Brief Synopses of New Arabic-Language Publications

Abstract

Heba Gamal El Deen M. El-Azab, Spiritual Diplomacy and the Abrahamic Interfaith: Colonial Plan of the New Century (Beirut: Center for Arab Unity Studies, 2021). 256 pp. ISBN 9789953829296Many questions have been raised in recent years in the debate relating to the notion of “Abrahamic interfaith” as a major approach to global religious peace and a basis for eliminating extremism and violence, and even for eradicating poverty and achieving sustainable development. Interest in research and investigation into the concept of Abrahamic interfaith and its objectives has become prevalent as the notion has featured in the discourse of several American and Israeli circles in relation to the monotheistic religions (Islam, Christianity, and Judaism) in an attempt to politically exploit the common denominators between the three religions and use them in a larger framework of what has become to be known as “spiritual diplomacy.”The author argues that the concept of Abrahamic interfaith is being used in the service of American foreign policy and the Zionist project in the Arab world in general and in particular in relation to the Israeli settler project in the occupied Palestinian territories. The aim of using the religious card is to sustain American hegemony in the region and thus strengthen control over its resources. Under the slogan of human brotherhood, based on mutual respect and dismissing inherited conflicts resulting from historical religious disagreement, the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to their land have been obliterated.The author refers to some indicators of “spiritual diplomacy” vis-à-vis US and Israeli policies on the ground to justify her argument. Accordingly, she notes that aspects of US spiritual diplomacy emerged in 1990 with the speech of US President George H. W. Bush regarding the new world order after the collapse of the former Soviet Union and the American war against Iraq known as the First Gulf War. He introduced the notion of the religious dimension of US wars and the use of American strength as a force for good. Another manifestation of the use of force for good emerged with the administration of George W. Bush in 2003 when the president sought to justify the invasion of Iraq in the context of confronting evil.American spiritual diplomacy arose again in relation to the “Deal of the Century,” the elements of which were put forward by former US President Donald Trump’s advisor, Jared Kushner, in February 2019. Kushner focused on promoting open borders to allow economic cooperation, but also freedom of worship and belief, in order to eliminate hatred and ancestral differences derived from religion as one of the most important aims of the Deal of the Century.A further direct step for American spiritual diplomacy was encouraging a policy of open borders in the Trump administration’s initiative called the “Abraham Accords Declaration,” which was signed by the United States, Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain in September 2020. These Accords, which were named to emphasize the shared belief in the Prophet Abraham in the “Abrahamic religions” (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), were referred to as a starting point for full normalization between the Arab states and Israel, in spite of the stalled peace process in the region.In this respect, the author argues that the Trump administration, by its “Abrahamic project” or spiritual diplomacy, disregarded the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and sought to impose peace and normalize Arab relations with Israel as if the Palestinian issue were simply a religious problem that could be settled within the framework of Abrahamic interfaith without addressing the Palestinian people’s rights to their land. The recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in December 2017 by Trump and then his support for Israel’s annexation of the occupied Syrian Golan, in March 2019, were regarded as clear violations of resolutions relating to international legitimacy and the Charter of the United Nations, and thus under no circumstances would lead to peace. Moreover, the issue of open borders was also considered an attempt to keep the issue of the occupied Palestinian territories out of the peace process. In short, there is a strong belief in the Arab world that the Abrahamic interfaith plan of the United States would not lead to peace, but legitimize the Israeli occupation of Palestinian and Arab lands and sustain American hegemony in the region.■■■■Abdelilah Belkezi, Pre-Orientalism: Islam in Christian Thought (Beirut: Center for Arab Unity Studies, 2021). 208 pp. ISBN 9789953829289This book deals with the deep intellectual roots of modern and contemporary Western visions of Islam, its social, political, and cultural world, and in particular the visions expressed within Orientalism. These roots are deeply implanted in the history of Christian religious thought and have expressed themselves in the texts of theologians and historians, both Orientalists and Roman Catholics, relating to Islam in the Middle Ages. Their ideas and image of Islam remained dominant and have been reproduced in modern and contemporary Orientalist thought. This recycling or reproduction of images of Islam was possible as the dismantling of modern and contemporary Orientalism, based upon mediating (Christian) religious heritage, was not final or complete.This does not mean, however, that Orientalism is merely an extension of theological thought or a resumption of its narratives in the creation stereotypes which were formed about Islam in Christian consciousness. Religion is only one aspect of Orientalism, which centers on the awareness of belonging to the West rather than to a religion. Also, this does not mean that the author seeks to study the origin of Orientalism. He speaks of pre-Orientalism as referring to the historical and religious background of Orientalism.The author argues that there is no single image of Islam in the Christian consciousness, but several images which differ from one Christian denomination to another according to its theological doctrine, its relationship to, or experience and vision of Islam. Accordingly, the author presents, in the first part of the book, the images of Islam that emerged and formed out of the relationship between the Christians of the East and Islam, including the relationship between the Christians of the Arabian Peninsula and Islam and the Christian “heresies” (Arab Christian denominations with beliefs or opinions contrary to Byzantine Christianity doctrine) and Islam.In the second part the author deals with Byzantine Christianity and Islam and the images of Islam in Latin Christianity. In general, Arab and Eastern images of Islam were characterized by greater openness than those stereotypes formed by Byzantine Christianity and Latin Christianity, and which, moreover, were based on hostility and superiority in dealing with Muslims and even with Christians of the East. In the final analysis, all images contribute to the dialogue and exchange between civilizations.■■■■Adib Nehmeh, Development and Poverty: A Critical Review of Concepts and Measuring Tools (Beirut: Center for Arab Unity Studies, 2021). 540 pp. ISBN 9789953829265This book provides a detailed critical review of 35 Arab and international reports and studies on poverty issued during the period between 1990 and 2019. It is concerned with the evolution of the concept of human development and the global development agenda (the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development), which made poverty eradication its primary goal. It seeks to present theoretical aspects of an approach to poverty, its definition and measurement, in order to free it from the restriction of economic, monetary, or quantitative approaches, and place it in a broader framework that includes philosophy, ethics, and sociology.Approaching poverty in a comprehensive manner would enable researchers to get closer to underprivileged people, to increase their knowledge of the dynamics of impoverishment, and to dissect policies that lead to inequality, the violation of human rights, and the absence of social justice. The author argues that applying a comprehensive approach to the concept of development would lead to a discussion of five key dimensions of development: political, knowledge/cultural, economic, social, and environmental. Four principles are to be added to development dimensions: productivity, equity, sustainability, and empowerment.The book has six sections. The first section deals with the theoretical dimensions of development and the theoretical framework for studying poverty, while the second section presents a critical review of international reports, most notably those of Oxford, the World Bank, and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). The third section deals with regional and Arab reports in addition to Oxford, the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, ESCWA, and UNICEF reports. The fourth section is devoted to reviewing national reports influenced by the Oxford methodology. It includes reports on Syria, Morocco, Iraq, Palestine, Libya, and Sudan. The fifth section reviews national reports on Lebanon, Iraq, and Jordan, in addition to regional reports of the League of Arab States and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). The sixth section presents some technical proposals for measuring poverty. It includes a critical review of the World Bank’s study of poverty in Palestine issued in 2011.Reports and approaches to sustainable development and poverty included in the book will be of interest to students, academics, policymakers, and those working in the field of development, poverty, and social policies, whether in international organizations, governmental institutions, or civil society organizations.■■■■Mohammad Nour Eddeen, One Hundred Years of Modern Turkey’s History: A Political and Social Biography 1920–2020 (Beirut: All Prints Distributors & Publishers, 2020). 512 pp. ISBN 9786144585191This book seeks to explore and analyze the most important transformations that Turkey has witnessed between 1920 and 2020, reviewing a series of prominent events that had their impact on the cultural, social, and political identity of Turkey, internally and externally, since it became a nation-state, following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of 1918.Accordingly, the author argues that the proclamation of the Turkish Republic in 1923 marked the actual beginning of an era full of trials and challenges. On an internal level, reforms under the founder of the Turkish state, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, including the adoption of the secularization of the constitution, were the most prominent features of domestic politics. Ataturk’s reforms, however, faced many challenges, the most remarkable of which were the conflict between secularism and Islam, the Kurdish question, class issues, and the role of the military establishment in Turkish political life.In this respect, the author sites the elections of 1950 that shook Ataturk’s ruling Republican People’s Party, led by the second president of Turkey, Mustafa Ismet Inonu, who lost the elections to the Democrat Party (DP) of Adnan Menderes (Turkish Prime Minister, 1950–60). He elaborates on the dominant role of the military in the political life of country, pointing to the military coup against Menderes in 1960 and his execution in 1961, the 1971 military coup, and the coup of 1980 that dealt with civil violence between right and left Turkish movements.As concerns the secular–Islamic conflict, which has accompanied the history of the Turkish republic, the author refers to the significant year of 1970 which marked the emergence of political Islam, with Necmettin Erbakan, founder of the National Order Party and later prime minister (1996–97). The dominance of political Islam on the Turkish scene, however, was not achieved except with the Justice and Development Party headed by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has become the most prominent president after the founding president Ataturk.Referring to the Kurdish question, the continuing refusal of the Turkish state to recognize the cultural and ethnic identity of its Kurdish citizens has generated widespread discontent among the country’s Kurds. For the Turkish state, the priority is to eliminate the Kurdish resistance led by the Workers’ Party of Kurdistan (PKK) before settling the Kurdish issue.On the external level, and after relative neutrality in the 1920s and 1930s, Turkey engaged in a defense alliance in the aftermath of World War II as part of NATO. Preserving the security of the Turkish Republic and its territorial integrity, in addition to its aspirations for cultural integration with the European Community, were the key aims of that era in terms of foreign policy. However, with the arrival to power of the Islamic Justice and Development Party, Turkey became more involved in regional affairs, especially after the “Arab Spring” uprisings. Turkey has attempted to restore its historical and cultural ties with the Arab countries that were under the authority of the Ottoman Empire, hoping to strengthen its influence in the region.Turkey’s relationship with Israel has also been part of its strategic foreign policy since Ankara recognized Israel in 1949 and allowed Jews to emigrate to Israel in the 1950s. But trust between Ankara and Tel Aviv was shaken with the rise to power of the Justice and Development Party in 2002 and with the Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip in late 2008. Moreover, the Israeli attack on the Turkish vessel Mavi Marmara in 2010, which left 10 Turkish activists dead, worsened Turkish–Israeli relations, but it did not cause a complete severing of their diplomatic ties.The Turkish policy of “zero problems” with neighboring countries promoted by Erdogan has failed due to many reasons, the most prominent of which may be Turkish intervention in the Syrian war, in northern Iraq, to pursue PKK militants. Also, there is the issue of oil exploration in Cyprus, the Libyan civil war, and Arab Gulf states’ affairs. At the same time, internal issues, particularly the Kurdish question and the secular–Islamic struggle, have remained unresolved.■■■■Tahani Al Hosani, Ruling Regime in Oman: Ibadi Doctrine vs. Political Practice (Beirut: Center for Arab Unity Studies, 2020). 140 pp. ISBN 978-9953-82-927-2The political events that the Islamic Empire witnessed in the first century of Hijra represented a turning point for the emergence of forces opposing the political practices of the Umayyad Caliphate. The Ibadi movement (Ibadism or al-Ibāḍiyyah) which originated with the Kharijite1 secession of 657 CE and was recognized as a moderate current of the Khawarij movement, was one of the main groups that opposed the Umayyad state. Initially, the Ibadi movement was developed in the Iraqi city of Basra, but it was also well-established in Oman. In addition, it expanded to parts of Yemen, and the Maghreb region, particularly Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya.The purpose of this book, however, is neither to trace the origin of the Ibadis or study their demographic distribution, nor to elaborate on their fiqh (jurisprudence). It is rather to uncover the circumstances and conditions that contributed to the transformation of the Ibadi stance to Kharijite towards the events that struck the Islamic nation in the first century of Hijra (first century AH/seventh century CE). This was characterized by a political theory of governance, which has been applied successfully in several parts of the Islamic world, especially in Oman and areas of the Arab Maghreb.The author argues that the study of the system of governance in Oman in the second to fourth centuries AH (eighth to tenth CE) is a topic within which intellectual frameworks and political principles intertwine with the specificity of the tribal heritage in Omani society, in addition to jurisprudence related to the provisions, traditions, and circumstances surrounding the declaration of the first Imamate in Oman in 132 AH/784 CE and the second Imamate in 177 AH/793 CE.The book comprises three chapters. The first chapter deals with political events in the Islamic world and their impact on the formation of Ibadi political thought. It presents the most prominent political developments that the Islamic world witnessed after the events of sedition and arbitration in the first century Hijra. It affirms the theory that the Ibadis arose from political standpoints in opposition to the violent practices of the Umayyad state. This chapter shows how Ibadism was transformed from a political faction into a denomination like all other sects.The second chapter explores Ibadi political thought between theory and practice, dealing with the prevailing system of tribal rule before the rise of the first Imamate and the circumstances that accompanied its fall. It then covers the declaration of the second Imamate and the experience of Ibadism in governance, and its interaction with tribal forces in Omani society. This chapter posits that, despite the values and principles that the Imamate launched, namely its opposition to centralization, hereditary rule, and despotism, and its pursuit of the principles of Shura,2 justice and equality, it was not able to enforce its attempts at preventing undesirable anti-Ibadism tribal alliances except through another tribal alliance that guaranteed its survival and continuity. In this there was an attempt to create a state of balance between the constants of Ibadism and the specificity of the Omani tribal community.The third chapter discusses the features of the state that were established during the era of the Imamate and the institutions that contributed to managing the affairs of society. It also deals with the phase after the deposition of Imam Salt bin Malik (271 AH/885 CE) that led to remarkable changes in the political features of the Imamate state. The most prominent of these were the transfer of political power from the imams and scholars to tribal leaders, tribal and scholarly struggle for power, and the disintegration of the state’s authority that resulted in the intervention of external forces represented by the Abbasid state. How to create a balance between Ibadism and tribalism remains an open and important issue for the smooth functioning of Omani system of governance.■■■■Waddah Ihsan Al-Jubouri, Federalism and Political Stability in Iraq after 2003 (Amman: Dar Wael, 2021). 156 pp. ISBN 9789957917760Following the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, Paul Bremer, head of the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) that took over the rule of Iraq, declared the Law of Administration for the State of Iraq for the Transitional Period (also referred to as the Interim State Administration Law), which was signed by an appointed Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), a sectarian and ethnic council, in March 2004.The Interim State Administration Law formed the backbone of the 2005 Iraqi constitution, which adopted federalism as the basis for the new Iraqi state. Yet, the application of federalism faced many challenges, the most prominent of which was the adoption of federalism on sectarian and ethnic grounds, the complete dissolution of the Iraqi army by the CPA, the loss of the George W. Bush administration’s credibility in promoting democracy and human rights in Iraq due to the “Abu Ghraib scandal” and its failure to restore security to the country, in addition to its admission that no weapons of mass destruction were found, which was one of the main pretexts for the US administration’s invasion of Iraq. Also, there was the interference of neighboring counties in Iraq’s internal affairs and the outbreak of a sectarian conflict in addition to the absence of a reliable unifying foreign policy.However, the concerns, in relation to federalism and the issue of political stability, are the main challenges that hover over the uncertain future of Iraq with the unsettled struggle over power, territory, and resources among the country’s sectarian and ethnic factional leaders. How to deal with the power-sharing arrangements between the central government in Baghdad and the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Erbil as well as with the country’s provincial leaders remains one of the key factors for the successful application of federalism and thus for political stability. In this respect, many researchers argue that Iraq would not remain viable as a country if Iraq’s Sunni or Shia majority provinces were to pursue similar policies of autonomy as were granted to Kurdistan Region.The issue of revenue and sharing arrangements, namely of oil and gas revenues, is also of great importance for political stability of the country. In this context, federalism will not contribute to stability if it fails to reach fair oil revenue-sharing arrangements between the central government in Baghdad and the KRG in Erbil, in addition to achieving satisfactory arrangements between the central government and oil-rich Basra in Iraq’s southern province and gas-rich Anbar in Iraq’s western province.Finally, there is a belief that federalism would be regarded as a sort of partition if the various factional leaders of Iraq fail to reach a new social contract that promotes citizenship in addition to an independent trustworthy unifying foreign policy.