- President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt spoke for other Arab
leaders when he described the killing of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin as "barbarous".
"It is senseless and will have incalculable repercussions," he
predicted.
-
- Sharon was depicted in the Arab press as a man of action,
not words, who couldn't care less what the world thinks of him or his country
as long as he has the American administration on his side. A desperate
minority in the Arab world in fact wished that they had a Sharon as their
leader: a leader who could match words with deeds, no matter how horrid
those deeds were.
-
- Some Arab commentators derided their leaders for the
inability to stop Sharon, to force him to withdraw from the occupied territories,
or even to dismantle one mile of the separation wall. This feeling of derision
reflected the mood of the Arab street, a mood of outrage and disgust not
just at the brazen killing of Sheikh Yassin, but also at the bankruptcy
of the Arab political order.
-
- Ordinary Arabs are in the worst possible situation in
this regard. They have internalised two kinds of anger: anger against Israel
and a self-directed anger which feeds on its own lethal frustrations. There
is no doubt that the latter is far more deadly, although the two are causally
related and fanned by the unquestioning support the US offers Israel.
-
- I have heard many Arabs ask if there was a limit to what
Israel could do before it may invite US condemnation. The answer is unclear,
but its consequences are glaringly obvious. Commenting on the Arab Summit
conference to be held in Tunisia this week, the Egyptian journalist Ibrahim
Nafie, writing in Al-Ahram Weekly, called on the Arab leaders to "tell
Washington that its extreme pro-Israeli bias is the foremost cause of anti-American
feelings in the region, and that it is impossible to consider any initiative
for the reform of the Arab world as long as Israel continues to occupy
Arab territory and perpetrate atrocities with impunity".
-
- Press reports of calls to avenge the killing of Yassin
by targeting Israeli leaders went hand in hand in the Arab press with more
sober attempts at analysing Sharon's action. Most commentators agreed that,
far from miscalculating, Sharon acted with full understanding of the consequences
of his decision. To begin with, he wanted to make sure that his intended
unilateral redeployment from Gaza will not be perceived as a sign of weakness
or defeat among Israelis and Palestinians, as happened in the Israeli withdrawal
from south Lebanon in 2000, which Hizbollah claimed as a victory .
-
- In addition, Sharon thought that by targeting the highest
echelons of Hamas, he would pave the way either to the emergence of a new
and malleable leadership in Gaza, which would enable him to impose his
will through formal Palestinian acquiescence, or to pushing the area into
chaos and internecine strife after redeployment in a way that disables
the Palestinians and benefits Israel.
-
- Some commentators argued that the timing of the attack
was particularly significant. It was meant to send a message to the forthcoming
Arab summit in Tunisia that Israel is prepared to challenge the Arab will,
and to signal to the Arab masses that their leaders are powerless in the
face of Israeli power. Another view linked Sharon's action to the Israeli
desire to push the Arabs into a diplomatic confrontation with the US administration
over its Greater Middle East Initiative, owing to its totally predictable
support for Israel in its attack on the Hamas leader. Some argued that
Sharon's action is born of the ideologically entrenched view in Israel
that force is the only language the Arabs understand. If this is true,
Sharon may soon realise that he has badly miscalculated.
-
- Hamas, and other Palestinian groups, have vowed to hit
back, but it would in fact be far more productive, politically and morally,
if Hamas did not retaliate and if the Israelis and the Americans read this
in positive terms. Some Arab commentators have argued this but, in the
explosive atmosphere in the occupied territories, this is wishful thinking.
-
- In Gaza and the Palestinian territories, some newborn
boys over the past few days have been named Ahmed Yassin, in memory of
the slain leader. In Basra last Monday, the day Yassin was assassinated,
a clash between Iraqi civilians and British troops turned into a demonstration
against Israel and America. The wheelchair-bound Palestinian leader has
quickly become an icon of resistance in the Middle East. As one Arab commentator
has said, Yassin may prove to be a more potent force in death than in life.
-
- - Yasir Suleiman is director of the Edinburgh Institute
for the Advanced Study of Islam and the Middle East at the University of
Edinburgh
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reserved http://www.sundayherald.com/40858
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