Orientalism "Left" and Right in American Discourse

Sabaa Bahrat Square in Damascus, Syria.

The following below is an addendum to and expansion of the second paragraph of the previous blog entry, "Geopolitical Context Matters pt. 2 - Slouching Towards Syria".

Generally speaking, the West -- but especially America -- is a bastion of ignorance when it comes to the Arab and Muslim world, with two extremes: the right-wing who see Islam as a race (rather than a religion) and a civilizational threat and equate all Muslims with Osama bin Laden. While the liberals and the 'left' also see Islam as a race and think that Wahhabism is just a mere expression of victimhood. Contrary to a popular narrative that is uncritically accepted by Western liberals and leftists, Wahhabism is not an expression of victimhood. Sunni Muslims are also not inherently or naturally predisposed to such an ideology. While racism, xenophobia, and anti-immigrant sentiment is rife with far-right circles who take a racially-charged approach and think it’s a globalist conspiracy to “undermine [their] way of life”, "progressives" look at the Global South with a kind of condescending admiration as they welcome refugees but continue to cheer on the U.S.-led wars that create them in the first place. With regards to Syria, Western "progressives" will, for example, habitually defend Wahhabism and Saudi Arabia in the name of "multicultural", pink imperialism (while the right wants a white supremacist imperialism), as well as allying with Al Qaeda in Syria and loudly cheering on the so-called "Syrian revolution". In either case, both left and right fail to understand the function of Al Qaeda. These Western "progressives" also uncritically parrot the libelous caricatures found in imperialist propaganda which paint secular, leftist, anti-imperialist resistance Arab leaders -- such as Gamal Abdel Nasser, Muammar Gaddafi, Hafez al Assad, and Bashar al Assad -- as cartoonish "bloodthirsty third world dictators" that Muslims need to be "saved" from. Nevermind the fact that those caricatures -- as well as the anti-Muslim caricatures made by the right-wing -- are actually more accurately descriptive of the NATO-backed despotic monarchs who lead vassal states and serve as stewards for Wall Street profits, such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Jordan; they rarely if ever receive the same amount of scrutiny in Western media that the aforementioned progressive Arab leaders have.

If there is a belief held in common between the two liberal and conservative extremes in American Orientalist discourse is that they both see Wahhabists as 'true' representatives of Muslims (or Sunni Muslims), as if all Sunnis are naturally predisposed to near-genocidal hatred of Shia Muslims. It is true that Wahhabism is a threat, but not against Western civilization; more accurately, it is a threat to [secular] Arab nationalist resistance (a.k.a. Pan-Arabism) and there is a long history of the United States and other Western powers in collaborating with Wahhabists (and/or Salafists) to undermine and crush Arab nationalist resistance against imperialism. Not to mention, both left and right extremes fail to take into account that the primary victims of terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda are in fact other Muslims, especially Shia Muslims, but also Sunni Muslims who do not fit the Sunni chauvinist trope that is typically expected of them in Gulf and Western media. Such terrorists groups are also more of a threat to secular leftist governments of Muslim majority countries. And so, it is indeed quite astonishing to be accused of being "Islamophobic" for supporting Syria -- a Muslim-majority country led by a Muslim President (yes, Alawites are Muslims, a Shia sect to be specific; and no, they are not leading an anti-Sunni conspiracy as Gulf propaganda will have you believe). Even more astonishing is the accusation of "toxic masculinity" levelled at the Ba'ath Arab Socialist Party in Syria, who have fought for and protected Syrian women's rights for many years as it is one of the Ba'ath pillars; and yet, that accusation is not applied to the literal misogynists of the NATO-backed terrorist groups (so-called "moderate rebels" who are largely made up of foreign forces) who, inside of "rebel"-held territory, prevent girls from going to school, force women and girls to wear burkhas (which even women who wear hijabs still find to be extreme), carried out mass rapes, and have facilitated sex trafficking. But again, that has a lot to do with the pseudo-left's pathological fear of anything that reeks of strength (in this case, it is the Syrian Arab Republic who are defending themselves against imperialism); and in the context of Orientalism, we see yet another case of Western "progressives" being out of touch with geopolitics.

When we discuss subjects as they relate to Muslim majority countries, we as Marxists do it through a scientific analysis which takes into account geopolitics, economics, and class. More importantly, this also includes dialectical and historical materialism, which seeks to explain, situate, and shed light on the conditions under which historical events happen. The scientific approach is what differentiates our discussions of such topics from that of conservatives and liberals. Conservatives typically approach the subject from a xenophobic and racist standpoint, while liberals do it through the lens of identity politics; in either case, both perspectives are anti-scientific and are products of the “culture wars” within the imperialist countries which ultimately centres and upholds the West as a template for their analysis of world affairs. Both perspectives fail to grasp the very complex history and geopolitics of the Muslim and Arab world; not only that, but neither side is willing to acknowledge the role that U.S. imperialism has played in shaping the present-day conflicts. In either case, both sides only see brown people who supposedly who can't wait to leave their countries for the “culturally superior” West. In the same way that the right’s gut feelings of racialist contempt will overrule any rational conversation, the liberals’ identity politics-driven ‘need’ to prove how “multicultural” and “inclusive” they are will overrule any rational conversation to the point where they will go as far as to defend Saudi Arabia and the several U.S.-backed terrorist groups who are working to destabilize Central and West Asia (again, their primary victims are Muslims inside of Muslim-majority countries).

Wahhabist and Salafist insurgencies are typically led by the wealthy landlord classes. And in countries such as Afghanistan (PDPA era), Syria, and Libya (under Gaddafi) which saw the rise of leftist, progressive, anti-imperialist, and secular governments who sought to modernize and lift people out of poverty, many of these ousted landlords -- many of whom would go on to live in exile -- were bitter because they had their private property and land confiscated, nationalized, and redistributed; they also eschewed all modernizing efforts. Hence the acts of violence, sabotage, and collaboration with imperialist powers and their compradors. Of course, it is true that such groups can prey upon, exploit, and recruit (and essentially use cult-like brainwashing) the less- or uneducated poor people from third world countries, as Saudi Wahhabi missionaries had often done to many of Saudi Arabia's migrant “guest” labourers who come from poorer countries. But that does not change the fact that the wealthy landlord classes were at the forefront, with the U.S. “pulling the strings” from “behind the scenes”, figuratively speaking. Plus, the leaders or representatives of these insurgencies have a lot more in common with the Gusanos who fled Cuba and live in exile in Miami, Florida. Therefore, from a principled anti-imperialist basis, it does indeed matter which Muslims you should be supporting. Simply and blindly throwing support to any group of Muslims just because they are Muslim, and only by virtue of them being Muslim, is not Marxist or anti-imperialist, it is doing identity politics. And as well-intentioned as it may be, it also does nothing but feed into and fan the flames of right-wing hardline reactionaries. By defending or excusing Wahhabists, one might as well be insinuating that all Sunni Muslims are Wahhabists, which essentially (albeit unintentionally) reaffirms American right-wing pundits' racial prejudices towards Muslims as a whole. 

Let us be clear here: not all Muslims are terrorists, and most do in fact reject Wahhabism and Salafism; there is a rich history of resistance to such ideologies. Again, refer to Nasserist Egypt, Ba'athist Iraq, Libya under Gaddafi, PDPA-era Afghanistan, and Syria to this day. Najibullah himself was a Muslim (he was Sunni), as were many members of the secular PDPA; Gaddafi, Nasser, and the Assads were/are Muslim leaders too who led secular nations and most certainly did not fit the Sunni chauvinist mold as the royals of the British-created Saudi Arabia have (although the Assads are Alawite, but that is beside the point). However, it is fair to say that Wahhabism and Salafism are terrorist ideologies, which are fundamentalist and sectarian in nature. A criticism of Wahhabism is not an attack on Muslims, just as criticisms of Zionism are not attacks on Jewish people, nor are criticisms of white supremacy attacks on Christians.