May 15, 2008 1:16

Citizen Power and the Middle East

Check out two new books on or related to the Middle East, Tragedy in South Lebanon: The Israeli-Hezbollah War of 2006, by Cathy Sultan (Scarletta Press), and Re-engage! America and the World after Bush, by Helena Cobban (Paradigm Publishers). I'm prompted to write about them after a friend emailing from San Francisco recently asked whether I was optimistic about the Middle East, and whether the "peace movement" was effective or an exercise in futility. Well, I'm guardedly optimistic, despite scenes like those we saw in Beirut again over the past week. But I do think citizens have an important role to play if peace is to become a reality.

In Tragedy, as in her earlier books, A Beirut Heart and Israeli and Palestinian Voices, author and peace activist Sultan expresses an honest citizen's outrage over the region's continuing conflicts and describes the human toll on all sides through the fascinating testimonies of people on the ground. Tragedy also has its merits as a good citizens' handbook to the problems in Lebanon and the Middle East. But what I like most about the book is how she tells the story through her eyes as a concerned citizen seeking a better world whose own eyes were opened wider by the personal experience of living through the 1975-90 Lebanese Civil War. American-born Sultan, now residing with her Lebanese husband in Wisconsin, helps open other eyes through her books as well as through her work in such organizations as the National Peace Foundation, which is involved in sending delegations to Israel and Palestine.

Journalist Helena Cobban's Re-engage! is a citizens' manual with a broader agenda. Cobban feels that Bush's invasion of Iraq has led to a strategic failure of a similar magnitude as the 1956 Suez crisis, which effectively diminished the global role played by once-great imperial powers Britain and France, and as the 1979 Afghanistan invasion, which helped lead to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Believing that the next American president has a new chance to put things right, Cobban calls for a revamped foreign policy of global inclusion to replace Bush's unilateralism. Cobban is formerly a foreign correspondent for major media outlets like the London Sunday Times. Her search for a better world likewise has the citizen's touch to it now; besides her mainstream writings and books, she draws inspiration--and had help with this book--from her Quaker congregation in Virgina. Since 2003 she has operated Just World News, a lively, informative blog on world affairs that is popular with specialists and non-specialist citizens alike. Just World News, like Re-engage!, is a good example of the role citizens can play in helping shape a new, better narrative for the Middle East and the world.

Back to my friend's question that prompted this blog post:

I'm not too worried about radical Islam, the "clash of civilizations" or Iran's nuclear ambitions. The main obstacle to a better future is the power politics over security, and I think very broadly speaking that the region's players and interested outside parties like the U.S. have gradually moved toward a more realistic understanding of how to live together. There's a long, long way to go, of course, but here's one important example of the way mindsets have evolved in the right direction. Twenty years ago this week when Israel was marking 40 years of independence, the PLO and its leader Arafat were branded as terrorists by the Israeli and U.S. governments. A few years later, the U.S., Israel and the PLO found a way of dealing with one another. Arafat and Rabin signed the Oslo peace agreement at the White House with Clinton. That was based on the realistic view that Israel was not going to disappear, yet the Palestinians' legitimate rights needed to be addressed. Today, as Israel marks 60 years of independence, the U.S. and Israel are desperate to keep Arafat's successor, Mahmoud Abbas, as a negotiating partner. All three parties are looking over their shoulders at Hamas. Yet, even Hamas, for all its radicalism, shows a willingness to compromise reminiscent of the old PLO. Who would have imagined that a former American president, the mediator of the Camp David peace accords, would be holding talks with Hamas leaders in the Syrian capital, as Jimmy Carter did last month? The U.S. brands Hamas a terror group and Syria a state sponsor of terrorism.

More important, mindsets among ordinary people have changed, too. In a Haaretz poll in February, 64% of Israelis said they favored talking to Hamas. That's quite remarkable, given the unforgivable suicide bombings the group has inflicted on Israeli civilians. But it also reflects the growing realism and impatience for peace at the grassroots level that you can see throughout the Middle East.

Ultimately, political leaders must take the necessary steps to make peace. You would be starry-eyed to believe that citizen groups have the capacity to foment some kind of popular hands-across-the-wall revolution throughout the Middle East. But I do think that the role of NGOs including peace groups--and including the work of folks like Cathy Sultan and Helena Cobban-- is vital for expanding the space for tolerance and understanding and challenging the conventional wisdom (as well as real fears) driving the conflicts onward.

--By Scott MacLeod/Cairo