Nothing could be easier in the present atmosphere than to accuse anyone who calls for recognition of and dialogue with Hamas, Hizballah and other Islamist movements of being closet supporters of reactionary "extremism" or naive fellow travelers of "terrorists." This tactic is not surprising coming from neoconservatives and Zionists. What is novel is to see it expressed in supposedly progressive quarters.
Arun Kundnani has written about a "new breed of liberal" whose outlook "regards Muslims as uniquely problematic and in need of forceful integration into what it views as the inherently superior values of the West." The target of these former leftists, Kundnani argues, "is not so much Islamism as the appeasing attitudes they detect among [other] liberals." [1]
Such views are now creeping into the Palestinian solidarity movement.
FULL TEXT: <http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/bustani281007.html> Surmounting Sectarianism in the Middle East: An Interview with Hisham Bustani by As'ad al-Azzouni
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Islamists who see themselves on the side of political clarity must comprehend the impossibility of attaching a liberation program to a subordinate authority structure, and they must decide on their options by removing themselves from a so-called pragmatic approach that enables containment and manipulation by international and regional powers. Islamists must open up internally to other non-religious forces (Marxist and nationalist) and espouse a civil, secular liberation program; and they must learn from the experiences in Lebanon and Iraq, where the religious and sectarian element was the basis for the game of hegemony and the foundation for fragmentation setting people against each other instead of being united against their common enemy.
This is not to say that Islamists are opportunists while secular forces are not. My concentration on Islamists is because they are the only real political force on the Arab scene today. There are two trends in the Islamic movement, one opportunist and the other principled. And the principled Islamists should pay heed, because in the light of this analysis they will be the first to be sacrificed by their opportunist brethren in faith and struggle.
Of course, there are also opportunist leftists (NGO beneficiaries and Marxists-turned-liberals) and xenophobic nationalists (with fascist tendencies against Iranians, Kurds, and Turks), but these phenomena are only trivial, since their currents are too weak to take the streets and challenge existing power.
Overall and as a prime desideratum, there is a huge and pressing imperative today for Left unity, of all its currents: the left of the Islamic movement, the left of the nationalist movement, and the left of the leftist progressive and revolutionary movement, on the basis of a program of resistance, liberation, and political clarity. The opposing Right of all those currents is already united and taking action.
Hisham Bustani is the Secretary of the Socialist Thought Forum in Jordan, and a member of the Coordination Committee of the Resistant Arab People's Alliance. The original Arabic version of this interview is available online at raya.com. The English version, slightly revised, is published here for the first time.
(It is now also available in French: <http://www.ism-france.org/news/article.php?id=7726&type=analyse&lesujet=Interviews>.)
<http://ihsan-net.blogspot.com/2007/10/responding-to-left-liberal-islamophobia.html> Monday, October 29, 2007 Responding to Left-Liberal Islamophobia
There are two recent articles that are worth a critical read because, while from the secularist-left, they both provide a response to left-liberal Islamophobia. Both articles provide a more complex view of Islamic movements, than some of the other outright Islamophobic liberal-leftists.
The first is by Ali Abunimah, titled Engaging Hamas and Hizballah, and the second is an interview of a Jordanian Marxist, Hisham Bustani.
I'll first comment on some of the assertions made by Hisham Bustani and then, in another post later this week, address some of the issues raised by Ali Abunimah. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/>