A cento based on the notes I took during a roundtable on the revolutions in the Middle East, hosted by the Middle East Centre at St. Antony’s College, Oxford.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the rhythms of life -- from day to night, and back again, from one season to another. A revolution also implies a cyclical movement. The long hand of the clock, for instance, makes one revolution in an hour, and then begins again. Recollecting my notes this way started to shed some light on the rhythm of the Arab world’s revolutions, or at least the pace of our discussions of them. There are the parallels between Tunisia and Egypt, the new vision for the region, and the two lingering questions -- what comparisons can we make? and what about Israel? Our thoughts about these events continue running in these currents. I wonder what these patterns really mean.
17 Feb 2011
Introductions
Tunisia
Egypt’s Tahrir Square, labor movement
Strategy
Turkey
Israel
Tunisia set the bar
successful - ?
# of old regime in the new
3,000 monitoring the internet
Rise of criminality, wave of emigration
Italy
Tourist sector --> collapsed
Parliamentary system or presidential - ?
5th Republic, France
political exiles return
Islamists to Marxists
Free press functioning
Algeria & Morocco
“anything could happen anywhere after Mubarak’s fall”
president, army - Algeria’s separate fronts
Morocco’s political stasis
“But not the kind of stasis you had in Egypt.”
Next six months, the least secure
Precedent in Egypt -
Political and artistic expression
25 Jan. - 11 Feb.
Football - nationalist expression given new meaning
National unity apart from Mubarak
cross and crescent
mass in Tahrir, victims of 31 Dec. bombing
humor, Egyptian identity
history of Opposition
politicized Militias
children leading chants
cultural revival for the last 10 years
Museum of the Revolution
Upper Egypt’s traditional dances
“The people became the guardians of Egyptian-ness”
Labor strikes continued
defying army, pro-democracy demonstrators
Media, governments downplay labor
focus on Muslim Brotherhood, youth movement
15 years of labor activism continues
Brotherhood in Parliament
more Party than opposition movement
losing peasant, worker support
joined labor movement, late-1990s
Most grassroots movement was the workers
April 6 movement saw this
Divide between labor and youth continues
“new face of the Arab world”
awakening
new “End of History”
ends perspective - Arab world as staid, incompatible w/democracy
Secular, focused on ‘dignity’
government initiated attack on Copts
Needs ongoing unity
change of strategic environment
! - Revolutions in US-ally states --> ‘moderate’ states
Egypt’s foreign policy - ?
Gaza blockade
support for Iraq war
Restoring Egypt’s regional role
emphasizing “national” interests
Opportunity
Israeli “revolution” - paving way for lasting peace
Haaretz’ positive coverage
US follow-through, human rights emphasis
partnership, not aid dependency
Turkey - acute sense of analogies
Rightly predicted Egypt
demand they listen to people
Mubarak couldn’t die in office
Changes in policy
“democratic instincts”
“Turkish Model”
army guarding civilian democracy
soft Islamist take over
Turkey and Iran - solidarity?
Israeli self-image
“island of democracy in sea of authoritarianism”
hasn’t supported Arab democracy
Outsider
Ashkenazi elite, Ben-Gurion
preference for Arab dictators
unnecessary wars
“Israel is the penis through which the imperialists piss on the Arab world,” allegedly Ben-Gurion
1979 peace --> defense budget from 30 to 8 per cent GDP
Israel belligerent
Mubarak - peace treaty sub-contractor
Fear of Iran, 1979
Binary vision
dictator/Islamists
No lasting peace w/o Arab democracy, Netanyahu
Should see opportunity
hard-wired not to see friends.
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