On Forging Muslim Nations
Besides land-idolatry, the factions have resorted to a perverse biological idolatry with two mythical racial identities: Palestinian and Jewish.
ON FORGING LIBERAL DEMOCRATIC MUSLIM NATIONS
BY
DAVID ARTHUR WALTERS
We have Arabs to thank for the spread of Islam, and its fundamental inspiration still resides in Arabia. Although Islam was originally more liberal than its predecessors, it was spawned by and embedded in traditionally tribal cultures. It is virtually impossible for liberal foreign interests to forge a modern liberal or 'democratic' nation out of ‘noble’ (Arab) tribes. Nationalism is contrary not only to tribalism but to fundamental Islam.
Nationalism is also repugnant to international communism although the communist ideologues eventually conceded to nationalism as an interim stage. The Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party (1947-1966) attempted to unite Islamism and socialism, but it espoused united Arab nationalism, contradicting the universal aspirations of Islam and communism. Its founders even repudiated Marxist-Leninist Communism notwithstanding its similar ideological tenets. Denounced by left and right, it was really a version of national-socialism, with socialism subjugated to the national interest. Its sway was limited to Iraq and Syria despite setting up offices elsewhere, and it was severed into separate Ba’ath movements, dominated, respectively, by Iraqis and Syrians, when the pan-Arab project fell apart at the seams.
We recall that Muslim intellectuals inspired the European renaissance with the Greek culture they had fostered, often secretly. And then, ironically, the scientific-industrial revolution for which the Arab-Greco culture had provided impetus eventually resulted in 'Arab' lands being colonized by the West. Nationalization seemed to be the antidote to colonization, but not along liberal Western lines.
The tribes of the modern period were just as disparate as the feuding tribes of the ancient days when the Hittite empire collapsed; Egyptian influence was withdrawn, and the Aegean peoples, particularly the Philistines, tried to take advantage of the vacuum, but they were reputedly stopped by Saul and David. Thus began the historical consciousness of the Habirus (Hebrews), a status group known to the Egyptians as rebels, mercenary nomads, and canal and tomb builders.
That has all come full circle, back to the country Romans called Palestine, with other ancient countries standing by or interfering. It is there that we have a return to the scene of the crime, so to speak, the feuding cousin-groups arranged accordingly, with only one strong nation among them, one that harkens back to a Golden Kingdom that was really rather drab and miserable.
Today's factions in Palestine have become so desperate that many of them have resorted to, besides their land-idolatry, a perverse biological idolatry professing two basic mythical racial identities, Palestinian and a Jewish. Former Prime Minister Sharon said he was fighting for the survival of the "Jewish race," a race as mythical as the Aryan race. He did not speak for all Jews, especially not for the anti-Zionists. On the other hand, Palestinians are several peoples just as they were in Canaan; archeologists have found vestiges running all the way back to the late Stone Age.
The 'Palestinians' were unified in group-love by hatred for a minority Israelite culture that, according to ancient tradition, they must serve or conquer. Yahweh commanded the minority Hebrews to get rid of the Canaanite tribes long ago. Jews, however, were much kinder than their god; they engaged many Canaanites as servants, some of whom even prospered, some of whom became Jews themselves.
Again, it is difficult if not impossible to suddenly forge national unity out of the Palestinians or any other 'tribal' or feudal culture. In any event, it behooved the Western colonial powers to preserve the disunity of tribalism, to keep the native peopled divided in order to rule. Nevertheless, Muslim intellectuals, taking their cue from Christian missionaries, especially Americans, tried their best to devise a more universal consciousness. They picked up the Western education that their antecedents had dropped off for translation in the West several centuries prior, and reintroduced it to the East along with its latest Western accretions, translating the whole into the language of the Koran – Arabic.
Nationalization was perceived to be the remedy or at least the intermediate solution for the backwardness of the Muslim countries exploited by the colonists. The national concept introduced was that of the modern Western nation. Muslim countries were to be modernized into neo-liberal, meaning industrialized nations, yet somehow Islam was to be retained. That simply would not work given the circumstances. It was the concept of Westernized Muslims, the scheme of ivory tower philosophers. And to the extent that national sentiment could be aroused in groups with strong particular and conflicting identities, it was directed against modernization and therefore the West at large. Fundamentalist Islam could not be retained as a militant dogma with a mission to destroy all “infidels” if the Western scheme were to be realized.
Again, fundamentally Islam as a religion does not respect national borders. That is why Muslims inhabit every nation, as do Christians and members of other world religions. Muslims in several Western liberal democratic nations get along quite well among their sects and with other civilized people. They abide on the whole by the laws despite fear-mongering, terrorist-inciting demagogues inside and out, adhering therein to their faith in peace.
Wherefore much is to be said for so-called neo-liberal democracy and its global aspirations in the long run. Nationalism is as antithetical to neo-liberal democracy as it is to Socialism and Islamism. Neo-liberal democracy is presently failing with the resurrection of nationalism flagged by such popular slogans as ‘Make America Great Again.’ contrived by an egotistical elite, who reflect, to their own self-centered ends, the madness and resentment of the middling crowd over the loss of the American Dream calculated in terms of purchasing power. The oppressed naively expect salvation from the worst sort of oppressors, coveting the means of oppression to free themselves from oppression.
The notion that one should give in order to get has been replaced by the notion that one should look out for Number One by taking everything one can get, giving back as little as possible although the flimflam man promises the world. Hitler won over crowds as he promised something for everyone, as his lieutenants guffawed into their sleeves backstage.
Minds shall eventually change in Muslim countries where the religion is political as well as spiritual, and they shall change even sooner in the West. People are existentially responsible for themselves whether they like it or not. They have a choice. They deserve their leaders, whether they elect them or not, because leaders can be deposed one way or another. People may work together constructively to educate one another and resolve their differences, or wage political-economic war until death and starvation or until duly terrified into making peace and getting on with the public business.
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