My research paper will talk about a subject which is very topical. The war between Hezbollah and Israel in summer 2006, the recent elections which put Hamas in power in Palestine and the nuclear question of Iran put on the Middle East scene three mains actors. Iran and Hezbollah are related because many leaders and organizations, like the Israeli government, accuse Iran to provide military furniture to Hezbollah. The both also share the same thing with regard to the religion: they are both in the same branch of Islam: Shiite. One of the goals reached by Iran could be the fact that they are trying to increase the Shiite influence in the Muslim world, which is Sunnite in majority. The link between Hezbollah and Hamas is that they fight side to side for the same cause: the liberation of Palestine. If Iran has Hezbollah on its side and if Hezbollah has Hamas on its side, Iran get closer of one of its main fellows: Israel. However, this is just supposition and it is at this question that my research paper will have to answer. By answering to this, I will try by the same time to find out if Hezbollah and Hamas are really terrorist organisations. It is what media and western opinion try to show us but is it true? My thesis statement is then: Does Iran use Hezbollah and the Hamas? What could be the aim of this?
7 commentaires:
You chose a very interesting and timely subject!
In my opinion, Israel and Western mass media exagerate the level of control and influence that Iran has over both Hezbollah and Hamas. It is only by portraying those organizations as terrorist groups, that leaders in Washington and Tel Aviv can cast Iran as a sponsor of "international terrorism". What Iran has in common with those organizations (as well as with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt) is an alternative political project to autoritarian Arab regimes in the region. Just as Iran as a democratic political system (however flawed it may be), both Hezbollah and Hamas have gained legitimacy throught the democratic process of their respective countries.
The following link may be useful to understand the impacts of the Irsael-Hezbollah war:
How Hezbollah defeated Israel by Alastair Crooke and Mark Perry http://www.atimes.com/atimes/others/hezbollah.html
Both authors are also the co-directors of Conflicts Forum (http://conflictsforum.org/) which tagline is "listening to political Islam, recongnizing resistance" and that "aims to open a new relationship between the West and the Muslim world."
Hope it helps.
I look forward to read your research paper.
Interesting topic idea, I followed this event last summer and I will look forward to your next blog posts.
To the previous poster, Vincent Gagnon-Levebre, I don't think that gaining power through a democratic process is enough to look at those organizations as ''democratic'' and as having good intentions. If memory serves, both Mussolini and Hitler gained power through democratic means...
Also, no matter where one stands on the Israeli situation, no one can deny that both the Hezbollah and the Hamas target civilians while the Israeli army targets known terrorist but cause collateral damage doing so. Civilians are not their prime target. Also, it's not only, like Vincent Gagnon-Levebre claimed, the USA and Israel who labeled Iran as a sponsor for international terrorism, but several other countries in the international community.
Also, let's not forget that Iran's ''democratic'' president publicly denies that the holocaust ever happened and also calls for the total annihilation of Israel and its Jewish population...
My main point was that Hamas and Hezbollah are not simply Iranian pawns that Tehran can control at will but that all three have a similar vision of the future of the country which is free of pro-US autoritarian client regimes. As to weither they have good intentions or not that is up to the Palestinian and Lebanese people who don't consider those groups as terrorists.
No one could either deny that Israel was consciouly targeting civilians in Lebanon this summer and destroying its infrastructure in an act of collective punishment that could only be described as state terrorism. Whoever labels Iran has a sponsor of terrorism can only do so by stating that Hezbollah and Hamas are terrorist organizations and not national liberation movements (between which there is a fine line I admit). But Iran does not sponsor transnational terrorism of the kind of al-Qaeda.
As for Iranian President Ahmadinejad, he as never called "for the total annihilation of Israel and its Jewish population". That is propaganda. The infamous "wiped out of the map" statement has never existed since that expression does not exist in Persian. The exact translation of his speech is "The occupation regime over Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time."
(see http://www.juancole.com/2006/05/hitchens-hacker-and-hitchens.html or http://www.juancole.com/2006/06/steele-on-ahmadinejad-of-arenas-of.html by Iranian expect Juan Cole)
What Ahmadinejad decries is the occupation of Palestinian land and the Zionist ideology or the Iraeli govenment. Later, he even said that Zionism could not be beaten by missiles or bombs but only through democratic elections inside Israel, but that statement did not make it through the Western media.
When Ronald Regan called for the destruction of the "Evil Empire" of the Soviet Union, he did not call for a genocide against Russians but for regime change in Moscow. Just like when Israeli or US policy-makers call for the end of the Islamic Republic, they do not call for the annihilation of Iranians. So when a president or anyone else calls for the end of the Occupation, he does not call the extermination of the state of Israel and its population.
One last thing, it is very easy the demonize Iran by citing a controversial president, but a closer look at the Iranian political system shows that the president does not have a lot of power. He is NOT the commander-in chief of the armed forces, he does NOT control the nuclear program and he does NOT have full control on Iran's foreign policy (Supreme Leader Khamenei control all those areas, and he does not like Ahmadinejad). Domestically, the president is actually only the 3rd most powerful man after the Supreme Leader and the Head of the Expediency Council (who is Hashemi Rafsanjani, who lost last presidential elections to Ahmadinejad). So even if he wanted to destroy Israel (which he denied many times), he could not do it.
1- Hm... the Lebanese don't consider the Hezbollah as a terrorist group, that's probably why they did not involve their regular army into defending them against the Israelis...
2- And if the Hamas and the Hezbollah are not considered as terrorists in their respective country (which I was told first hand it was not the case by people living in those two countries) then it would imply that suicide attacks on civilians and the likes are common and ''regular'' acts of war and considered so by all the Palestinians and the Lebanese. I doubt you believe this.
3- As for the targeting of infrastructures and creating a ''state of terrorism'', it's the same old argument used for the Dresden bombings that happened during WW2. This argument seems to always leave out the fact that these bombings did not happen like this for no reason. And in the case of the Israeli-Hezbollah war of 2006 these infrastructures were harboring known terrorists and were storing weapons that would sooner or later target civilians. Sure it caused a lot of damage to the economy but it was not Israel's goal to cripple Lebanon's industries. War are uglies, war happens, even more so when you have elements in your country who target your neighbor's civilian population and you fail to do anything about it for decades.
4- Financing ''fighters'' or whatever you want to call them who target civilians whether on another continent or in the country next to you is still financing terrorism. Oh and transnational means that it goes out of your borders... Al Qaeda or not...
5- I checked your website and tried to find other confirmations that it was indeed mistranslated, I came up with a few results but none of them looked official. So I think I will trust the BBC and the New York Times on this one... sorry. Was he mistranslated too when he publicly denied that the holocaust ever happened and held several conferences on this matter? When you put everything into the equation (the context, their background, their contacts, etc.) the international community's concerns over Iran's nuclear program are well founded. And I believe that the United Nations will do the right thing.
6- And the equivalent for the ''annihilation of Israel'' in your comparison would have been something like ''the annihilation of Russia''. Your ''evil empire'' comparison doesn't work. The American president was obviously and clearly talking about Russia's imperialist control over territories outside of its regular borders such as Estonia, Latvia, Georgia, Lithuania and Moldova that it conquered (and not liberated) during WW2 and integrated in their ''empire''.
I look forward to continue this debate. Take care.
Iran-Hezbollah-Hamas debate: take 2
The problem with this kind of debate is the unclear definition of terrorism. Even the Bush administration did not lay out a definition that was clear and not open to interpretation when it launched its "global war on terror".
Generally it is agreed that terrorism is an act of violence whose main goal is to terrorise a population usually by targeting civilians. When I said "state terrorism", I did not mean "creating a state of terrorism" but "terrorism done by the State". You seem to have a very black and white vision of "non-State terrorism" but when it comes to "State terrorism", you bring the "wars happen, wars are ugly" justification. And in both kinds of terrorism "these bombings [do] not happen like this for no reason". The Dresden bombings were State terrorism because its main goal was to terrorize the population. Just like the bombing of Beyrouth and elsewhere in Lebanon was aimed at terrorizing the population to eliminate its will to fight and resist Israel, just like Israel has aimed to do with the Palestinians throughout 40 years of humiliating occupation (with mixed success).
As for my distinction between transnational (for a lack of a better term) al-Qaeda-style terrorism and the actions of Hezbollah and Hamas. Those two organizations are not simply militias and have extensive social welfare activities. "approximately 90 percent of the organization's [Hamas] work is in social, welfare, cultural, and educational activities"(1) and "Most experts believe that Hezbollah's social and health programmes are worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually"(2). There is thus a huge difference between them and a group that does not have any national popular base and does not contribute to the political, economic, social and cultural life of a given population.
As for local perceptions. There is always different opinions but "87 percent of Lebanese support Hezbollah's fight with Israel [...] Eighty percent of Christians polled supported Hezbollah along with 80 percent of Druze and 89 percent of Sunnis, [...] 74 percent of Christian Lebanese viewed Hezbollah as a resistance organization"(3). As for Hamas, its election talks for itself (even if it does not mean that Palestinians support Hamas's ideological program, but they are more fed up with corrupt Fatah).
Finnaly, Iran. Whatever you believe about Ahmadinejad's declarations, I state again that even if he wanted to destroy Israel, he could not do se. Also, last December's municipal and Assembly of Experts elections showed a defeat of almost all of Ahmadinejad's alies. So to demonize Iran because of its president's comments on the Holocaust or Israel only serves the goal of preparing Western public opinion for a war against Iran. To quote Asia Times Online reporter Pepe Escobar "Washington might need to start manufacturing another "new Hitler"" (4) because this one has no chance to get reelected, unless the US or Israel declare war on Iran.
Ahmadinejad's misrule has accually created an ironic alliance between the so-called "moderate conservatives" led ex-President Rafsanjani and the reformist movement led by ex-President Khatami. Post-Ahmadinejad Iran might be very interesting.
Western analysts always tend to cast Iran as a unstabilizing factor in the Middle East while overlooking its stabilizing factor in Central Asia, Afghanistan and South Asia (having good relations with both Pakistan and India and sometimes serving has a intermediary). Iran will be (and in many ways already is) a responsible international player, (more than occupying, war-declaring, non-declared-nuclear-weapons-possessing and international-law-non-abiding Israel) if the West gives it a chance.
Oh, and for Reagan's comments. He did not only refer to "evil" imperialistic control on other territories, but also to an ideology considered "evil". It can thus be compared to Ahmadinejad's comments about an "evil" occupation of Palestinian lands and an "evil" Zionist ideology. In both cases, it does not imply the extermination of a population.
References (Those on Wikipedia have other (more autoritative) references at the end of the page)
(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas#Provision_of_social_welfare_and_education
(2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Social_services
(3) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Public_opinion
(4) http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IA19Ak03.html
Hi, since you use wikipedia, I might as well do so. I will try to keep it short as the debate is starting to go away from the user’s research. I’d recommend you reply in my own blog, in whichever topic you want or here if you see it fit.
The Dresden bombing had legitimate military ends even if it cause extensive collateral damage. It was a strategic location and was bombed for a question of troops movement. Remember that this was half a century ago and ‘surgical strikes’ were not possible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dresden_bombing
Saying Israel aimed to terrorize the population to eliminate its will to fight and resist is quite simply incorrect. The civilian buildings targeted were used by the Hezbollah to launch rockets and receive re-supplies. There’s always two sides to a story, maybe you’d like to share with me why the Hezbollah and the Hamas knowingly targets civilians, no matter the age or gender, people who have nothing to do with what the government does. Do Israeli transportation bus carry Israeli troops supplies?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel-Hezbollah_war#Targeting_of_civilian_areas
Also I’d advise you take a look at why the Israelis occupied those lands in the first place. Here are two very interesting links.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab-Israeli_War
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6-Day_War#Conclusion_of_conflict_and_post-war_situation
I’m not saying that it’s ok, there is a reason why they left those places not so long ago, but still there was a reason for this that shouldn’t be forgotten.
I know about the Hamas and Hezbollah’s political action. But it doesn’t remove the fact that they sponsor terrorist attacks on civilians. To go back to my previous comparison, the Nazis had social, cultural and educational activities too. See where I'm going with this? Also there are some interesting home-made videos on youtube.com about what happens during those ‘educational activities’ in Palestine and Lebanon. And even if it's not the case everywhere it's still very disturbing that they're VERY common.
What I heard from Muslims living in those regions is that it’s a minority who controls a population that either doesn’t agree or doesn’t care or doesn't want to be in trouble... I'm not so fond of surveys taken in those regions as it's nearly impossible to know the context in which they were taken.
I am aware of the Iranian president’s situation. About the comment on ‘Washington needing a new Hitler’, let’s say it’s highly unlikely that the Americans ever invade or bomb Iran. They’re already too involved elsewhere. Israel on the other hand, will never allow Iran to have the capacities to build nuclear weapons and will probably strike if there is a need to. (See Operation Sphinx 1978-1981) When the current Iranian president steps down it will be a good riddance and I really hope they choose someone more down-to-earth to replace him.
As for Reagan’s comments, I still believe what was told to me in ‘American History since 1945’ which I took at Laval University and I see nothing in common with Iran's president highly anti-semitic comments.
Have a good day
I agree that the debate has strayed from topic a little bit.
It will thus be continued here:
http://belangervince-writtencom2.blogspot.com/2007/01/first-entry.html
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