Book review "War in Syria: Resolving a Global Conflict" I think Ms Helberg, or the reviewer, is wrong in saying people " took to the streets without ideological blinkers " and among them was Yassin al-Haj Salah. It seems there is a lack of familiarity with Al-Haj Saleh's writings and positions. He is in fact a very ideological Syrian leftist who fought the regime, imprisoned, and he is still ideological leftist and anti-dictatorhsip and anti-imperialist. Dismissing ideology is a phantasy. The question is which ideology and whose interests? Is it progressive or reactionary, or "antiquated" as al-Haj Salah calls it: "Overall, the fast-moving current of antiquation that is engulfing us all appears to be a result of three springs merging into one: the spring of religion, which offers legitimacy to existing and soon-to-exist despotic authorities; the spring of despotic states that receive assistance and legitimacy from a world system cente
“The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact; non-Westerners never do.” —Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilisation and the Remaking of the World Order, 1996, p. 51