The Toonari Post - News, Powered by the People! » Arab World Grassroots Journalists, Bloggers and Experts capture and report news from around the world. Become a citizen journalist with Toonari Post today! Sat, 15 Mar 2014 19:17:42 +0000 en-US hourly 1 Syria Exposes Limits of U.S. Influence Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:30:10 +0000 In late 2010, a wave of protest and civil unrest swept through nearly every Arab nation. Dubbed the Arab Spring, the protest’s whipped through the region like one of their legendary sand storms, and swept rulers in the countries Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen out of power. In their wake have been uprisings in Bahrain, Oman, Algeria, and Syria.

The term “Arab Spring” is meant to be an analogy for the thawing out of the average Arab citizens acceptance of rigid and authoritarian regimens. This is more a hope than a reality, and the events have exposed America’s weakness and limits in foreign policy regarding the Arab region.

From the start, the Obama administration has had a schizophrenic response to the events of the Arab spring. The protesters in Iran, arguably the start of the Arab spring, got very little, if any, support from the U.S. Though President Obama was near-silent toward Iran, the President was quite forceful in telling President Mubarak of Egypt he had to go. Odd, given that Mubarak was the only true ally of the U.S. in that area.

He might have been a dictator, but he was our dictator. Now, the Muslim brotherhood stands poised to take political power, just as Hamas did in Palestine. As Libyans began to fight against Gaddafi, the U.S. took a position of leading from behind in helping to enforce a no-fly zone, and providing other low-key military assistance to the rebels, while Syrian rebels were getting, and still are getting, slaughtered by the hundreds with only words of support from the international community.

Opponents of President Obama believe his ambivalence is another sign of weakness in his administration, but you can argue that he’s politically stuck. The stark realty is that Iran, Syria, and every other situation in the Middle East exposes an ugly truth about foreign policy for that region; there is not much that the U.S. can do.

Americans, the citizens not the politicians, are a strange lot. We cannot stomach human rights violations wherever they occur: China, North Korea, Darfur, South Africa, or the Middle East nations. When we see 8500 innocent civilians killed in Syria, we feel the need to do something to stop it.

However, the only way to stop killing on that scale in a country a world away is through force. We are either going to send troops in, or we have to arm the rebels and lend military support similar to what was done in Libya. Unfortunately, the American public does not want to do that, and therefore neither does President Obama.

Instead, we get empty statements from our President and other world leaders about how President Assad must give up power. Really?  According to whom? Every time a statement like that is issued, I hear President Assad saying, “So what? Who are you to tell me what to do,” and “Okay, well make me leave.”

Even if President Assad is not saying those exact words, they are certainly the sentiments of the reality on ground. Dictators are either forced from power by their own people or forced out by an outside force. In either case, force is what is needed for changes.

Unless we force him from power, there is nothing we can do. And that’s the problem every President must face at times. Situations in the world that we would like to alter, but the choices on the table on how to do it are not good choices. Whether we are talking about halting the killing in Syria, or stopping Iran from going nuclear, force is the only thing that is ultimately going to work. And going that route is fraught with other implications and unintended consequences.

Diplomacy is its own minefield. It takes a long time to work, which is not exactly good for the people getting shot at in Syria. And an unspoken assumption in diplomacy is that the person across the table is a rational actor. The heads of oppressive governments are seldom rational, and rationality, as Americans and Europeans measure it, is completely absent from the Muslim world.

In America, for instance, ostensibly everyone gets a say while the Middle East is fraught with authoritarian discipline, often guided by religious doctrine; a “do this, or there will be consequences” approach. Couple that with the general principle of dictatorship — doing what is necessary to stay in power — and you have a volatile mix that Americans may never understand.

President Reagan, in his memoirs, has famously lamented getting the U.S. involved in Lebanon. His opinion being that if he had to do it again, he would not, because, we (America) do not understand the Middle East. This remains true to a large degree today. President Obama is in charge now, but if it were President McCain, or if it turns to be a Republican candidate in 2012, not much will change.

Force is what is necessary, and we cannot send troops into every Muslim country that decides to start shooting up their citizenry. Does anyone really see a President Romney sending in ground troops to Syria? No, the best we can hope for is a President, present or future, who can explain that some things we cannot affect, and that the things we can, may require force.

We will have to make hard choices about what is in our national interest, preventing Iran from a nuclear bomb, and things that, while sickening, do not affect the U.S. directly, like what is happening in Syria. The only question remaining is whether the voting public will understand and accept those distinctions.


Image Courtesy of Fabio Rodrigues Pozzebom / ABr [CC-BY-3.0-br], via Wikimedia Commons

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Syria Anticipates the Arab Spring Sun, 26 Feb 2012 14:30:20 +0000 If until recently, the problematic situation in Syria was thought to be a temporary instability, then today, it can be said that there is a possibility of civil war in the Arab country. The protests against the president, Bashar al-Assad, and his regime grew into a continued and strenuous struggle that evoked the public opinion. How long this will last is unknown.

It is too late for the Syrians to peacefully extinguish the bloody conflagration. The victims of the uprising are increasing all the time, and by now, they exceed 7,600 people.  This includes both civilians and military men. Whether Syria will have the success of Egypt is one of the most asked questions, concerning society all around the world, because the national issue that started almost a year ago, has gradually turned into a universal one.

The correspondent for London’s ‘The Sunday Times’, Marie Colvin, and the French photographer, Remi Ochlic, were cruelly killed in the city of Homs during a siege. Until now, people have not been thinking about the jeopardy and the consequences of this uprising, but the tragic death of the two journalists in Syria proved that the situation in the Arab world is going off the rails.

On February 24, in Tunisia, a meeting was held by the “Friends of Syria”. During the meeting, around 60 countries insisted on stopping the outrage in troubled Syria. The world leaders unanimously decided that more serious measures against the Assad’s regime need to be taken. They are considering issuing an ultimatum to the Assad government. Their main goal is to send aid in order to help the civilians of the revolutionary country.

Hillary Clinton, the U.S. Secretary of State, appealed to all nations to put bans on the import of oil from Syrians as well as on traveling to and from the Arab country. According to Clinton, it is the high cost that the Syrian officials have to pay for not taking into account the opinion of the international community. She also added that the U.S. will allot $10 million in aid to the Syrian citizens.

Only the leaders of China and Russia still support the Syrian president. They were against the UN resolutions of ending the Assad’s regime, stating that the these declarations will cause more violence in the Arab country. Some diplomats connected the actions of China and Russia to their previous union during the Cold War, but one is sure, with their attitude towards the UN resolutions and the current affairs in Western Asia, they incurred the sharp tongue of the U.S. Secretary of State.

Hilary Clinton described their veto regarding the resolutions as “despicable”. “It is just despicable, and I ask, ‘Whose side are they on?’ They are clearly not on the side of the Syrian people,” she said during the meeting in Tunisia.When the Arab Spring will come is still not apparent, but it is an incontrovertible fact that the uprising has transformed into a universal issue that has strained relations between world leaders.


Image Courtesy of

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Diminishing Monocratic Rule in Libya Thu, 06 Oct 2011 15:00:52 +0000 Col Muammer Gaddafi has ruled Libya with an iron fist for the last 42 years, since he seized power in 1969. In the initial stages of his rule people considered him a handsome, charismatic, young military officer. He is a disciple of former president of Egypt, Gamal Abdel Nasser.

He made his own political philosophy, and over time forced students to read this philosophy in schools. Further, he banned all political parties from operating, imprisoned many critics, and led them to death in his period of governance. Decades of survival under tyrannical times, and unparalleled oppression under the Gaddafi regime have made people rebel.

He has been a great head-turner at most of the international gatherings so far. People in the Arab world call him flamboyant because of his outlandish clothing and blunt speeches.

The first Anti-Government demonstrations started with over-throwing the Tunisian and Egyptian governments that engulfed the Arab world. On February 17, protests took place in Libya calling for a regime change or for Gaddafi to step down.

Decades of suppression, economic sluggishness, stagnant standard of living and impossibility of political reforms, might have made the people of Libya revolt against the 42-year-old military rule. The spark of the regime change movement got escalated in the Arab world after the successful ousting of the Tunisian government early this year.

Gaddafi attempted to suppress protests even in the initial stages by curbing them down with the military use of live bullets, mortars, machine guns and anti air-craft missiles, leading to heavy loss of civilians in many towns of Libya.

Protests continued to turn violent in February. Witness reports said that there was bloody fighting between soldiers and rebel forces.  On February 20, rebel forces captured the port city of Benghazi, and the next day the Libyan Justice Minister resigned and said he was unhappy with excessive use of force against protesters.

From the beginning of this revolution, rebel forces fought tooth and nail in their aim to change the existing political system for democracy. Professor Daniel Serwer of John Hopkins University met with the National Transitional Group (NTC) and said “From what we know they want a democratic Libya, an Islamic state but a state that is clearly a multiparty state, clearly a liberal state”. The rebel (NTC) includes several very different groups including former Gaddafi Allies, long-time opposition figures, ethnic Berber fighters, and Islamists.

A five month long battle was aided by NATO forces that entered fighting in Libya, after UN secretary Council passed a resolution which authorized “all necessary measures” to enforce a no-fly zone and protect civilians. As far as the role of United States is concerned in this battle to oust Gaddafi, it has been subtle and American troops have not placed their boots on Libyan soil.

Now after five months of deadly hostility in Libya, rebel forces have captured Bab-al Aziziya, Muammer Gaddafi’s compound and the heart of his rule for the last 40 years. It was stormed and looted badly and the statue of the besieged dictator was demolished.

The huge complex was literally filled with anti air-craft shells and used bullets as rebels fighters found their way inside the compound amid dozens of bodies. Several NATO strikes and the onslaught eventually led to the fall of his compound.

It seems to be clear that decades of military rule in Libya has its days numbered. What can be counted on is the relentless and munificent execution of fierce battle against the Gaddafi troops: this is truly a mark of courage and determination.

igor kisselev /

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How the Middle East Stole Africa’s 15 Minutes Sun, 27 Mar 2011 17:55:40 +0000 While the liberation of people in the internationally defined ‘Arab world’ receive daily exposure on screens and in newspapers around the globe at the moment, people south of the Sahara are desperately trying to raise their voice: What about the rest of Africa? ran a story about the missing attention towards Africa in international media in late February – roughly two months after Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain had captured the world with their people’s unrelenting protest against dictatorship. The coverage of the scores of Egyptians who took over Tahrir Square in peaceful but defiant objection to the regime, provoked widespread sympathy across the global audience. To see a non-violent revolution turn the nation full circle became a source of great admiration in the rest of the world.

All of a sudden, #Egypt was a ‘sexy topic’ but despite the banks of the Nile stemming from central Africa, the world viewed the Egyptian uprising solely as a Middle Eastern issue, directing their attention towards the greater region southwards and what the revolution would mean for the rest of the Arab world and Israel. Few seemed to notice that the rest of the continent which Egypt resides on, a continent with a billion people, are living under equally despotic regimes and suffers the same sociopolitical suppression as their neighbors of the north.


The ‘spark’ was ignited, literally, when Mohamed Bouzazi’s self-immolation in Tunisia (an African country) articulated the frustrations of a nation and the fire spread to Algeria (also African), Yemen and Bahrain while Hosni Mubarak sat unwittingly of the revolution about to come.

But did you know that in ‘darkest Africa’, far away from the cameras and reporters, another dramatic protest unfolded in Gabon on January 29 where opposition protested against Ali Bhongo Odhumba’s government, whom they accuse of hijacking recent elections. With little geopolitical importance, news organizations seemed largely oblivious to the underdeveloped oil exporter whose people have lived four decades under the Bhongo family’s regime. Elsewhere on the continent protests broke out, inspired by the populist movements of the North, but the coverage was in many places either directly stifled (newspaper staff being arrested by local authorities) or indirectly ignored by international news.

AlJazeera reported that Egypt and Tunisia may have been the catalysts for revolt across the Arab world, but will the fire spread to the rest of Africa and if so, will the international audience even notice?

“What the continent lacks is media coverage,” says Drew Hinshaw, an American journalist based in West Africa. “There’s no powerhouse media for the region like AlJazeera, while European and American media routinely reduce a conflict like [that in] Ivory Coast or Eastern Congo to a one-sentence news blurb at the bottom of the screen.” Nanjala, a political analyst at the University of Oxford suggests that the media’s shortcomings stem from a tendency to favor explanations that fit the ‘failing Africa’ narrative.

The American journalist is equally disappointed in world leaders. “ Barack Obama publicly condemned the use of violence in Bahrain, Yemen and Libya. When was the last time you saw Obama come out and make a statement on Ivory Coast? Or Eastern Congo? Or Djibouti, where 20,000 people protested [...] according to the opposition?”.

The tendency in global media to distinguish between the outdated ‘third world’ Africa-issues and the ‘media friendly’ revolution in the northern part is a valid concern among several nations, especially of Central Africa, who find their struggle trivialized in comparison with the Western world’s obsession with the Middle East. Has the line between the familiar suffering of ‘the African’ and the fascinating suffering of the Egyptian or Tunisian really been drawn by cameras and reporters? Another question is if the African continent will ever receive high priority in the global media stream. If a highly exposed revolution on its very soil failed to put Africa on the international agenda – what will?

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Disbanding the Arab League Sun, 27 Mar 2011 16:58:00 +0000 What does one do with a broken, seemingly useless regional organization like the Arab League when it fails to be relevant anymore? Allow corrupt and wealthy member states to pour more money into it to keep it afloat. At least that has traditionally been the case with the Arab League.

By any measure, the Arab League has been a sad and utter failure since its inception. Far from achieving Arab unity – even though many of its member states can hardly be defined as Arab to begin with – the league has simply weathered the 60 or so years of its existence by accepting money from its oil rich member states to stay functional, but at what price? How can we expect an organization as weak as the Arab League to rise up to the challenges of our time and to help fix the challenges currently besetting the Middle East? We can’t, which is why it needs to be completely disbanded. Not reformed and tinkered with, but rather completely built anew from the ground up.

The Arab League was originally designed to achieve two main objectives. The first was to create a platform for political and economic cooperation between Arab states. The second was to represent a unified stance against Israel. It has failed on both counts. The Arab League has been fractious mainly because it denies itself to dream up a better vision of its world.  Instead of rallying around ideals such as democracy and freedom, it has accommodated the worst of regime leaders, Omar Bashir of course being no exception.

Without the ability to agree on a single set of principles, no matter how general, the hopes of the Arab League ever achieving meaningful change in the region are nil. As the age old saying in Middle East goes, Arabs can only agree to disagree. Couple that with the Israel component of its founding charter and you have an organization that has been propped up to fail from the day it was created.

Instead of facilitating the corrupt status quo, countries like Tunisia and Egypt should lead the region by dropping out from the Arab League and jointly creating a newer version of the organization.

In both those countries the ideals of freedom and democracy brought down their corrupt leaders and presumably the whole system that kept them in power. With their reformed political structures in place, both countries could start drafting a new charter for a new Arab League that agrees with them in principle as well as vision.

By having a clear set of guidelines put forth as a pre-requisite for membership, the new Arab League can maintain its integrity and that of its members. After all, membership that is hard to attain and honorable to have is better than one that is raffled off to whatever country is interested in expanding its political portfolio. Therefore, respect for human rights, rule of law and democratic institutions should become the new norm in any draft charter agreement. Anything that falls short of that is really not worth fighting for, let alone paying hard earned money for.

The citizens of Egypt and Tunisia should start by demanding that their future governments review their financial assistance to the Arab League. They should also ask their new governments the tough question of whether it is appropriate for their countries to be contributing members of an organization that shields the same kind of despotic behavior that they fought, bled and died to get rid of in their own countries. Finally, they should consider if their honorable dreams of freedom could be expanded upon regionally and whether the newly minted characters of their nations need to be represented as such in forums such as the Arab League and beyond.

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