Democracy & Hypocrisy in Libya
by TRNN
In Libya as we speak, European and
American planes are pounding Libyan air defenses. Dozens of people have
been killed. And Libyan leader Gaddafi says [inaudible] will be a
protracted struggle. He says the Libyans will win: our country belongs
to us and not to you. Now joining us from New York is Hamid Dabashi.
Born on June 15,1951 into a
working class family in the south-western city of Ahvaz in the Khuzestan
province of Iran, Hamid Dabashi received his early education in his
hometown and his college education in Tehran, before he moved to the
United States, where he received a dual Ph.D. in Sociology of Culture
and Islamic Studies from the University of Pennsylvania in 1984,
followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University. He wrote
his doctoral dissertation on Max Weber's theory of charismatic authority
with Philip Rieff (1922-2006), the most distinguished Freudian cultural
critic of his time. He is currently the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of
Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in New
York, the oldest and most prestigious Chair in his field. He has also
taught and delivered lectures in many North American, European, Arab and
Iranian universities. His books include Close Up: Iranian Cinema, Past,
Present, Future (2001), Iran: A People Interrupted (2007), and The
Green Movement and the USA: The Fox and the Paradox (2010).
PAUL JAY: Welcome to
The Real News Network. I'm Paul Jay. In Libya as we speak, European and
American planes are pounding Libyan air defenses. Dozens of people have
been killed. And Libyan leader Gaddafi says [inaudible] will be a
protracted struggle. He says the Libyans will win: our country belongs
to us and not to you. Now joining us from New York is Hamid Dabashi.
Thanks for joining us, Hamid. HAMID DABASHI: Thanks, Paul. Thanks for having me.
JAY:
So, Hamid, you have been studying the Libyan situation for years, and
you've written about the Iranian situation. You teach at Columbia. So,
first of all, what's your take on what's happening as we speak?
DABASHI:
Well, there are two takes. One is to take everything on face value that
United States and its European allies are in this to protect the
civilians and establish a no-fly zone. But we, given the history of
United States and its European allies, have every reason to doubt that
this indeed is the agenda. What has happened is--and for this
difficulty, Muammar al-Gaddafi himself is the principal culprit--a
peaceful, by-and-large peaceful revolutionary uprising in North Africa
that has come to conclusion, perfect conclusion, peaceful conclusion in
Tunisia and in Egypt, has been bloodied. And what we are witnessing
today in the aftermath of this military operation by US and its European
allies is further bloodying of a peaceful revolutionary uprising. In
other words, what Muammar al-Gaddafi has done, the last and lasting
contribution of Muammar al-Gaddafi to these revolutionary uprising, is
to give United States and European allies a military foothold in the
revolutionary uprising in North Africa.
I see the events in Libya, the
military operation on the eighth anniversary of US-led invasion of Iraq,
in tandem with Secretary of State Clinton telling in effect the
Egyptians that you had a peaceful revolution because of your military,
and your military is our military, and then going to Tunisia to tell the
Tunisians that she's there to help them. In other words, what the US
and its European allies are doing are trying to use and abuse the
criminal atrocities of Gaddafi to get a foothold, diplomatic and
military foothold, in the peaceful revolutionary uprising that we are
witnessing in North Africa.
JAY: The rebellion, the people
in Benghazi, they were asking for this. And they would say to you, I
presume, that our revolutionary movement was about to be demolished, and
Gaddafi was about to attack the city of Benghazi, and there was no
other choice to defend Benghazi, 'cause they were overwhelmed by
Gaddafi's armaments. What do you say to them? Even though they would
agree with you, I would assume, most of them, that the intent or
motivation of the Europeans and Americans is their own agenda, they
would say, we had no choice but to somehow make use of that.
DABASHI:
Listen, Paul, as progressives, we have to come to [inaudible]
understanding that opposition to the US military operation does not mean
you don't have an absolute and unconditional support and solidarity
with Libyans. Libyans began in solidarity with their Tunisian and
Egyptian fellow Arabs, a very peaceful demonstration for change in their
country. It is--the principal culprit and criminal here is Muammar
al-Gaddafi, who bloodied their uprisings and forced them into violence.
But we have to have a larger frame of reference when it comes to
assessment of United States intentions in the context. As I told you on a
previous occasion, United States and European allies had already
intervened in the battle between Muammar al-Gaddafi and Libyan people on
the side of Gaddafi, by arming Gaddafi to his teeth, both United
Kingdom and United States. Also, professors from Harvard University to
Princeton to Johns Hopkins, etc., were on the payroll of Muammar
al-Gaddafi to whitewash his criminal atrocities and present him as
something pleasant and acceptable. These are the contexts. So, suddenly,
from the same political culture, from the same military culture, you
cannot expect a situation that they are going on with shining armor to
defend the civilians. The Libyan television already is reporting
civilian casualties. However you discount because they are not reliable,
the fact of the matter is that United States and its European allies do
not have a reliable record of avoiding civilian casualties in
Afghanistan, in Pakistan, or in Iraq. So all my solidarity,
unconditional solidarity, and the solidarity of all people who are in
support of these revolutionary uprisings must be and is with Libyan
people. And the criticism of this military intervention, it doesn't mean
that you're letting Gaddafi off the hook or you are abandoning your
solidarity with the revolutionary uprising in Libya.
JAY: The rebellion in Benghazi would say if there hadn't been this intervention they would have been slaughtered.DABASHI:
And they are probably correct. And as a result, the international
community--the real international community, not the cockamamie in
United Nations--must hold United States and European allies responsible.
US military chief Admiral Mike Mullen is on the record for having said
that a no-flight zone is now effectively in place. If that is the case,
then the military operation has to cease. In other words, we have no
control over the military agenda of United States and its European
allies. No control. We have to hold them responsible for civilian
casualties, and we have to hold them responsible for restoring a civic
situation in which Libyan people can demonstrate peacefully and achieve
their democratic revolutionary ends.JAY: Isn't that part
of what's wrong with the UN resolution is that there's actually no
process or mechanism for any accountability? The resolution is clearly
not for regime change and only for the protection of civilians, which
also means that these European-American forces aren't supposed to be
killing civilians.DABASHI: No, I completely agree with you
that the wording of the UN resolution is very vague and is subject to
all sorts of interpretation. And as Secretary Clinton and others have
said, they can interpret it any way they want, I mean, short of soldiers
on Libyan ground. But what does that mean in 21st century military
operations?JAY: We interviewed an international law
professor. He says the resolution actually doesn't mean no boots on the
ground. The wording is "no occupation". But that doesn't mean there
couldn't be boots on the ground with the promise to get out at some
point.DABASHI: Exactly. So what it means for Libyan people
is to allow them to go back to ground zero, which was a peaceful
demonstration. The more these uprisings become bloody, the harder will
be the transition to a peaceful, democratic institution in the aftermath
of Muammar al-Gaddafi and Saif al-Islam Gaddafi pack their belonging,
go to Caracas, or go and collect their money that they gave to Sarkozy
for his campaign. We have to keep in mind, Paul, the larger picture. The
larger picture is the uprising of people in North Africa and the Middle
East for a transition into a democratic condition. And United States
does not--or its European allies--does not have a record of having aided
and abetted in any such democratic aspirations. And also, the giveaway
is when the US and its European allies insist that we are doing this
with our Arab allies. Which Arab allies, exactly? Arab allies from
Morocco to Yemen are shaking in their boots, because they are the
principal culprits. And when [inaudible] Saudi Arabia is also one of
this Arab allies. Saudi Arabia is now cracking down precisely similar
democratic aspirations. How could the same Saudi Arabia or any other US
allies be a partner [inaudible] to this operation, in terms of helping
Libyans restore democracy in their homeland?JAY: I've
never seen such an array of allies or people that agree with bringing
down Gaddafi. It ranges everywhere from al-Qaeda to Cameron in the UK to
Hezbollah to Obama. I mean, the range of people that want Gaddafi to
come down, I have to say, personally, as much as I don't like Gaddafi,
it's almost enough to make you want to defend the guy. But all that
being said, what is the issue now? That these forces should cease their
attack, and there needs to be some kind of promotion of some kind of
negotiated solution? Because it looks like they really do--certainly the
Europeans and certainly the French want to turn this into regime
change.
DABASHI: They are, but that's wrong. The only
people entitled to regime change are Libyan people. Libyan people have
to be allowed the democratic possibility of peaceful demonstration,
peaceful reconvening of their constitution. They are perfectly capable
of achieving that. What we are witnessing is militarization of US
involvement and European allies in the Libyan affairs, which pushes the
Libyan revolution towards far more radical, and perhaps even Islamist.
This is the scenario that United States and its European allies love to
see, business as usual, whereas what we are witnessing in North Africa
and the Middle East is in fact an end to that discourse, the beginning
of a new discourse towards democratic liberation. They want to have--to
restore it back that it's either us liberating you the way we liberated
Iraq and Afghanistan, or it's the Islamist and radical, any other
militant option.JAY: What do you make of the role of Qatar and Al Jazeera?DABASHI:
Al Jazeera never talks about that. The fact is that Al Jazeera is in
the middle of all of this mess, but we never ever hear anything about
Qatar or about Doha or about military bases of United States in the
Persian Gulf or anything of that sort.
JAY: The emir
was--certainly was part of the Arab League and signed on to the military
intervention. I personally have found, even though we've been running a
lot of the Al Jazeera coverage, which in whole has been very good in
terms of capturing things during the whole uprising in the Middle East,
they've been very gung-ho about this intervention.
DABASHI:
Well, there are many problems with Al Jazeera, as there are problems
with any other news organization--except Real News Network, of course.
And the reason for that is that they are in a business, so some sort of a
business that they have to sell their news and be in operation. I'm not
categorically trusting them or categorically distrusting them. They
have also been very sectarian in their coverage of issues in Bahrain,
and also in Iran. They have not been as supportive of the Iranian
uprising or the Bahraini uprising. They play the sectarian card, which
is very, very troubling to me. But nevertheless, when you put them next
to BBC and CNN and New York Times and Le Monde and etc., you will have multiple lenses through which to see better.
JAY: Thanks very much for joining us, Hamid.DABASHI: Thanks, Paul. Anytime.JAY: And thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
End of TranscriptDISCLAIMER:
Please note that transcripts for The Real News Network are typed from a
recording of the program. TRNN cannot guarantee their complete
accuracy.
|
