Arabs and Pan Arabism - Research Paper Example

Arabs and Pan – Arabism The word Arab has a connotation of individuals who speak clearly. Thus, it constitutes a linguistic, cultural term referring to individuals speaking Arabic as their first language, and who recognize themselves as Arabs (Montgomery & Cachia, n.d). Currently, Arabs are more than a hundred million in the whole world most of whom come from states in the Arab League. They are not a race and constitute an indistinct ethnic group since there are black and white Arabs. Surprisingly, there is no clear method of defining or distinguishing Arabs. Neither language nor religion can be used to distinguish Arabs from other ethnic groups. This is because there are several Arab-speaking Jews who are not referred as Arabs. Moreover, Lebanon is a member of the Arab league yet the country has an equal proportion of Christians and Muslims. Thus, defining Arabs by religion or language is wrong. Distinguishing an Arab has even challenged modern Arab intellectuals. According to a conference held in Brussels in 1938, the intellectuals declared that individuals who are an Arab in language, loyalty, as well as culture constitute Arabs (Nydell, 2006). Moreover, Arabs consist of highly heterogeneous set of people having different religious backgrounds, traditions, varied ancestral origins, as well as historical identities. The major unifying factor among the Arabs entails the Arab culture (Tamari, n.d). It has unified them even in times of political intense disunity. Therefore, the only binding factor among Arabs is the cultural, genealogical, and linguistic grounds. Arabs have been divided in history and the only time they became politically united was around A.D 634 to 750. Before the coming of Mohammed, this ethnic group was divided into quarreling tribes and some of the tribes never accepted collaborating with him. However, after his death, the Apostasy wars ended in unity under the command of the second caliph until 750. At that time, Arabs were ruling an empire stretching from Spain through Punjab and to Central Asia (Infoplease, 2005). However, after 750 A.D, division occurred due to increased rivalry and desire to extend territorial boundaries. There exists a strong feeling of cultural affinity among the Arabs despite political disunity. They have a strong feeling of kinship amongst themselves despite being in various countries and localities (Montgomery & Cachia, n.d). Moreover, despite the Islamic religion forming the basis of cultural affinity, Arabic language has also played a critical role by creating a stronger bond among Arabs. The Arabic linguistic as well as literary standards have remained homogenous in various regions of the Arab world as well as in other Islamic provinces. Most Arabs recognize with Islam as their main religion. However, a number of them belong to the Christian and Jewish religions. This ethnic group is mostly found in the Arab world, which consists of 22 countries (Montgomery & Cachia, n.d). These countries include Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Algeria, the Comoros Islands, Lebanon, Palestine, Sudan, Tunisia, Egypt, Mauritania, Qatar, Djibouti, Bahrain, Libya, Kuwait, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Oman, Morocco, Yemen, and Somalia. The countries also have a rich diversity of ethnic, religious, and linguistic communities including the Kurds, Berbers, and Armenians. Muslims exists in many parts of the world, in fact, in almost every region, in the world. They comprise a major part of the world population with statistics showing that they approximate 1.2 billion (Tamari, n.d). These are mainly found in 55 countries forming members of the Organization of Islamic Countries. Muslim statistics in the world are as follows; Indonesia has 170. 3 million, Bangladesh has 106 million, Pakistan 136 million, India 103 million, Iran 60.7 million, Turkey 62.4 million Nigeria 47.7 million, Egypt 53.7 million and China 37.1 million (Tamari, n.d). Surprisingly, despite the large number of Muslims in these countries, only Egypt is an Arab state. A large number of Muslims, therefore, originate from non-Arab countries such as Indonesia, Turkey, and Pakistan as well North America. Therefore, it is true to assert that most Arabs belong to the Islam faith, however, majority of Muslims are not Arabs. Thus, Arab history is connected with Muslim history but the Arab world does not correspond to the Muslim world (Tamari, n.d). Consequently, since Islam is a religion revealed and passed to Muhammad through the Arabic language thus practiced and taught in Arabic language, both Muslim Arabs and the non – Arab Muslims, therefore, share a common language when praying or performing religious rituals. Thus, most people in the Muslim world recognize and use Arabic language in most of their dealings. Pan Arabism refers to the modern movement that was developed in the 20th century with the idea of seeking unification of countries constituting the Arab world. The unification was a means of recreating Arab political power (Doran, 2002). Its first influence was on literary works where there was a spread in print journalism and performance of various experiments with varied literary forms. Therefore, its chief successes have been on cultural matters including the establishment of a library. Moreover, the renaissance among Arabs created a political agitation leading to the independence of many Arab nations from Ottoman Empire in 1918 as well as from the European powers within the mid 20th century (Danielson, 2007). The Sherif in Mecca had a mission of establishing an Arab state that was independent of any kind of Ottoman rule thus the intervention and support of the British. At the beginning World War I, both France and Britain joined allies with Huayn ibn Ali, a Hashemite Sherif with ancestry from Prophet Muhammad against the German – Turkish alliance. Thus, the British and the France used Huayn since he was the ruler of Mecca as well as the religious leader of Islam thus had a massive influence among the subjects (Danielson, 2007). Moreover, since the 1930s, pan Arabism received a boost and support resulting from aggression against Zionist oppression of Palestine (Stand for Israel, 2014). Further, the founding of the Baath Party in 1943 and which later spread into several countries before forming the ruling party in Syria as well as Iraq played a significant role in establishing and supporting pan – Arabism. The movement created official expression immediately after World War II with the formation of the Arab League (Butt, 2012). Established in 1945, the member countries included Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Transjordan, Iraq, and Yemen with unification efforts as Arab Federation (1958) of Jordan and Iraq, the Arab Union (1958), the United Arab Republic, the Arab Maghreb and the United Arab Emirates. However, membership has grown to include countries such as Algeria, Libya, Kuwait, Morocco, and Sudan. The aim for its formation was to enhance cooperation, which has been challenging. The main factor behind the establishment and support of pan- Arabism during the 1960s entailed the Baath party (Danielson, 2007). The party was active in the majority of Arab nations such as Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Egypt, and Syria. King Abdulla of Jordan championed Pan Arabism. He planned to unify Syria, Jordan, and Palestine to form great Syria. The idea was unpopular with among Arabs since they were suspicious. Consequently, the British never supported the idea. After being assassinated in 1951, the idea of formation of a greater Syria subsided. Moreover, Gamal Abdel Nasser, the Egyptian President was an effective and charismatic advocate of pan –Arabism (Doran, 2002). Despite not belonging to the Baathist party, he expressed and possessed similar ideas of socialism and unity. Nasser was a controversial leader of Egypt and the Arab world. He supported development and growth of pan – Arabism by engaging in inters – Arab policies and the vision of unity of the Arab world. For instance, in one of his speeches, he held the view that the Arab dream of being united will never die and this inspired many future Arab leaders such as Muammar Gaddafi (Butt, 2012). Moreover, President Nasser had a vision of seeing a region salvaging its self-esteem, uniting in opposing Western States and Europe. Pan – Arabism continued to dominate politics of the Middle East commencing from the First World War until the time of its defeat by Israel in 1967. Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s President from 1979 – 2003 had his reign characterized by costly as well as unsuccessful wars with neighboring nations (Danielson, 2007). Being a member of the Baath Party, he actively participated and contributed to the formation as well as support to the pan – Arabism movement. In 1979, he nationalized Iraq’s national oil industry. Since he was supporting Egypt as leader of the Arab world was one of the goals of Saddam Hussein, he, therefore, facilitated and supported formation, and existence of pan Arabism by being a strong critic of the U.S. Pan – Arabism was never a religious affair involving only Muslim Arabs. The movement was established as a secular nationalist organization with the majority of its prominent leaders belongs to a different faith apart from Islam (Danielson, 2007). For example, Tariq Aziz was a leader of the movement and who later became the Iraq’s deputy prime minster during the reign of Saddam Hussein. However, absence of religious focus of the movement made many Arabs shun the movement. Pan – Arabism continued to take varied forms and reached the climax of psychological and political power during the late 1950s as well as early 1960s under the influence Egyptian President Gamal Abd – al- Nasser (Butt, 2012). The defeat of pan- Arabism by Israel was a catastrophic and led to its fall and rise of particularistic nationalisms such as Syrian nationalism, Egyptian nationalism, as well as Palestinian nationalism. Moreover, the death of Nasser in 1970 was a big blow to the cause and goals of pan – Arabism. After the demise of Nasser, several leaders fought over the leadership as well as control of the movement with rivalries rising between Saddam Hussein, of Iraq, Hafiz al Assad of Syria as well as Libya’s Muammar Qadaffi (Butt, 2012). However, during the period of Arab – Israeli war in 1973, the Arab nations displayed cohesion by using oil as the main economic, as well as political tool in the international scene. Moreover, there have been numerous efforts to unify Arab but all attempts have failed due to long time dynasty rivalries, the border dispute, greed as well as fighting over leadership of the Arabs witnessed between Qasim of Iraq and Gama Abd al - Nasser of Egypt (American Arab Anti- Discriminatory Committee, 2014). However, the Iran – Iraq war as well as the signing of Camp David between Israel and Egypt destroyed the cohesion. Consequently, President Saddam Hussein used the pan – Arabism rhetoric in an effort to stir antagonism to the UN forces at the time of the Persian Gulf War. Surprisingly, the majority of Arab countries backed the anti – Iraq forces (Doran, 2002). Presently, the issue of pan Arabism is fading away though there are some followers and supporters of President Nasser still believing that achieving the goal is possible. With the emergence of various problems affecting the youths such as unemployment, the growing gap between the wealthy and the poor, rise of continuous internal conflicts, internal divisions as well as revolutions, uprisings and instability common in Arab states, attaining pan Arabism seems elusive among Arabs (Stand for Israel, 2014). Pan Arabism was a good idea but sadly, with the death of its proponents such as Nasser, then achieving the dream seems bleak. References American Arab Anti- Discriminatory Committee. (2014). “Who is an Arab?” Facts about Arabs and the Arab world. Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://www.adc.org/education/facts- about-arabs-and-the-arab-world/ Butt, G. (Producer). (2012). Enduring divisions keep pan- Arab unity a dream. [Television broadcast].Middle East: BBC News. Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-20027919 Danielson, R. E. (2007). Nasser And Pan – Arabism: Explaining Egypt’s Rise in Power. Retrieved April 17, 2014 from http://www.nps.edu/Academics/Centers/CCC/research/StudentTheses/danielson07.pdf Doran, M. S. (2002). Pan-Arabism before Nasser: Egyptian power politics and the Palestine question. Oxford [u.a.: Oxford Univ. Press. Infoplease. (2005). Pan- Arabism. Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/history/pan-arabism.html Montgomery, W., & Cachia, P. (n.d) “Who is an Arab?” University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://www.africa.upenn.edu/K-12/Who_16629.html Nydell, M. K. (2006). Understanding Arabs: A guide for modern times. Yarmouth, ME: Intercultural Press. Stand for Israel. (2014). Pan – Arabism. (Web log comment). Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://www.blog.standforisrael.org/issues/world-opinion/pan-arabism Tamari, S. (n.d) “Who are the Arabs?” Retrieved April 18, 2014 from http://ccas.georgetown.edu/document/1242771122913/Who_Are_the_Arabs.pdf Read More