Sarbast Nabi
Throughout history, we do not find an ideology more justified than the Baath’s in terms of justifying the rise of the two most barbaric regimes in history and their domination over two societies, in addition to their tyranny on the fate of millions of people for half a century. Despite this, the Arab and Islamist opposition in Syria and Iraq are still inspired by the Baath approach and its discourse most of the time in terms of political practices and positions.
So far, the Syrian opposition, which is leading the revolution against tyranny and slavery, has not undertaken a critical review of this ideological approach. Otherwise, it is trying to acquit the Baath Party from the regime and its tyrannical practices, whether in Syria or Iraq, and modestly suggests the validity of its discourse for the future of these two countries. The sectarian (Shiite) opposition in Iraq acquitted the Baath after it considered that tyranny as the product of the domination of a Sunni sect, while the sectarian (Sunni) opposition in Syria acquits the Baath’s ideology from the tyranny of the regime considering it as just an Alawi sectarian tyranny. The ideology of the Baath is the greatest insult to human culture, and it is no less degenerate than Nazism. Rather, it is a product of the deformation of a fleeting pleasure relationship between Nazism and Leninism.
Returning to the Baath’s ideology, which some describe as secular, we notice then a vertical and horizontal division between two patterns, the Syrian pattern (which was described as a leftist) and inspired the esoteric discourse of Zaki al-Arsouzi, the most backward and reactionary, and even foolish of its counterpart (the Iraqi pattern). While the latter was considered “rightist” and in turn, was inspired by the views and ideas of the “Circassian-Turkman” Sat’i al-Husri, and was also theorized by the Christian Muslim, Michel Aflaq.
In his youth, al-Husri was a member of the Young Turks Movement before he became a theoretician of Arabism, inventing a lineage for himself which extended to the Arabs of Yemen. When he was appointed as head of the Education (known as Dar al-Ma’aref at the time), in Baghdad, he destroyed many Abbasid monuments as he considered them the heritage of the Shu’ubiyya (A response by non-Arab Muslims to the privileged status of Arabs within the Ummah).
Al-Husri was an extremist Sunni despite the rational, worn-out aspect of his speech that he inspired from Ataturk. In any case, this is the naked secularism of the Baath if some want to understand it, and this is the dilemma of Arabism, which I lament for now. A dilemma that is not with the Arabs, but with the Arabists who bid on the peoples of the region, such as al-Husri, Khaled Bakdash and Muhammad Kurd Ali, the colorful knights of Arabism who enthusiastically participated in raising the slogan of “the world of Arabism” and ” Syria’s Arab”. Those people inherited these ideological delusions to the country and the people, despite their non-Arab origins, and herein lies the paradox.
But was the Baath a secular party in its theory and political practices? How can a party be secular while at the same time, it justifies the most brutal and racist practices of tyranny?
Certainly, there is no way to democracy without secularism and vice versa. There is no true secularism without democracy, and this explains the failure of Ataturk’s undemocratic secularism, and explains Erdogan’s ambiguous, non-secular democracy. Anyone who boasts that the Baath was or could be secular, reveals a terrible ignorance of the secular philosophy.
It is well known that the secular thought that calls for the positive neutralization of religion from political practice is not satisfied with this only. Secularism firmly demands that politics be stripped of all narrative and totalitarian systems, not only metaphysical, but even “worldly” as well. That is why the secularism of the communist and Nazi regimes is ambiguous to a large extent, as it involves in salvific and totalitarian structures that are not different from any other religion. By going back to the Baath ideology, we do not find any difference between those who say “the nation carries the eternal message” and the non-historical nation that transcends time and place, and those who believe that the message of Islam is eternal and that this religion is valid for every time and place. Both narrative doctrines contain a metaphysical and salvific faith that cannot be doubted.
In its simplest definition, secularism is the philosophy of worldly authority which legitimizes its existence not according to a belief or any hypothetical narrative, but based on the recognition of the sovereignty of free selves that create their history without any ideological commandments, whether heavenly or worldly, and the recognition of the legitimacy of those selves and their equality, regardless of the nature of their faith or religious conscience. This philosophy contradicts any deviation of power or an effort to occupy the public sphere and imprint it with the religious or cultural character of any ethnic or religious majority, as the Syrian Islamic opposition wishes to do.
From the beginning, this Syrian opposition justified its hostility to secularism and political modernity with bravado and the claim that the tyrannical regimes in the Arab world, including the Baath, were secular. In this way, they were practicing deliberate deception to disavow the true entitlements of democracy.
On the other hand, it promoted the conviction that a true democratic regime can be found in the modern era, which is not secular. It preached real equality among citizens without a secular system, especially in a society that includes sectarian and religious pluralism, such as the Syrian or Iraqi society, where there is no way to real democracy without secularizing the political system, and here lied the main dilemma of its political mind.
This separation between democracy and secularism reveals a blatant political and social paradox in these two societies (Syrian and Iraqi) between the call for a “non-democratic secularism” which the minority usually calls for and impersonates on one hand, and a “non-secular democracy” which the sectarian majority loudly declares and excites on the second hand. This raises our deep suspicion of the ideological and political claims on both sides. Whereas Arab Sunnis constitute the dominant sectarian majority in Syria, they are advocates of the “non-secular democracy”, while in Iraq they are enthusiastic advocates of “non-democratic secularism” as a sectarian minority. This reveals an explicit political pragmatism in the discourse of the Arab sectarian mind, as there is no religious doctrine more or less democratic or secular than others. This applies to the Shiites of Iraq and the Alawites of power in Syria, where they exchange political roles along the same lines here and there. The power of Alawites in Syria, who are a minority, are advocates of secularism, as they appear, but their awareness of secularism is based on the rejection of democracy. While the Shiites, who are the majority in Iraq, emerge as enthusiastic advocates for the democracy of the majority, which is a non-secular democracy, and vice versa, regarding the position of the Arab Sunnis who form a majority in Syria and a minority in Iraq.
Both are two sides of the same coin, and both stem from a sectarian consciousness that separates between secularism and democracy. However, one does not exist without the other. Hence the conviction that it is necessary to emphasize the dialectical relationship between the two concepts without separation or selectivity, emerges.
This paradox is blatantly exemplified by the double standards of pluralism, democracy and selectivity in the discourse of the Islamic opposition. When talking about sectarian and religious pluralism in Syria, the saying is repeated that the majority in Syria is of a specific sect and religion. In this case, they also count the Kurds within that majority in the face of a minority of Christians and other sects. On the other hand, when talking about national pluralism, they seek the help of Christians and other sects to emphasize an Arab majority in the face of the Kurds, as a numerical minority, and to prove the necessity of the Arabism of Syria. In both cases, political and epistemological suspicions arise in the Islamists’ democracy and their discourse on pluralism and civilization.
The Islamist opposition in Syria is not yet ready to give up its self-awareness about its existence as representing the majority, and thus the most deserving and worthy to rule Syria and dominate it. This is what appears to us, at least now, and is disclosed by the mouthpiece of its political elite, and even the liberals among them, who, in many cases, are unable to appreciate the collective self and look at it outside this horizon.
Objectively speaking, this claim will not lead to any pluralistic transformation or possible democratic change in Syria. Hence, the hostile of this opposition to the regime of Bashar al-Assad and his father can be seen only from this position, which aims only to overthrow the regime’s head while preserving the entire administrative structure of the regime and its ideological discourse, which the father dictator had prepared and shaped to gain the Sunnis in the previous era, such as the identity of the Arab state and considering Islamic law as one of its main sources. This form of opposition to the regime acquired a sectarian character from the beginning, based on hatred and the principle that the domination and sovereignty (the usurped authority) was usurped and seized from the Arab Sunnis and confiscated by another sect unworthy of it, so it must be regained and taken over again.
Since the beginning of the Syrian uprising, the Syrian opposition raised the slogan “Assadist terrorism is the only in Syria” and sought to impose it on public opinion with the aim of misleading people about the sectarian counter-terrorism that was practiced by jihadist groups and extremists who infiltrated the Syrian revolution until they finally dominated it.
We all remember that such theses came in an atmosphere accompanied by political orgy against reason and rationality, a fascist blackmail by some, an escalation against the left, secularists and liberals, and against everyone who opposed the discourse of the Islamic opposition. It was against all who were calling for caution against descending into the dilemma of the culture of hatred and sectarian warfare, which the regime wanted from the beginning to be a feature and character of the Syrian uprising. There was an intellectual and political terror by the opposition and an open and suspicious plagiarism of the blood of the victims. There was intellectual and political terror by the new mobs of politics, who were mere agents and informants of the authoritarian regime until recently. They wanted to purify themselves and remove their dirt by attacking the left, the democrats and all the enlightened ones. This was a prelude to the coup against all the revolution’s values of freedom, equality and democracy, not just the values of the Syrian revolution.
In harmony with this irrational climate which prevailed, a number of the Syrian culture and the opposition figures, who we thought were enlightened at that time, revealed a narrow horizon and fanaticism that is only befitting of a Jewish extremist obsessed with the Sabbath. Their true emotions and convincing feelings exposed them in broad terms of rationality and tolerance. The odors of unbearable sectarianism from their words smelt strongly and are still smelling, the ember of sectarian hatred and revenge under their tongues predicted that the Syrian revolution was entering recklessly into the era of the civil war. Religious and sectarian hatred was the shroud of the real revolutions, and revenge was its coffin. The Syrian opposition mastered its role in being the grave digger of the historical uprising. In this position, it was the partner of the regime and shared the responsibility for all the tragedies that have befallen the Syrians so far.