By Louis Fishman.
Recently, news from the Middle East does not look good. Last week, anti-American riots broke out in Egypt as the result of an obscure cheaply produced amateur film degrading Muhammad, the Muslim prophet. Parallel to this, and seemingly not related to the film, an anti-American group of fighters (perhaps motivated by al-Qaeda) carried out a well planned attack on the American consulate in Libya, killing the U.S. ambassador, Chris Stevens. Following the riots and the killing of the ambassador, a wave of commentary has emerged questioning whether or not the Arab uprisings, coined the Arab Spring, was “good” for the U.S., Europe, or even the Arabs themselves.
The fickleness demonstrated by so many concerning the Arab Spring is not new. After the victory of the Muslim Brotherhood’s candidate, Muhammad Mursi, in the Egyptian Presidential elections, some western news outlets covering the elections made it sound like it was doomed to become another Islamic Republic of Iran. Now that Syria has fallen into a civil war, some in the world long for the days when Syrians never dared make a peep about their unhappiness with Bashar Assad’s totalitarian regime.
If one supports, or does not support, the Arab uprisings, we all need to recognize the fact that there was no alternative to the revolutions, and we cannot turn the clock back. Revolutions happen not because one party supports one way or the other. They emerge due to deep desperation and the will of the people to make change. Yes, the Middle East has been thrown into a tumultuous and chaotic period; however, this should be expected due to the fact that for decades a tight lid was kept on their societies with their leaders ruling through coercion and corruption, losing all legitimacy in the eyes of their people.
The short film, Innocence of Muslims, which sparked off the anti-American riots is not the source of hate for the U.S., only the catalyst. While the killing of the ambassador is sad and frustrating it should not come as a surprise. The Americans are not a neutral partner in the unfolding of events and they cannot expect to remain unscathed. The U.S. is an integral part of the old order, which the masses rebelled against. It was the U.S. that propped up for years the late Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. It is the U.S. that has not been able to pressure Israel to move towards a peace agreement and end its 45 years of the occupation of Palestinian lands. It is the U.S., which invaded Iraq on false pretensions and left the country in shambles, which under their command introduced new levels of violence to the region.
For those who keep criticizing the Arab uprisings and asking if they were good for the West, don’t forget this revolution belongs to the Arab people, not to Washington, or NATO. For the U.S. to regain the trust of the people, taking measures at damage control will not suffice, but rather a serious reassessment of the U.S .role in the Middle East which treats the regimes as equals and not as their cronies. In the mean time, the U.S. will also have to bear the backlash of violence and anger that they themselves sowed.
On the flip side of the coin, the new Arab governments have shown that they are interested in stability and retaining relations with the U.S. Moreover, we can breathe a sigh of relief because until now violent protests against the U.S. have been directed at government offices and not at its citizens who reside in these countries.
