Hind Kabawat: “Who won and who lost in the last conflict in the Middle East?

My daughter was in a camp in Maine this summer, called the Seeds of Peace, where teenagers from Arab and Israeli families spend time together learning how to solve conflict, and dialogue with each other. She asked me on the phone - after the war broke out and after seeing all the pictures of the civilians who died in the Middle East:" Do you think there is still hope for peace, did we lose the hope for peace?”

If I ask you the question who won and who lost in this war, the answer is simple: nobody wins at war, we all lose - violence will always bring violence.

From my point of view the biggest losers in the recent Middle East conflict between Israel and the Hezbollah were those of us in the region, who have been campaigning - sometimes under quite dangerous conditions - for the creation of a truly peaceful, open, secular, pluralist and yes democratic civil society in the various countries of the region.

The Liberal Arab consensus has been badly shaken by the rise of the fundamentalist Islamic alternative as represented by the Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Hamas in Palest6ine, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Radical Shiite insurgents in Iraq, and the looming presence of Iran, which could be the template for new regimes in the region unless things change quickly.

Another big loser is the United States, which aspires to be the “patron” of democratic reform in the Middle East. But US policy - when it suits its strategic interests – could be extremely counterproductive to achieving such democratic reforms, as may be seen from the war in Iraq, its unconditional support of Israel, its almost indifferent response to the brutalization of the Lebanese people in the recent Hezbollah/Israeli conflict, or its unconditional support of repressive autocratic regimes in the region - Egypt, Saudi Arabia - to cite just a few examples.

Without exception, the policy choices of the Bush Administration have done nothing but undermine progressive liberal opinion in the region which the US should be trying to help not hinder.

Never before in my memory has an American administration been held in such low repute by almost all elements within Arab society. Ironically, the US has succeeded in creating unity in the Arab world where none existed before - between the religious and the secular, between the Shia and the Sunni, between the “westernized” elites and the more traditional Arab Street. All now strongly oppose and resent US interference in the internal affairs of the Arab World.

Perhaps for the first time in the modern history of the region, all major players on both sides of the conflict – Syria, Iran, the US, Israel - seem to be working in concert to destroy any hope of true democratic reform. How sad and tragic for those of us who yearn for a more open inclusive secular democratic society in the Arab world.

Other possible big losers are the secular autocracies in the region, like Egypt and Jordan, and the more traditional royal theocracy in Saudi Arabia, all of which are officially pro-western and pro-US.

Increasingly, all of them have been labeled guilty by association by larger and larger numbers of people on the Arab Street. Like the Fatah, which also flirted too closely with the US, these regimes, are viewed by many as corrupt and could easily be replaced by more fundamentalist Islamic regimes. Call this perhaps the Shah effect like the Reza Pahlevi government in Pre-Revolutionary Iran, these regimes have become utterly detached from popular opinion in their societies and since none of them permit the development of countervailing civil institutions, the only organized political force able to fill the political void are the fundamentalist religious groups.

Who is to blame for this sad state of affairs? Well, for starters, those of us in the liberal democratic West, who have done nothing to pressure these autocratic regimes to permit the evolution of a civil society. When it suites his interest, George W. Bush complained about Saddam dictatorship in Iraq, but what about the dictatorship in countries like Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, which the US supports? Not a peep. Double standard? You bet.

As I mentioned at the beginning of my remarks, democratic institutions and organizations - call it a peaceful civil rights insurgency - have now been totally sidelined by the popularity of the Hezbollah and other religious extremists.

Just how ironic this problem has become is captured by a little story, which explains just how fast the star of Sayed Hassan Nezrallah is rising. A close family of mine has a  teenage son. As may be expected from a real westernized family - with western education and a western environment - he drinks, smokes, and go clubbing, but now he openly supports Hezbollah. Indeed, he says that he plans to have five sons and to name them all Sayed Hassan Nezrallah! That should be confusing in a family dinner. When I asked him why he supported a man who was so inimical to his own “Westernized” “Christian” interests, he said: “Because I am sick and tired of corrupt leadership in our Arab country. We need a charismatic leader who fulfils his promises to build schools and hospitals, not palaces and villas; we need someone who will look after the interest of his own people like what Nezrallah did in the south of Lebanon.”

Sadly in my own country Syria, officially secular for nearly half a century, religious extremism is on the rise. Bizarrely, the Government of our secular country has built more mosques than schools for the last ten years. You can easily dominate people with no education.

Finally, the last big loser of this war is Israel itself. Their belief in “force majeur” as the only way to contain the Palestinians, in particular, and the Arabs, in general, will not succeed. They have lost the sympathy and support of much of the western world. They have lost the support of those of us in the region, who yearn for peace with Israel and even see the intensely democratic Jewish state as a model for political reform in our own countries. For years there have been many in the Arab world - many more than most people in the west imagine - who have strongly believed that normalization of relations with Israel would be a catalyst for economic prosperity and a political renaissance. Can you imagine what could emerge if such entrepreneurial communities as the Israeli, Lebanese and Syrian worked together?

Right now, all that seems like a shattered dream. Why? Because of politicians in Tel Aviv believed the kidnapping of two soldiers - and remember these are two soldiers - merit the wholesale destruction of a country’s infrastructure and the death of thousands of innocent civilians on both sides - in Israel and Palestine. “Disproportionate” is a word which just barely captures the misguided policy of Israel. They could just simply have accepted the negotiations and dialogue for the return of the prisoners in releasing the two soldiers.

Personally, I have spent a good part of the last five years working for the peaceful accommodation of the Israeli and Arab people. What remains for me right now is resignation and despair. Will this mood pass? I hope so. Will I again take up the work of Peace in the region? I expect so, but to be frank, my heart is still very heavy.

SO WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

The US, in particular, and the western world, in general, must re-examine their Mid-East policy in its entirety.

Instead of giving Israel a blank check to indiscriminately bully and terrorize their Arab neighbors — have not the West Bank and Gaza become the world’s largest concentration camps? — they should expedite a plan which will quickly give the Palestinian people their inalienable right to self-rule.

Simply put, Israel’s belief that its security will be guaranteed by keeping the Palestinians as prisoners in their own land will not work. What it does achieve is this: more hatred, more frustration. It literally incubates the self-destructive culture of the suicide bomber. What do these people have to lose: they have no country, no economy, no jobs, no future. For goodness sake, they cannot even move from one village to another without confronting armed Israelis. This, in the land, which the United Nations says is theirs.

I believe Israel will guarantee its future — and its security — if it takes a truly bold initiative. LEAVE THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES NOW. All other political issues —Jerusalem, right of return, reparations, etc. — can be resolved AFTER a Palestinian state is up and running.

The US and other western powers, including Canada, must use all their leverage over Israel and insist they end their illegal occupation immediately. Too much time has been lost. Israel, Palestine, the Middle East, the international community need a TWO STATE SOLUTION NOW.

If one simple truth has emerged from three generations of conflict in the region it is this: Occupying Arab lands does not ensure Israel’s security—AND IT NEVER WILL.

Why do I believe a unilateral Israeli withdrawal might work?

Well, let me digress with a short history lesson.

One issue dominated British politics for much of the 19th Century: the so-called Irish Question.

For centuries the Protestant England occupied Catholic Ireland and it created a culture of hatred, hostility and, as the nineteenth century turned into the twentieth century, VIOLENCE.

But the English, after one too many bloody encounters, did leave Ireland after World War I, and although, relations between the Irish and English did not become warm and cozy overnight, today the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom enjoy very cordial relations.

Who, back in the 19th century, would have believed the Irish Question could have been resolved. But excluding remaining issues in Northern Ireland, it has been. Ireland is now the most prosperous country in Europe—richer on a per capita basis than its old nemesis, England—and it is a good friend and ally of the UK.

IT IS MY FERVENT BELIEF THAT THE ISRAEL/PALESTINE ISSUE CAN BE RESOLVED AS WELL.

It is my belief that my son and daughter’s generation will live to see the day when a trip from Damascus to Tel Aviv will be as common as a Londoner spending the weekend in Dublin. And more importantly that Israelis and Palestinians will no longer live in fear of each other. But that day will only come when both peoples are self-governing. I beseech the Israeli government to demonstrate real statesmanship and show real political courage and do what is right. Let me end my remarks by echoing the famous words of Ronald Reagan at the Berlin Wall in the last days of Perestroika, “MR. GORBACHEV, TEAR DOWN THIS WALL.’

So if I had the opportunity to talk to the Israeli Prime Minister, right now, I would say, TEAR DOWN THAT WALL AND LEAVE THE WEST BANK AND GAZA.

And if I had a similar opportunity to meet with the head of the Hammas, I would say, RECOGNIZE ISRAEL NOW AND EMBRACE YOUR JEWISH BROTHERS.

If such events come to pass, I am confident that the friendships my daughter made with Israeli kids this summer in Maine will be lifelong and, in her lifetime, she will travel back and forth between Damascus and Tel Aviv like Londoners now travel to Dublin for the weekend."

Thank you for your attention.