by Turki Al-Owerde
We hate to be controlled.
Blaming others and shirking responsibility for the chaos in the Middle East is the easiest thing ever and I don’t respect that kind of thinking.
The countries of the Middle East had the last 40 years to take hold of their region, and only five of them would have been enough to force Iran to become a normal state instead of going along with their logic of war and conspiracy.
The cooperation among countries of the region and their agreement on a comprehensive political and economic boycott would have been sufficient to make the Iranian regime accept reality and move away from foreign interference.
Because of centuries of occupation, ignorance and cognitive backwardness, most countries in the region have been ruled by a political class that does not know the ABCs of politics, state administration, or even planning ahead.
Most people in the region suffer from a kind of schizophrenia that starts from losing their identity and then confuses their moral compass as well. Most of them no longer identify themselves only as Arab-Islamic and that’s an essential side of the problem.
Long term occupation was one of the reasons for loss of identity. Even when the peoples of the region threw off direct occupation they were still captured by ideological mindsets of both West and East.
Rather than capitalizing on the immense civilizational legacy of the ancient Arab empire, each country tried to create its own and but only achieved distorted versions of Arab civilization.
Well, of all the peoples of the region only the Arabs escaped occupation for thousands of years. Why is this? Let’s take a look at the concept of susceptibility to occupation or colonization.
With the exception of the Arabs, peoples of the region don’t have enough of a bulwark of cultural entrenchment to be able to resist occupation. Long occupation breaks and distorts the cultural foundations of societies and makes them susceptible to any new ideology or identity.
These peoples need elites and leaders who are broadly aware of this cultural dimension; otherwise, they will continue to sink in the same vortex in every historical cycle.
You’ve surely noticed that I always insist on Islam to solve all of mankind’s issues. It’s because Islam does not steal your identity. It empowers and improves the positive sides that you already have so people become stronger and more stable.
Instead peoples of the region began to invent ideologies – distorted versions of Islam – that are mixed up with local moods. Then they attempt to normalize them by mixing in elements of liberalism and communism.
This has produced several contradictory versions if Islam – Shiism, then Sufism, and then Ikhwanism (AKA MBrotherhood) – as well as leftist and local religious trends. All of these ideologies must be radical in nature and always produce the worst outcomes.
Normally Islam is supposed to produce a positive competition among peoples, but because of these distorted versions of Islam the competition is only about imposing and expanding local versions on others.
The West and East have nothing to do with the foundations of conflict in the Middle East. They are purely local cultural causes, and these contradictory local ideologies of course must leave a vacuum that can attract foreign powers.
Foreign intervention can not be positive because human nature will always resist being imposed upon from the outside. We hate to be controlled.
Remember that the peoples of the Middle East never resisted the first Arab-Islamic influence, but welcomed it, regardless of what happened later. They converted to Islam peacefully because it was naturally constructive.
Everyone observes that there’s a positive competition among the Arabs (Saudi Arabia and UAE). In general they’re more stable and consistent with the international order and are making accelerated impressive efforts in projects of education, technology and development.
The peoples of the region today should respect and benefit from Arabian success and cooperate with the Saudi-UAE model instead of wasting their capabilities and wealth in endless warring conflicts.
Unfortunately the small emirate of Qatar has been tricked by Iran, Turkey and Ikhwanism (MBrotherhood). It believed it could take over Saudi Arabia, and is still wasting wealth on fueling conflicts with help from the West and Israel.
This happened because of rejection of the natural and stable Saudi leadership in the region.
Turki al-Owerde is an independent Political Analyst and Commentator from Saudi Arabia. He tweets under@Turki_AlOwerde.
Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not reflect Milli Chronicle’s point-of-view.
