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Is Anti-Americanism on the Rise among Muslims after the Arab Spring? |
20 September 2012USAK Researchers Tunc Sakaoglu and Reyhan Guner have conducted an interview with Assoc. Prof. Veysel Ayhan on the popular demonstrations throughout the Islamic geography against American and British nationals. Dr. Ayhan responded our questions with special emphasis on the possible repercussions of the elevating public tensions in the Middle East on Muslims' relations with the West in the aftermath of the Arab Spring.
Are anti-American attitudes on the rise throughout the Middle East after the “Arab Spring”? Why and how such protests full of rage and violence against Americans and the British are taking place after tens of years with no significant uproar as such?
Negative sentiments against the interventionist policies pursued by the US and the UK have always been strong among the Muslim populations spread all around the region. The overt support which has been provided for decades by these Western powers toward Israel has always been the true source of such great sensitivity and negative attitudes. The war in Iraq also contributed overwhelmingly to anti-Americanism in the region, and affected the relations with the Western world in general adversely.
The US adopted an interventionist discourse towards the domestic affairs of many Arab countries in the last decade. For instance, during the Palestinian Presidential Elections of 2005, Muslims felt betrayed by the US. The latter was initially giving voice to the right of all political parties including Hamas to enter into democratic elections locally. But when Hamas won the Presidential Elections, the US and the EU countries turned their back on Hamas as they stated terrorist organizations are not legitimate to rule a country even if they are popularly elected. A similar situation was observed regarding the US statements of declining support concerning the rise of Islamic Brotherhood in Egyptian parliament even before the Arab Spring. Muslims were not late to notice that the US was playing a double-game and lost the last remainder of hope and trust toward the US.
What I believe is that the Arab Spring consists of two main stages. The first stage was the overthrowing of the oppressive regimes, such as Colonel Gadhafi’s in Libya and Hosni Mobarak’s in Egypt, regimes with a strong grip over conservative Muslim elements trying to access political power. In the following second stage, I believe the “movement”, influenced by the general inclinations and long-accumulated feelings of the public, will turn against the West as a whole and against anything that seems to go along with it. At least at the grassroots level, there can be seen a turbulent and radical disengagement from the discourse of democracy and solidarity with the Western countries, a discourse that was somehow valid during the initial stage of revolts against dictatorships throughout the region. Today, what we see is a greater picture where the revolutionaries are too afraid to lose their efforts and spirit to Western manipulation. They do not want to be cast any role by the West to be ultimately put into a repurposed and subjugated position.
The protests are spreading throughout a greater Islamic geography from Pakistan to Tunisia, and from Iran to Sudan. But can we suppose that these popular demonstrations reflect the overwhelming attitudes among the majority of Muslims accurately?
Actually, Muslim communities are not a single homogeneous entity in their political attitudes and interests. The same situation is valid regarding different attitudes towards and motives behind protests that were supported by various layers of Muslim societies all over the Islamic geography. In the very recent instances of burning American flags and raiding American embassies and so forth, on one side we have moderate Muslim leaderships of Morsi in Egypt and leaders from Islamic Brotherhood all over the Arab world, who have gained strength and an increasing popularity with the Arab Spring. On the other side, we have fundamentalist movements pioneered by Salafis and Shia circles under the influence of Hasan Nasrallah (leader of Hezbollah) and Iran. The moderate Islamists are against violent and uncontrollable actions as such as they do not want to antagonize the West and lose grounds of international legitimacy. However, fundamentalist groups such as Salafis which have significant public support like the moderates are anti-West in essence as they have no concern what-so-ever to appease Americans or the international community in any way.
Shiite groups are anti-West as long as they are under the influence of the current Iranian regime and Hezbollah, which are both at odds with Israel and the US. Therefore they aim to exacerbate tensions also between the Sunni majorities in Egypt, Libya and so forth and the US. Moreover, by giving the impression that Iran is the first and foremost supporter of anti-American movements and Islamic values, Shia leadership aims to pit Arab populations against their “US-backed” moderate governments to drive the moderate Islamist regimes into a corner. Also, Iranians take advantage of the global public attitudes deteriorating toward the Free Syrian Army in Syria as FSA is becoming further associated with Islamist groups by the global media. Thus, Iran is playing a double game as well. While propagating the idea that the Syrian opposition is a Western-backed movement within the Middle East, Iran implies the idea that the same groups are radical Islamist entities to Western audiences. This tactic is put into action in Lebanon and Egypt most visibly.
In addition, we have the old secular status-quo in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya, which is so disillusioned with the recent upheavals and its fall into disfavor in the eyes of the US. Therefore this group is more than happy to see the global public attitudes tilting toward the negative pole with regard to the public image and motives of the “revolutionaries”. The above-mentioned group is also looking forward to see the US witnessing some sort of disappointment after undermining the ancién regime.
*Assoc. Prof. Veysel Ayhan is an expert on Syrian and Middle Eastern affairs. He is also the president of International Middle East Peace Research Center (IMPR). |
20 September 2012
Journal of Turkish Weekly
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