Melhem:
The recent military setbacks suffered by ISIS in Iraq and Syria, and the beginning of attacks by local forces to retake Fallujah, Iraq and Manbij City, Syria, backed by US-led coalition airstrikes, coupled with the steep decline in the number of foreign fighters flowing to Join ISIS, portends the eventual defeat of the Caliphate as a significant military threat maybe as early as 2017. But given the trajectory of the Syrian and Iraqi conflicts in recent years, the corrosive role of most outside powers, and the frightening human toll of identity politics, the defeat of the monstrous Caliphate could turn to a resounding pyrrhic victory.
Since
the Second World War, the United States has had a poor record in translating
its military victories into political successes. It is very likely that the two
longest wars in American history will end with political forces that are either
hostile or unfriendly to the United States controlling both Afghanistan and
Iraq. The real challenge for the US in Afghanistan, Iraq and in Syria was never
military in nature, but rather political. After the eventual military defeat of
ISIS in Iraq and Syria the perennial question of “what’s next politically?”
will be asked just as it was asked after the liberation of Afghanistan from
Soviet occupation in 1989, the defeat of Iraqi forces in Kuwait in 1991, and
after the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq in 2011.
The victory of identity politics
Ironically,
the defeat of ISIS, a positive development in and of itself, in the absence of
acceptable political scaffoldings to begin healing these societies, could
presage the victory of foreign powers like Iran and Russia, a genocidal regime
in Damascus and a sectarian corrupt regime in Baghdad both of which are
beholding to Tehran. More importantly in the long run, the defeat of ISIS if it
is not accompanied or followed by the eventual demise of the Assad regime in
the context of an overall political resolution that guarantees the civil and
political rights of all Syrian communities, and in checking Iran’s destructive
influence in Iraq, will result in the overwhelming victory of “identity
politics”.
The
fights for Fallujah and Manbij City are raising serious fears not only of
massive civilian casualties, but of deepening sectarian and ethnic cleavages
leading to more death by identity and the creation of more refugees. The United
States is currently providing air power to support the Iraqi government forces
attacking ISIS forces in Fallujah, but these conventional forces are augmented
by Shiite militias backed and trained by Iran and led by Iraqis who are very
loyal to Iran. These largely Shiite militias make up the so-called Popular
Mobilization Forces (al-Hashd al-Sha’bi),were created in response to ISIS’
occupation of Mosul in June 2014. These militias engaged in widespread abuse in
Sunni cities liberated from ISIS in recent months.
Following
the eviction of ISIS from Tikrit last year Human Rights Watch documented the
“Ruinous Aftermath” in the city thus: “in the aftermath of the fighting,
militia forces looted, torched, and blew up hundreds of civilian houses and
buildings in Tikrit and the neighboring towns..” While it is true that the U.S.
in the past criticized the sectarian practices of these militias and asked the
Iraqi government not to allow them to participate in liberating Sunni cities
from ISIS, a request that was ignored by Baghdad, there are ample signs now
that Washington has lessened its opposition to some of these militias. In fact
last spring US Consul General Steve Walker expressed sympathy with some of the
wounded members of the Popular Mobilization Forces during a visit to a hospital
in Basra.
Deepening sectarian and ethnic divides
Just as
the city of Ramadi was essentially destroyed in order to be “saved” from ISIS,
a similar fate could befall Fallujah. There are credible concerns that the
decision to attack Fallujah which came after a short notice to the U.S. is in
part a political maneuver by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to deflect
attention from his domestic travails following a series of deadly bombings in
Baghdad, and growing social unrest against corruption and calls for reforms
that almost paralyzed his government. Iran, the hidden hand behind major Iraqi
decisions, was on display recently when the ubiquitous Iranian Revolutionary
Guards Quds Force commander General Qassem Suleimani showed up in photos taken
at an operations room outside Fallujah, discussing maps of military operations
with senior militia commanders. The absence of a unified countervailing
moderate Arab Sunni force to ISIS in Iraq and Syria will guarantee that the
defeat of ISIS, will likely lead to the birth of a new form of Sunni radicalism
in years to come.
The
fight for Manbij City, which is a prelude for a major attack on ISIS controlled
Raqqa is raising concerns about potential ethnic conflicts between Kurds and
Arabs. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a US-backed coalition of armed
groups led by the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), has been with U.S.
logistical support mobilizing thousands of fighters in the countryside north of
Raqqa to isolate the city. American Special Forces in Syria have been training
and advising and possibly fighting along with YPG fighters. In fact U.S.
military personnel have been “embedded” with YPG fighters, as seen in recent
photos showing U.S. soldiers wearing emblems of the YPG on their shoulders.
But
while the Kurds of Syria have legitimate political and cultural grievances and
demands that should be fairly addressed in a post-Assad Syria, nonetheless the
YPG which represent the most powerful Syrian Kurdish group has been accused by
human rights organizations of engaging in ethnic cleansings and forcing Arabs
and Turkmens from their areas and demolishing their homes in areas under YPG
control. It is ironic that the YPG, which came into existence with the help of
the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) of Turkey a group designated by the U.S. as
a terrorist group, is also receiving help from the Russians in Syria. If the
YPG leads the fight to retake Raqqa and its environ, a region inhabited by
mostly Syrian Arabs, the outcome will likely result in new tensions and
possibly violence between Arabs and Kurds.
The disintegration of states
In
recent years we have witnessed the destructive triumph of identity politics
during the breakup of Yugoslavia, and the Sudan or between the Hutu and the
Tutsi. Since the beginning of the Arab uprisings five years ago, we have
witnessed the collapse of the state system in a number of Arab countries. Many
a historian and analyst have had their chance in recent weeks to ponder the
legacy or legacies of the Sykes-Picot agreement and the other treaties and
arrangements that led to the birth of the modern State system in the Middle
East after the First World War. One clear conclusion is that many of those
societies failed to develop modern state institutions, good and efficient
governance based on fair representations of the components of those societies,
a failure that led to the calamitous present in Syria, and Iraq ( the same can
be said about Yemen and Libya)..When the uprisings failed to create alternative
political structures, the brittle regimes in Egypt, Libya, Syria and Yemen
collapsed into chaos or civil wars. (a similar situation occurred in Iraq, with
the failure of the invading power to create a functioning and fair governance).
With the fears and uncertainties spawned by the collapse of order, particularly
in heterogeneous societies, people fell back on their bedrock certainties and
identities. When people are threatened as members of a community (a religious
sect or an ethnic group) they tend to develop a strong sense of solidarity with
other members of the group as a form of self-defense. The identity of the group
is almost always exaggerated, and the threat is invariably described as
existential. That is one reason why civil wars are the most passionate of wars.
It is so because the combatants know each other, and because they have
irreconcilable views and visions about their way of life, their future and
their very own identity. Extreme identity politics reduce us to mere members of
a large tribe.
The
region is going through a historic convulsion that will last for years, maybe
decades. But the raging sectarian wars and mounting ethnic tensions are recent
and the product of power struggles, political decisions and events and not the
result of “ancient hatreds”. The Sunni-Shiite wars are unprecedented because
they are the product of the last few decades. The 1979 revolution in Iran was a
milestone in modern Shi’a assertiveness. Sunni political Islam after suffering
crushing blows by the Arab Nationalists in the 1950’s and 60’s began to
reassert itself after the Arab defeat in the war with Israel in 1967 by
claiming that the return to true Islam is the solution. The disastrous Iraqi
decision to invade Iran was a huge blow to Sunni-Shiite coexistence, and it
revived Arab-Persian enmity. In Syria, the ascendency of the Alawite minority
(an offshoot of Shi’ism) to power and their control of the army and the
security agencies deepened the rift with the Sunni majority. This situation led
to a low intensity civil war beginning in 1978 and culminating in the massacre
of Sunni rebels in the city of Hama in 1982. Finally the American invasion of
Iraq, which empowered the Shiites who have been marginalized in the modern
state of Iraq and oppressed as a community by the regime of Saddam Hussein, led
to the most sectarian bloodletting between the two sects in modern times. The
U.S. cannot mediate the Sunni-Shiite divide, but at least it should not pursue
policies in Syria and Iraq that will make it irretrievably worse.
In the
last fifty years, many groups in the region engaged in crass expressions of
identity politics, and outright discourse of exclusion; this is true of Arabs
and Jews, Arabs and Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites and Christians and Muslims.
Identity politics and practices have become the norms, even in cities like
Alexandria, Beirut, Damascus and Baghdad that were once cosmopolitan. Dissent
against the prevailing orthodoxy of the tribe became prohibitive, particularly
under autocratic regimes, where the state is unable or unwilling in most cases
to help those who dare to challenge the discourse of identity politics. There
are few dissenting Shiite and Sunni voices in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and
other states were these two sects live, who would oppose publicly the course of
the tribe.
Ironically,
the digital age which allows the peoples of the region, particularly the youth
tremendous opportunities to look beyond the confines of the tribe, to be
informed instantly of events and trends, to be exposed to practical and
theoretical knowledge, is in fact contributing to the atomization of the region
and deepening the attachment to identity politics. Death by identity need not
be the future of the region, but until the various tribes are exhausted, and
until new uprisings emerge against the sins of both the in-group and the
out-group, the scourge of extreme identity politics will continue to devour the
region.
