Arab Leaders Research Articles

Speaking Truth to Power in a Dictatorship: Secular Ideology versus Islamic Realpolitik—A Fierce Dispute in Ṣaddām’s Iraq

ABSTRACT In July 1986, a dramatic top-secret meeting of the Baʿth Pan Arab Leadership, the party’s highest ideological body, fully recorded by Ṣaddām Ḥussein, took place in wartime Baghdad. This meeting is thrice unique. First, the medium, an unabridged, audio-recording. Second, the topic, the dilemma of many Middle Eastern ruling regimes, vacillating between a secular, or semi-secular ideology and Islamic political expediency. In the case of the Baʿth, a more secular and ideological movement than most, this dilemma is particularly poignant. Third, it is exposing a bitter clash between a brutal dictator, who had executed comrades for opposing him, and three brave lieutenants. On the surface it was convened to discuss a tactical alliance with a sworn enemy, the Muslim Brethren (MB). At a dangerous moment in the Iraq-Iran War, Ṣaddām identified swelling popular religiosity. He hoped that an alliance with the MB would blunt criticism of his regime’s secularism. All the same, some participants feared that secular Arabism, the central tenet of Baʿthi faith, was at stake. Unexpectedly, the meeting produced a startling drama. Albeit temporarily, it forced Ṣaddām to take one step back. Other ideologically oriented dictators, such as Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Ḥāfiẓ al-Assad, and the Ayatollah Khomeini, too, faced ideology-politics dilemmas, yet none of them left such a surprising chronicle. A similar audio recording also comes to mind that offers a rare verbatim meeting of the inner working of a county’s highest institution at a moment of crisis – the transcripts of Kennedy’s ExComm during the Cuban Missile Crisis. While it deliberated an existential global matter and took place in a democracy, one sees similarities, namely, its detail, the exposure of emotional charges, the ability to speak truth to power, and the benefit resulting from that ability.

The Stones of Lifta by Marc Kaminsky

Reviewed by: The Stones of Lifta by Marc Kaminsky Marc Jampole (bio) the stones of lifta Marc Kaminsky Dos Madres Press www.dosmadres.com/shop/the-stones-of-lifta-by-marc-kaminsky 77 Pages; Print; $17.00 "Hineni" (or "Hinani") is the heartfelt song the cantor sings before he begins leading the recitation of the Amidah—typically the longest prayer in Jewish services—on Yom Kippur. The cantor sings that although he is praying on behalf of all those present, only he should be blamed when he fails to do it right, not the entire community. The prayer starts with the Hebrew, "Hineni," which means "Here I am," the very words Moses utters when the Jewish god appears before him in the desert. For both the cantor and Moses, "Here I am" announces a willingness to take action to propitiate the deity on behalf of the community. Thus, when Marc Kaminsky uses the phrase "Unworthy as I am …" to begin "Hinani," the first poem in his latest poetry collection, The Stones of Lifta, he signals, at least to knowledgeable Jews, that these poems will deal with a communal guilt that he feels unworthy to assuage or explain away. And in fact, we could conceive of the entire collection as an attempt to expiate the communal guilt of Israelis and all Jews regarding the violence perpetrated against Palestinians since the founding of the state of Israel in 1948. The Lifta of the title was a Palestinian village on the outskirts of Jerusalem with distinctive stone houses that never held more than about 2,250 inhabitants. During the 1947–48 civil war in Palestine, Arab leaders asked Lifta's residents to abandon the village; some did and some of these came back. Arabs fought several battles with Jewish forces at the site before every Palestinian finally abandoned Lifta. Later Lifta housed Jewish refugees. After the war many Jewish families settled there, but all left at the end of the 1960s. The Israeli government then briefly used parts of the village as a drug rehabilitation clinic and a high school. In 2017 the last Jewish residents left Lifta, and the village, decrepit stone structures and all, was declared an Israeli nature preserve. In these poems—all about Lifta, its inhabitants and its history—Kaminsky [End Page 125] presents the views of a wide range of nuanced voices, mostly Palestinian, but also of Israelis and American Jews. We read—and feel—the full range of emotions and rationales expressed by peoples of both nations fighting over one territory. Various Palestinian voices mourn the loss of land and people, offer justifications of terrorism, swear defiance against torture and economic mistreatment, evoke nostalgia for a past life, or express hatred of Jews. The Jewish voices in these poems reference the Holocaust as a justification for claiming the land, evoke the threats to the state of Israel and Israeli Jewish lives posed by the Arab world, and remind the reader of the Jews' ancient claims to the land. "First Cousins," for example, is an argument between two first cousins, one Israeli, one an American Jew (who likely is supposed to be the author). At Lifta, the American cousin expresses deep sympathy for the Palestinians, which the Israeli cousin mocks with: And you come wheeling in your baggageof opinions, stuffed with unearnedcompassion for victims of the Nakba. and Aren't you just anotherself-hating Jew? Note that "Nakba" is what the Arab world calls the mass migration that occurred in 1948 when 700,000 Arab residents of the territory under control of the Israelis either fled or were expelled from their homes. By the end of "First Cousins," the American cousin recognizes that deep inside himself lurks a blood-thirsty nature that would have responded to the Palestinian presence and threat with exactly the same violence as Jewish settlers did and Israelis have done: And I see Lifta is the only gatethrough which I could have come to Jerusalemto face the rage and perplexity of contending with youand the horror of encountering the murderous tribesman in myself. A number of the other poems, including "Constellations of Lifta" and "The Coffee House at...

Brief Synopses of New Arabic-Language Publications

Brief Synopses of New Arabic-Language Publications

Развитие политических, экономических и культурных связей между арабскими странами и Болгарией (конец XIX – XX в.)

Introduction. The article is devoted to the development of relations between Bulgaria and the Arab countries in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The development of relations between Bulgaria and the countries of the Arab East is of interest in the context of the study of the forms, directions of cooperation, reasons for the mutual interest of peoples heterogeneous in ethno-confessional and cultural terms. Methods and materials. The historical-typological, historical-systemic methods and the civilizational approach used in the article allow to analyze the process of the emergence, development and transformation of the Bulgarian-Arab relations in political, trade, economic, cultural areas. Analysis. Before World War II the international mechanisms were being created for the further development of trade, economic, and political ties between the Arab states and Bulgaria together with infrastructure and sea transport routes. The problems in the development of Bulgarian-Arab relations were caused by the difficulties in forecasting of the processes, which were often subordinate to the subjective factor, personal ambitions and emotions of Arab leaders. Bulgarian diplomacy demonstrated the great patience to maintain relations that met the country’s interests. The cooperation between Bulgaria and the Arab countries developed in various forms with noticeable positive dynamics. Political changes in a number of Arab countries and inter-Arab conflicts did not fundamentally affect relations, but caused only temporary difficulties. Despite the fact that the systemic changes, which occurred in Bulgaria in the 1990s, became a restraining factor in the development of the Bulgarian-Arab relations, they were restored due to the mutual interests of the states at the turn of the 20th – 21st centuries. Results. It is concluded that Bulgaria had established diplomatic relations with almost all Arab countries by 1960. The main direction of development of ties until the 1990s was dictated by political and ideological considerations, but trade and economic relations often preceded political ones. Bulgaria had gone beyond the traditional exchange of goods and switched to such forms of cooperation as construction, engineering design, tourism, culture, exchange of specialists, and personnel training. At the end of the 20th century Bulgarian leadership returned to the development of relations with Arab countries, which was dictated by the needs of the market economy development, new political realities and Bulgaria’s attempts to identify its place in the modern world.

Semantic analysis of Arab leaders on social media

ABSTRACT Social media has led to the creation of complex networks of political and social leaders, and has allowed for instantaneous interaction with broad audiences. Semantic analysis of these interactions is essential for policy-makers and various experts, such as in the anti-terrorism community. However, comprehensive quantitative analysis of the attitudes of Arab political and religious leaders is currently limited. To handle this problem, we first create a novel dataset consisting of 1,145,525 tweets posted in 2009–2018 from 449 political, social, and religious leaders from 12 Arab countries. Next, to semantically process various Arabic dialects in their informal expressions on social media, we develop a Latent Semantic Analysis algorithm that is then used to identify the individuals with the highest semantic matches to our pre-specified categories of interest. Finally, we construct an original Temporal Semantic Similarity (TSS) measure that allows the tracking of those expressions over time. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed semantic approach can effectively and efficiently process documents in each category. We have made all the data, code and results publicly available on the project homepage: https://github.com/ArabLeader.

The Arab World and the Language of Politics

Language society and politics are terms, which are interchangeably important. Those three terms are linked in a way that is beyond separation or argument when it comes to analyzing discourse in general and political discourse in particular. Through language, society can deliver politics and impose beliefs and ideologies. The relationship between Arabs in general and politics has been a source of questions for decades due to many reasons. These reasons vary between social and historic reasons. This study aims to discuss and track how Arab writers and scholars looked at politics in their writings and how they perceived its importance and role starting with the early Islamic era and ending with our current days. It has been found that there is an apparent and close relationship between politics and religion. Further, it has been noticed that the political discourse delivered by Arab leaders has not received proper attention in terms of its effect on the different Arabic societies and the different political events that took place throughout the post-colonialism era.

Is Democracy Lost?

President Kais Saied's de facto dissolution of parliament in July 2021, abandonment of the constitution, and targeting of the opposition are clear signs that Tunisia is no longer a democracy and has returned to the authoritarian playbook of Arab leaders past and present. I see three main reasons for this abrupt end to Tunisia's decade-old democracy: 1) the failure to accompany political reform with socioeconomic gains for citizens; 2) the subsequent rise of populism; and 3) the mistakes of the Islamic party. To move forward in Tunisia and the Arab world more broadly, prodemocratic forces must link freedom, development, and social justice.

Factors Contributing to the Signing of the Abraham Accords

The signing of Abraham Accords can promote the realization of the common interests among countries to a certain extent. However, it may also trigger some conflicts among nations. This paper mainly analyzes the important factors contributing to the signing of the Abraham Accords from three perspectives: (1) the external factors -- the intervention of the US; (2) the internal factors -- the Arab and Israel’s adaptation to the current international situations; (3) other factors -- the impact of COVID-19, the dictatorship of Arab leaders, and the personal political pursuits of the leaders from other nations. In this paper, Classical Realism is used to analyze the interests between countries, and the influence of some political decisions made by relevant state leaders is supplemented by Neo-realism. Additionally, in this paper, Neoliberalism and Constructivism are also employed to analyze the negotiations between national interests, including compromise, containment, and obstruction, as well as how negotiations promote the realization of common interests. It is expected that this paper can be of some reference significance to future research on the interests between nations as well as their cooperation and conflicts in the context of globalization.

تأجيج الازدراء: سياسة الرئيس ترامب تجاه الصراع الإسرائيلي الفلسطيني

For decades, evangelicals have generally supported Republican candidates for being more religiously committed. This was reflected in the tremendous support Trump received in the 2016 election, which brought him to the White House. Trump’s success has raised serious concerns about the state of U.S. policy as well as America’s future role in the world. The study stems from concerns about U.S. foreign policy, accompanied by widespread controversy under President Donald Trump, particularly among those interested in the Palestinian issue, which was fuelled by the President’s shocking remarks and speeches. Although Arab leaders have agreed with Trump's explicit statements of preparation to fight ISIS, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remains a public criticism. While Trump represents a series of contradictions, his close ties with Israel and the ‘deal of the century’ resolution have made Middle Eastern politics more complicated and have made it more difficult to find a just solution to the crisis. This paper discusses Trump’s new policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and his tendency to fuel contempt rather than compromise. The study attempts to analyse the position of the U.S. President Donald Trump in light of his special relationship with evangelicals and to understand its implications for future conflict prospects.

People on the Move: Addressing Vulnerabilities of Nomadic Communities in Darfur

Until recently, the needs and concerns of the Arab nomadic communities in Darfur were not given sufficient attention by the international community, probably because of the tendency to equate them with the notorious “Arab militia” accused of committing crimes during the conflict in Darfur. This began to change after several Arab nomad leaders complained to the United Nations and relief groups about their exclusion from humanitarian and development programmes and projects implemented in the region. The article explores the conditions and vulnerabilities of nomadic communities in Darfur and highlights some of the subsequent successful initiatives undertaken by the United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) to address the concerns of the nomadic community members.

Iran's Reconstruction Jihad—Rural Development and Regime Consolidation after 1979

Iran's Reconstruction Jihad—Rural Development and Regime Consolidation after 1979

دور الأنظمة العربية في اغتيال فلسطين ونكبة 1948

This research discusses the historical backgrounds that led to the Zionist occupation of Palestine. It demonstrates the significant contrast between the official and popular positions in dealing with the Zionist project that began its invasion to Palestine at the beginning of the 20st century. The research demonstrates the role of the Palestinian leaders who were supported by the popular Islamic and Arab movements in intensifying resistance and military conformation against the British mandate and Jewish armed groups. In addition, the research identifies the most prominent military achievements of the armed resistance. This paper also documents the negative role of the official Arab regimes in deterring the popular revolutions and containing the developing of military rebellions. More importantly, this research has proven that the official position of the Arab governments served against the Palestinian cause by preventing the genuine armed popular movements from fighting the Zionist project, which had consequently led to the defeat (Nakba) of 1948. To study the official position of Arab leaders, the research puts emphasis on four elements: Adoption of a protest diplomacy, Exclusion of the military solution to confront the Zionist project expansion, Acceptance of the United Nations Resolution regarding the partition of Palestine which shapes the first core for establishing the Jewish State, and finally Acceptance of the ceasefire after 1948 war which represents a recognition of the right of existence of the Jewish State.

THE ARAB SPRING ONLINE NEWS COVERAGE: CORPUS-BASED ANALYSIS OF THE TUNISIAN AND EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION KEYWORDS

In 2011, the Arab world had become the centre of attention once again after the emergence of the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ in December 2010. This historical event in the modern history of the Arab region has brought significant social and political reform to the Arab world. The wave of Arab uprising begins in Tunisia at the end of 2010, rapidly separated into other neighbouring countries such as Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Syria, Bahrain, and Sudan. Since the early stage of protest, which mainly participated by locals, mass media has comprehensively reported this historical event, which brought down many Arab leaders in power for decades. Thus, Arab Spring has become the headline of many international media outlets, and the media are still discussing the significant impact of the event until now. Hence, the main objective of the study is to examine the event's Arabic online news discourse by focusing on the keywords and prominent social actors in the news reports surrounding the Arab Spring. This will indicate what has been included and excluded or highlighted and marginalised in the news coverage. The data is consist of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) online news published by four prominent news outlets namely with different origin and background: Al-Arabia of Saudi Arabia, Al-Jazeera of Qatar, BBC Arabic of the UK and CNN of the USA. These well-established news outlets were selected for their comprehensive international coverage aims at various Arabic readers worldwide. The study employs corpus linguistics analytical tools by using corpus data mining software ‘AntConc 3.4’. Then, the quantitative results of corpus data will be analysed using a qualitative approach based on the textual-oriented Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of Fairclough (1992) and Wodak (2001). The result shows that news coverage of the event has highlighted several keywords that indicate the main social actors and main social events of the Arab Spring. These keywords are the shared command features among the news outlets, although each outlet portraying them is significantly different. Finally, the article presents suggestions for other related studies in the future.

Some Aspects of Historical, Theological and Religious and Political Dimensions of the Palestinian and Israel Conflict

The primary objective of this paper is to highlight some similarities and dissimilarities between orthodox Judaism and Islamic teachings to inspire and motivate these two communities to share their common values and moral teaching at this crucial juncture of deteriorating Judo-Muslim relations. At the outset, I would like to make a clear-cut distinction between the philosophical ideas of the Zionism and the orthodox Judaism. Many academics and experts in comparative religious studies have made a clear-cut distinction the concept of the Zionism and the Judaism. Millions Jewish people do not subscribe to the idea of the Zionism and many of them reject the ideas of creating the state of the Zionism. I will try to discuss this conflict from an objective perspective to understand this ethnocentric problem without any prejudice or discrimination. I will try do my best to make this article academically acceptable and creditable. My intention is not to be judgmental on this problem rather to highlight what the religious texts both old testament and the Holy Qur’an say about these issue and what Jewish and Muslim religious leaders say about this problem. This paper is divided into seven parts. 1) Theological Bonds Between Judo-Christians and Muslims, 2) Origin of the Zionism in brief, 3) What Qur’an says about minds of rebellious Jews,4) Motives and Aims of the Zionism, 5) Inept Arab Leaders and the Palestine Problem, 6) International community and the Palestine problem,7) The role of Muslim intellectuals, religious and military leaders.

THE EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION OF 2011 AND ITS AFTERMATH IN EDITORIALS HEADLINES: CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF THE REPRESENTATION OF EGYPT IN AMERICAN AND BRITISH MEDIA EDITORIALS

The Arab world, starting from December 2010 onward, has witnessed unprecedented revolutions during which many long-lasting Arab leaders were unseated. Western media has allotted much coverage to the uprisings especially in nations, such as Egypt, with which the West, namely the U.S, shares mutual political ambitions in the Middle East. This study analyses a sample of 101 editorials headlines that were written, between 2011 and 2018, by the NYT, the WP, the Guardian and the Telegraph and suggests that these papers treatment of the revolutions is reflective of Orientalist conceptualizations that inferiorize Egypt and the Egyptians. The study draws on Edward Saids postcolonial model of Orientalism (1978) to make sense of the selected sample and targets two main areas in critical media studies quantitative content analysis and critical discourse analysis (CDA), to uncover whether or not the four newspapers editorials headlines are suggestive of Orientalist modes of thought. The study concludes that the coverage under scrutiny connects the West with the East in a way that is characterized by power relations wherein the West is having the upper hand, and thus producing a rhetoric that is stereotypical and Orientalist.

ВІЙСЬКОВО-ПОЛІТИЧНІ ОБСТАВИНИ ПЕРЕМОГИ МУСУЛЬМАН У БИТВІ ПРИ АЛЬ-КАЗІМІ У 633 РОЦІ

The Battle of Kazima in 633 marked the beginning of a series of successful victories by General Khalid ibn al-Walid on the west bank of the Euphrates, which opened up opportunities for the Arab Caliphate to defeat the Iranian Sassanid Empire. The battle was a minor and secondary skirmish between Iranian border guards and nomadic robbers. The number of soldiers involved in the battle on both sides was not significant. In fact, the battle of Kazima was a clash between Arab Muslims and non-Muslim Arabs with the support of a small contingent of professional Iranian troops. The Iranian command followed passive and wait-and-see tactics, while the Arab military leader Khalid ibn al-Walid used mobile rapid maneuvering tactics to determine its course. The Iranian army and its allies were forced to fight after a long grueling march through the desert and weakened fighting spirit. At the beginning of the battle, the Arabs managed to trap and kill the Iranian commander Hormuzd, which further worsened the moral and psychological condition of the Arab Confederates allied with the Sassanids and led to their escape from the battlefield. The victory in the battle of Kazima had a largely moral and psychological significance for the Muslims, as it persuaded non-Muslim Arab tribes to join the Arab Caliphate. As a result of the victory at al-Kazimah, Muslims received significant material resources as military booty, which increased the influence of Muslims among the Arab leaders. It is not scientifically appropriate to call the battle of al-Kazimah a "battle of chained or tied" because of the absolute fiction of the plot about a load of iron chains in the convoy of the Iranian army. The fact that soldiers were tied up during combat formation was common in Iranian military practice, but its use was inappropriate in the Battle of Kazima.

مکی دور میں مسلم اقتدار کے تصورات کا تجزیاتی مطالعہ

Details of Madani era are available in the chronicles of history & Sīrah, but this aspect is somewhat terse research, as to when did the efforts to establish the state of Madinah begin? Obviously, the establishment of the state of Madinah is not a coincidence but it was already been planned for, efforts have been made for its establishment and It must have been a reaction too. Therefore, in the Mecca era when did the Holy Prophet think of establishing a state? On what occasions did he express it? Did his opponents understand his thinking? Who they were and how they reacted? What was the ruling of Allah to him in this regard? This article enlights all the above-mentioned aspects and concludes that the establishment of the state of Madinah is not an accident, but the result of Prophet’s constant struggle in the Mecca period, which he has expressed on various occasions. Arab leaders, as well as Jews of Madinah, knew about the prophet's views for the establishment of a state in the near future and opposed him either by creating obstacles in the preaching of Islam or by removing the shreds of evidence from the previous religious literature such as Bible.

El-Mutenebbî’nin Seyfüddevle’ye Methiyeleri (Seyfiyyât)

Ebû’t-Tayyib Ahmed b. el-Huseyn el-Mutenebbî el-Kindî, genellikle Hamdânî hükümdarı Seyfüddevle ile ilişkilendirilen bir Abbâsî dönemi methiyecisidir. el-Mutenebbî şairlik kariyerinin ilk dönemlerinde çeşitli hamileri övmüştür; ama bu süreç, Seyfüddevle’yle aralarındaki ilişkiye yalnızca bir girizgâh olabilecek niteliktedir. Nitekim söz konusu ilişki, şairin kariyerinin en parlak dönemini meydana getirmektedir. Seyfüddevle 337/948 senesinde Antakya’ya muzaffer olarak girdiğinde, el-Mutenebbî, Seyfüddevle’nin kuzeninin aracılığıyla, onun gelişini kutlayan bir methiye nazmetme fırsatı bulmuştur. Böylelikle 337/948 senesinin başlarında, nihayet Seyfüddevle’nin resmî şairi olacağı Hamdânî sarayına yerleşmeyi başarmıştır. el-Mutenebbî, methiye şairi olarak dokuz yıl kadar bu mecliste kalacaktır. Burada hamisi için nazmettikleri, Arap şiirinin en meşhur methiyelerindendir. Seyfüddevle’ye adanan bu övgüler, bir bütün olarak Seyfiyyât namıyla tanınmaktadır. Hamisine askerî seferlerinde eşlik eden el-Mutenebbî, savaşların detaylarını kaydetmiş ve bunları tebrik methiyelerinde betimlemiştir. el-Mutenebbî, Seyfüddevle’ye gerçekten de samimi şekilde bağlanmıştır. Onun gözünde Seyfüddevle, cesur, fedakâr ve cömert olmasının yanı sıra, İslam’ın savunucusu ve ideal bir Arap lideridir. İcra ettiği bu paha biçilmez propaganda hizmetinin karşılığında, şaire oldukça iyi bir ödeme de yapmıştır. Bu nedenle aralarındaki durum, esasen karşılıklı bir çıkar ilişkisidir. el-Mutenebbî hem saraydaki hasımlarının düşmanca komplolarının hem de kendi kibrinin kurbanı olarak, sonunda Hamdânî sarayından kaçacaktır. Bu çalışmada, el-Mutenebbî’nin Seyfiyyât’ı ve onun şiirsel üslubu bilimsel bir metotla incelenmiştir. Bunun yanı sıra, söz konusu koleksiyondan öne çıkan bir methiye, örnek olarak sunulmuştur.

Review

Review

T. E. Lawrence's Misrepresentation of the Arabs in Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Adopting postcolonial theory, this article investigates T. E. Lawrence's depiction of the Arabs in his Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1926). I argue that Lawrence displays a Western colonial discourse in which he represents the Arabs as the silent uncivilized "Other." Part of this colonial discourse is Lawrence’s presentation of himself as superior, prophet, leader and inspirer of the Arab Revolt. Arab leaders and tribes are depicted, in Lawrence's discourse, as an inferior "Other" who need the English to help them achieve their independence. In addition, I argue that Lawrence’s negative representation of the Arabs is an ideology that justifies Western domination over the East. Lawrence’s misrepresentation addresses Arab feuds, nature and atmosphere, Arabic language, Arab costume, and religion. Keywords: Arab Revolt, Colonial Discourse, Other, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence