[The present is a consequence of an ongoing past. In order to understand the coming alliances and conflicts, cooptation and containment, grassroots struggles and top-down repression, the old and new market forces and those who pull the strings regionally and internationally, the cultural scene and the new cultural production, the role and position of women in the ‘new Syria’, the adaption and concessions or intransigence and authoritarianism of this or that political group, one needs to map out Syria what has happened.
Who will ‘the Islamist-led regime’ work with, who will provide the capital and the conditions? What condition state like the US and Turkey set? Will the old institutions – or what was left of them – be transformed or reformed? Those who marched from Idlib to Damascus do not have the experience of running big cities like Aleppo or a big and diverse capital like Damascus. Even if the leaders tolerated the cultural and artistic traditions of the past decades, would the ranks tolerate them? What interpretation of the scripts will be used in this new context? Will a revolutionary movement be able to find ground and challenge the reactionary forces that have taken over Syria, replacing one reactionary force with an alliance of reactionary forces, some of which have already brandished the worn-out rhetoric of ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights’.
What actions will the new regime of ‘Abu Ahmed al-Zelensky’ take against Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza? Western imperialism wants a friendly regime in Syria – one that Israel wishes for. Gulf states would also want to see a friendly regime. The new rulers in Syria will need Gulf capital. Will the ‘normalisation’ process of pre-Gaza genocide resume, since the leaders of the genocide are winners? What does the future hold for not only Iran, but Syria’s neighbour Jordan – an American protectorate?]
A book by Yasser Munif (Pluto Press 2020)
Introduction
In March 2015, the World Social Forum (WSF) was held for the second consecutive time in Tunis. The Tunisian capital was chosen by the organizers to emphasize the importance of the Arab revolts and their impact on social movements globally. Evidently, there were many panels and events about the Arab and Syrian uprisings. During the Forum, Assad supporters attacked several dozens of people attending a panel about the Syrian revolt that I helped organize. As I finished introducing one of the speakers, the late Syrian-Palestinian intellectual Salameh Kaileh, about 20 men entered into the conference room causing a scuffle. They chanted pro-Assad slogans, and removed pro-revolution posters and a banner from the walls. When attendees tried to steer them out of the room, they became threatening and shouted, “You are terrorists! No to regime change in Syria!”
Two years prior, a similar incident had taken place at the same Forum. Assad supporters became quickly agitated when they realized that half a dozen of us were collecting signatures for a petition that condemned the Syrian regime’s atrocities.1 A man in his 30s was louder than the others and was pushing for a confrontation. “There is no revolution in Syria,” he shouted, “there is only a global conspiracy against the only anti-imperialist state in the Arab World and we will defeat it!” He was probably a provocateur but many of the people with him were persuaded that all protests against Assad were the result of Western manipulations. Some argued that Gulf countries paid infiltrators to destabilize the regime and justify an attack on, and later an invasion of, Syria. Within minutes, approximately 200 pro-Assad supporters and pro-revolution activists were facing each other, and ready to clash. The WSF security and organizers spent close to an hour trying to defuse the tension. Later that day, several people physically assaulted a friend who was on her way to attend a different event.2 Heated arguments about the Syrian revolt and confrontations such as the ones described here are not unusual; in fact, they have become the norm since 2011. In the United States and Europe, it is common to see pro-Assad supporters or pro-revolution activists picket or disrupt the events of their political rivals.
These conflicts have also become an integral part of the academic landscape. Sheffield University has recently asked Professor Piers Robinson to leave his post as a result of a campaign that exposed his affinity to autocratic regimes such as Russia, and use of conspiracy theories regarding Syria.3 The intense confrontation in academia is not confined to the social sciences, political science, or history departments. There are fierce debates in areas that are usually impervious to politics. For example, a few years ago, environmental scientists took part in a discussion about the role of intense, multi-year droughts that preceded the 2011 revolt. Some scholars argued the droughts caused the displacement of the population on a massive scale leading to the formation of poverty belts around large Syrian cities such as Aleppo and Damascus. In their view, these structural processes were instrumental in generating protests against Assad.4 Others contended that decades of mismanagement of water resources, combined with unrestrained irrigation, played a more important role in the pauperization of the peasantry.5 Scholars and professionals working in health had a heated debate about their ethical role in the Syrian conflict. Dr. Annie Sparrow wrote an article about the World Health Organization (WHO)’s criminal complicity with the Syrian regime. While most international health institutions, organizations, and practitioners took a firm stance against the Syrian regime, others such as the WHO allowed it to weaponize the medical field against its population.6
Another fervent debate took place in the field of chemistry and ballistic science to determine who was behind the various chemical and non-chemical attacks in Syria. Theodore Postol, professor of science, technology, and international security at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is one of the leading experts in the field.7 He has become the academic of reference when regime loyalists and allies seek an authority figure in the field of ballistic science to absolve Assad of inconvenient chemical attacks.8 More serious scholars, however, have debunked his claims by highlighting the many inconsistencies in his analyses.9 In the same vein, the archeological community is split around the role of the Assad regime in the destruction and looting of archeological sites such as Aleppo’s Old City, Palmyra, or Krak des Chevaliers castle.10 Some professionals in the field played a significant role in undermining the Syrian revolt using their credentials and expertise. For instance, when Russian and Syrian forces defeated ISIS in the Syrian Desert, Vladimir Putin contacted the then Director-General of UNESCO, Irina Bokova,11 to inform her about “the successful completion of military operations to liberate the city of Palmyra, one of the treasures of world cultural heritage.”12 It is logical that the Russian president put the blame on ISIS for the destruction of Syria’s historical sites but that UNESCO is helping him to polish his image is problematic to say the least.
Maamoun Abdulkarim, the Director-General of Antiquities and Museums in Syria, argued that the greatest threat to Syria’s archeology is ISIS. He told Ian Black, the Guardian’s journalist, that the Syrian government has been protecting archeological objects during the war. He then concluded, “[n]ow we hide things in Damascus, but if Damascus falls, what can we do? We are not supermen.”13 The Guardian’s article describes the atrocities of ISIS in the ancient city of Palmyra but fails to push back against the government’s narrative according to which it is safeguarding archeological sites and artifacts. It mentions the tragic killing of Syrian archeologist Khaled al-Asaad by ISIS but doesn’t make any reference to Tadmur prison, which is within walking distance from the archeological site and which witnessed the massacre of more than a thousand prisoners on June 27, 1980. The journalist briefly explains, “irreparable damage has been done by government forces as well as their enemies—in the battle for the Crusader castle of Krak de Chevaliers and the magnificent 14th-century Madina souq in old Aleppo.”14 However, the thrust of the article is about ISIS’s systematic destruction of archeological sites and the government strategies to prevent that. Black writes,
[i]n scenes that echoed the second world war story of the Monuments Men who saved artworks from destruction or looting, 24,000 objects were also brought by truck from Aleppo earlier this year. The heroine of that operation was a 25-year-old Syrian archaeologist who stayed with the army-escorted convoy for a hazardous 11-hour journey.15
The irony is that The Guardian published an article, less than a year later, titled “Syrian Troops Looting Ancient City Palmyra, says Archaeologist.”16 Finally, Black neglects to explain that the regime reduced entire neighborhoods into rubble and ruins, and destroyed large sections of cities where countless civilians perished and archeological sites were annihilated. This article is paradigmatic of mainstream coverage of Palmyra and other archeological sites in Syria.17 The main battle for these journalists is between Western civilization and the Islamic State’s barbarism; their coverage of Palmyra, unfortunately, is the by-product of a Eurocentric world-view.18 This explains why many believe that the Syrian regime is a legitimate partner when it comes to defeating ISIS and preserving world historical sites. Maamoun Abdulkarim understands these dynamics and knows how to exploit Western sensibilities as his conversation with Black demonstrates.
The tragic reality is that the debates occurring within the field of archeology are not exceptional or surprising. Scholars in fields as diverse as health, environmental science, ballistic science, not to mention the social sciences, history, or the humanities are all deeply split around the same issues. Many scholars decided to become guardians of a hegemonic geopolitical order instead of mobilizing resources within their fields to support Syrians’ struggle for justice and self-determination. Conversely, these professional circles should use the Syrian revolt to decolonize their disciplines, and make sure they’re not simply vehicles of state power or international law deployed against oppressed groups in Syria. These seemingly impartial academic or technocratic debates cannot be delinked from the lives of Syrians and their daily experiences. As seen above, some of these debates have lethal consequences, while certain academics and professionals are complicit in the regime’s crime.
In this book, I argue that the deep divide described here transcends any specific field and should be understood as a confrontation between two world-views. The first one focuses mostly on the macropolitical dimension and utilizes conventional theoretical tools, such as the “nation-state,” “international relations,” or “geopolitics,” to analyze the Syrian crisis. The second is attentive to micropolitics and everyday practices; it avoids simplistic labels that might invisibilize the people struggling on the ground. Simply put, the first reinforces the “politics of death,” while the second produces a multifaceted “politics of life.” The book proposes an unconventional reading of the Syrian revolt by analyzing the anatomy of violence and grassroots struggles. It argues that the conflict between revolutionary forces and the Syrian regime should be understood primarily as a confrontation between micropolitics of life and macropolitics of death. It is a clash between authoritarian technologies of power and grassroots micropolitics.
Notes
1. “Solidarity with the Syrian Revolution,” The Socialist Worker, May 1, 2013. Accessed June 3, 2019. https://socialistworker.org/2013/05/01/solidarity-with-the-revolution.
2. Marcus Halaby, “Supporting Syria’s Revolution at the Tunis World Social Forum,” Red Flag Online, April 14, 2013. Accessed May 3, 2019. www.redflagonline.org/2013/04/supporting-syrias-revolution-at-the-tunis-world-social-forum/.
3. Chris York and Ewan Somerville, “Professor Piers Robinson Leaves Sheffield Uni Post After Accusations of Promoting Conspiracy Theories,” Huffington Post, April 17, 2019. Accessed June 9, 2019. https://bit.ly/2EPoZS0.
4. For an extensive discussion about the impact of climate change on the Syrian revolt, see Jan Selbya, Omar S. Dahi, Christiane Fröhlich, and Mike Hulmee, “Climate change and the Syrian Civil War revisited,” Political Geography 60 (September 2017): 232–244. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2017.05.007.
5. Francesca De Châtel, “The role of drought and climate change in the Syrian Uprising: untangling the triggers of the Revolution,” Middle Eastern Studies 50 (2014): 521–535. DOI: 10.1080/00263206.2013.850076.
6. Annie Sparrow, “How a UN Health Agency became an apologist for Assad atrocities,” Middle East Eye, January 16, 2017. Accessed June 19, 2019. www.middleeasteye.net/big-story/how-un-health-agency-became-apologist-assad-atrocities.
7. See Academic page of Theodore Postol at: https://sts-program.mit.edu/people/emeriti-faculty/theodore-postol/.
8. “MIT Professor accuses Bellingcat’s Higgins of enabling war criminals to walk free in Syria (VIDEO),” RT, October 21, 2018. Accessed June 5, 2019. www.rt.com/news/441891-bellingcat-higgins-debate-syria/.
9. For an example of a rebuke to Theodore Postol, see Cheryl Rofer, “‘A naive set of assumptions’ – an expert’s view on Ted Postol hexamine theories,” Bellingcat, August 6, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2019. www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2018/08/06/naive-set-assumptions-experts-view-ted-postol-hexamine-theories/; and Eliot Higgins, “Professor Theodore A. Postol of MIT vs. The Concept of Time,” Bellingcat, April 28, 2017. Accessed July 9, 2019. www.bellingcat.com/resources/articles/2017/04/28/professor-theodore-postol-mit-vs-concept-time/.
10. For a discussion of the ways the Syrian regime instrumentalized Palmyra to polish its image, see Nour A. Munawar, “Reconstructing cultural heritage in conflict zones: should Palmyra be rebuilt?,” EX NOVO Journal of Archaeology 2 (December 2017): 33–48.
11. Irina Bokova has a close relationship with the Russian autocrat and is more than willing to use UNESCO to enhance his image. See Sam Greenhill, “Putin Ally in UNESCO crony row is favourite to take top job at United Nations when Ban Ki-Moon steps down at the end of this year,” Daily Mail, April 12, 2016. Accessed July 9, 2019. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3536896/Putin-ally-UNESCO-crony-row-favourite-job-United-Nations-Ban-Ki-moon-steps-end-year.html.
12. “Telephone conversation with UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova,” The Kremlin, March 27, 2016. Accessed July 9, 2019. http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/51574.
13. Ian Black, “‘They are barbarians’: meet the man defending Syria’s heritage from Isis,” Guardian, September 29, 2015. Accessed July 9, 2019. www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/29/they-are-barbarians-meet-the-man-maamoun-abdulkarim-defending-syrias-heritage-from-isis.
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid.
16. Agence France-Presse in Berlin, “Syrian troops looting ancient city Palmyra, says archaeologist,” Guardian, June 1, 2016. Accessed June 2, 2019. www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/01/syrian-troops-looting-ancient-city-palmyra-says-archaeologist.
17. Steven Lee Myers and Nicholas Kulish, “‘Broken system’ allows ISIS to profit from looted antiquities,” New York Times, January 9, 2016. Accessed June 1, 2019. www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/world/europe/iraq-syria-antiquities-islamic-state.html; Benoit Faucon, Georgi Kantchev, and Alistair MacDonald, “The men who trade ISIS loot,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 2017. Accessed July 8, 2019. www.wsj.com/articles/the-men-who-trade-isis-loot-1502017200; and Simon Cox, “The men who smuggle the loot that funds IS,” BBC, February 17, 2015. Accessed July 8, 2019. www.bbc.com/news/magazine-31485439.
18. A group of Syrian archeologists, with the help of Western colleagues, built a network to prevent the looting. They catalogue artifacts before they are destroyed or stolen, and preserve whatever they can. Since they document the looting of government loyalists, they are also their targets. For a discussion of their work, see Joe Parkinson, Ayla Albayrak, and Duncan Mavin, “Syrian ‘Monuments Men’ race to protect antiquities as looting bankrolls terror,” Wall Street Journal, February 10, 2015. Accessed July 8, 2019. www.wsj.com/articles/syrian-monuments-men-race-to-protect-antiquities-as-looting-bankrolls-terror-1423615241.
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