Godfathers Of The Levant Part 2

When all is done and dusted, the tantrums of Levant’s Godfathers fade into insignificance compared to the fury of the world’s real gangsters- US capitalism. And since this fury is quite capable of creating another blazing hell, it would be instructive to review the ups and downs of US-Syrian relations over the years.

When Eisenhower replaced Harry S. Truman as president of the USA, a New Look foreign policy was hammered out to ‘correct [the perceived] deficiencies in the Truman administration’s approach to containing communism’ (Lesch 1998: 92). ‘Whereas Truman’, writes Lesch (1998: 92), ‘had perceived a bipolar world where zero-sum play meant any gain by the Soviets was a loss for the United States, requiring costly military preparedness to combat Soviet aggression anywhere, Eisenhower advocated a less costly asymmetric strategic deterrence, based on the threat of massive retaliation using nuclear weapons to check Soviet advances. The nuclear threat was supplemented by strategic alliances, psychological warfare, and covert operations to counter indirect and non-military communist aggression’.

Now if we were to replace George W. Bush for Eisenhower, Clinton for Truman and Islamic terrorism for the ‘communist’ threat in the above paragraph, a clear historical analogy presents itself. Syria’s support for the First Gulf War was welcomed by the USA. Former President Bill Clinton ‘praised Asad upon receiving news of the Syrian leader’s death … [and] Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s attendance at Asad’s funeral’ reflected a thawing of relations and tacit approval of the transition of power (Ghadbian 2001:35). She even praised Syria, ‘Syria has played a constructive role as far as Lebanon is concerned. We hope they will continue to do so’ (quoted in Pipes 2000: 24). Even under the auspices of the present Bush the relation was initially amicable. The US asked and received intelligence support from the Syrians regarding al-Qa’ida cells. George W. Bush even phoned Bashar al-Asad to thank him personally (Zizzer 2003: 31). A great deal has changed since those days. The ‘new’ unilateralism, notions of pre-emptive strike and even dark whisperings in and around the Pentagon about the deployment of localised nuclear weapons against America’s enemies are the farcical repetition of a previous tragic episode. The element of farce, however, does not make its brutalising potential any less real. The Syrian ruling class is fully cognisant of this threat due to its own history with the USA.

All highly ironic of course since most Syrians throughout the 1920s expressed an overwhelming preference for a US rather than a French mandate- that is if they could not have full autonomy immediately (Lesch 1998: 93). The Suez war of 1956 and a series of attempts to overthrow anti-western regimes in the Middle East had created justifiable paranoia. The USA overthrew the Iranian nationalist Mossadeq in 1953; there was an unsuccessful British-Iraqi attempt to overthrow the Syrian regime (called Operation Straggle by the British); and the discovery of a US-engineered attempt in 1957 to do the same by Eisenhower’s administration (Lesch 1998: 92). In the same year CIA had ‘intervened covertly in the Lebanese elections to ensure that the constitution would be amended to allow far-right Maronite President Shamun to have a second term’ (Worker Freedom 2005: 2). [The Syrian regime’s recent manoeuvre to extend pro-Syrian Lahoud’s presidential term is an exact repetition of the 1957 events].

At this junction the ‘United States seriously contemplated direct military action against Syria’ but the failure to gain Arab backing for the invasion prevented the plan. At the end the Eisenhower administration calculated that if it could not keep the USSR out of Syria, ‘it might entrust the job to someone who could [i.e., Nasser who had successfully kept the USSR at arm’s length in Egypt]’ (Lesch 1998: 11). The US even stood by ‘Jimmy’ Nasser when the British attempted to restore the Muhammad Ali dynasty (Springborg 1993: 23). However, the Eisenhower Doctrine rapidly lost the US all the goodwill it had garnered by its opposition to the tripartite invasion of Egypt at Suez. This is in keeping with the extraordinary loss of sympathy for the US which it briefly enjoyed immediately after the events of 9-11. The ‘axis of evil’ speech by President Bush put the seal on a turbulent phase of the US-Syria relationship which will probably last a long time.

Of course there is very little direct economic pressure that the USA can bring to bear on Syria. Bush did freeze Syrian assets in America in 2003 but the amounts are not thought to have been substantial. As Orbach (2004: 1) makes clear, ‘economic relations between Syria and the US are limited, diminishing the impact of sanctions. In 2002, Syria exported a mere $148 million of goods to the US and imported $274 million in American goods … this made Syria the 93^rd largest trading partner of the US … In fact, a ban on US investments in Syria would probably have a greater negative bearing on US firms than on Syrian ones. For example, a potential victim is Occidental Petroleum, part of an international consortium preparing to negotiate a $750 million gas field development contract with the Syrian government’.

However, the US is more than capable of tightening the economic noose round Syrian neck indirectly by either vetoing World Bank and IMF loans or blackmailing other countries from trading with Syria. There also exist diplomatic and military forms of leverage that have helped to isolate Syria. The Israeli-US ‘axis of bullies’ works in tandem in this regard. When Israel bombed Syrian soil in October 2003, Pentagon advisor Richard Perle egged them on with undisguised glee, ‘I am happy to see the message was delivered to Syria … And I hope it is the first of many such messages’ (quoted in Yassin-Kassab 2005: 2). The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed to have owned the bombed base. They also claimed it had been deserted for years (Marshall 2003: 6). Likewise, after the Hariri assassination Israel demanded the expulsion of Iranian ‘Revolutionary’ Guards from Lebanon, ‘who in reality left Lebanon more than 15 years ago’ (Fisk 2005b: 1). Syria’s withdrawal from Lebanon will weaken it regionally as well as vis-à-vis the US-Israeli axis.

Made guys!

In this section we would like to analyse the chances of further Muslim gains in the Levant. Will the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood topple Asad? Will Hezbollah take over in Lebanon? What are the implications for the class struggle of a shift toward/away from Islamic doctrines?

The most prominent Islamic force in Syria is the Muslim Brotherhood (a.k.a. the Muslim Brethren). A derivative of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, ‘Syrian Islamist thinking was often burdened with the legacy of that movement, particularly in its confrontation with Nasserism’ (Talhami 2001: 110). For example, the Syrian Brotherhood’s opposition to unification with Nasser’s Egypt in 1958 was a strategic blunder of immense proportions caused by its desire to follow its Egyptian branch’s advice. Furthermore, for a region where collective memory is nourished constantly, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood is still perceived with suspicion by large sections of the population for its failure to be actively engaged against French colonialists (Talhami 2001: 110).

The Muslim Brotherhood is essentially an urban movement. This is in dire contrast to the Baath Party which has always found inspiration and membership from rural areas. Batatu (1988: 116-117) writes, ‘The religious class with which the Muslim Brethren were and still are closely connected is not, relatively speaking, very large in Syria. It is not, in the numerical sense, anything like its Iranian counterpart … [but there is as with the Iranian case] a substantial degree of coincidence between the class of tradesmen and the religious shaikhly class. The shops of the tradesmen-shaikhs are usually located in the neighbourhood of mosques’. Again, unlike Iran, the Syrian ‘clergy’ have usually ‘worked’ for a living and are therefore not generally regarded as ‘parasites’ by the proletariat. This explains, according to Batatu (1988: 119), the absence of widespread anti-clerical sentiments within Syria. It also goes some way in clarifying the reasons for the ‘Communist’ Party’s failed anti-religious propaganda campaign in the 1920s.

Another reason which Batatu does not contemplate but is worth noting could be the atavistic version of atheism propagated by Syrian Engels-Leninists. This is an ideological atheism which attempts to dislodge theism through ‘rational’ arguments. In so doing, ideological atheism ignores both the ‘irrational’ causes of religiosity as well as the social basis of religious activities. A rejuvenated atheism must either base itself on everyday proletarian activities or it ends up functioning as yet another top-down ideological imperative.

Throughout the 1940s, 1950s and the 1960s the Brotherhood was marginalised and out of touch, since all the running was made by the Syrian National Social Party (championing the vision of regional nationalism) and the Baath Party (with its notions of Pan-Arabism) (Talhami 2001: 111). When parliamentary delegates were engaged in heated debates about land reform, the Brotherhood was courting ridicule for its call to ban youths from frequenting movie houses and females from participating in scouting parades (Talhami 2001: 119). Perhaps under the ideological influences of the times, the Brotherhood in the 1940s and 1950s initially flirted with an undefined ‘Islamic socialism’ which was hastily excised from their political vocabulary by 1961 (Batatu 1988: 112).

From then on, they preferred to portray themselves as the ‘natural’ spokesmen of the Sunni ‘community’ and to stoke up the ‘religious’ divisions of Syria by opposing the Alawi clan. As Batatu (1988: 11) wryly observes this is a long term strategy in support of the ‘social interests of the upper and middle elements of their landed, mercantile and merchant classes’ that may at last be bearing fruits. These groupings, however, do not feel obliged to repay the compliment. The bourgeoisie of urban and rural areas only support the Muslim Brotherhood as a form of protest when their profits are threatened, otherwise they keep their distance. For instance, during W/W II when inflation, speculation and profiteering had enriched the local bourgeoisie, they cold-shouldered the Muslim Brotherhood. This is also true of the periods of liberalisation inaugurated by Hafiz al-Asad in the 1970s and 1980s.

To demonstrate how protective of their class interests Muslim tradesmen are one need only bear in mind their unremitting hostility to agricultural co-operatives in rural districts and consumers’ co-operatives in urban area. According to Batatu (1988: 120), ‘Co-operative stores were the first establishments to be destroyed in a rising organised by the Muslim Brethren in 1980 in Aleppo’. From 1980 onwards the Brotherhood allied itself openly with liberalism and pluralistic democracy. This was partly because their friendly overtures to Khomeini with his more populist/fascistic interpretations of Islam were rebuffed by him and an Islamic state that had already established a firm alliance with the Syrian Alawi elite. And it is partly a nod to the persistent appeal of Syrian nationalism and the re-emerging civil society movement. It also represents a major and real difference with the Egyptian branch of the Brotherhood which has traditionally rejected the notion of parliamentary life. In recent years the weakening of the Islamic world movement (see more on this below) has accentuated the Brotherhood’s desire for legitimacy and recognition.

The Brotherhood’s putsch of the early 1980s was, in a sense, a sign of weakness and political inexperience. It was not even supported fully within the organisation, since some could see its counter-productive futility. As Talhami (2001: 124) explains, ‘the [Syrian] Baath regime … not only crushed the Islamic Front [i.e., Muslim Brotherhood and new allies] militarily, it was able to mount a determined propaganda campaign against it’. Their training camps in Jordan were attacked. Leading journalist sympathisers of the Brotherhood, such as the Lebanese Salim al-Lawzi, were assassinated by Syrian security (Talhami 2001: 125). Immediately after the threat of an Islamic uprising had receded, the regime took great care to co-opt its Islamic critics. Official Islam was promoted through more government-financed mosques and Shari’a institutions in order to divide and weaken the Islamic opposition. Today the Brotherhood has indirectly acknowledged the success of this strategy by allying itself to the Syrian ‘Communist’ Party in a front against the Asad regime (Talhami 2001: 126). Worryingly for the regime there are signs that more members of the ‘private bourgeoisie’ are once again joining the ranks of the Islamic opposition.

Besides the Muslim Brotherhood, one should also briefly mention the influence of Sufi brotherhoods in the Levant. The Syrian Baath Party has been generally hostile to Sufism especially during the Islamic uprising that culminated in Hama in 1982, although Sufis had next to nothing to do with the uprising (Weismann 2004: 303). As a result there has been a marked decline in Sufi brotherhoods there but significantly they have managed to make inroads in other ‘niche markets’.

To be more precise, the decline has been amongst urban-elitist brotherhoods which have become either existential study groups or tourist attractions, whilst ‘their rural-popular counterparts have proved more capable of holding to their traditions’ (Weismann 2004: 304). The ‘paganistic’ veneration of saintly tombs has played a vital role in preserving Sufism in rural areas- a Sufism that has ‘tapped into its reformist traditions in an effort to adapt itself to the modern situation’ (Weismann 2004: 307). The Naqshbandi brotherhood is the only Sufi organisation allowed freedom of action by the Syrian regime. The ‘apolitical’ Yashrutis are also tolerated. They have many members in Palestinian camps south of Damascus and even more near Beirut and Sidon. This latter is one of three brotherhoods with a following in Israel (Weismann 2004: 315). It is also noteworthy that the much lauded welfare and charity work carried out by these brotherhoods has its origins in not only the Ottoman-sponsored Jamiyat al-Maqasid al-Khairiyah, which emerged in 1878 in Beirut and was then exported to other Arab countries but also in the Truman Doctrine which built the first educational and medical infrastructures, later to be augmented by ‘Petro-Islamic largesse’ (al-Azmeh 1998: 6). Middle Eastern proletarians, whilst still accepting such ‘charity’ out of desperation, are beginning to notice the hypocrisy attached to it.

Hopefully the above summary has gone someway in de-mythologizing Islamic influences in the Levant. In Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood is re-emerging after years of internal dissention. Their disillusionment with the masses (who failed time and again to heed their call for an uprising in the 1980s) seems, thankfully, to be reciprocated by a sceptical population unwilling to go down the Iranian route. The Muslim Brotherhood’s recent rapprochement with the Syrian ‘Communist’ Party would not have occurred if the Brotherhood believed it could take on the regime single-handedly. The Sufi brotherhoods are dispersed, isolated and mostly in decay. The ones still thriving seem ‘apolitical’ and ‘reformist’ and, therefore, not a threat to the regime. In the unlikely event Islamists gain power in Syria it will be as part of a broad ‘Populist-liberal-social democratic’ civil society movement. The end result will be closer to the Turkish model than the Iranian one.

In Lebanon, Hezbollah is trying hard to forge a new identity for itself. Some believe that since it was founded as a Shi’a military resistance network against the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, Hezbollah lost part of its raison d’être after the 2000 Israeli pull out. The skirmishes around the Sheba farms, are then viewed, as a desperate ploy to extend the emergency mood of Lebanese politics, since low-level internecine warfare are always to the advantage of warlords. This standpoint ignores that Hezbollah has always been an ideological organisation with strong personal and ideological ties of continuity with the Islamic Republic of Iran. It is an adaptable entity. In recent years, since the business oriented faction within Hezbollah prefers a stable political regime and since the Syrians have been reigning in the military faction, the balance within Hezbollah has gradually shifted toward political ‘normalisation’. Hezbollah does not even recruit from the troublesome Palestinian refugees in Lebanon anymore (Freeman et al. 2001: 9). Hezbollah’s clumsy overtures to both the West (witness recent high level meetings between Hezbollah officials and ‘ex’-CIA and MI5 interlocutors), as well as engagement with middle class operators within the ‘anti-globalisation movement’ are testimony to this trend. Scum such as Walden Bello (executive director of Focus on the Global South) have quite consciously welcomed Hezbollah’s sudden ‘conversion’ to the cause of ‘anti-globalisation’ (Karmon 2005: 2). But then again Bello ‘does not hesitate to embrace the Republican Right in the USA as allies’ either (The League for the Fifth International 2004: 42).

As for the so-called ‘secular’ Amal movement, they still seem to be backing Syria. Amal was established in 1975 in response to the civil war in Lebanon by Iranian born Musa al-Sadr. It fought with Arafat’s PLO and Jumblatt’s Druze against Syria and the Maronite Christians but opportunistically switched sides to Syria (Moubayed 2005: 1). This is a long term alliance (at least since the early 1980s) which will probably stand the recent realignments. Amal has lost a great deal of its appeal since the 1970s. Another family, Hamas, ‘which was aided by Israel during its founding and has taken a life of its own’ may be able to win supporters amongst Palestinian refugees in Lebanon (Freeman et al. 2001: 9). Of such unscrupulous, deceitful stuff are Godfathers and their families made of!

Melancholic Troglodytes believe what goes by the name of ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’ is, in general, on the wane. In societies such as Iran, Turkey, Egypt and Syria the proletariat has, by and large, seen through its façade. In countries like Afghanistan massive military setbacks have dented its aura. In Algeria the Islamists undermined themselves by proudly opposing ‘a dust workers’ strike … a civil servants’ strike and a one day general strike’ (Harman 1999: 32). In Sudan the regime is desperate to make deals with USA, providing the CIA with vital information regarding Al-Qaeda ‘terrorists’ (Goldenberg 2005: 17). Iraq is perhaps a temporary exception to this general trend, although even there people have demonstrated against hostage taking and assassination of atheists. We are not in a position to offer a balance-sheet regarding Saudi Arabia but welcome comments from readers.

The term ‘Fundamentalist’ is, of course, problematic since it brackets together a number of heterogeneous movements which have different class compositions, socio-political agendas and cultural imperatives. ‘Political Islam’ is not much better since all forms of Islam are political. ‘Radical Islam’ is perhaps worst of all, since it gives the mistaken impression that this is a movement capable of going to the root of contemporary problems and offering a real alternative. In Spain the term ‘integristas’ is preferred to fundamentalism. It implies a closed community where dissent and conflict is suppressed by foregrounding a particular form of identity. Although this may describe accurately a certain aspect of the umma (Islamic pseudo-community), it tends to overemphasise discourse and identity-formation at the expense of the material basis of Islamism.

Whatever we choose to call this wave of Islamism there are certain commonalities that bind its adherents: a political philosophy steeped in extreme conservatism which is, nonetheless, flexible enough to take on board some attributes of modernism and postmodernism; intrusive moralism as a way of disciplining the proletariat and neutralising liberal bourgeois rivals; a genuine desire to regenerate capitalist ‘base’, ‘structures’ and ‘superstructure’ in accordance with a belief system; reverence of the word at the expense of historical experience; and, finally, a desire to recreate a mythical ‘golden age’.

Without wishing to pathologise our class enemies, it is worth pointing out that the latter attribute is sometimes referred to by social psychologists as the ‘Quondam Complex’. Lipset and Raab (1071: 488) have defined it as, ‘… more than nostalgia; it describes a condition whereby the primary symbolic investment, the primary status investment is in the past and is related to some reference in-group whose symbolic and status significance has dwindled’. Aziz al-Azmeh (1998: 1) puts this in its Islamic context, ‘Fundamentalism is an attitude toward time, which it considers of no consequence, and therefore finds no problem with the absurd proposition that the initial condition, the golden age, can be retrieved: either by going back to the texts without the mediation of traditions considered corrupt … as with Luther and Sunni Salafism … and the Muslim Brothers now, or by the re-formation of society according to primitivist models seen to be copies of practices in the golden age …’. One should not make too much of this since ‘pre-modern Fundamentalism’ is perfectly compatible with certain aspects of both ‘modernism’ and ‘postmodernism’. To castigate ‘Fundamentalism’ of rigidity would leave us dazed and confused when it morphs with the rapidity of western politicians following the latest opinion poll. ‘Fundamentalism’, despite its desire for a golden age, is more than capable of integrating the latest technological and scientific know-how into its matrix of discipline and punishment.

Al-Azmeh (1998: 2) is basically correct when he says, ‘[the ideological output of contemporary Islamic movements] is inconceivable without the universally-available equipment of right-wing, para-fascist, populist movements. It is not by accident that they emerged in the 20s and 30s of [the twentieth century], at the same time as the Indian Hindu fascist RSS, at a time when the West also was very strongly veering towards the extreme right …’. He then goes on to discuss the organismic and Romantic politics of restoration in Islamism, ‘Both Ali Shariati and Sayyid Qutb were great admirers of Alexis Carrel – a famous eugenicist of the 1920s, cultural advisor to the Marechal Petain, who railed against degeneration within, and advocated the cause of a small saviour minority which will bring health to the body of society diseased by degeneration’ (al-Azmeh 1998: 4; see also Greason 2005: 126 for more Islamic thinkers enamoured of European fascism).

The gist of our argument is that this brand of Islamism, whether one wishes to refer to it as ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’, ‘Islamic Fascism’, ‘Islamic Populism’, ‘Political Islam, or ‘Islamic Integralism’, is no longer capable of suppressing the class struggle as it did two or three decades ago. We agree with Sadiq al-Azm’s (2003: 2) analysis, ‘… when Islamists become a power to be reckoned with or when they actually take power, they ultimately fail. They did not even offer a hint of a workable Islamic alternative – from Iran to Taliban. I have pointed out that the resorting to blind terrorism is an expression of the depth of the Islamist movement’s crisis, and not at all an expression of its rising and ascending’.

The popularity of Islam in the West amongst a new generation of Pakistani, Bangladeshi, African and Middle Eastern youth, which is more to do with defensive identity-formation in a racist environment, should not blind us to the fact that at its heartland in the Middle East, ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’ is past its zenith. This does not mean it is no longer capable of massive mobilisations or toppling regimes. That would be wishful thinking. However, increasingly the arrogance of its advocates has been replaced by confusion, disappointment and in some cases where the proletariat has expressed itself in atheistic terms, with shear horror.

By way of conclusion

A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm (Perle et al. 2000) is a remarkable document. Written by a study group of top-notch opinion makers at The Institute for Advanced and Political Studies, it provides a clear strategy for the Israeli ruling class to adopt in order to strengthen its position vis-à-vis its neighbours and the Israeli proletariat. The project leader, Richard Perle, has today become a leading light of the Bush administration.

What is striking about this document is not its racist tone which one has come to expect from US politicians but its explicitly anti-working class stance. In fact, the ‘analysis’ begins with an attack on the Israeli proletariat in a rather confused opening paragraph: ‘Israel has a large problem. Labor Zionism, which for 70 years has dominated the Zionist movement, has generated a stalled and shackled economy. Efforts to salvage Israel’s socialist institutions- which include pursuing supranational over national sovereignty and pursuing a peace process that embraces the slogan, New Middle East -undermine the legitimacy of the nation and lead Israel into strategic paralysis and the previous government’s peace process’ (Perle et al. 2000: 1).

Perle and chums are clearly saying the Israeli bourgeoisie has two problems: the low rate of exploitation of the Israeli proletariat who henceforth should not be shielded by subsidies and social democratic compromises; and its previous overly generous peace offerings to the ‘Arabs’. Benjamin Netanyahu should make a ‘clean break’ with the ‘land for peace strategy’ and pursue a binding agreement ‘based on peace through strength’ (Perle et al. 2000: 1-2). The economy has to be liberalised, taxes cut, public lands and enterprises sold off and free-processing zones established (Perle et al. 2000: 2). By working closely with Turkey and Jordan and ‘upholding the right of pursuit’ into Palestinian areas, Israel can employ its dominance more effectively. The US could then cut its aid to Israel thus catalysing economic reform. This is related to the class struggle ‘at home’. As Cohen (2003: 4) explains, ‘When recently the Israeli rulers tried to smash the Israeli workers on strike in the ports of Israel, they were calling on the help of the Egyptian and the Jordanian capitalists to use the ports in Egypt and Jordan’.

Israel should also, it is argued, strike ‘Syria’s drug-money and counterfeiting infrastructure in Lebanon’ (the Bekaa valley is allegedly home to some of the most sophisticated forgers of US currency) and attack Syrian forces in Lebanon and, if necessary, Syrian territory itself (Perle et al. 2000: 2). The Lebanese opposition should be used ‘to destabilize Syrian control of Lebanon’ and any ‘land for peace’ deal on the Golan Heights should be rejected. The Israeli rulers dutifully obliged. For good measures they also reduced the number of Palestinian workers in Israel and imported less subversive workers from abroad as replacement (Reuveny 1999: 4). Incidentally, in 2001 the Israeli state was accused of dumping toxic waste in the Golan Heights, ‘Syrian university students in the Golan demonstrated on Dec. 20 outside the offices of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the United Nations to protest Israel's dumping of toxic waste in the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel since 1967, and the distribution of poisonous paint by Israel to the Syrian citizens in the area’ (Washington Report on Middle East Affairs 2001: 39).

Perhaps what is most startling about this piece of opportunistic skull-duggery is not how much of it has come true under Ariel Sharon’s premiership or

the explicit linkage made between the need to attack the Israeli and Arab proletarians but the close historical analogy between this proposed strategy and the US army’s assault on Native Americans in the nineteenth century. Today Palestinians are pursued, killed or emasculated in reservations as numerous Indian tribes were so many years ago (This is a topic Melancholic Troglodytes hope to return to in the near future). At this stage we would like to summarise some of our conclusions regarding the Levant:

1. The assassination of the multi-billionaire Hariri has acted as a slow fuse which is burning its way toward a new powder-keg. Whether this is going to be a controlled ‘neo-Liberal’ detonation, yet another civil war or a massive ‘disorderly’ social revolution remains to be seen. The balance of class forces is not currently favourable but things are gradually shifting. Lebanon seems to be the most unstable country in the Levant. Capitalist instability and prospects for intensifying the class struggle do not always go hand in hand. However, in this case, Lebanon does seem to offer the best short and medium term prospects for revolutionary activity. This is partly due to the weakening grip of ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’ (Amal has for some time considered itself a ‘secular’ Shi’a movement whilst Hezbollah has had to adapt to changing regional and global conditions), and partly due to Lebanese trade unions’ inability to recuperate the class struggle. By contrast, Israeli and Syrian trade unions appear capable of smothering proletarian dissent, at least for the time being. In Jerusalem, for example, the 50,000 strong demonstration of March 2003 was easily contained by the trade unions. Significantly though it did attract both ‘Jewish’ and ‘Arab’ workers from both the ‘private’ and ‘public’ sectors (Schwartz 2003: 1).

2. The US ruling class is encouraging a transfer of power from incumbent Islamic and Arab nationalist ‘state-bourgeois’ elites to ‘private-bourgeois’ elements. The Syrian rural bourgeoisie have always been relatively successful in mechanising agriculture and producing profits (Springborg 1993: 16). The first wave of Arab bourgeoisie was always more capable than they were given credit for. They favoured, for example, the joint stock company. By 1954 Syria had 94 joint stock companies. However, throughout the twentieth century, it was the ‘sate bourgeoisie’ that was given political backing by the US ruling class since they were deemed more able to maintain bourgeois order. This is now changing and the second wave of Arab ‘private bourgeoisie’ will curry favour in high places.

In Syria, the drop in oil revenues will hasten this trend. If successful this manoeuvre will have severe repercussions for the current Syrian rulers and to a lesser extent for the Israeli elite. The military forces of both countries will have their decision-making power as well as their semi-legal economic activities curtailed. The ‘military-mercantile-complex’ will be broken up in favour of new intra-classist alliances. Should the US ruling class decide to maintain a weakened Bashar al-Asad in power and urge Israel to return some parts of the Golan Heights in a comprehensive ‘peace deal’, the move will pave the way for a final reckoning with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

3. Both Islamism and Leninism have had to acknowledge their shrinking constituencies in the Levant by joining forces. Islamic forces in the Levant (and further afield in Egypt, Iran and Iraq) are distancing themselves from ‘rogue-terrorists’ and kidnappers. The Lebanese ‘Communist’ Party calls for a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon and moves closer to Sunni, Druze and even Amal forces. Whilst in Syria, an opposition front is forged by Syrian Leninists and the Muslim Brotherhood. These realignments will, they hope, provide them with a more solid foundation within the civil society movements of Lebanon and Syria and a bigger slice of the cake when it comes time to sharing the spoils.

4. Melancholic Troglodytes do not pretend to understand the Levant profoundly. This pamphlet has suffered from a shortage of radical literature on the region and our unfamiliarity with the hidden struggles currently being waged. We know there are ‘hidden struggles’ thanks to anecdotal information from friends and comrades but felt their inclusion would be unwarranted since we have no way of verifying them at present. This has led to an inadvertent exaggeration of the power of the bourgeoisie. Certain seminal changes within the ruling class and the state have not been related to proletarian resistance. In addition we have said little about the situation in Israel/Palestine or even Jordan. We are hoping to rectify these problems in future investigations. Despite these shortcomings we feel that the Levant and Middle Eastern scenes, in general, are becoming less cluttered. The dust is beginning to settle. We feel justified in speculating that various ideologies are losing ground, paving the way for a clearer confrontation between a number of dichotomies:

1.The ‘civil society movement’, in all its guises, is showing its true anti-working class spots. Proletarians are beginning to insist on autonomous social resistance against both political and civil societies. Trade union bureaucracies, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and the left wing of capital are less able to sabotage the class struggle (see Federici 2001, for a good critique of aid and NGOs). Increasing numbers of proletarians are dismissing ‘reasonable’ NGOs (a term designating those NGOs the World Trade Organisation, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund can work with) as ‘heirs of the US Peace Corps’ (al-Azmeh 1998: 4). And even ‘unreasonable’ NGOs (those that refuse to work directly with the WTO, WB and IMF) alienate proletarians by employing similar discourses, developmental philosophy and culturally-specific aid. In relation to these well-intentioned NGOs, ‘the naive sentimentalism of the way in which [they] regard natives leads them generally to recreate imaginary communities under the auspices of their most regressive elements’ (al-Azmeh 1998: 6).

2.‘Secularism’ and the sham bourgeois slogan of the ‘separation of church from state’ are nearing the end of the road. The contradictions of this nonsensical demand have become overwhelming. In no country has the church/mosque been separated from the state. What can be said with certainty is that in most countries the state used to be subordinated to the church, whereas today it is usually the church that is subordinated to the state. The fact that the left wing of capital is the only element still dutifully calling for this unrealistic demand is indicative of its anachronism. ‘Proletarian atheism’ will emerge to oppose both theism and bourgeois ‘secularism’. This will be a slow process entailing a number of setbacks.

3.All politicians are scum. All nation-states equally reactionary. We do not choose between liberalism, neo-liberalism, liberal-fascism, neo-libertarianism, social democracy, neo-Keynesianism and Leninism. This does not mean we are unaware of the different challenges and opportunities that each of these bourgeois political philosophies represent. We adapt our tactics and strategies mindful of these nuances. However, more and more proletarians are beginning to view Bush, Blair, Chirac, Khatami, Sharon, Hussein, Castro, Chavez, Lula, Asad and their ilk as Godfathers. The combined power of Godfathers is immense but it is also a power based on shaky foundations. Once fear deserts us, the aura of Godfathers will crumble.

4.We feel those proletarians in the ‘West’ who wish to assist our ‘Middle Eastern’ counterparts in escalating the social conflict can do so on a number of fronts: First, we should step up the struggle against those sections of the bourgeoisie we have an impact on (this is sometimes the bourgeoisie ‘at home’ and sometimes vulnerable pockets of the ruling class ‘abroad’ and sometimes both at the same time); Second, we should acknowledge, demarcate and foreground the qualitative class divisions within ‘our movement’ by articulating the distinction between middle class ‘anti-globalisers’ and working class anti-capitalists. Middle class ‘anti-globalisers’ represent a neo-libertarian trend paralleling the ideology and structures of neo-liberalism. Tourist summit-hopping and joint-activities between some sections of the ‘anti-globalisation’ movement and reactionary scum like Hezbollah are merely the most obvious and superficial manifestation of this symbiosis; and finally, we should establish better channels of communication with our comrades in the Middle East, learning from their experience whilst informing them of ours.

Melancholic Troglodytes

(in the original this was put into arabic, but could not be copied into html)

1 May 2005

Beijing, Volgograd and London

Acknowledgments

A number of comrades were good enough to read through earlier versions of this text. We found their comments extremely useful. Thanks to Ian (Manchester), Vahid (Denmark), Mohsen (London), Johnny boy (Brighton), Fabian (London) and Nick (France).

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