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Basic Given of Haytham Manna’ speech in Los Angeles
(26th April), Chicago (27th April) and Detroit
(29th of April)2008. In the occasion of Syrian
Independence Day
Syria’s last
century has been one of upheaval and political-social
disintegration. Colonialism, nationalism, and Islamism have each
played a role in this disintegration, which has seen the law of
force consistently replace the rule of law. This disintegration has
left a political vacuum, with the struggle for human rights and
viable civil Society the only option if we are to reclaim the
political life of Syria, and rescue it from this black period of
history.
1. The Colonial Era
As in much of the Arab world, the
initial upheaval within Syria’s socio-economic structures came about
as a result of European penetration. With this penetration came the
disintegration of Syria’s traditional society and its values.
Middlemen and compradors became symbols of the new commercial order
and quickly developed into a privileged class. For better or worse,
the traditional commercial class adapted itself to the new
conditions in order to save its interests. They did not abandon
their religious traditions, however, nor did they forget what it was
which maintained these structures. All survived, the new co-existing
with the old without supplanting it. The Turkish Marxist Quflagumli
aptly described this hybrid situation by calling forth the image of
a “sterile mule.”
Even those among the traditional
merchant class who had turned to usury in their efforts to survive
found they could no longer control their autonomous commercial
domain. The artisan class would also find their lives and their work
brusquely transformed. They awoke to a world suddenly inundated by
manufactured goods, sweeping them into a pauperized proletariat.
Morally polluted by despotism and steeped in religiosity, artisans
cried that “Islam is dead!” (1) and banded together to revolt. But
traditional merchants, their former exploiters, urged them to
cooperate with the new middlemen, whatever their religious
background, reinforcing the new comprador class in its dominant
position.
Intellectuals traveled a different
path. They understood by the end of the 19th century that the best
thing to do was to build on the duality they knew to characterize
all colonized Arab societies. They spoke of “reconciliation” and
“harmony” and of the “positive aspects” of Western thought and
Islamic culture with many advocating, for example, establishing a
democratic state based on both shura (consultation) and
equity. Their best-known spokesman was Abdel Rahman al-Kawakibi
(1854-1902), attorney and author of the seminal The Nature of
Despotism, which argued for a democratic, constitutional project
and the moral and physical integrity of the human being.
Assassinated by the Ottomans in Cairo the same year the book was
published, al-Kawakibi possessed the qualities which symbolize the
best of what this epoch had to offer: intellectual honesty, an open
mind, and great personal courage. (2)
It was the hostility of some
intellectuals toward Ottoman despotism that drove them to call for
freedom and Arabism, two components that later became the rhetorical
elements in the Hashemite revolt. The 1916 movement grew into what
is generally referred to as the “Great Arab Revolt;” in reality,
however, it deliberately muddied the ideological waters to create a
coalition gathered under the Hashemite banner in order to fight the
Turks and later the European colonial powers and proclaim Arab
Independence. Syrian independence was declared March 8, 1920 by the
Syrian Congress. Faisal was proclaimed King July 3 of the same
year. The new King based his legitimacy on a Constitution, the
“Basic Law,” which in 148 pages detailed the rights of individuals
and of groups under the law, regardless of religious affiliation.
But twenty-two days later, General Gouraud and his troops entered
Damascus.
The start of the new century
was marked by a host of new social categories such as lawyers,
journalists, and civil servants, many of whom found liberty in exile
in France and Egypt. It is to them we owe our introduction to the
first writings about Human Rights and fundamental freedoms. The
Shuhada (“Martyrs”) of May 6, 1916 (3) were the
on-the-ground translation of this generation’s intellectual
inspiration. In the wake of the 1925-1927 revolt, the nationalist
movement brought a new dimension to Syrian political life by
introducing the concept of patriotism and independence to the
detriment of religious identification; one of its characteristics
was to turn away from salafiyyism rather than articulating
itself within a traditionalist discourse. The birth of political
parties and new socio-cultural associations also brought about
conflicts of ideas as well as of interests, while currents of
nationalism opened a breach within clan, ethnic and religious
structures by introducing familial pluralism, and by letting women
participate in public life. Failure of the colonial project to
establish a number of small, religious states -- Alawite or Druze --
paved the way for progressive nationalistic Arabs to abolish even
the administrative autonomy of Djebel al-Arab (Druze) created by the
authorities in 1943 and for the progressive factions within all
religions to lead the struggle against the religious divisions
within the country (4). Thus it is noteworthy that nationalism
twice ushered in fundamental liberties: first, against the Ottoman
religious entity, and, second, against the Western colonial powers.
The notions underlying human rights
gained greater prominence with the birth of the Union of Arabic
Women (Damascus, 1933) and of the League against Fascism (May 15,
1937). In addition, intellectual debates were initiated that same
year by a Lebanese writer who, in Damascus, published the first book
about human rights on Arab soil. He was Raif Khouri, who touched
upon the history of human rights, devoting a large part of his book
to denouncing fascism and managing to tightly wed the Soviet
evolutionary approach to liberal ideas. Emphasizing that democracy
is a sine qua non in achieving respect for human rights (5),
Khouri dubbed fascism the most destructive force in contemporary
history. On June 10, 1941, the League renamed itself the League
against Fascism and Nazism. The battle against fascism broadened
even more when the League of Arab Students was formed in April 1942,
its constitution embracing the goals of pro-democracy and
anti-fascist students, demanding nothing less than a democratic
front on a global scale and Syrian independence.
The nationalist movement was also
reinforced in its commitment to democracy and opposition to colonial
rule by France’s failure to respect its promises. French ambitions
came clear with its 1939 cession of Syria’s Alexandretta to Turkey,
and it's bombing of Damascus immediately after the end of WWII,
followed by the storming of Parliament. Nonetheless, in April 1946,
Syria did attain independence with the evacuation of French and
British troops.
The Post-Colonial Era
In 50
years, Syrian political life had changed dramatically. Political
alliances forged in the early 1900’s gave way to numerous political
parties, including the Syrian Communist Party (1924), the People’s
Party (1925), the National Bloc Party (1932), the League for
National Action (1933), and the Ba`ath Party (1947). Along with
these secularist parties, the Muslim Brotherhood was created in the
city of Aleppo in 1937 from an assortment of Islamic associations.
Meetings multiplied as the Brotherhood attracted more and more
people. By the time of their fourth Congress in 1943, a
para-military group, the Saraaya, was created. In 1944, at
their fifth Congress, a Central Committee was instituted and M.
Mustafa Sibai was named “General Adviser”, organizing the
Brotherhood into a bona fide political party.
Organized in hierarchical levels,
Muslim Brotherhood members were sworn to “fidelity, order,
obedience, sincerity, precision, prudence, and discretion.” (6)
Their program revolved around a solidification of Muslim family
structure, spiritual instruction, and liberation of the home country
from all political, economic, and spiritual non-Islamic power.
While the Brotherhood accepted principles of political pluralism and
a legitimately constituted state, it still represented the
continuing conflict between old and new, secular and religious,
tradition and innovation.(8)
In Syria, as in the entire Arab
world, 1948 was the year of the Nakba, the disaster. The
birth of the state of Israel on May 15 of that year launched a war
between Arabs and Israelis and engendered an enduring sentiment of
injustice and embattled hostility among Arabs. Embarrassed by their
ineptness in confronting Israel, Arab governments were further
discomfited by the effectiveness of volunteer units of Islamists and
Arab nationalists, which gained them popular political acclaim and a
more prominent political profile. Dogmatism and fanaticism, however,
constrained their maturation, to the benefit of the National and
Ba`ath parties.
A quick succession of three coups
d’état
between March 30 and November 21, 1950 brought Syria’s disarray to a
head. Even as an armistice between Syria and Israel was being
signed, a militaristic discourse within Syria became increasingly
dominant. And even as Syrian women obtained the right to vote,
the Syrian Constitution was amended to make Islam the State religion
and its teachings the basis of all instruction in the schools and of
an all-out fight against “atheism” in the entire country. Debates
about democracy were stopped short by the dissolution of the
National Assembly, the suspension of political parties, and the
interdiction of all non-governmental media in 1952.
Unfortunately, nationalism in the
army, on the rise since the end of the 1948 war, constituted the
gravest menace to freedom and human rights. Israel’s general
militarization reinforced pressure for a corresponding military
build-up in neighboring countries. But neither Syria’s political
parties nor the army developed a program that considered the needs
of society as a whole rather than a military focus on Israel. This
mutual weakness eventually led to the collapse of Shishakli’s
dictatorship and opened the path to the country’s return to a
parliamentary form of government (1954-1958). Yet the power of
nationalism returned in reaction to the tripartite invasion of Egypt
by Britain, France, and Israel. This led Parliament to agitate for
a confederation with Egypt in the name of pan-Arab nationalism. On
February 22, 1958, the United Arab Republic was created by uniting
Syria to Egypt. Jamal Abdel Nasser was appointed President and all
political entities were dissolved. The people and most of the
political parties had thus sacrificed civilian and political
pluralism in the name of pan-Arab nationalism. July 8, 1959, saw
elections in which the National Union, Nasser’s ruling party, ran
uncontested. The strangling of democracy in the name of Arab unity
did not last long, however; another coup, that of September 28,
1961, led to the secession (al-infical) of Syria from its
union with Nasser’s Egypt.
The failure of Nasser experience was
as much a result of internal as external factors. The coup that
brought down the Egyptian-Syrian union returned to power the forces
which themselves had been defeated in the 1950’s. Muslim
Brotherhood returned to the political scene with the rise of a new
party leader, Issam al-Attar, an intellectual open minded Muslim
from the parliamentary school. Nonetheless, the Brotherhood’s
internal crises, as well as its uneasy relations with much of the
rest of society, were not easily resolved and constrained its
growth. For the pan-Arab nationalists, the coup of 1961 amounted
to a genuine electric shock The Ba`ath Party went about reorganizing
its entire membership, but its internal divisions and trends
remained sharp and its unity a mere formality.
On their side, the Communists and
Islamists supported the secession as they assumed they would regain
their legal status. Still, many Islamists as well as Arab
nationalists considered this a mere transition period. The military
component of the Ba`ath Party and military officers loyal to
Nasserism prepared the stage for a coup of their own. Lastly, in
1962, Mouaffaq Eddin al-Kuzbari, a doctor of law, established the
Syrian League for the Defense of Human Rights. But in the
streets, the desire for political pluralism did not outweigh the
nostalgia for a time of unity. It was with the pretext of restoring
this unity that another coup, this one dated March 8, 1963, brought
a new government to power which immediately re-imposed
a state of emergency and sealed, once and for all, the fate of
normal political and judicial life in the contemporary history of
Syria.
In a country where governments had
been overthrown more often than elections were held, no one ever
suspected this last one would survive over 45 years. Syria’s
political agenda became defined by an ideology of unity with Egypt
and Iraq, Arab socialism, and anti-reactionary discourse. This was
baptized a revolution.
Memory constitutes a formidable
weapon against the randomness of the history which would follow. But
how many pages does one have to fill with collections of eyewitness
accounts, supplemented by the lived realities expressed in a
thousand and one oblique references to what is “private” because one
cannot speak without fear and without masks? How is one to
explain the transformation of Michel Aflaq’s trinity of Arab unity,
freedom, and socialism into the tri-colored melodrama posited by
Arendt: destruction of the judiciary, the death of the moral
personality, and cancellation of the specific singularity of each
human being?
Images parade in one’s memory,
jostling each other. The massive enlistment of villagers in the
army; purges for the “purification” of the military, now called “the
dogmatic army;”(al jaish alaqaidi) the creation of
paramilitary units (al-haras al-qaumi); the creation of
para-justice (in official language: laws for the protection of the
revolution); the reorganization of the Ba`ath Party to create units
charged with re-education of the population.
The declaration of a state of
emergency was followed by the nationalization of the economy and the
hegemony of sections of the Ba`ath Party over the army, each of
which strongly impacted Syria’s socio-political structures. A
military-bureaucratic faction took the place of a capitalist class,
not as rightful owners but as administrators of the means of
production, distribution, information, and expression.
Delegated by the state, this faction became the state’s
intermediary, and representative of its interests -- it mattered
little who officially delegated what to whom in the name of the
state: law was made by the powerful. (8)
Attaining supreme power so
quickly bred tragic consequences. It resulted in a pathological
drive toward a personality cult of the supreme leader; the
militarization of a supposedly civil society; the modification of
power itself such that it was exercised for the sole benefit of
powerful sectors within the military. Under a chronic state of
emergency, values are turned around, fear takes hold of society, and
humiliation becomes the only commonality between individuals. The
ability to dream is shattered, an ability which is the vehicle of
individuality and of the dignity inherent in human beings.
The state, empowered to establish
laws, instead relied on extra-judicial means as the basis of its
political power. How is one to explain to the citizenry that the
maintenance of order demands a permanent menace to the integrity,
both physical and moral, of humanity?
However, in this situation the people in power are not shielded
either – one misstep and they, too, are at the mercy of the torturer.
Thus, power not only generates fear, it
also possesses fear. This is why it practices “preventive”
repression. How many citizens have paid the price for this
extra-judicial prevention? We know, at least, that in 45 years, more
than 45,000 individuals have been in prison and about 3,000 are
still reported missing. A total number is difficult to ascertain
since, for example, the number killed by Hama in 1982 and executed
summarily between 1979-1982 is unknown.
In 45 years, laws have considerably
evolved in the world. Each day, international conventions direct
local laws toward more civil and judicial humanism. In Syria, on the
other hand, the state of emergency freezes in place an
under-developed judiciary and societal stagnation. So long as the
independence of the judiciary is perceived as a threat by those who
dominate the state, the citizen is in peril.
Political ideologies and
Human Rights
The persistence of the state of
emergency and the militarization of society definitively separated
Baath ideology from any concern with fundamental freedoms and human
rights. The discourse of the governing people’s also created a gulf
between the population and the non-Ba`athist secular parties – a
virus of distrust was sown by the authorities which touched every
facet of society.
The party also, of course, devoured
its own children. Just as the Ba`athists had seized the nationalist
discourse from other pan-Arabic movements, their supreme leader now
seized the party and reduced its powers to a shadow of his own.
Most major Ba`ath party figures would be arrested and pass from 15
to 25 years in jail, with or without trial, it mattered not. And so
a national crusade to achieve something in which the country
believed became nothing more than a barren trek across the desert.
A few days before his mysterious death in his cell after 22 years of
incarceration without trial or conviction, Salah Jadid, founder of
the military organization of the Party, wrote a tragic note to his
daughter Wafa:
“It was only a dream,
wasn’t it?”
“What was the dream?”
“Everything, everything,
everything that happened that year, Fania, why would I destroy
your happiness?” (9)
If the nationalist independence
parties stopped there activities, for Muslim Brotherhood, these
years were also a nightmare. From 1965 onwards the movement
initiated the work of reorganization and mobilization. They were
aided by the phenomenon of growing religiosity in Syrian society
which had become visible under different forms after the arrival of
Assad in power, but this very growth also led to chaos within the
movement. Numerous local groups took shape independently of the
Brotherhood, but soon either joined them or dissolved before taking
root.
The principal difference between the
Brotherhood’s experiences of before the unity with Egypt and after
the declaration of the state of emergency was that the first
experience was marked by the spontaneous adoption of political
pluralism, while during the second period, under the state of
emergency, it based itself in a totalitarian intellectual
discourse. The goal became an Islamic State directed only by the
Party of God purifying the country of the unfaithful and other
secular persons.
The 1970’s were a time of general
crisis within parties of the Left, and of the re-composition and
radicalization of the Islamic discourse. These years also saw the
total decomposition of the Arab nationalist opposition. The issue
of human rights, on its part, was forcefully marginalized and the
League of Human Rights only allowed to work discreetly under the
aegis of the Union of Lawyers. The term democracy officially
remained a suspicious concept, only to be referred to under the
cosmetic cover of related concepts: Shura, popular
democracy, revolutionary democracy, and so forth.
Paradoxically, it was the rise of
the Brotherhood’s that precipitated a more general movement against
this political situation. In 1978, the Union of Lawyers demanded
the lifting of the state of emergency and other professional
organizations followed its lead. That same year, the Communist
dissidents-Political Bureau adopted a program of straightforward
democracy in place of its previous commitment to so-called “popular
democracy.” In 1980, the secular opposition founded the National
Democratic Assembly, which adopted human rights in its program.
(10)
The League of Human Rights and the
Union of Lawyers as well as the unions of engineers, doctors, and
pharmacists called for a strike on March 31, 1980, to signify the
dual rejection of both an authoritarian government and an Islamic
State. The Brotherhood, for its part, was telling its partisans to
go all out against the state “because the revolution will be
Islamic.” In response, the authorities intensified their
repression. From April 7 to 13, 1980, Aleppo was given over to some
20,000 soldiers and police. Dozens were arbitrarily killed and there
was looting, rapes, and 1,500 arrests. The leaders of the League of
Human Rights were also jailed, including its founder and president,
al-Kuzbari, who is still in prison with his friends so many years
after his arrest, with no trial and no judgment.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s (MB)
confrontation with the state were notoriously bloody. The butchery
of Hama (February 1982) marked the end of a historic period for the
Syrian MB, and ushered in two fundamental changes. One, as a result
of these confrontations, the public became hostile to all
religiously-based conflict. As to the Brotherhood, its defeat led it
join later in 1982 the National Alliance, which included the Islamic
Front, the pro-Iraq Ba`ath Party, the Arab Socialist Party of Akram
Hourani, and some independent personalities.
The ideologue of the Islamic Syrian
movement, Said Hawa, learned the following lesson: “Syrians like
the republican system, freedom, political activities, and equality
before the law.”(11) Hawa was convinced, perhaps, but not very
convincing to others in the Brotherhood. The MB, ultimately, did not
analyze its failure and the obstacles its program face in a
pluralistic, multi-religious state such as Syria. To the contrary,
debates concerning reform ideas largely ignored what Said Hawa had
to say. Although many survivors of the confrontation with the
government came into contact with human rights activists and
subsequently adopted a more moderate stance toward the Islamic
State, as a whole today’s Syrian Brotherhood is well behind those in
Egypt, Turkey, and Tunisia. Others reinforce the Hizb al Tahrir
(Islamic Liberation Party). The physical elimination by the state
of the Brotherhood’s leadership has, of course, played a role in
delaying the integration of democratic reform into Political Islamic
Movement program.
As to the ideologues of official
nationalism, they showed little or no interest in reconciling their
discourse with democracy. Justifications of arbitrary rule included
the old stand-by that an external threat justified internal
repression.(12). It was only the Left which made a commitment to
democratic liberties an essential part of their political program.
Of course, as a movement, the Left continues to be seriously
weakened by constant arrests and other forms of repression, which
have limited its ability to act.
New generation
The wounds inflicted on the Syrian
League for the Defense of Human Rights were profound.
More than six years of detention
without trial or verdict was so hard for SLDHR leaders after the One
day demonstration (31/03/1980). Nonetheless, a new generation
stimulated the organization’s renaissance, despite the heavy costs
of doing so under the state of emergency. Their animating belief is
that Syria could not stay aloof of human rights much longer if it is
to reconstruct its political society. In this climate, on December
10, 1989, at the end of a three-month period of meetings among those
representing various cultural, social, and professional
perspectives, a communiqué was issued in Damascus announcing the
founding of the Committee for the Defense of Democratic Freedoms and
Human Rights (CDF), the successor to the League for Human Rights.
The new organization conducted
intensive work, both inside and outside the country, to establish
credible lists of prisoners, analyze the authoritarian basis of
Syria’s power structure, secretly publish a journal, to distribute
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, put out an Annual Report
published in Paris, and, amid these activities, generate an
extensive Arab and international communication network.
The CDF was no extraterrestrial
phenomenon, but rather arose out of a societal demand for some sort
of protection against the arbitrary use of power at a point in time
when to survive in Syria a citizen had to accept his or her
marginality. Silence, self-destruction, or the risk of
disappearance were and continue to be the sole choices for a
citizen. Denial of the right to work, interdictions of publications
and travel, pursuit by the mukhabarat, incarceration, exile
and, in sum, the impossibility of living with dignity were the grim
alternatives to silence.
The junta prosecuted 17 CDF members
before the High Court of State Security, and on March 17, 1992 ten
of them were condemned to five to ten years in prison, forced
labor, and a surrender of their civil rights. The trial of the
CDF’s human rights’ activists did provide the opportunity for the
abroad CDF direction to prove the arbitrary nature of the process of
detention in Syria. As a result, in the following three years more
than 27 reports and books about Syria were published in Arabic,
French and English. Moreover, we established a network of
international contacts with over 120 non-governmental organizations
from around the world, while being careful to refuse all help that
could be interpreted as violating martial law or justifying the
state’s taking of even one more prisoner.
Independent of the CDF, other
networks dedicated to human rights sprung up spontaneously. Of
course, all this was done in full awareness of the government’s
intelligence activities and, in general, Syria’s political
realities. It is within this context that Syrian human rights
defenders, in side or out side CDF, attempted to reflect on the
successes and failures of the human rights project in the region. In
prison, underground and in exile, they have continued to work for
ways defend their agenda, and how to maintain a balance among
economic, political, civil, social, and cultural rights.
The only thing left to say is that
we began the 21st century in a period where the future is
more uncertain than ever and where the disintegration of society is
so advanced that it has become difficult to see the light at the end
of the tunnel. It should be remembered that three-quarters of the
Syrian population was born after the founding of the state of
emergency and the proliferation of its extra-judicial laws which has
generated such disarray and, even, psychosis. There are about
150,000 Kurds still deprived of their Syrian nationality and an
indefinite number of voluntary and forced exiles, lost to their
country forever. But in 10 years of mobilization, More than ten
thousands prisoners were released, some of them with a real
intellectual construction and political rebirth. A new vision and
approaches of political life begin to take place, Hafez Assad
departure will be the best opportunity to open a new period of
struggle.
During that period, in 1997 exactly,
Damascus Center for Civil Rights and Theoretical Studies was
fortifying. The Center included various important symbols of the
Syrian movement. Through its intellectual magazine "Moukarabat",
it attracted the most important political and legal trends.
Furthermore, the activities of the Syrian Committee for Human Rights
in London increased and the preparation for a Syrian Association of
Human Rights in Damascus started. Also, due to the contacts between
the Arab Organization for Human Rights and the Arab Commission for
Human Rights, the Friends of Civil Society Association was
established at the end of August 2000. This Association gave the
Revival of Civil Society Committees and the Statement of the One
thousand. Also, an important number of the Syrians, who belonged to
the Revival of Civil Society committees, activated in the Arab
Commission for Human Rights and the Amnesty international. Also, a
number of senior members in the Syrian League for the Defense of
Human Rights decided to resume their activities because the regime's
decision to stop the league in 1980 was an illegal.
Authoritarian nationalism has lost its reason for its existence, but
not before it destroyed the civil society. Islamists and democrats
could not establish a viable alternative due to a long oppression.
The
Islamic and secular parties had many
difficulties in the underground reconstruction of a political
life in Syria. The societal expressions took place, such as: tribal
and/or sectarians, familial and geographical types. Going out of the
public sphere created negative and/or traditional form of religious
practices.
"Damascus Spring"
President Hafiz al-Asad
died in 2000, after a
30-year ruling: His son, Bashar al-Asad, replaced him. President
Bashar had no previous experience in ruling Syria. In the early
months of Bashar's era, the young doctor took a few limited steps
toward political and economic reforms. In a moment of enthusiasm,
Syria-watchers called it the "Damascus Spring." For example, He
encouraged the initiation of political and cultural forums
(Muntadayat). Intellectuals, politicians, and old political
prisoners discussed the need for pacific transition to democratic
model in an atmosphere of relative openness and freedom. Bashar's
limited support for these forums encouraged submitting petitions on
political reform. Some of intellectuals established the "Committees
for the Revival of Civil Society”. Three new human rights NGOs were
self reclaimed.
In one year, Syria lived in a happy
experience. Direct contacts and confrontations took place between
the N P F (in power) and different secular oppositions. The openness
was short-lived. In mid-2001 Khaddam, Shara, Al Ahmad and Al Assad
led a counter-attack against the supporters of the reforms. At the
peak of this counter-attack, the regime ordered the disbanding of
the majority of forums that had separated throughout Syria. From
August 10 to September 9, 2001, ten persons were arrested and sent
to 5 to 10 year prison. The economist Aref Dalila still in prison
up to now.
Two days before September 11 and by
internal decision, the Syrian authorities stopped the process of
reforms. Unfortunately, the war against terror used by the
authorities against reformers. The end of the "Damascus Spring" and
ambiguity of economical reform demonstrated that the new leaders of
the country had no clear vision of the State of Law and the
necessity for a Syrian civil society as the best protection against
violence inside the country today.
Damascus
Declaration
The occupation of Iraq has had deep impact on
Syrian political opposition and civil society. The Iraqi situation
was not an attractive example by the public and wasn’t convincing
the educated elite. Those who opposed the occupation kept active to
establish a larger role for civil society and political opposition
in the reforming project in Syria. The Iraqi situation created
“fear” among both sides: ruler and people. Those new environments
were created: more groups wanted to re-start the Damascus Spring
with a better understanding of the regional politics and the role of
the opposition. The groups wanted to function within more organized
structure.
During 2004-05, the Gathering for
National Democratic Assembly and Muntada Jamal Attasi
(Home-Club for Democratic Dialog) initiated several attempts to
discuss the internal reform and Kurdish issue, in particular, issues
related to Kurdish identity citizenship and culture rights. A
Coordinative Committee was formed from
National Democratic Assembly,
Committees for the Revival of Civil Society,
Party of Communist Action, Kurdish Democratic Assembly and Kurdish
Democratic Front to coordinate the mentioned initiative one
year prior to Damascus Declaration. A subcommittee from the
Coordinative was responsible for organizing mass demonstrations in
support of Iraq and Palestine and calling the government to lift the
state of emergency and release prisoners.
Damascus Declaration was established in
October 16, 2005 and included groups who were members of the
Coordinative Committee. Nevertheless, Damascus Declaration attracted
seven independent national figures in addition to Muslim
Brotherhoods and other Islamic and secular groups and personalities.
For the first time, after 43 years of state of emergency, a large
group of political movement, involving secular groups and Islamic,
Kurdish, Assyrian and Arabs, liberals and communists, accept to work
together under Damascus Declaration umbrella. Thus, Damascus
Declaration became a national umbrella for many groups.
(It is important to notice
that Muslim Brotherhoods showed a real political and ideological
improvement in joining Damascus Declaration when they signed the
"National Chart" of August 2002 in London. Muslim Brotherhoods
review their positions on the use of violence, pluralism, civil
state, and peaceful change of government).
The Syrian Government didn’t arrest people after issuing the
Damascus Declaration, although the political situation was tense
since the United Nations Special Envoy announced that they will
issue the report about the assassination of Rafiq Hariri in three
days. Thus there was a real opportunity to open a serious dialog
with the ruling party. The opposition was thinking to have a
national conference for all groups. However, there was political
ambiguity among the politicians and the Government on how should
they treat each other. As soon as the ex-Vice President Khadam left
Syria to Paris and launched a political war on the Syrian Regime,
mistrust rose between the Government and oppositions.
There were two opinions among Damascus Declaration’s groups. First,
that Khadam finished politically in Syria and his bad reputation
will damage that of the oppositions. Second, was counting on
Khadam’s relationship with the ruling figures, army and
international to strength the opposition. The latter was led by Ali
al-Byanouni, the General adviser of the Muslim Brotherhoods. Mr.
al-Byanouni and Mr. Khadam formed “Savior Front” in Brussels during
March 16 -17 2006. The Savior Front cut all ties with the Syrian
Government. At the same time, forming Savior Front ended the unity
behind the Damascus Declaration, although no official declared that.
Individual or groups, which made the Damascus Declaration,
interpreted the declaration articles based on their needs and
therefore started to work alone.
30/11/2007 was a very crucial moment
in this delicate situation: A triumphal discourse of the new
direction just after Damascus Declaration national conference, and a
vague of arbitrary detention(13). Two important political parties
(Party of Communist Action & Socialist Democratic Arab Union Party)
decided to stop all cooperation with the new direction. Syria lost
in the same time, the unity of internal democratic opposition, the
societal self-immunity and the possibility of a new internal
integration, that’s means, any possibility of national dialogue for
reform nowadays.
Is it the end of an era? The conflicts of the
old generation have no place for the new one, Syrian youth questions
are different from the political class project. In this situation,
Syria needs new initiatives, new political structures, and a lot of
imagination. Today, it is only a
political and civil rebirth founded in a commitment to fundamental
freedoms and human rights which can be a bulwark against
authoritarian structures of the Stat in its present form, and in the
forms that will come.
Are the political leaders of democratic opposition and NPF ready to
use their wisdom and embrace these freedoms in a non-violent
struggle?
_____________________________________________________
Notes
(*)
Haytham Manna: psychosomatic physician and Ph.D.
in Anthropology, Director of the Syrian
Revue MOUKARABAT (1998-2008), author of about 30 books. Manna
is the President of the International Bureau for Humanitarian NGOs
(IBH), Spokes person of the Arab Commission for Human Rights.
(1)During the
events of 1850 at Aleppo and of 1860 at Damascus
(2)Reading:
Ecrits critiques de la renaissance by Daguerre, V. Riwaq Arabi,
N. 4, CIHRS, Cairo, 1996, pp. 119-129. (3)
(3) The last cry
of an empire about to disappear was uttered by stupid, vengeful
acts, criminal doings by military Ottomans without legitimacy.
Jamal Basha Al-Safah (the murderer) executed on the al-Burg place in
Beirut 11 democratic militants, August 1915. May 1916, 14 militants
opposing the presence of Ottomans on Arab soil are executed in
Beirut and 7 in Damascus. In 1922, this butcher was himself killed
by two survivors of the Armenian genocide in which he had played a
dirty role: Pedros Derbogosian and Estiban Zagikian. Reading:
Thaourat al-Arab, “The Revolution of the Arabs,” by As’aad
Dagher. Second edition, Aleppo, 1989.
(4) Reading:
Histoire des Frères Musulman en Syrie by Manna, Haytham, Sou’al,
1985. Reissued in collected volume, L’Islamisme dans tous ses
ètats, Harbi, M. (Editor), Arcantère, 1991. On May 22, 1930,
the French representative declared the Syrian Constitution adopted
by the Syrian Constitutional Assembly after adding article 116 about
powers of representation.
(5) Reading: Hokok
al-insan, min ain wa ila ain al-masir, “The Rights of Man,
from where and where to?” by Khouri, Raif, Dar Ibn Zaidoun,
Damascus, 1937. An important part of this book will soon be edited
by H. Manna in a volume entitled: Les premiers ècrits sur les
droits de l’Homme dans le monde arabe. Al-Kamel Verlag,
Cologne, 1999.
(6) Manna, op.
cit. p. 69.
(7) In order
better to understand the spirit of the era, we advise reading:
Review al-Hadith (modern version) published by two
intellectuals from Aleppo (Edmond Rabbat and Sami Kayyal). Also
al-Tariq (The Road) of the CP Syro-Lebanese of the period.
(8)An incoming
Minister of Defense who had been founder of the educational services
of the Air Force explained to party members, “It’s the army that
made the revolution...Lin Piao is second in command in China. I’m
not Lin Piao and there’s no Mao Tse-Tung in Syria...comrades?”
(9)Amnesty
International, CDF-Syria, FIDH, Les droits de l’Homme en Syrie:
30 ans d’état d’urgence (Paris conference), Vol. 2, 1993.
(10) In a
“Declaration to the people...for liberty, democracy and change” the
RND proposes a 6-point program
- The army back to its barracks;
- Rescinding of the state of urgency;
- Proclamation of democratic freedoms;
- Liberating political prisoners;
- Dissolving the secret service;
- Appointment
of a government of National Unity, which organizes free elections;
and signed by:
the CP-Political Bureau, the Arabic Socialist Union (nasserian-led),
the Revolutionary Labor Party, the Democratic Ba`ath Party (February
23).
(11) “Le Monde
Diplomatique” March 1983.
(12) In a confidential letter of the permanent diplomatic mission
of Syria to the United Nations at Geneva, dated August 31, 1992, the
delegation explains the state of urgency as follows: “The
justification of the state of urgency lies with the menace weighing
on the country. Which gives authorization to the civilian
government to promulgate an exceptional set of laws which,
proceeding from the spirit of such laws, are able to protect the
State’s territory, oceans and rivers, and fly zones from the dangers
menacing them. It has been installed under exceptional
circumstances, i.e. the war opposing the state of Israel and the
occupation, until today, of a part of its territory by the latter.”
The text does not explain why the state of emergency was declared
four years before the occupation of the Golan, and not, either, how
Syrian citizens threaten the territories of the State, its waters,
and its aerospace. This false state discourse about national
security gave rise to an anecdote that said it all: “In order
better to ensure the security of the father of the nation, an
essential condition to obtain such security, the army has decided to
exchange with Israel one day of war for one year of the state of
emergency.”
(13) Mme. Fida Horani, M. Ahmad Touma Al Kheder, M. Akram Al
Bunni, M. Jabr Al Shoufi, M. Walid Al Bunni, M. Ali Al Abdallah, M.
Yaser Al Aiti, Riad Seif, Fayez Sara, Mohamed Hajji Darouiche,
Marwan Al Ich, Talal Abou Dane still in prison up today.
Basic Given of Haytham Manna’ speech in
Los Angeles (26th April), Chicago (27th April)
and Detroit (29th of April)2008. In the occasion of
Syrian Independence Day. Thankfully and successfully Organized by
The Syrian American Congress.
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