دعوة لتسوية
A Call for Compromise
“My people will not agree on an error” said Muhammad in Medina, opening the ways of peaceful dissident. The corollary is that the community will coalesce around a truth, that unanimous consent is required for any decision. This may have worked well in 7th century Medina, amongst an enlightened and tolerant populace. A modern society is many time more complex; it features convergence of cultures and technologies. One can also trust that, historically, ignorant and dominant men in high places have, one way or another, debased and even ruined life for millions of ordinary folk. We see that today, particularly in war and in financial speculation.
Looking back seven months, at the birth of the Arab Spring, we calculate the number killed (unarmed protesters and soldiers refusing to fire on them) at 24,000 with another 140,000 missing. Libya, Syria, Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, Iraq, Bahrain, Sudan, Somalia, have all seen recent violence, still on-going. In and amidst these nations one looks for any sentiment of conciliation, any forgiveness, or any compromise. But it is desert, harsh and unforgiving.
All these governments now guilty of killing their own unarmed protesting citizens have offered to talk it over. Yemen's president Saleh agreed to leave office after six months. During the Libyan war of independence, Qaddafi and his children agreed to reform. In Bahrain, the Sunni king M. Hamad ibn Isa al Khalifa, opened the parliament to elective representation, inviting Shi'i leaders to state their grievances. Even in Syria, where the situation is truly dire, the Al Assad regime expresses its willingness to reform, to do what the people want to do.
But in each of these situations, the opposition refuses to talk or agree to any step-by-step process by which a new, better government can be put into office. This inability to compromise has direct implications – the sheer force of the army and secret police can now shoot you for blocking traffic. Why such suicidal behavior?
The main reason is that the discontent goes back some four decades. The second reason is that too much blood has been unjustly shed for any talks, any ceasefire. The protesters want revenge. The third reason is that a steady diet of intense demonization of one's enemy makes it impossible to even think in terms of compromise. In other words, one's cognition is faulty, failing to credit the 'enemy' with any legitimacy.
Our morality certainly does not derive at root from any book. Babies at age eight months exhibit altruistic behavior. Our legal system is based on English common law, which is based Saxon, Jute and Angle law, in other words, the laws on Germanic tribalism. The rights of women, electing one's leaders, trials by one's peers – juries – but this basic ideal of equality – all this comes from our so-called barbaric ancestors living for many centuries in the open steppe of Central Asia.
But the Bible exhibits some potent correctives. “Thou shalt not bring false witness against another.” Imagine what would happen if people really believed this. Our collective political life could then finally focus on the very real problems, like getting enough food, gasoline, and electrical power. The Hebrew Bible also has God say: “Do not use my name to commit harm. If you do, you will be punished severely.”
(Exodus 20.7).
Only in some countries is any compromise seen. Jordan, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Algeria have evolved into dialogue and reform. In Libya on this day the democratic freedom fighters broke in Sirte and are driving the last pro-Qaddafi loyalists from room to room. Most Libyans support amnesty and reconciliation. Just because you worked in government, or even for Qaddafi directly, does not in itself condemn you to prosecution.
In Tunisia and Egypt, the revolutions seemed guaranteed. But half a year later, it is clear that the army in each country, plus many former friends of the regime, has rolled back certain democratic reforms, keeping power all along. Just as bad, the economies did not improve, prompting widespread unrest. But behind the scenes, in the cafes of Cairo and Alexandria, in the mosques of Al Mina and Asyut, political leaders have been talking policy and reform. Early on, there were some weird 'marriages' – like the one behind technocrat Muhammad al Baradai, and the Muslim Brotherhood. Last week we examined the role of Islamists in government in Egypt, finding that they concentrate of social service on the most local level.
There is wide-spread confusion about Islam. The Islamists and ordinary Muslims think they serve Islam as 'slaves of God.' But the Qur'an makes it clear that God does not need human prayers, that Islam serves men and women, that it should never be forced or coerced. So secular people are hardly excluded from Islam, especially since most have dedicated their lives to providing food or services to the nation.
The Islamists I observed and lived with briefly, live competitively, praying in front of each other, mouthing the Qur'an without really examining it. Very few Muslim scholars have real training in the social sciences, or access to the latest discoveries, so Islam's origins, it's core message, is lost for want of rational analysis.
One thing all Muslim terrorists have in common was, is, ignorance of Islam. One thing all Americans and Europeans share is – ignorance of Islam.
Muhammad was a modest man, without pretense. He never wished to be a prophet. Though he did have a background in law, he opted not to be a universal law giver. He had no use for a clergy. He left no texts – the Qur'an was pieced together two generations later, from scraps of writing on the scapulae of camels and horses. Muhammad had no scheme of world conquest – the Qur'an told him that Islam was just for the Arabs. He left no instructions, no successor or any means of choosing a successor except through elections. In short, Muhammad Qureyshi failed to organize his patrimony, his legacy, because he did not think himself so important.
Contrast this to the pride, often emotionally expressed, of many Muslim men. It is important that they control, even enslave, their women (against Muhammad's laws). It is safe to say that if your religion is reinforcing your ego, then it is false. For the blessing is to step aside from mere human identity as a concept, to find oneself alive in Something much higher, much more alive than even family relations or teacher-student bonds.
Any religion or sect that claims to be the exclusive way to God, or even if it claims to be the best, is immediately compromised. For such a sense of superiority is unseemly in the eyes of the Spirit. Mankind is of course much smaller than we assume as we live our lives. Belief that one has the answer, the only answer, disqualifies one's little group from the cross-fertilization that would be required to reach genuine human perfection.
There are millions in Arabia and in the USA who hate each other. The Americans will hate the whole people – all the Muslims are suspect, while the Arabs generally hate only the US government. The reasons are clear, if not entirely rational. The American invasion of Iraq in 2003 has created a bleeding wound that does not heal. America's blanket support for Israel's expansion into Arab Palestine has certainly alienated most Muslims. The US government is seen as hypocritical, and hypocrisy breeds anger.
But the Muslim states hate Israel, as they were taught to. Hatred of Jews is taught in their schools. Indoctrinating children is a sin in itself. A child's world is no longer innocent, joyful, perfect. Such hatred precludes any peaceful settlement. Even if the Palestinian leaders could cut a deal, there will be a small but determined number who commit terror. And Jews also teach hatred. And these so-called spiritual teachers have compromised themselves: the more extreme ultra-Zionists are like the militant Salafis, in that they cannot be critical to the thoughts in their own heads, but serve to reinforce their hatred by just being together. All this prevents practical concrete solutions – peace.
The Ba'athi Syrian government has long used the Palestinian issue to assist the coercion of the population. The dominance of the military in Egypt and Syria, Libya and Yemen, is in part causing the poverty that prompted the revolutions. The army is traditionally seen as being above politics, pure, loyal, even if not justified or productive. But they are essentially unproductive organizations, eating up the bulk of a nation's discretionary spending. Officers pensions and healthcare is the greatest cost, but this is true in the USA as well.
The time has come where any progress depends on talking with one's adversaries. Trust must be built, but the quickest way is just to see through one's own attitudes and prejudices. The ideologue is certain, the scientist does not know. So risk it. Or maybe the democratic opposition needs to be told to compromise.
It is such a colossal train wreck, these imperfect half-revolutions. The various societies all polarized. Now they can't re-focus and come together. All this blurry vision lets the extremists set the agenda. In Bahrain, the Yemen, in Egypt as well, the original protesters were educated secular people. But the youth took charge. Slowly the Islamists come out of their caves. But jihad is no longer the call. The real war was, is, against one's self – the jihad al nafs – against the ego.
No longer can we see these political processes as polarized between secular and sectarian. Jihadism has shot its wad. "A growing number of Muslims now want to use their faith as a means to an end, rather than end in itself - or as a way to find answers rather than being the answer itself. For them, Islam is often more about identity than piety, about Muslim values rather than Islamic ideology." (Robin Wright, Rock the Casbah, p.46. in 2011.)
-John Paul Maynard
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