Tuesday, September 04, 2007


I had the opportunity today to show two 'individuals' ashamed of being Arabs precisely what I thought of them. One, a senior reporter formerly of the Arabiyah news channel and now in, like the other, the new to be launched BBC Arabic.

I'll give you the juice rather than the lemon. Essentially their argument was that we are in a state of decay. Arabs must accept the fact that a 'West' now holds the lantern for human civilisation and that we must now accept this and play ball. 'We' have no alternative to offer which is better and must therefore accept. 'We' must surrender. 'We' have a victims mentality, ironic in that it was true for the two of them. I enjoyed wrestling them and tossing their flimsy arguments in the air. 'Their' arabs are not a tribe I recognise. 'Their' arabs are addicted to defeat and have surrendered before a struggle, stuck in their past.

Palestine, Iraq, Lebanon...these two 'arabs' cannot see victory there, only defeat, just like their American idols. I assure you I can, so can many others.

6 comments:

Ibn Bint Jbeil said...

all humans who innately recognize their own dignity and sense of liberty, will not allow others to trample on that, and do not want anyone to teach them it. even if at times the circumstances do not allow them to do anything about what is oppressing them, they eventually repel that oppression.

the funny thing is that some who do not care about their own dignity and liberty and are willing to sell that, cannot see how others refuse to be like them.

Maysaloon said...

That is exactly what ended up happening. Their argument in the end boiled down to the fact that dignity and liberty are not worth anything in the face of being poor and faced with somebody allegedly more powerful. Not only that, I was a fool who couldn't see the real world apparently.

Ibn Bint Jbeil said...

the truth is, they don't really care about what's "real world" and what's not. they just care about their pocket and to be given approval by those they look "UP" to.

sasa said...

Iraq and Palestine are humiliating defeats, catastrophies even. But to signal the end of the Arabs? What rubbish.

To believe that, you have to believe this is the end of history, and as a generation, we are more important than all those who came before us, and all those who will follow.

The truth is, we are just a tiny dot on history. Palestine has been occupied for 60 years - even if it continues for another 40 years, it will be forgotten by history.

Yes, our generation has been defeated. But our race? That's a bit arrogant.

Maysaloon said...

Sasa,
I like you very much but it pains me to have to say this. You've just said something completely wrong! Lak where do you see defeat? From Algeria to Palestine to Iraq to Lebanon where do you see the Arabs losing? The Israeli's cannot rest on what they have stolen and live their lives within an American funded fortress. The American army can't find enough mercenaries for the contract companies and they have to hire poor people from South America to fight for them. The soldiers are broken and demoralised, they are fighting for money only and finding it is not enough.

The Palestinians are not broken, they are still struggling and it is still alive. Lak where do you see defeat? The defeat you talk about is for the stooges who have aligned with the Americans. It is they who are failing. If you judge defeat on the type of governments we have then again I just say who are these governments? They don't represent me and I don't need them to be an Arab. There is a post coming on this, but if you have a moment read my 'bread' post earlier. Then tell me if we are defeated. :)

Ibn Bint Jbeil said...

i spoke of an arab crisis in my august 29 post, and wassim, you asked me about it.. but never would i equate a crisis with defeat. i agree with you, that to claim arab defeat is to make a supposition of the situation, and why would we make such a supposition, when we can suppose otherwise and support the proposition of triumph?

when i estimate that the situation is one of crisis, i see it as one of possibilities and open-endedness, with consideration for many of the positive outcomes that we see in many struggles taking place.