07 December 2005

For four days between November 19 and 22, the Arab League hosted Iraqi political and sectarian factions in a conference for national reconciliation in Cairo. The meeting highlighted not only Iraq's return to the Arab fold after prolonged resistance by many Iraqis, but also a decision by the Arab world to embrace the Iraqi question that for almost three years has been handled exclusively by the United States and the international community. 

For both Iraq and the Arab world, the meeting constituted a departure from a process of estrangement that started before the American invasion of Iraq and continued in various forms thereafter, until Amr Moussa, the Arab League secretary general, finally visited Baghdad in October to arrange for the Cairo conference. With this visit, Moussa broke with the League's seemingly contradictory pose of legally accepting the new post-Saddam Iraqi state while denying its political legitimacy. And by attending the meeting in Egypt, the diverse Iraqi political forces broke with their pretence that Iraq no longer needs the Arab world.

What happened in Iraq regarding association with the Arab world after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime was no different than similar developments following major turning points in other Arab countries, such as Egypt in the 1970s and Kuwait in the 1990s. The pattern usually begins with a questioning of the value of association with other Arab countries in the Arab League or outside of it. The questions are usually followed by the claim that national interests should supersede pan-Arab interests. Sacrifices for the Arab cause are often stressed in a fanfare of propaganda, accompanied by the call to consider the needs of the country first. Isolationist policies toward the rest of the Arabs are promoted.

In many cases, this policy does not last for long. Internal and external considerations soon push the Arab country in question back into the fold, as Egypt, Kuwait, Libya, and others can testify.

With Iraq, the pattern this time was not very different. Iraqis of different sectarian background blamed the Arab world twice: once for abandoning them to the bloody dictatorial claws of Saddam Hussein and his regime, and once for leaving them without help or care after his downfall. The Arab world was blamed not only for exploiting Iraqi resources under the banner of pan-Arabism in the past, but also for legitimizing and supporting the insurgency that has bedeviled Iraq since the war. In a way Iraqis, or at least the majority of Iraq's new political elites, are proud to compare their new democracy to Arab dictatorships and eager to contrast their new association with the West with Arab-Western tensions since September 11, 2001. Despite their continued formal presence in the Arab League, different Iraqi sectarian factions have stressed the slogan " Iraq first" and have promised a new Iraq that is democratic, federal, modern, and above all that breaks with autocratic Arab traditions.

The Arab League, which did not support the U.S. invasion of Iraq and denied the war any Arab legitimacy, initially entertained serious doubts about the new Iraqi political elite and its patriotism. Despite surrendering the Iraqi seat to the Iraqi Governing Council and its successor institutions and accepting the UN Security Council process for dealing with Iraq, a majority of Arab countries never reconciled with what they conceived as an occupation-installed political power that had no legitimacy beyond the American-protected Green Zone in Baghdad. The empowerment of Iraqi Shiites and their political coalition with the separatist Kurds heightened concerns in the predominantly Sunni Arab world over the fate of Iraqi Sunnis in a new country whose Arab identity had been weakened. The result was a dual Arab policy: offering lip service to the stability of Iraq while leaving the country to its own fate. All Arab League resolutions to support Iraq were ignored, and the small Arab diplomatic presence was withdrawn from Baghdad after the first fatalities among diplomats.

However, this process of estrangement proved unsustainable. The continuation of the insurgency, the possibility of Iraq fragmenting into three states in the course of a very bloody civil war, and the heavy Iranian presence in the country all persuaded the new Iraqi political elite to seek Arab help for salvation and balance.

Salvation was to be accomplished by convincing the rebellious Sunnis that although they are a minority in Iraq, they are part of a very large Arab Sunni majority in the region. And balance was to be achieved by seeking a stronger Arab presence to face the new Iranian presence. The signs of weakening American support for the war in Iraq also worked against those who wanted to maintain isolation from the Arab world.

Meanwhile, on the Arab side the fear of breakdown in Iraq was mounting, along with concern with the spread of a new wave of terror as well as apprehension over the Iranian presence. Fear of the spread of the new Iraqi model of violence and separation - not democracy, to be sure - sounded an alarm that the Arab world did not want to hear.

The result was Iraq's return to the Arab fold. Baghdad was asked to indicate its Arab allegiance and to promise to give Sunnis a new shot at revising the Constitution after the coming legislative elections. In Cairo, "resistance" was condoned while "terrorism" was denounced. In exchange, the Arab League will provide legitimacy for the new Iraqi political system, urge Sunnis to cooperate, and help sustain a reconciliation process scheduled to start in February.

Abdel Monem Said Aly is director of the

Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo. This commentary first appeared at bitterlemons-international.org,

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