WHITHER WANA? Reflections on the Arab Uprisings
schisms and economic stagnation, religious dichotomies and threats to territorial integrity, seem to characterise the aftermath of the Arab uprisings.
What explains this situation?
Analysis
Though it is not possible to compartmentalise the reasons into neat categories, we shall for the sake of our analysis divide them into domestic, regional and non- WANA factors.
Among the pertinent domestic factors would be the attitudes of the ruling elites to the popular uprisings. Mubarak in Egypt, Salleh in Yemen, Al-Khalifa in Bahrain and even Gaddafi in Libya failed in the initial stages to grasp the significance of the uprisings against them and foolishly sought to employ force against the protesters. Bashar AlAssad of Syria was also guilty of adopting the same approach. Though the opposition to him was proportionally smaller, his security forces adopted harsh measures to deal with unarmed demonstrating schoolchildren in Daraa at the beginning of the uprising in March 2011. It revealed an authoritarian ruthlessness which not only steeled the protesters further but also undermined the President’s credibility. If resort to violence ― especially the excessive use of force to quell protesters ― has sullied the image of the ruling elites, their opponents’ eager embrace of arms has also eroded the legitimacy of their struggle. With the exception of the protests in Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain which were largely peaceful, the uprisings in Libya and, to some extent, Yemen quickly turned violent. This violence which in turn breeds inter-factional and intra-factional violence is one of the main reasons why the Arab masses are so disillusioned with the uprisings. Nowhere is this more pronounced than in Syria. The unspeakable violence of some of the rebels, reflected in their cruel barbarity, has convinced a lot of ordinary Syrians that Bashar for all his authoritarianism is preferable to these inhuman “champions of change.”
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