America and the Arab Change and Reform Revolutions

A person doesn’t have to be familiar with American affairs or knowledgeable of the workings of the centers of decision-making in the lone great power to understand the influencing factors, the complex calculations and the ambiguous goals of the most important capital, an influence on all global events — including the internal affairs and personal circumstances in the states of the East and West.

Perhaps the question, which has been posed unceasingly since the first spark of a movement for change in the Arab world was ignited this year in Tunisia, relates to the essence of Washington’s position toward the Libyan revolutions, which hit at the same time as they hit the Arab rulers most loyal and sympathetic to America’s policies and regional interests in the greater Middle East, and even in the wider continental area.

Although America’s position on the inaugural revolution in Tunisia was not seriously questioned and didn’t much occupy the mind of the Arab world, it’s true that the same question about Washington’s position on the developments of the Egyptian revolution was very prominent and was the subject of debate for all Arabs. This was particularly due to the fact that their position was initially characterized by vagueness and hesitation and only later on transformed into powerful public pressure.

It was striking that the American administration — which tried to rush change in Egypt and seemed to so easily sacrifice the keystone of its Middle Eastern policies, by which we mean the former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak — was highly cautious regarding the winds of revolution that swept over its ally in Sanaa and extremely hesitant about its old enemy in Tripoli before it made a decision and created an international coalition, without acting as its leader, against Moammar Gadhafi.

I think that Syria’s protest movement, which has not yet risen to the level of popular revolution, can serve as a practical model, if not as proof, to guide observers toward a complete understanding of American policy on the current developments throughout most of the Arab world. This is especially true given that we now have guidance from a “barometer” to read the components of America’s position and the face of its developments, changing first with the power of popular movements and second with the revelation of who it was leading those movements.

President Ali Abdallah Saleh succeeded in scaring the United States by stirring up its fears about the power that would replace him, saying that it would be the forces of radical Islam. Col. Moammar Gadhafi was unsuccessful when he tried to play on this sensitive chord of Washington’s with accusations that his opponents were Al-Qaeda. By this — the fear of the boogeyman of Islamism — America’s hesitance to support the Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions, until it was clear to the United States that this was not at all the case, can be understood.

Thus, American policy is now in a middle position, if not in a gray area, with regard to the situation in Syria, while it waits for both of the two main factors affecting its policy toward almost the only Arab state not aligned with American interests in the region to become clear. By these two we mean first the comprehensive and deep co-opting of the Syrian protest movement and second its strategic lack of an Islamist identity.

Accordingly, it’s not news that the United States lacks a basic, disinterested policy on the same interests and considerations when it forms its positions toward the Arab change movements. It’s not news either that while America is not modest when it talks about freedom, democracy and human rights, it often closes its wide eyes to the noblest of democratic powers, and completely closes its eyes to the most authoritarian regimes — if they don’t relate to its fixed interests and changing alliances.

It’s possible that America’s total silence toward the bloody abuses of the Yemeni regime on the one hand, and its unrestrained speech on the protest movement in Syria on the other, not to mention its early withdrawal from the international coalition against Col. Moammar Gadhafi, are the best definitive evidence of the United States’ lack of standards of political morality, on which bets can be made regarding whether America will take a supportive role of movements striving toward those values, ideals and principles that the United States purports to believe in.