North-Press Agency
Hussein Jemmo
One of the modern and necessary myths in politics is the formulation of an ideology that adopts the discourse of “unity”. This word resonates throughout this region. It is used by states, peoples, and intelligence agencies, each according to their own purposes, but the statement itself – as is clear from the categories coiled around it – works effectively.
In the Arab world, this phrase, “the unity of the Arabs” was used not only by ideological parties of this kind, but rather the diligence in analyzing and saying that the intelligence services, whether Arab or Israeli, were also promoting the idea that “the unity of the Arabs” alone would guarantee the liberation of Palestine. This is a seriously negotiable idea, to keep the idea of liberation out of the reach of a large segment that believes that the only way to achieve this is the unity of the Arabs. That is, the phrase itself could be transformed into an excuse to keep the situation as it is “without liberation.” Rather, it came down to the fact that some Arab countries within the so-called “Ring Countries” (a term given by President Jamal Abdel Nasser in the 1960s to the Arab countries that surround Palestine, namely Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt) developed a special form of the unity discourse in order to justify what it implicitly considers to be a failure to fulfill their duty, and to repeat phrases such as “Arabs do not listen to our calls for unity.”
As for the Kurds, it is more romantic, where the ideologization of political unity among Arabs has an offensive character intent on annexing an occupied region. This was not the case with the Kurds until a few years ago, because everything that is theirs is under occupation. There is nothing outside the occupation except holding weapons against it. On this basis, a Kurdish discourse emerged, which politically believes in predestination, that is “the unity of the Kurds”, and with popular words which resonate in dozens of songs, as the Kurds must abandon division and unify, and only then the enemy will surrender.
Within this circle of fatalistic perceptions, a broad ideology was built that would bury any analytical attempt of the past and present of the Kurds, as fatalistic vision ignores all other aspects in the course of Kurdish politics since the early days of the national struggle in the 19th century.
The romance of unity remains active as an emotional motive for mobilizing popular support for partisan ideas. It went like this throughout the 20th century, but with the stormy global transformations of the current century, the discourse of unity no longer enjoys the romance it had, and it is no longer the case that the enemy will automatically collapse once the Kurds unite, but rather preserving the partisan reality becomes more explicit as it is, without that form of unity in the minds of the people, who, despite their frequent repetition of it, do not pay any attention – at all – to who will be the leader of this imaginary unit. There are, of course, partial partisan answers to this question, but the largest non-partisan segment does not really ask who will achieve this. It is like entering paradise.
The fact is that neglecting the discourse of unity, uniting the people, and other general mobilizing phrases may open the door for betrayal, without embarrassment. In other words, underestimating the unity discourse may be an entrance for some political groups to work with the enemy. But at the same time, exaggerating the position of unity discourse also provides a safe cover for betrayal, given that the factions calling for unity are naively willing to forgive all the betrayer’s sins and view the one in them as “the day his mother gave birth” as betrayal accusations according to the perceptions of this category impede unity.
This narrative, which is boring and confused at the same time, has reached the point where it can be said boldly that in both cases, in the case of unity and in the case of division, the options are the same. They do not change, and the proof is that in both cases the betrayer moves comfortably and without embarrassment. So, is there any justification for contributing to the transformation of “class unity” into a political project?
In order not to misunderstand the question, as if the content of it is to oppose the unity of the Kurdish class, another narrative can be presented: What makes the existing Kurdish rivalry a unique and distinctive case? The reality is that there is nothing unique or distinctive in it, nor in the history of the accomplished world, the world that produced sovereign and recognized countries in the United Nations, all these countries, without exception, were not founded on the unity of their peoples. It is perhaps not correct – for security reasons – to say that studying the history of the formation of states gives a very different result to the prevailing discourse. Civil wars and armed partisan wars are the ones that played the role of the midwife supervising the birth of the states, i.e. there was division, then a certain party decisively settled the division, and without this settlement, the problem was exacerbated and this people fell under occupation, whether with an external scheme or not. This was the case of the tribal Kurdish emirates until their collapse in the mid-19th century.
The examples of the resolution by one party over another are all similar, the closest of which geographically and popularly is Turkey. Would the Turkish Republic have existed without the defeat of Farid Pasha by Mustafa Kemal? This question is an occasion to recall a historical summary. As an entry point for evading the promises granted to the Kurds, Britain’s representatives intensified reminding the Kurdish leaders of the dilemma of “defection and non-defection between the Kurds”, that is just an excuse. Despite the differences, Kurdish leaders were actually more unified when compared to the Turkish leaders that were engaged in a grinding internal war between their different wings.
The previous examples and models are a summary of the experiences of nations and peoples in politics, not a circumventing call to justify Kurdish infighting and push a party to crush its opponent, but rather to refute the fatalism that links liberation, liberalization, and achieving the impossible with the “unity of the Kurds.” At the partisan level, not the popular one, the unity of the Kurds is assumed not to be a political project, but an achieved automatic reality. The sign of unity is not turning into a recruiting agent within the ranks of the occupying enemy. As for considering that Kurdish unity is presented in the romantic form, a tool to stop the wheel of treachery committed under the pretense of national purity, those who watched the occupation of Afrin, Serekaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Tel Abyad, while they were happy as partisan, despite their popularly schizophrenic dissociation, this issue is not diminishing throughout history. Rather, the failure of the leadership to find a way out even with the presence of mercenaries and occupiers, is the major dilemma in the history of the Kurds.
Despite this, this does not mean that all aspects of “the unity of the Kurds” are subject to criticism and correction as a political project. Rather, such a project that is currently proposed in northeastern Syria could be a tool for another purpose, which is moving the course of internal politics and preventing the death of politics. This is in the interest of all, without exception, even in the interest of the external parties represented by the Global Coalition.