2 New Posts on Beirut Spring

Posted: 26 Mar 2013 03:39 AM PDT

How two bottles of water can be a symbol of Everything that is wrong with the Arab league.

For many reasons, it has become cliché to criticize the Arab League. There’s even a trending #DissolveArabLeague twitter hashtag. But today I want to focus on the two bottles of French water, Perrier and Evian, that proudly sat in front of each Arab leader. I have nothing against French bottled water, as I myself occasionally like to indulge, but in the context of an Arab summit, their presence symbolises several tone-deafnesses that are defining the cluelessness of the Arab league.

Self-image tone deafness: I can understand that the water in the Arab gulf in undrinkable, but why not benefit of the occasion to showcase the diversity of the Arab world? Arab countries on the Mediterranean have great climates and produce great mineral waters, why not use Lebanese, Tunisian or even Syrian water?
Self sufficiency tone deafness: European summit leaders would never ride American or Chinese-made car. They take pride in the made-in-Europe fare, in part because of pride and in part because they want to display their economic self sufficiency as an Economic/cultural body
Economic tone deafness: Expensive imported bottled french water scream wastefulness and profligacy. This is obviously not a body that is trying to cut costs and save its tax payers’ money. These are Oil sheikhdoms, you might respond, but this summit is supposed to represent all Arab nations, even poor ones
History tone deafness. It’s not a problem when regular people use commercial goods made by their former colonizers, but when the products are bluntly displayed in such high-profile sovereign gatherings, it sends an unnecessary message of subservience
Symbolism and Geopolitics tone deafness: A bottle of water in such an event is never just a bottle of water. It’s a sign, a message that is open to interpretation. Should the folks in the Quay D’orsay applaud this display as an official Arab support for French policies and sell it as such to French journalists and the French people? Should Arabs be buying more French weapons?
Environmental tone deafness: Putting water in plastic bottles and shipping them across the world? Wasn’t the gulf region supposed to be on the way to a more environmentally sustainable path?

Worst of all, it’s the carelessness with which such details are routinely ignored that give an image of incompetence and lack of purpose to this dinosaur of a body.

There’s the Qatar Arab Spring, and there’s the Imaginary Arab Spring

Posted: 25 Mar 2013 06:26 AM PDT

Qatar’s vision for the future of Arabs is winning so far. A realistic alternative is yet to emerge.

– Another project in Qatar –

As Qatar prepares to host the next Arab Summit, I was thinking of how far this tiny kingdom has come in spreading its DNA on the series of historic movements that some still refer to as the “Arab Spring”. It then occurred to me that up to now, Qatar is the only game in town, and the alternatives are yet to prove themselves.

Qatar’s version of Spring

The vision of Qatar’s strategists for a successful Arab Spring country is one that is stable, prosperous and has good (and slightly subservient) strategic relations with Qatar. Qatar made a bet to back the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, Tunisia and Syria and all over the Arab world not because the Qatari regime has an ideological affinity with the brotherhood, but because their strategic calculations rest on the premise that the brotherhood is truly popular among the populations of those countries and can provide a stable and sustainable basis for government.

After making that bet, Qatar –as it does– went all in. From the Aljazeera bully pulpit, to the arming and strong-arming of the players on the ground, Qatar used every tool in its arsenal. The last chapter in Qatar’s hardball game was the imposition of the close Ghassan Hitto as a leader for the Syrian opposition to the disgruntlement of leaders Like Muaz el Khatib and Michel Kilo.

There are many things wrong (and immoral) with Qatar’s vision. Signs of backlash from Tunisia to Syria are beginning to show, but an alternative vision has not proven itself yet.

Jeffersonian Delusions

Many observers –who are overly represented on social media– see this Brotherhood phenomenon as a temporary phase on the road to a “real” democracy, where the law rules supreme, institutions abound, freedom thrives and minorities are as influential as the rest of the population. Mahmood Salem, an Egypt watcher wrote:

Egypt's Islamists have waited 80 years to get into power, and now that they have, the countdown to their now-inevitable fall has begun. One day we will all live in a secular Egypt, and it will all be thanks to the Muslim Brotherhood.

This could very well happen, but that vision hasn’t proven itself yet. None of the countries in question have shown signs yet that a true liberal democracy is about to take hold. We may never see the day where Free Arabs are ruling the show.

Some of you reading this don’t like the horse that Qatar has backed. It is crippled, one-eyed and smells kinda funny. But so far it’s the only one standing in this race.

,Liban tweet, Lebanon tweet سقسقة حول لبنان

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