crowd of demonstrators who were attempting to get an ambulance to take the wounded past an ISIS checkpoint. In stark contrast, JN have offices in the city, respects the locals, and have many Syrians within their ranks, which is part of a much larger tactic by JN to influence the Syrian conflict through means other than military action. Whilst there can be no doubt they are predominantly a military group, they also have a string of non-military institutions, including a number of religious leaders who spread JN’s religious message and preside over courts, a Majlis al-Shura (Consultative Council) which makes decisions for the group, and a media outlet al-Manara al-Bayda (The White Minaret) which has propaganda videos. JN are also extremely careful in toning down religious rhetoric. The group actively engage in non-military work, firstly through Da’wa (missionary work) and secondly, through humanitarian work, with a specific department Qism al-Ighatha (Relief Department) which gives blankets, bread, and gas to civilians, as well as regulating grocery prices to prevent the needy from being exploited. In Aleppo, there are even examples of JN establishing courts to mediate disputes, and in cases, even officially ratifying the purchase of property. Civilians living in areas controlled by JN have said that they operate with integrity. By providing social services and establishing institutions like courts, as well as operating with the consent of the local population, JN have ensured that they can achieve much more than they could using solely military methods.

Although there a number of rebel groups operating in Syria, funding from the Gulf has ensured that JN remain one of the most popular choices. Only a year into the conflict, many Syrians became disenchanted with the FSA and other non-Islamist groups after joining to fight the regime, only to find that they lacked both firepower and the means to get it. There were even instances of weapons being distributed without ammunition, as this could not be afforded. This problem does not exist for JN as they have enough resources and support coming from their

ANDREW FREEMAN

“AS THE CONFLICT UNFOLDS JN WILL CONTINUE TO EXERT THEIR INFLUENCE USING BOTH MILITARY AND NON-MILITARY MEANS”

affiliates in Iraq as well as the Gulf. The result is that they are becoming a much more attractive proposition than the Free Syrian Army. Despite this, recruitment for JN is very selective. Assurances (“tezkiyya”) are needed from two front-line commanders assuring that a potential recruit has the correct attitude, religious commitment, and skills.

According to the Quilliam Foundation, recruits are tested for bravery, loyalty and dedication to JN’s ideologies and then take a vow of allegiance (al-Bay’a). This selection process is another reason for JN’s success - although their numbers are relatively small, they are a strong, cohesive unit who, due to the oath they gave, are fully committed to the group’s cause - unlike the FSA, who recruit en masse from wherever they can. Because of this, there is considerably less unity and the FSA are less efficient.

Consequently, the FSA has conducted a number of joint operations with JN, who can draw on their experiences fighting in Iraq as part of al-Qaeda. A joint mission was conducted between the two to gain control of the Damascus highway in a bid to prepare for a battle inside the capital. JN has also shown a willingness to work with other rebel groups too – in October 2012 they fought with the Syrian Liberation Front and the Idlib Military Council at Wadi al-Dief, between Aleppo and Hama, and on January 11 2013, they worked with the Syrian Islamic Front and the Syrian Liberation Front to take Taftanaz Airport (situated between Idlib and Aleppo). Its sister organisation ISIS has shown no real interest in doing this, and has alienated itself from other groups, who see it as having its own agenda inside Syria. This is highlighted by a recent statement made by a political leader of another rebel faction, the Tawhid Brigade, stating 13 rebel groups (including JN) who are signatories to the statement, should cooperate, and therefore avoid conflict. Tellingly, ISIS is not part of

this group. As the conflict unfolds JN will continue to exert their influence using both military and non-military means. Whilst much of the focus on them up to now has been on their military strength and effectiveness, the influence they will have over the local population is much more important. Because of this, their humanitarian wing and the courts that they have established to restore order will become much more significant. The role that these institutions play will do much more to persuade civilians to side with JN - provided they continue to learn from mistakes in Iraq (where the Sunni population initially sided with the Salafis, up until they began to execute civilians for various infringements). As society continues to break down under the conflict, residents of affected areas will need somewhere to turn. By establishing these institutions, having the ability to ratify property purchases, using courts to judge criminals, or even preside over marriage and divorce means that JN could hold sway over individuals in a completely different way to other rebel groups. In time, this will lead to an Islamising of the conflict in Syria that has not fully been seen up until now.

Whilst much is made of the fighting in the country, and the devastation this has left, JN’s ability to operate ‘behind the scenes’ and gain legitimacy through humanitarian and institutional work will end up affecting the outcome in Syria in a way that combat cannot. It may be that the biggest threat to democracy post-conflict will not lie in military action and violence, but in the way groups like Jabhat al-Nusra manage to legitimise themselves in civil society throughout the country.

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ISSUE 9 2013

BLOCKADE TAKES IT’S TOLL IN NORTHERN SYRIA

by CARL DROTT

For some time now, we have cooperated with journalist Carl Drott, who has written articles for our blog. Carl recently returned from his travel to Syria. This article is his report of the situation in northern Syria close to the Iraqi border.

The Xabûr river marks the border between Syria and the Iraqi Kurdistan region. The area on the Syrian side is formally controlled by the Kurdish Supreme Committee (Desteya Bilind a Kurd = DBK). However, the Democratic Union Party (Partiya Yekîtiya Demokrat = PYD), which is an offshoot from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan = PKK) in Turkey, is de facto in charge. The border station itself is one of the few exceptions when it comes to the dominance of the PYD. Its staff are split exactly in half between supporters of the two constituent organisations of the DBK, namely the PYD and the Kurdish National Council (Encûmana Niştimanî ya Kurdî li Sûriye = ENKS). The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq has close relations with the outmanoeuvred parties of the ENKS, but its relations with the PYD have always been strained.

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The new pontoon bridge that enabled tens of thousands of Syrian Kurdish refugees to cross the Xabûr in mid-August has now been closed, supposedly for maintenance. The ferries are still operational, but since 19th May they no longer transport any aid into Syria. This situation appears incomprehensible, especially as the recent refugee crisis is primarily the result of deteriorating living conditions rather than direct security threats. Even though the exact reasons remain obscure, it is clear that the decision on the part of the KRG to keep the border closed is a result of its political disagreements with the PYD. While factories in Homs, Aleppo and Damascus used to satisfy almost all domestic needs for medical drugs, the on-going civil war has resulted in a drastic decrease in production.[1] Since the DBK-controlled People’s Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel = YPG) took over large parts of northern Syria last summer, almost no medical drugs have reached these areas from elsewhere in Syria.

The roads are either deliberately blocked by opposition or regime forces, or they have simply become too unsafe for the movement of goods. The Turkish border has mostly remained closed, leaving the ferry route from Iraq as

MIDDLE EAST

the XABÛR RIVER by CARL DROTT

the last lifeline. The Kurdish Red Crescent (Heyva Sor a Kurd) medical centre in Girkêlegê opened in April to serve the needs of poor people residing in the area. Special priority is given to the many Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) that have come here from other parts of Syria.

Until now they claim to have helped around 1800 people, but increasingly often they simply have no medical drugs and no treatment to offer. The Kurdish Red Crescent also run another centre in the nearby town of Rimêlan, where they give emergency treatment to the wounded before they take them to the hospital in Dêrik or Qamişlo.

Dr Issa Rasul, a cardiologist trained in Russia, is the only physician at the medical centre. The eleven full-time staff also includes two nurses and one pharmacist. Many doctors and nurses have fled the country, which has increased the already great strain on the remaining medical personnel. Modern equipment is lacking and there is a desperate shortage of all kinds of medical drugs, especially paediatric drugs and infant milk formula. Ultimately, the blockade imposed by Kurds on other Kurds is certain to cause civilian deaths.

– We are conducting humanitarian work here and do not care about political issues. We just need them to open the border, says Dr Rasul.

In a seemingly erratic exception to the blockade, a brand new ambulance was allowed to pass over the Iraqi border at the end of August. It was sent to Girkêlegê as a gift from the Kurdish Red Crescent in Germany, after the old one had broken down. The YPG, who have been involved in a war against radical Islamist groups in the area since mid-July, have their own ambulance to evacuate wounded fighters. The frontline is located just south of Girkêlegê, close enough for the sounds of heavy weaponry to reach the town at night. Even if the Kurdish Red Crescent primarily focuses on the needs of the civilian population, they will help take care of wounded from the fighting if necessary. Agîd Ibrahim, one of the staff members, recently brought a prisoner from the al-Qaeda affiliated group Jabhat al-Nusra to the hospital in Dêrik.

– He was very surprised that we would take him in this new ambulance and give him medical treatment, Agîd smilingly recounts. It is our duty; we do not care if he is an enemy or a friend.

[1] HADDAD, R. (2013) ‘SYRIA drug shortages threaten health catastrophe’, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE (AFP), 18 September. Available at: http://goo.gl/Rh8vzg [Accessed 24 September 2013]

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ISSUE 9 2013

ITINERARY OF A COLLECTIVE MEMORY the LEBANESE post-war experience

by PAUL KATSIVELIS

road sign showing HEZZBOLLAH warriors in south LEBANON by PATRIK HERMANSSON

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MIDDLE EAST

Perhaps more than any other country in the Middle East, Lebanon gives expression to the dynamics and the prominent areas of conflict that characterizes the region at large. We have been given the opportunity to publish a scientific article written by Paul Katsivelis, Doctoral candidate at the Department of Oriental languages at Stockholm University, which reflects upon the Lebanese post-war experience A common attitude among modern day Lebanese is to embrace the following adage: “Focus on the present, the past will take care of itself”. Two decades after the civil war, however, the public sphere in Lebanon is experiencing a relatively dynamic development of a public dissemination and formation of a collective memory (Haugbolle 2010, 8). Lebanese contemporary society recognises a number of attempts to break trough Lebanon’s wall of public silence regarding the civil war that devastated the country – chief among these are artists and writers trying to transpose their own experience of the war (se Generation War http:// www.beirut.com/l/25421), activists calling for unveiling and healing, nongovernmental organisations promoting the search for historic truth (Haugbolle, 2007), or intellectuals engaged in post-war nostalgia and historic imaginings (Khalaf, 2006). Still, attention in this paper is initially directed towards the unavowed, yet omnipresent, polemics in the narrative accounts of the post-memory generation.

Drawing upon Hayden White’s concept of Metahistory (1975), the present paper sheds light upon the implicit nature of narratives Lebanese youth are providing by re-visiting and reproducing memory traces that are socially felt, though not personally experienced. Is it narratives that endorse the country’s official ethos of cultural coexistence (tacayush), or narratives that Lebanese or others make up in order to bring meaning to their lives in the absence of a cogent sense of national self-understanding?

These questions arise out of the multicultural experience of difference; they try to explore the possibility of genuine understanding of others, and of what such understanding consists. To put it more concretely: given that Lebanon is an enigmatic mix of civilisations, a blend of indigenous and foreign or invading cultures, and a land of considerable contrasts, is it possible to create an inclusive narrative of

the war that captures the experience of the post-war generation and integrate it into a national self-understanding or a collective memory?

It is worth mentioning that post-memory is a concept that was elaborated by Marianne Hirsch (2008). It encompasses the narratives of a generation who have grown up dominated not by dreadful events, but by painful rupture which indelibly scars a nation, religious groups, community, or family. Post-memory can also be referred to as post-war nostalgia; it is an inherited form of memory which carries and connects with the “Pain of others” (Sontag, 2003).

White distinguishes different levels on which historians work to make their narratives apprehensible to their readers, chief among these are story and plot, (White 1975, 79).

When a given set of events has been encoded or organised into a hierarchy of significance, including a beginning, middle, and end, the reader has been provided with a story (White 1975, 7). A plot, according to White (1975, 27) is conceived to be the strategy by which an unfolding story is articulated.

Inspired by the theory of the literary scholar Northrop Frye (2000), White discerns different archetypical plot structures where historical processes can be displayed in their narratives as stories of a particular genre; one of these is of special importance for this study, namely Satire (White 1975, 8-9). According to White (1975, 9) the archetypical theme of Satire is “a drama dominated by the apprehension that man is ultimately a captive of the world rather than its master”. It is worth mentioning that as a genre, satire is not meant to be “funny” at all. Due to the ultimate awareness of its own inadequacy to comprehend the world fully, the satirical mode of representation suggests that men are hardly capable of affecting their future, or indeed, their own actions (White 1975, 10).

Analysing keywords according to White’s typology regarding how Lebanese negotiate the silences and screams of their nation’s bloody past will help us locate or identify an itinerary for a collective memory. In White’s view, there is a deep structural and rhetorical content that is generally beyond the surface level of the historical text (White, 1975).

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LEBANON

“THE LEBANESE POST-WAR GENERATION IS OFTEN OUT OF WORK WHEN IT COMES TO ARTICULATE THE UNSPEAKABLE PAST”

The following testimony belongs to a 22 years old Muslim sunni University student from Lebanon, Rola: - Memory of the war, I don’t know if I can even talk about it – I mean if there is something in society that helps you to think about it, but everything encourages us to escape. Nothing encourages you to deal with it, to face it, nothing! They don’t even talk about it anymore and even if they do it’s very dangerous to awaken something that is not yet ready be awakened… It’s not easy to remember and it’s such a blessing to forget sometimes; but if you want to remember and you want to deal with it, and I hope each one of us will want to face something, and when he is ready, then it will help. (Larkin 2010) In her account Rola reveals a willingness to face the past.

Yet, there is a certain fear of rousing popular feelings whenever Rola or someone else attempts to start a public debate about the war. After more than twenty years of bloody combats, Rola is probably far from being the only youth that is caught between the contradictory forces of collective remembrance and social amnesia. The greatest of difficulties is, yet, not the social deficits of amnesia but the nature of the war itself (Larkin 2010). As a historical event, the Lebanese civil war is precarious in many regards.

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It lacks a storyline; there is no a finite period of time for the populace to relate to. It is true that there is a general consensus that the Lebanese civil war started in April 13, 1975. Yet, it is much harder to establish when exactly the war ended (Ibid). Moreover, the number of arguments running concurrently produces serious disjunctions with the precepts of a nationalist discourse (Haugbolle 2007, 8-11). Public memory of the civil war in Lebanon is characterised by a multitude of voices (Ibid). For some, the Lebanese civil war never ended, it only shifted from military clashes into a supposed economic and political recovery, giving ethical issues only second priority (Ibid).

Basically, the Lebanese population is divided into two camps: one composed of people who don’t want to look back, but rather seek forgetfulness as an antidote to future conflict, and another who privileges a process of public remembrance and self- analysis in order to overcome the haunting power of a sacred, fragmented ethnical and political landscape (Kassir 2001). While the former category believes that the war experience still have a traumatic effect that the Lebanese are unable to face it properly, the

PAUL KATSIVELIS

MOHAMMED AL-AMIN MOSQUE in BEIRUT by PATRIK HERMANSSON

later one points that repressed memory has a constant tendency to re-emerge into consciousness (Ibid). Which one of these categories is compatible with Rola’s stance is yet difficult to say. On the one hand there is a lack of consensus regarding the post-memory experience revealed in Rola’s account: “It’s not easy to remember and it’s such blessing to forget sometimes”. On the other hand Rola’s eclectic stance towards post-war nostalgia is overcome by her future wish to look the beast in the eye: “and I hope each one of us will want to face something and when he is ready it will help”.

Social forgetting implies that the past is embarrassingly persistent in the minds of those who share a common experience of it (Haugbolle 2010, 76). In Lebanon, embracing an amnesiac state appears to be a proper way to overcome divisions. Jocelyne Dakhlia (2001) tries to shed light upon the reasons behind Lebanese civil society’s structural resistance to public memory: “what is actually at the core of collective memory is forgetting. A kind of structural or mechanical forgetting rather than a forgetting due to trauma, because it is only material which

is no longer relevant for the present that is forgotten, lost or abandoned”. According to the post-war novelist Elias Khoury, social amnesia espouses a tragic feeling that the civil war has never been a misfortune in the minds of the Lebanese (Khoury and al Khazen 1999); thus, depriving the country of a coherent, unifying narrative. Fadi, 19 years Christian orthodox university student explains the rationale: - The civil war is a mystery for me and most of my friends, there are no history courses at school or at university to describe this war and all the major events of it. In order to learn how this major event of the Lebanese history started and all the consequences of it, youth must read books from different authors to get different point of views and opinions. Recently I decided to read about it, and if I could describe it, the first word that comes to my mind is “waste”. This war was a waste of blood, youth, heritage, time and money... It was a war of power, so that one community can control the other, but nothing changed, the constitution is the same, we still live together, nobody won, everybody lost. This war had no purpose and was useless, a matter of power that destroyed our beloved country.

(Interview, October 15, 2013)

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LEBANON

Fadi’s post-war narrative, like Rola, stresses the need of a storyline, including a beginning, development and fulfilment: “In order to learn how this major event of the Lebanese history started and all the consequences of it, youth must read books”. Further, in the following account: “nobody won, everybody lost”, Fadi endorses the notorious formula of la ghalib, la maghlub (no winners, no loosers). The formal rhetoric is that Lebanese from all denominations lost together: no victor no subdued. The communal fighting 1975-1990 was supposed to bring with it a profound change in the system of feudal and sectarian power sharing in Lebanon. Instead, a strategy of oblivion was imposed after the war in order to promote the status quo (Haugbolle 20100, 70).

guerre pour les autres (Tueini[1] 1985), suggesting that it was the others (regional and global superpowers) who fought on Lebanese soil whereas the Lebanese were not to blame.

La ghalib, la maghlub remains a paradox as much as the post-memory itself: forgotten and remembered, terminated and persistent, incomprehensible yet the source of debate (Larkin 2010). The plot structure in Rola and Fadi’s narratives echoes a satirical mode of representation in the sense that the war is plotted as a taboo subject, holding the Lebanese in its grip and suggesting that they are no longer master of their destiny. Not to mention of course the condemnation of the enforced public silence that indelibly denounces a breach between a so called post-war recovery and a sustained sectarian power sharing.

The following passage belongs to Fadi: “It was a war of power, so that one community can control the other, but nothing changed, the constitution is the same, we still live together”.

A collective memory for Lebanon?

The satirical plot structure can also be captured by the common vacuous and abstract term of Ahdath or “the events”, referring to a fifteen years of bloody conflict.

What makes Ahdath an elusive term is primarily the lack of agency, i.e. you don’t know exactly who are the perpetrators or the victims of these events (Ibid). It is simply out there haunting the collective memory of Lebanese citizens. The public memory is still resisting attempts to demystify the term (ibid). Similarly, the country’s lack of a war memorial is an indication that the public ethos “Kulluna lil watan” (We belong altogether to the nation) does not risk encountering a second opinion (Haugbolle 2010, 198). Yet another concept of political alienation is “a war for the others”, une 14

The Lebanese post-war generation is often out of work when it comes to articulate the unspeakable past. According to Fadi and most of his friends, the war is a “mystery”.

The same can be said about Rola: “Nothing encourages you to deal with it [the memory of the war], to face it, nothing!

Rola and Fadi’s accounts reveal a sharp critic against the lack of a history curriculum. Both students are far from being the only ones who deplore the fact that the Lebanese state has no coherent official narrative to offer on the one historical major event, Ahdath! (Haugbolle 2010, 162)

More than two decades after the end of the hostilities, it is perhaps time to explore the possibilities of overcoming the complexity and fluidity that invariably surround Lebanese post-memory. First of all, it should be acknowledged that there is no One True Story to be told about any historical event or personal biography (Johansson 2005, 66-68).

Further, the stories we think we are living and the stories we or others come to see ourselves to have been living are not necessarily the same (Ibid). Thus, for example, at the time of the Lebanese civil war the belligerents were convinced that their activities were part of a particular larger story; otherwise they would not have fought the war. But later historians, or the participants themselves with later hindsight and reflection, may come to revise the story of this war, may refit it into a narrative which is quite different from the original participants (Ibid).

The Lebanese civil war was an embodied narrative while it was being fought. But it does not follow from this that an intentional action (like waging a war) embodies a single narrative. The nature of a narrative may change as the consequences of it become evident, or as the people’s understanding of it alters (Ibid). Unfortunately, public silence and evasion of the historical memory of the war are still going strong in Lebanon. In the urban spaces of Beirut, belligerent memories still resist the idea of a collective memory (Haugbolle 2010, 230). Christian Maronite as well as pan-Arabist and Muslim sunni political groups

PAUL KATSIVELIS

list of references seem unable to provide new paradigms of thoughts in order to reorganize their interpretation of the civil war (Ibid, 63).

The construction of a collective memory is a difficult, yet worthwhile task. In order to overcome the post-memory generation’s attempt to distance and anathematize themselves from an onerous past, a number of Lebanese activists are now calling for a middle way strategy in between complete amnesia and an absolutist scheme of awakening the malicious demons of the civil war (Traboulsi 2007).

This third option, defined as “selective amnesia” by the sociologist Fawwaz Traboulsi, suggests primarily the deconstruction of a number of concepts largely present in the minds of young Lebanese such as “Ahdath”, “La ghaleb, la maghlub”, “une guerre pour les autres”, “kullna lil watan” etc. According to Alex King (1999) and Michael Rowland (1999) selective forgetfulness, however, should not exclude a critical engagement, contestation and interaction with a multivocal narrative of war - a narrative that seeks to provide the post-memory generation with a sense of a shared national history.

In conclusion, the actions and sufferings of the civil war in Lebanon can be viewed as an indefinitely revisable project.

It is a challenge for historians, intellectuals and artists to produce ever meaningful and inclusive accounts of the war, i.e. revisiting storylines and plot structures to inform new ways of reorganizing the stories one tell about the past.

The longer the nature of the war remains unresolved; the more disoriented the post-war generation will feel, trapped between silences that generate a historic void and screams that prevent any future hope

[1] TUEINI GHASSAN, Une guerre pour les autres (PARIS : Lattes, 1985)

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Frye, N. (2000[1957]). Anatomy of criticism: four esays.

Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Haugbolle, S. (2010). War and memory in Lebanon.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Haugbolle, S. (2007). Memory as Representation and Memory as Idiom. In Youssef Choueiri (ed.) Breaking the Cycle: Civil wars in Lebanon. London: Stacey International, pp: 121-133.

Hirsch, M. (2008). The Generation of Postmemory.

Poetics Today, 29, pp: 103-128.

Jocelyne D. (2001). New Approaches in the History of Memory? A French Model. In Neuwirth and Pflitsch (red.), Crisis and Memory in Islamic Societies: proceedings of the third summer academy of the Work ing Group Modernity and Islam at the Orient Institute of the German Oriental Society in Beirut, 10 - 25 September1998. Würzburg: Ergon, p. 72 Johansson, A. (2005). Narrativ teori och metod: med livsberättelsen i fokus. Lund: Studentlitteratur Khalaf, S. (2006). Heart of Beirut: Reclaiming the Burj.

London: Saqi Books Khoury & Al-Khazen (1999). Interviewed in the Wash ington Post, 20 December 1999 King, A. (1999). Remembering and forgetting in the Public Memorials of the Great War. In Forty, Adrian & Küchler, Susanne (red.) (1999). The art of forgetting. Oxford: Berg, pp: 147-170 Larkin, C. (2010). The Lebanese Postmemory experience.

International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 42, Issue 4, pp: 615-635 Rowlands, M. (1999). Remembering to Forget: Subli mation as Sacrifice in War Memorials. In Forty, Adrian & Küchler, Susanne (red.) (1999). The art of forgetting.

Oxford: Berg, pp: 129-146 Samir, K. (2001). Ahwal al-dhakirah fi lubnan (The Sit uation of Memory in Lebanon). In Makarem, Mémoire pour l’avenir, pp: 195–200.

Sontag, S. (2003). Regarding the Pain of Others. N.Y.: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux Traboulsi, F. (2007). A history of modern Lebanon. Lon don: Pluto Press White, H. (1975). Metahistory: the historical imagination in nineteenth-century Europe. Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins U.P. 15

ISSUE 9 2013

OUR VISIT TO THE SHATILA REFUGEE CAMP

by ALEXANDRA BRO and SIMON ROSE

In May earlier this year members from The Stockholm Association of International Affairs went for a study trip to Beirut in Lebanon. The purpose of the trip was to meet with organizations, exchange contacts and experiencing what goes on in the country and in the region. During a six days visit the delegation met with different international and local organizations, a representative from the Swedish embassy and also traveled with an organization to the southern and eastern part of the country. One of the meetings was with UNWRA, The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, who brought the group to visit the refugee camp Shatila in Beirut. This is Alexandra Bro and Simon Roses reflections from the visit.

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school girl in SHATILA by PATRIK HERMANSSON

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To wake up early soaked with sweat is never easy. So to hear the alarm ring at seven in the morning made no one happy. As the day went on, things got a lot worse.

This morning we were scheduled to meet with Ann Dismorr, director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), in Lebanon. UNRWA works solely with the Palestinian situation, managing camps with health, education and social services in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Gaza and the West Bank.

The camp we visited was Shatila, set up in 1949.

Shatila has two primary schools and we were invited to visit one of them. Even though we interrupted three classes, the children enjoyed our presence. Despite the horrible living conditions these children faced daily, their laughter was filled with hope and joy. One boy shared future dreams with us and two other children stood up in the middle of the classroom and sang to us. It was truly an incredible moment.

Due to the ongoing conflict in Syria, the refugee crisis has caused enormous pressure on the camps in Lebanon. Some 460 000 Palestinian refugees live in Lebanon. In Shatila, apartments are built wherever there is room and people are crammed into tiny spaces.

One Syrian refugee residing in the camp invited us into his room where he, his wife and five children lived. Seven people shared one room – a room smaller than a standard Swedish kitchen.

The contempt against Palestinians in Lebanon is huge. During almost every meeting we had, the host mentioned the Palestinian situation as the worst, long-term problem in Lebanese society (perhaps apart from the unknown effects of the current Syrian crisis). The discrimination permeates almost every field. Palestinians are not allowed to own property, 95% lack any form of health insurance and the statistics show low school enrollment.

One of the biggest problems Palestinians face is the labor market. Some are able to find low-level jobs, but discriminating laws in Lebanon forbid Palestinians to hold certain jobs.

This makes it hard to be employed in any way other than a day-to-day basis. Still, half of the Palestinian population in Lebanon is unemployed. Combined with the fact that the price of bread, the main food in the camps, is roughly ten times as expensive in Lebanon as it is in Syria, the situation is even more pressing.

The man we met in the Shatila refugee camp even told us that he contemplates going back to Damascus and risk his life in war-torn Syria.

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ALEXANDRA BRO SIMON ROSE

top: SHATILA school. bottom: SYRIAN refugee by PATRIK HERMANSSON

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ISSUE 9 2013

STRATEGY FOR PROGRESS a meeting with ABAAB

by ARIANNA FRAMVIK MALIK

When it comes to gender equality, in comparison with some of its neighbouring countries, Lebanon tends to be viewed as relatively emancipated. During The Stockholm Association of International Affairs trip to Beirut earlier this year we met with women’s groups to learn about their take on this. Our first meeting of the trip was with Roula from the organisation ABAAD, a resource center for gender equality. Founded as recently as in 2011, ABAAD has already become an active independent non-governmental organisation in Lebanon working towards gender equality and empowerment of marginalized groups through a plethora of practical and policy-oriented activities.

To start our meeting off, Roula gave us some numbers.

Women in Lebanon have had the right to vote since 1952, yet only 4 of the 128 parliamentarians and none of the 35 ministers are women. Although over half of Lebanon’s university students are women they occupy only a quarter of the labour market. Feminists believe that women are not recognized as full citizens of Lebanon, and that the reason for this is the confessional system.

In the Republic of Lebanon there are eighteen recognized religious groupings or so called “confessions”. Fifteen of these confessions regulate the personal statute codes. This means that there are no universal civil rights in Lebanon, instead your individual civil liberties are determined by 20

which confession you belong to. Lebanon’s political system is sometimes described as ‘neo-feudal’[1]. It dates back to the Ottoman Empire in which the area of Lebanon, as part of historic Syria, was legally managed through a dual system of state and religious courts. Each of the religious communities was semi-autonomous and their leaders kept order for the Ottoman rulers. The personal statute codes that exist today traces back to this era where personal matters such as marriage, divorce and inheritance were determined by religious courts for Muslims and were governed by leaders in the Jewish and Christian communities.

The age you are allowed to get married, if you have the right to get a divorce and if so what custody rights you have of your children are examples of rights that still today are dependent on one’s confession. However, there is one law that applies to all women, no Lebanese women can have her nationality transferred to her child. The nationality of a Lebanese woman’s child is determined by the nationality of the child’s father. Almost all of the organisations our organization meet in Lebanon complained about this law.

Keeping up with separating different rights between different groups while at the same time holding a nation together begs the question: how do you achieve progress in women’s rights when women are divided between each other through law?

An obvious answer would be to take these civil codes out

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of the confessional system, and national civil rights are one of ABAAD’s goals. For instance, ABAAD wants civil marriage to be possible in Lebanon. In the face of confessional conformity many couples choose to get civilly married in Greece or Cyprus because unlike a civil marriage officiated in Lebanon, these civil marriages of Lebanese citizens is accepted by the state. According to some of the organizations we met, this phenomenon exposes the double standard which saturates Lebanese society.

er, the approach is likely viewed as controversial by some women’s rights groups. After all, female emancipation has often been reached through setting demands and clashing with the (male) establishment. So what has led ABAAD to this strategy of cooperation and use of the lowest common denominator? Well for one thing, their goal is not only a change in policy but in behavioural structures as well. As Roula explains it, when it comes to ending violence against women, ‘We really want to reach change’.

This double standard is a likely explanation as to how a fragmented nation is held together despite an unequal distribution of civil rights. Nevertheless, if a progress in civil rights is to be made these contradictions needs to be challenged and this has led to some interesting methods of approach within some of the NGOs we met. For example, a current project of ABAAD’s and other women’s right-organisations is getting a national law against domestic abuse approved by parliament. The struggle to get the law passed has been a long one and ABAAD, still relatively new on the scene, has a fresh take on how to abolish violence against women. Instead of using confrontational ad-campaigns, Roula explained to us that they use the strategy of positivism or non-confrontational methods when reaching out to politicians or religious leaders because they believe this has a stronger success rate. Starting out they held a roundtable discussion with religious leaders and asked them ‘Do you believe that we have a problem with violence against women?’ followed up with a ‘What can be your role in ending this?’ They believe that if they had used confrontational campaigns blaming religious leaders for the violence against women they would gain nothing but a big statement and no progress. According to ABAAD, results are showing that by using positive psychology, religious institutions are on their own beginning to develop preventative and awareness-raising roles. ABAAD is now following up on how these roles can be put into place practically within the religious institutions, for instance by hearing a women’s rights discourse during Friday prayer.

In line with this, they also aim at reaching groups that are often not the target when the task of working towards gender equality is carried out. When they started in 2011 they found that almost all solutions to end violence against women were directed towards women and they realized that they needed to reach out to men as well. Since then ABAAD has opened a “Men Center” equipped with a psychologist who provides stress- and anger management.

They are also planning on engaging men through sport in order to see if this can help them ‘tap on the equality notion’.

Seeing as a long term dialog between a gender equality organisation and religious communities would only be possible if they don’t try to push their agendas on each oth-

Another organization that shares ABAAD’s views on the need for a positive message is the Samir Kassir Foundation, a free speech organization founded in the name of the late journalist and historian. During our meeting with Ayman, the director of the foundation, he shared with us the importance that is given to maintaining a façade of riches and sophistication in Lebanon while at the same time neglecting some of the country’s problems. Ayman tells us about problems such as despite being able to build the fanciest of downtowns in Beirut, Lebanon is not able to provide the basic need of clean tap water or a sufficient amount of electricity. Another example Ayman gives us is the problem with the profound discrimination of Palestinian refugee’s as well as the apparent indifference it is met by. As mentioned above, the tendency to pretend that problems don’t exist is a way of keeping double standards alive. In light of these practical and humanitarian issues Ayman tells us that people find their own private solutions like buying tap water or renting a private electric generator instead of holding those accountable for the problems responsible. In order to reach progress, the indifference towards injustice needs to be fought and in order to make 21

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““HOW DO YOU ACHIEVE PROGRESS IN WOMEN’S RIGHTS WHEN WOMEN ARE DIVIDED BETWEEN EACH OTHER THROUGH LAW?””

this happen, Ayman stresses the importance of a positive message.

Ayman gives us an example. In Lebanon persecution of homosexuals is legal through article 534, a law that states that “sexual intercourse contrary to nature” is punishable by up to one year imprisonment. In august 2012 a TVshow went to a gay erotic cinema and outed moviegoers against their will. In a matter of minutes the police showed up at the cinema and proceeded to arrest and physically harass its clientele with the unscientific method of determining sexuality through ‘anal tests’. This time, this common but secret police routine was exposed and led to enormous outrage amongst the public. People could not believe that this violation of human rights was taking place in their country, regardless of article 534. Even mainstream TV-shows put the issue at the top of their news bulletins.

The outrage led to an official decision by the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Interior to ban these tests.

When the police recently raided a nightclub and tortured its clientele in the same manner it wasn’t a question of whether it was right or wrong anymore. The behaviour by the police and the mayor in question was unlawful and people reacted against it. Issues like these are not taboo to talk about anymore, and thanks to the intrusive role of social media, decision makers understand that they are under scrutiny. What would have passed under the radar five years ago will get attention today and this has led to behavioural changes amongst the ruling elite.

Because of this, Ayman has become quite the optimist and he stresses the importance of spreading these success stories so people can believe that change is possible. The NGOs play a part in this.

‘If we are five times, or twice as organized and smarter about how we do it, a bigger change can happen’.

This brings us back to the importance of actual consequences against the abuse of women. If the level of gender equality is to progress in Lebanon and everywhere else, 22

legislation against domestic abuse needs to be adopted.

However, in a country marred by a lack of protective laws as well as a lack of implementation where laws do exist, preventing the root of the problem in the first place makes sense, for instance through ABAADs prevention work with children and men.

After our visit to Beirut, the July 9th murder of a women who was beaten to death by her husband in front of her five children sparked another wave of protests and women’s groups continued their relentless campaigning for parliament to legislate against domestic violence. Nevertheless, when we met with ABAAD, Roula had pointed out that if they were to organize a march for women’s rights only a hundred people would show up, if they were lucky. Five days after the tragic death of the women whose husband will go unpunished, activists called for a sit-in in a square in downtown Beirut. Despite a nationwide outrage at the murder, less than a dozen people showed up for the protest. In light of this, creative ways of inspiring people to be part of change is, no matter how cliché it might sound, necessary. about this article Facts and information in this article has been gathered from meetings with in May of 2013 with NGOs ABAAD – resource center for gender equality, and Samir Kassir Foundation, as well as from “Empowering Women or Dislodging Sectarianism?: Civil Marriage in Lebanon” by Sherifa Zuhur in Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, “Islamic Clerics Oppose Lebanese Law Protecting Abused Women” by Jean Aziz in Al-Monitor 2013-07-24 and “Lebanon Domestic Violence Law: A “Cosmetic” Gain for Women?” by Zeinab Merhi in Al-Akhbar 2013-07-24

[1] P. 179 in “Empowering Women or Dislodging Sectarianism?: Civil Marriage in LEBANON”

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QAHERA

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EGYPT

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QAHERA

qahera Fighting injustice with spectacular practices, Qahera the muslim superhero cuts through the conflict lines of her zeitgeist. Qaheras’ popularity is growing as the comic is spreading from the Middle East to the rest of the world. Behind the Qahera comics is Deena, an Egyptian artist and blogger who describes Qahera as “a female visibly Muslim superhero who combats misogyny and islamophobia amongst other things”. The relevancy and innovative approach of Qahera is adequate as well as inspiring. This is the first part of Qahera comics called “Brainstorm”.

QAHERA is available at http://qahera.tumblr.com

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ISSUE 9 2013

AFTER EGYPT’S MILITARY COUP the uncertain future of political ISLAM in the MIDDLE EAST

by ERIK SUNDBLAD

illustration by AXEL ÖBERG

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The polarized situation in Egypt threatens to throw the country in extreme chaos. Erik Sunblad discusses the sequence of events which has induced this complex situation in Egypt.

Egypt, long viewed as the most important country in the Arab World, has always warranted special attention by observers of The Middle East. That “the Arab world goes the way Egypt goes” has been a prevalent sentiment in the Middle East ever since the states of the region became independent after the Second World War. When Egypt, the by far most populous Arab country, embraced a mix of Arab nationalism and Socialism during the Nasser era of the 1950’s much of the Arab World followed. When the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat came to champion a more market-oriented economy in the 1970’s it was followed by similar moves in many other Arab countries.

The so-called Arab Spring first broke out in Tunisia at the end of 2010 – but it was first and foremost the Egyptian uprisings, which toppled the long serving dictator Hosni Mubarak in January 2011, that came to capture the imagination of would-be revolutionaries in Libya, Yemen and Syria.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s search for a place within Egyptian politics Egypt isn’t only a political trendsetter and the cultural centre of the region, with its music industry and largescale movie production; it’s also the birthplace of Political Islam, a notion also known as Islamism that views Islamic values and Islamic law and an integral part of any modern Muslim state.

It was in the sleepy canal city of Ismailiyya where Hassan al-Banna, a charismatic schoolteacher, together with just a couple of comrades formed the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928. The Muslims Brotherhood came to be an organisation that aimed at re-introducing Islam in the social as well as the political life in Egypt and to rid the country of the British occupation and what they viewed as negative Western influences.

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood grew rapidly has been the largest and most important Islamist movement in the Middle East since the 1930’s. Not long after its foundation it branched off and there are now important parties

affiliated with the movement in virtually all Arab countries. In the early 1940’s Hassan al-Banna decided that the Brotherhood should run members for the upcoming parliamentary elections. However, the Egyptian authorities, which were working in close conjunction with the British occupation, persuaded al-Banna to stand down.

A few years later the Brotherhood went through with it´s ambition to run candidates for parliament but failed to win any seats due to massive election fraud. What followed was the first state-orchestrated persecution of the Brotherhood. Although the exact timing is disputed it was during the 1940’s the Brotherhood launched its “Secret Apparatus” – a clandestine organization that came tangled up with the Egyptian authorities in a cycle of violence that culminated in the murder of the Egyptian Prime Minister Nukrashi Pasha in 1948 and then the subsequent murder of Hassan al-Banna the year after. To what degree the Secret Apparatus’s violent acts were sanctioned by Hassan al-Banna has been somewhat disputed. Another matter of much discussion has been the exact relationship between the leadership that took over after al-Banna’s death, and radical thinkers within the movement such as Sayyid Qutb, that came to conjure up new ideas of political violence after a renewed crackdown on the Brotherhood followed the establishment of a socialist regime in the 1950´s – headed

by Gamal Abd al-Nasser.

Under Anwar Sadat, Nasser’s successor, an era of political rapprochement between the state and a new leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood ensued. When radical and militant Islamist movements sprang up in Egypt in the 1970’s the Muslim Brotherhood became a bulwark against political violence, and ever since has been the main source of inspiration for Islamists that repudiates violence and advocate political moderation.

Under Hosni Mubaraks long reign, which began in 1981, the Muslim Brotherhood was outlawed and at times persecuted but still somewhat accepted. Their important social services could operate in the open and so could many of their political activities. In the 2005 elections candidates from the Brotherhood were even allowed to run for parliament, as long as they ran as independents or within the framework of other political parties. Despite substantial election fraud, Brotherhood candidates were able to win around 20% of the seats in Parliament. It thus became 27

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clear to everyone what a popular force they were and the time in parliament gave the movement some hands-on experience of parliamentarian work.

The Brotherhood’s year in office When Egypt in 2012, after the toppling of Mubarak the year before, held it´s first free parliamentarian elections a majority of the electorate saw the Brotherhood as the political force most suitable to take over the reins of power.

Not long after, in the summer of 2012, Muhammad Mursi from the Muslim Brotherhood became Egypt’s first freely elected president, winning the first and second round of the elections with a small margin.

By many, Mursi was deemed as not being particularity charismatic and not independent enough from the organization he stemmed from. Furthermore, many started to feel uneasy with the Muslims Brotherhood’s monopolization of power. The movement, that after the revolution had declared that they would run only a limited number of candidates for parliament and wouldn’t run a candidate for the presidency, now controlled both the legislative and executive power in Egypt.

The Muslim Brotherhood had taken on a momentous task. The Egyptian economy had been in free-fall since the ousting of Mubarak. Many state institutions weren’t functioning. Much of the police force had melted away during the revolution never to return to their posts. The result was a level of instability and crime never before seen by most Egyptians. In addition, the Muslim Brotherhood faced difficult political opposition. The ultra-conservative Salafists hade gained about a fourth of all seats in parliament and demanded a share of power. The Brotherhood, sensitive to the liberal opposition and to the West to whom the Salafists was an anathema, however chose to keep them at an arms length. The liberal and left wing opposition, who had faired badly in the elections, came to view the success of the Islamists as a hijacking of a revolution that they had initiated, and they were not keen on cooperating with the new government. With very few allies amongst the political actors, the Brotherhood instead tried to cultivate better ties with the powerful Egyptian military.

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The year following the parliamentarian and presidential elections was a rough period for the Brotherhood. In the process of writing a constitution, the Brotherhood was criticised by the Salafists for not paying enough credence to Islam and by the liberals for not being liberal enough.

When the judicial system, much of it still loyal to the fallen regime or inclined to support the liberal opposition, for a second time tried to dissolve the constitutional assembly assigned to draft the new constitution, Muhammad Mursi announced his famous power decree where he gave himself the power to disregard the judiciary and push through the constitution. The constitution was then approved in national referendum, although, in a referendum with a relatively low turnout.

The final product was a constitution not very different from previous Egyptian constitutions although it did raise some questions concerning women’s issues and minority rights. The liberal opposition, utterly dismayed by their lack of influence on the process of the drafting the new constitution and by their subsequent failure to defeat it at the polls, came to seek a closer cooperation with elements still loyal the old regime; a regime that they, together with other groups, had toppled less then two years earlier.

During the spring of 2013 the Muslim Brotherhood became all the more isolated on the Egyptian political scene and clashes between pro-Mursi and anti-Mursi demonstrators became a common scene in the streets of Cairo.

With an economy that just wouldn’t recover, anti-Brotherhood sentiments grew. The relation between the Brotherhood and military soured after Mursi fired a number of senior officers and started to conduct a foreign policy more independent of the military, who had longed viewed foreign policy as part of their dominion. At the end of June this year the liberal opposition initiated massive demonstrations against Mursi’s rule. Piggybacking on the wave of popular discontent the military intervened. They dissolved parliament and arrested Mursi. Supporters of the ousted president staged large-scale protests against the coup and after a month of street clashes and a number of killings,(of mainly anti-coup protestors) two big protest camps in Cairo were stormed by the military with many hundreds dead as a result. Since then, most of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood have been arrested and the

ERIK SUNDBLAD

organization seems set to get outlawed. Demonstrations are still taking place, but due to the threat by security forces and vigilante groups they tend to be small and localized.

The future of Islamist movements in the Middle East in the wake of the coup in Egypt Since the latest clampdown of the Muslim Brotherhood began after the coup in July this year, the Brotherhood has stayed committed to the principle of non-violence.

But as the dead pile up, anger and frustration is growing among their rank and file.

The new military regime, led by General Abd al-Fattah al-Sisi, claimed to fight terrorism when they were mowing down people who were protesting the military takeover.

An important question now is whether that claim risks becoming a self-fullfilling prophesy.

The question isn’t central to only the future of Egypt but to the whole region, as the question of whether Islamist movements can and should participate in democratic processes is a burning one throughout the Middle East.

It was always a tough task - selling the idea of participating in democratic processes - to Islamist opposition groups in the Middle East, the most autocratic region of the world.

In the past Islamist parties in countries like Turkey and Algeria have been ousted by the military after winning popular elections; and after the Egyptian military’s power grab it will be as hard as ever to convince young Islamists that they can ever achieve influence through a democratic process.

What is most unfortunate about Egypt is that the rule of the Muslim Brotherhood and Muhammad Mursi didn’t get the chance to succeed or fail on its own terms. New parliamentarian elections had been expected to take place this year. It was widely believed that the Muslim Brotherhood would have fared badly in the elections and lost its parliamentarian majority. Instead of getting a new political playing field - where the Brotherhood would’ve been forced to share power and the oppositions forced to take on responsibilities and work with the Brotherhood - we now have a situation were supporters of the ousted Muslim Brotherhood are claiming that they were never given

a fair chance. After the Arab spring many predicted the beginning of the end of radical Islamism in the Middle East. As the region opened up politically, moderate Islamists - so the thinking went - would prove to their more radical counterparts that it was possible to gain power by the ballot boxes. Now radical Islamists around the Muslim world are openly scorning the Muslim Brotherhood for what they see as their naivety. Whether the Muslim Brotherhood can keep its commitment to democracy and peaceful protests amidst a growing frustration amongst its supporters, and whether it can prow to Islamises around the region the way of moderation can be successful even in the future, will likely be it’s biggest test to date.

The West has long been adamant in stressing the need for Islamists to accept the rules of democracy. But as those rules were unceremoniously put aside this summer, the responses from Western countries were timid and weary.

The West’s acceptance and sometimes support of secularly oriented autocrats has been an important factor in the spread of radical Islamism in the Middle East. Radical Islamism isn’t only a Middle Eastern problem these days but also an important security problem for the West; and from a Western perspective the developments in Egypt need to be viewed in that light.

The broader Middle East follows the developments in Egypt closely. As Islamists are set to gain prominence in virtually any Arab country that opens up democratically, Egypt has set a very dangerous precedent. An exclusion of Islamists from the political process has brewed extremism and terrorism for decades in the Middle East. If the Arab World is to go through a period of true transition to democracy - advocated by so many of its citizens during the beginning of the so-called Arab Spring - they must find a way to accommodate Political Islam.

“WHAT IS MOST UNFORTUNATE ABOUT EGYPT IS THAT THE RULE OF THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD AND MUHAMMAD MURSI DIDN’T GET THE CHANCE TO SUCCEED OR FAIL ON ITS OWN TERMS”

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ISSUE 9 2013

A NEW DIRECTION FOR IRAN? voices from the DIASPORA

by DANIEL LUNDH

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The changing rhetoric of Iran’s new president has instilled hope in the international community. Daniel Lundh discusses the recent changes in Iranian politics After the 2013 Presidential election in Iran, the Islamic Republic has initiated a ”charm offensive” towards the West unlike anything seen from the regime since before the 1979 revolution. There have been conciliar efforts towards Israel, talk of Iran not pursuing nuclear weapons, and generally an expression of the regime having a desire to improve relations with the rest of the world. This seemingly new political direction for Iran has been communicated by the newly elected President Hasan Rouhani, a 65-year old political veteran of the Islamic Republic, a cleric who followed Ayatollah Khomenei already in the 1960’s and has been loyal to the regime throughout its existence. Rouhani’s political history may not make him appear as a reformer, but may actually be the factor that provides him with enough credibility among the Iranian religious leadership to be able to engage in successful bilateral negotiations. On September 27th which may not sound like a big diplomatic step, but it was in fact the first such talk between the leaders of Iran and the USA since the 1979 revolution.

Rouhani has been careful to express that he has the support of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, which is crucial to take any substantial political action in Iran. Former president Khatami did not have the support of Khamenei, and his ability to govern was severely limited because of it.

Their relationship is in fact still so bad that a newspaper editor close to Khamenei labelled Khatami a traitor and called for his execution in 2010 for disputing the results of the 2009 election. That statement would hardly been made without at least the silent consent of Khamenei.

Former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had a famously antagonistic relationship with the West in general and USA and Israel in particular; he also had also a very different political background from Rouhani. Before becoming President Ahmadinejad had been the mayor of Teheran, and he had no experience of international politics whatsoever. Rouhani is an experienced diplomat who has served as Secretary of the National Security Council, he was the chief nuclear weapons negotiator between 2003-2005.

Rouhani actually resigned from the position due to his inability to reconcile with the hardline policies of the Ahmadinejad government.

How did this sudden and seemingly radical change in policy come about, and how much of the rhetoric is likely to result in political action? What is the opinion of the Iranian people, do they believe in what they are being told by their government? There is no doubt the Iranian, 2013, Rouhani and president Obama had a 15-minute phone conversation, regime has been under increasing pressure to reform both domestically and from international actors in the past few years, there have been severe international economic sanctions against the country, and the regime does definitely not want a repeat of the 2009 “Green revolution” which caused major disturbance throughout the country.

A substantial percentage of Iran´s population was born in the 1980’s, as a direct result of Ayatollah Khomeinis family policy during the Iran-Iraq war, where Iranian mothers were encouraged to have many children in order to provide the state with soldiers. The Iranian population doubled in 20 years, from 27 million in 1968 to 55 million in 1998. Many of these children are now young adults and many of them are fed up with the oppressive religious regime of the country. They have also been exposed to the world through travels and social media in a way that previous generations were not. Zahra, Pegah, and Samir are three young people who are part of the Persian diaspora which has been growing all over the world ever since the 1980’s. They have a college education from both Iranian and Western universities and have lived abroad for a few years which have given them perspective on how Iran is governed. Zahrah welcomes the new direction indicated by the regime, although she wants to see substantially more actions taken then the ones implemented so far. They all agree it is the economic sanctions and the pressure inside Iran to improve the country´s economy that have forced the regime to open up for negotiations with the US. She says moderate Islamists like Hashemi Rafsanjani have tried opening up negotiations for many years but were held back by the Ahmadinejad government. However, she does not believe the regime has suddenly changed their minds from decades of oppressive policies, but rather that they are concerned about self-preservation. Rouhani is hardly a counter-revolutionary that will shake up the regime in a significant way, his political history indicates he is determined to preserve and ensure the survival of the Islamic Republic. The difference between him and 31

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Ahmadinejad lies not primarily in their objectives, but in which strategies they feel will be the most effective in order to achieve them.

Most likely this change in policy originates from a calculation that the isolation that the country has suffered under has become a liability for the regime, they have to find a new path that will reduce unemployment and improve the economy in general. Zahrah insists the change is not merely a rhetorical; there are actions such as the release of political prisoners happening. Zahrah says these are some steps that have been taken by the Rouhani government but also that there is still much to be done.

“I believe the changes are promising, but they are not enough. I also believe it is important that Iranians outside Iran, such as me, make sure that the human rights abuses inside the country are not forgotten.”

Pegah says it is important to remember that Khamenei still has ultimate authority in Iranian politics, although he prefers to give the impression of being a mainly spiritual leader that is “above” politics. Samir agrees, and adds that Khamenei and his allies will use any means to protect their power and maintain the status quo in the Islamic Republic.

International press is focused on Iran´s nuclear proliferation program, which the regime claims it has the right to develop and that will be used for energy purposes only.

Israel and the US have long been concerned that Iran is attempting to develop nuclear weapons, a concern voiced

by Israeli president Netanyahu in the UN on the same day as Rouhani´s speech. These discussions should not drown out discussions over the regimes policies against its own people, which include human rights abuses, limits on press freedom, death penalty for homosexual acts, an enforced dress code for women upheld by the official “moral police”, most commonly known as the Basij, but (in a rather Orwellian turn of phrase) officially named “The Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed”.

Pegah claims that the most important factor to understand about Iranian politics is the way Islam is used to justify the regimes actions against both Iranians and the rest of the world, and to maintain the regimes power. She also believes that moderate Islamists like Rouhani are actually 32

part of the problem in Iran, and that they are allowed influence in order to calm down public opinion but that they usually don’t achieve any real change.

“There is a Bad cop-good cop game constantly played between the conservative and reformist Islamist politicians”. Samir argues there are two schools of thought about the current changes in Iran; the first is that the leadership have actually been forced to changes because of internal and external pressure, the other is that the changes are all for show in order to avoid events like the Green Revolution of 2009.

In a recent speech to the UN assembly, Rouhani spoke about the suffering of the Palestinian people under the occupation and of attacks against civilians in Iran, but, unlike Ahmadinejad, never mentioned Israel by name.

The Israeli representative was not in the chamber to hear it, however. He also spoke of the problems with using drone strikes in the war against terrorism, a thinly veiled criticism of American foreign policy. The speech had all the trademarks of being written by a seasoned diplomat in the way it addressed a number of controversial topics without resorting to Ahmadinejad-style rhetoric.

However, the main issue for Iranians inside Iran is the economy, youth unemployment, and the escalating inflation that is weighing heavy on the country at the moment.

The wish for reform and liberalization among a large part of the population has existed for a long time in Iran. Will the Rouhani administration be the one under which it happens? How will USA and Israel approach the new situation? There will be political opposition from hardliners, mainly right-wing, in all three countries. Zahrah is cautiously optimistic about the future of Iran, and she is not alone; “I can tell that Iranians are filled with more hope now than at any time in the past eight years, and this is the first time in my lifetime an Iranian President is actually talking about negotiating with the USA” Zahrah firmly believes that the younger generation will eventually force the regime to change whether they would like to or not; “It is important not to forget the power of the young and of the women in Iran, the regime can not ignore them forever”.

DANIEL LUNDH

illustration by JOSEFINE EKLÖF TORP

“I BELIEVE THE CHANGES ARE PROMISING, BUT THEY ARE NOT ENOUGH” ZAHRAH

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ISSUE 9 2013

EVERYDAY REALITY IN BETLEHEM

by LINDA LINDBERG

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MIDDLE EAST

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PALESTINE

During the summer, we’ve posted Linda Lindbergs travelogues from her journey to Israel and Palestine on our blog. This report from Betlehem is the last in the series.

It’s 03.30 a.m. and it is still dark. The first prayer from the mosque is heard all over the city.

I gather my papers, my ’clicker’ and walk down from our house to Checkpoint 300, also called Gilo. You might think that a town would be sleeping at this time but in front of the checkpoint people are already working to set up their small shops where they sell coffee, fruits and other things that are nice to buy and bring along while going to work and waiting in line. Despite the hour people with small lunch bags in their hands are running quickly past me. Everyday they’re in a hurry even though they are up hours before work starts, a necessity since they have no idea how long it will take to get to work on this specific day.

The first ones to reach the checkpoint run through a long iron cage that, like cattle, brings them to the first ID booth. By 04.00 the cage is almost always full and the queue is at a standstill. Thousands of people pass through every day and they are usually forced to wait long periods of time. When the queue does not move at all the stress and tension becomes obvious. ”I need to get up at 03.00 a.m. in order to get to work at 07.00, sometimes. I question why I keep returning to this and why I put up with this day in and day out”, says a man who has just returned home from Chicago. But there is no work for me on this side of the wall.

When the queue is not moving some men push through holes in the sides of the cage or climb on the roof in order to jump down at the very font of the queue. Most of the others in line don’t seem to mind the fact that people are jumping the queue, instead they laugh.

They seem to think that they must be in a real hurry and that if they are willing to take the risk of climbing, and have the strength to do it, it’s up to them.

I wait at the top where the passage opens up in a somewhat larger cage before the first turnstile where their papers are checked. I keep record of the number of people that are allowed to pass every half hour, and of how the so-called humanitarian line meant for women, elderly, children and the sick is managed. This lane has been set up due to the other one being both long and even dangerous in the mornings for those who are not physically strong. The humanitarian gate has been broken since we arrived two months ago and must be managed manually by the soldiers. Not all soldiers have the energy or motivation to do this so these people can only hope that today is one of the days when a sympathetic soldier is working.

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LINDA LINDBERG

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PALESTINE

When they get through the first checkpoint they run quickly to the next queue which leads up to the metal detectors. Inside the checkpoint soldiers and security guards with large automatic weapons are walking around on metal bars above the worker’s heads.

After the last part of the process where the workers fingerprints and work permits are checked, those who are allowed to pass say a quick ‘good morning’ and then run past us and on to the first bus to Jerusalem hoping to get to work on time.

Despite the absurd treatment they receive every morning, these people can be counted as the few lucky ones who have been granted permits to Israel. In order to receive a work permit a Palestinian must pay 300 Euro a month, be a minimum of 25 years of age and have at least two children. If you or someone in your family has ever had problems with the Israeli authorities or the military there is a significant risk you have been blacklisted, and then a permit is out of the question. During the last demonstration that I merely observed, a soldier came up and without saying why demanded to have my passport and proceeded to take photos of it. I know after learning from others that this could be used to claim that I am a security risk to the country of Israel and thereby to stop me from returning to Israel and Palestine within the next ten years. For a Palestinian who is dependent on the Israeli authorities this arbitrary and indiscriminate behavior certainly has much worse consequences.

While living here I have come to realize how close and deep the military monitoring really is. Therefore, Bethlehem has started to feel more and more like a prison. For example, Israeli military are looking down on to the streets from military watchtowers around the city. Late one night when I am walking alone in a small alley a spotlight from one of the watchtowers turns on and shines on me. This time, darkness feels safer and the feeling of being small and in the hands of someone unknown with all the power is a very uncomfortable experience.

The knowledge that a young boy was recently shot from the same watchtower does not help ease my distress regardless of the allegations[1]. That children in this city need to think about how close to the watchtowers they play, how they look at soldiers and that they always have to think about not being perceived as hostile deprives people not only of their physical but their emotional freedom.

[1] http://goo.gl/qXCvC2

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LINDA LINDBERG

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ISSUE 9 2013

THE GATEKEEPERS documentary review

by SIMON ROSE

Only men (like so many other times), talking about their careers and the decisions they’ve made. Doesn’t sound that exciting at all. But this documentary will leave you with goose bumps, and a heavy heart.

The six former heads of Shin Bet, the Israeli security service in charge of intelligence and counterterrorism in the West Bank and Gaza, are giving their insights on the conflict that has been going on for several decades. It’s an utterly compelling piece of film, even for those who’d prefer not to know the workings of an intelligence service.

But the most perplexing about this documentary isn’t the calm voice in which horrible decisions are described, the tales of “moderate physical pressure” applied to Palestinian prisoners or the failures of the past. It’s a horrible documentary, because of the picture it paints of the future.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is so embedded in our minds that some think it’s the deadliest conflict in the world, even though it’s far behind compared to many other conflicts. To outsiders, the issues at hand don’t seem that difficult at all – just split it god damn it! – and for most people the solution seams so simple that everyone knows where it’ll end up, it’s just a matter of getting there.

In that regard, the pragmatism that guides these elderly men is relieving, and their frankness refreshing. It’s not nostalgic, and not idealising. Instead their assessment of the situation is clear sighted, combined with the doubts, emotions and qualms that trouble every human mind.

Because the tragic of the conflict is not the prolonged suf40

fering, nor the numbers of lives lost – it’s the reproduction of the conflict itself, which constantly stops any thinkable solutions. When a Palestinian child stands up in class and says that their dream is to become a great soccer player or astronaut, oh, and of course to return to their homeland, the possibility of compromise is a little bit further away.

When an Israeli teacher visiting Poland tells her pupils to get away from the old men in the park, because you don’t know what they’ll do to Jews, it shows how the notion of security is embedded in the Israeli identity. The haunting idea of extinction on one side, however real or not, contrasted with an imagined utopia of return on the other, is preserving the conflict as it is.

History shows that leaders from both sides can compromise, but the constant quest for relative gains, both in regards to each other and in domestic politics on both sides, leads to a lack of political will. A sort of multiple prisoner’s dilemma, in a horrific form.

In that respect, these men give you hope. They’re certainly not idealistic peace activists, but rather the utmost representatives of the Israeli occupation, and so their honest worries about the current path Israel is taking has enormous force. I just hope someone is listening.

So for anyone, from any side, who wish to listen or challenge their own perspective, I recommend to take some time to look at these old men talking about their careers.

MIDDLE EAST

“VICTORY FOR US, IS TO SEE YOU SUFFER” YAAKOV PERI, former head of the SHIN BET

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THE STOCKHOLM JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

A FINAL WORD

by SIMON ROSE and ALEXANDRA BRO - president and vice-president

We are slowly but surely getting closer to winter time and we have witnessed yet another year of interesting seminars, travels, mentorship programs and journal editions unravel in front of our eyes. But there is still some time left before January is here.

On November 28th UF invites members to a seminar about the meat industry where both ethical and practical questions regarding our relationship with animals will be discussed. For those of you who want to get an idea of what job opportunities await after your studies, we recommend that you join our study visit to the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) on December 5th a 6-day long trip to Belgrade, Pristina and Skopje.

We would also like to inform about our meeting on December 12 where a new board will be elected. So if you are interested in becoming more active in the association, apply for a position! More information will be published soon so keep your eyes open.

Thank you for this year and we wish you a merry Christmas.

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become a member of THE STOCKHOLM ASSOCIATION OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS it includes: free entry to lecture and debates, access to valuable contacts, opportunity for study visits in sweden and abroad and free issues OF THE STOCKHOLM JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS year membership - 50 sek - available at our events and website. www.ufstockholm.se