With the fall of the Gaddafi regime the optics for Cameron and Sarkozy were always going to be good, at least for a while.
This piece in the Irish Times yesterday from Farah Abushwesha perhaps hints at the darkness that will follow after the sound bites have been digested and the camera crews have packed up and left.
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/0924/1224304677595.html#.Tn2t81f5X38.twitter
The everyday lives of women in Libya will be the canary down the mine.
As their life choices are incrementally curtailed by the mullahs and their messianic street thugs then we on the outside will have an idea of growing strength and influence of radical Islamism.
I have written before that the entire concept of the “Arab spring” is risible.
http://www.philmacgiollabhain.ie/the-arab-spring-will-usher-in-an-islamist-winter/
What is no laughing matter is an Islamic regime with a Mediterranean coastline.
For now the optics remains beneficial for the political leaders of Britain and France and their focus is entirely short term and electoral for they have no cause only careers. The godly men they have helped think in centuries not news cycles
Toppling the Tripoli regime was an Anglo-French adventure which, in this post Suez epoch, they were permitted by the USA to proceed with.
It was of course almost a century ago when Britain and France, then not needing the USA’s permission, dismembered the corpse of the Ottoman Empire and gave us this daisy chain of failed states around the eastern Mediterranean.
Modern Islamic fundamentalism starts in that period with the Moslem Brotherhood being founded in the Egypt of Farouk’s puppet regime. Although ostensibly committed to change through peaceful means it was this organisation that nurtured Sayyid Qutb.
Hanged in 1966 for a plot against the secular government of Gamal Abdel Nasser he is seen as the providing the ideological framework for Bin Laden and Al Qaeda.
Patience is something that every successful revolutionary must learn.
They have waited a long time for the power to impose their messianic will on civil society.
Egypt in 2011 is much more close to Qutb’s Islamist vision than Nasser’s roadmap to a secular pan-Arabist republic where the Mosque did not intrude upon the governance of the country.
When the Moslem Brotherhood was established it was Britain and France that was their enemy. Post Versailles they got to carve up the Ottoman Empire. After the Great War the USA was still a gangling adolescent just starting to explore the world stage. Britain and France were the major players in the region then.
Now these colonial geriatrics have unwittingly assisted the determined ones to power in Libya.
Gaddafi, like Saddam, was a major obstacle to project caliphate.
Now they’re both toppled.
Brutal dictators of criminal regimes for sure, but they had no truck with the Bin Laden world view.
Indeed post 911 Gaddafi came in from the cold and was doing business with the west on every level.
This makes the partisan response of the NATO powers to the Benghazi uprising, a rebellion in part Islamist inspired, even more baffling.
It also makes nonsense of simplistic leftist “explanations” about the motivations of the UK and French governments in providing the air power for the Libyan rebels.
The “it’s all about oil” stock explanation is easily dismissed as British oil executives already had their feet under the table in Tripoli in 2009.
What’s done is done and the political elites of the west should now be concerned with what type of regime replaces Gaddafi’s idiocracy.
Of course they’re too busy at present enjoying the reflected glory of a clean little Mediterranean adventure where there were very few European boots on the ground.
As regime change goes it is as good as it gets.
This is how Iraq in 2003 was meant to be…
So for now the Libyan caper has went well far too well to be worrying about what to do about the fact that a situation has been created where it is now possible that Iranian ballistic missiles maybe smuggled into Benghazi five years from now.
Whereas Gaddafi wanted such weapons as status symbols and bargaining chips the jihadi want them so that they can use them.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/29/us-iran-missile-nuclear-idUSTRE75S5CJ20110629
Unthinkable?
There’s no fool like an old imperial fool or maybe even two of them…
Phil Mac Giolla Bhain
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/02/womens-rights-islamist-yemen-uprising?CMP=twt_fd
Good to see the Guardian allowing a piece that challenges the “Arab spring” narrative.
October 2, 2011 at 11:12 am
Brian
Islamism, like Fascism and Communism before them is a degenerate ideology that should be taken very seriously.
democracy – western style – is a very, very flawed system, but so far, from what I’ve seen it still remains the ‘least bad’ of the alternatives that exist now or at anytime in the past.
We should all be careful for the sake of our children and theirs that it remains an option for them.
September 26, 2011 at 12:55 pm
Colin Stephen
I will only say that Countries are quick to accuse Iran,etc of breaking UN resolutions but why do Israel get away with breaking the same thing on a worser scale than any of these Countries,the hypocrisy is unreal.
September 26, 2011 at 3:45 am
dave
Think you will find its the jews who control most things in USA, which in turn control the UN
In 1947 (I think it was) both Israel and Palastine where each given status , but it was only the state of Israel which was recognised.
The USA need a friend in that region and thats why they will never go against Israel , but what is happening in the Arab world is very dangerous , if Iran get the A-bomb they will use it 100% as they have stated on numerous occasions.
In my opinion the Arab world are gearing up for a united effort against the west and reducing the amout of oil it sends to the west , if that happens then you WILL SEE the 3rd world war.
September 26, 2011 at 12:06 pm
Phil Mac Giolla Bhain
Then it is VERY important that the Iranian regime does not acquire nuclear weapons.
September 26, 2011 at 12:11 pm
Ian Ferguson
Phil, you have hit the nail on the head.
Jehad has made a major advance with these events.
Fools like Cameron think it is an Arab Spring, a step on the road to democracy. It is not, what it has done is remove another obstacle in the road of establishing a new Caliphate.
When the moderates are killed or beaten into submission & the hardliners become established in all the nations involved in the so called Arab Spring out leaders will be scratching their heads wondering what went wrong … again.
You summed it up well, the Arab Spring WILL become an Islamic Winter.
September 25, 2011 at 3:11 pm
albannach-éireannach
Personally, Ian, I feel that there will be a danger from this kind of confrontation. Yet it will arise in our own complacency: not in stock-piling more weapons, but in disarming. If my neighbour our someone within my street were building a small armoury, of course there would be cause to believe that there would be some usage of these arms.
I feel that this act of pre-emptive aggressive defence only raises alram in the world; if we want people to trust us, we have to lead the way by disarming, while ensuring that world leaders agree and sign a legally-binding term of unilateral disarmament. This has of course been mooted many times prior to the current revolutionary crisis, particularly by peace-makers of the post-Cold War generation.
Tragically, we cannot legislate for the sociopaths who somehow combine their megalomania with a cunning political ambition (ie Josef Stalin) and propel themselves into unassailable positions. This is of course human nature gone wrong, and I feel we who crave peace are getting to the level of voices drowned out by the clamour of those who wish to recommend that the only way is their way. Men and women of peace are raised in every nation, every social class, and every generation. Where are the current peace-makers? Labelled dissidents and imprisoned.
September 25, 2011 at 6:08 pm
Ian Ferguson
Albannach Eireannach, unfortuneately this is a different situation than a cold war political standoff, there were always enough people on both sides who wanted peace to make a difference & block the hawks to a certain extent.
As I said this is a different scenario, there are none within the Jahad belief who want to negotiate.
Jews, non Jihad Muslims, Christians, Bhuddists & non believers of every description fall into the same catagory, they will convert to THEIR Jihad version of Islam or perish.
Islam has a tradition of the people of the book encompassing the Abrahamic religions & moderate Muslims accept them as non Muslim adherants of a revelation given to prophets by God.
Modern Jihad is a corruption of the traditional call to defend Islam with the relevant promises given to those who die for their faith.
Jihadists believe that time is on their side, they will force the world to accept their version of Islam no matter what, no negotiation.
Moderate Muslims will fall first,Iran will push for extemist measures throughout the Middle East, they are Shia, Sunni Wahhabi Islamists will push their brand, they hate each other almost as much as they hate all non Jihad Muslims & the West.
The best the West can hope for is a Sunni/ Shia civil war between both sets of extremists, it won’t stop them but it will slow them down.
There is no Liberal answer to Islamic extremism they despise liberal laws & rules, their culture is based on submission & it is their intention to make the world submit to their belief.
September 25, 2011 at 8:25 pm
albannach-éireannach
Yes, I feel this has to be a clash of cultures, and is now also that of a specifically developing religio-envagelical sphere.
Both Christianity and Islam have a stated mission to bring the True Word of God, in divergent (and in the case of the extremists on both sides, irreconcilable) styles.
The chararcteristics which continue to fester in the collective religious mind are those of persecutions in antiquity, or certainly within a scale of a thousand years.
I say “religious mind” as there are differences between following rules, and actually believing, as Kierkegaard would put it. Believing, to the Dane, was to be “in love”. Following rules is what we all have to do, until they become archaic or irrelevant. Could you please correct me, Phil, if I am wrong here, but many years ago (1991), I had read that there was a by-law on the Isle of Man, instituted just after the isle’s liberation from Norway and Scotland (around the end of the 13th Century), which states the killing of a Scotsman within a mile onshore of Man to be a duty for all Manx (as to preserve the independece of the then fledgling Kingdom)? This is a law long since forgotten by most, besides a few Celtic scholars. The Manx certainly do not hold fast to this law; archaic as it is, and commmon law having taken precedence over something that is perilously like anarchy; what we see in Arab nations is that of a need to save the world from permanent annihilation, spiritually speaking, as do Christians. The way of the sword of salvation was replaced with a book to remind others of the ultimate penalty for continually ignoring their own spiritual dimension. Islam still feels enough threat, and from those now with an agenda to promote a system of capitalism through bloodshed (which I vehemently oppose, even with the old maxim “no state was born without strain and bloodshed” contradicting me).
So we are left with the dilemma of either burying the hatchet literally and verbally, or an escalation of tension. Which, through what we have seen during the Cold War, is in some perverse way, a desire of governments on the largest scale, the superpowers, to keep in a state of a fear, in order to maintain control. Whether this is done through proclamations of eternal damnation, or worldly destruction, they are succeeding in so doing. Neither approach is the correct one.
September 25, 2011 at 2:45 pm
Alex Hamilton
The revolution in Eygpt/Lybia erupted because the majority of the population in these countries were “marginilised” as the rulers hived off the wealth for themselves and their chosen elites, The West backed these regimes for a steady supply for oil to run their own economies. Oil producing countries need customers to pay for their own public sevices…Education was “free” in Lybia which has a very large, well educated population.
You make a reference to Christians as having a spiritual need of “saving the world from permanent annihilation”.
Saving the world from nuclear annihilation should be a priority for any faith or none.
A World Without Nuclear Arms Is Possible and Urgent
http://bit.ly/mW9wFm
“Islam still feels enough threat, and from those now with an agenda to promote a system of capitalism through bloodshed”
Just a point on the above quote..I think it’s PEOPLE who have an agenda to promote ANY economic system which will make their country wealthy, NOT a religion per se.
“Cummunism through bloodshed” – During the Cultural Revolution in China (1966-1976), the population were forced to convert to atheism or die. All temples, churches, mosques, monasteries etc were looted and destroyed. 30 million people were put to death to make way for Mao Zedong’ s great socialist paradise.
Your comment:- “The chararcteristics which continue to FESTER in the collective religious mind are those of persecutions in ANTIQUITY or certainly within a scale of a thousand years.”
Statistically, TO-DAY, Christianity at this point in time, IS the most persecuted group in the world.
http://persecution-of-christians.posterous.com/
September 26, 2011 at 7:18 am
albannach-éireannach
Alex, we are singing from the same hymn sheet.
I deplore violence, and as Islam is the largest growing religion at the moment, I do not understand why they fear so much from a religion that is waning rapidly. And the ebb of Christianity is saddening, tragic, and disturbing; but also expected, if you know your Scriptures.
How we can attack one another is despicable and unjust; I believe in non-violence and unilateral disarmament. I strongly believe in turning the other cheek, however difficult this may be in practise.
I also firmly believe we are seeing more than a rise of a religion that will tolerate no others; it would frighten those with a vague sense of faith, or those with none; as it is, I feel secure in the knowledge that I am a Christian, despite my transgressions.
Perhaps I misrepresented myself as one without a steady opinion, or that I was atheistic. This cannot be farther from the truth. I am grieved at the persecution Christians face; my reference was deliberately vague in order that I could not be labelled as one-sided. It is Islam who feel the persecution of centuries past, not Christians, who in the eyes of Islam, are the perpetrators of violence and suppression of their faith. And, as I also pointed out, were you to read my post again, Alex, that it is the “religiously” minded, not the faithful; there are distinct meanings and connotations for all. As a friend once said to me – “I don’t do religion; I do faith”. Religion is, to me, to follow rules strictly; whereas faith justifies. That is the meaning of faith.
I apologise to you, Phil, if this post is over the top, but I felt I had to clarify.
September 26, 2011 at 5:55 pm
Mick Reilly
Well said Phil. Something definately WRONG with that whole episode. Still think the Rebel Libyans were using the British and French or the “Great Liberators!” as a means to an end. Anyway the good ol’ U S of A has its hands full with 2 of the worlds biggest oilwells and the insurgency in those areas..but rest assured they would have had cast iron guarantees that there would be something beneficial for America in there somewhere. Its not just oil reserves or cut price crude etc (although its a big part)..Its the French American and British contractors, some of the biggest companies in the world, construction water gas roads electricity etc..a country’s infrastructure, that there is billions upon billions of dollars in contracts for the “corpratocracy” after they have spent billions of taxpayers money absolutely smashing it into the desert sands. Also as my last point..YOU CANNOT hold one group of “freedom fighters” upto the world as a heroic example of what happens when a “people” have had enough of the regime.. then turn around and say others have NO cause or grounds for armed struggle or the right to have a say on the day to day running of their own lives, or for that people to have a right to determine their own future or have a country of their own or to have a say on how their country is managed. So if that was the “rules” so to speak..Why did NATO troops stand by and watch,no,all governments and the standing armies they control,stand by and watch what happened in the balkans??..whilst the serbs where shelling hospitals..arkan was running armed football hooligans as “brigades” or the “serb tigers”?? The world watched as dubrovnic, srebrenitza and towns and villages elsewhere where Ethnically cleansed?? All because no-one fired on NATO troops??? I think, its because, to the powers, or “Great Liberators”,a barrel of oil is worth more to them than a starving baby or an orphaned child. p,s This is not the rant of a madman or “dissedent”..just the voice of the everyman You’ll meet on the corner..
September 25, 2011 at 10:37 am
Brian
Mick, I thought there were at least two or three other ethnic groups commiting attrocities in the Balkans around the time of Arkan?
September 26, 2011 at 12:59 pm