The generation that came before me lost three-quarters of Palestine, and then my generation came to liberate the land but ended up losing the remainder of it. I have lived to see the nation descend down the abyss of oblivion with a steady pace, and decided that the Arabs, who were ‘the best of the nations raised up for (the benefit of) men', are in a state of clinical death, or that they are already dead, and all that is left is to hold a procession. However, the nation has suddenly risen from the ashes of defeat, like the phoenix, and I found myself witnessing a historic era that is very rare, and that only takes place once every couple of decades or centuries. Does the Arab situation today resemble any other situation that came to pass in our lifetimes, or that history books had taught us about? I will try to answer this question. But before that, I would like to note down that a given revolution is usually motivated by a resounding military defeat, or economic collapse, or even a military coup or famine that follows drought. However, the Arabs had lost every war since 1948, and the majority of Arabs live on two dollars per day each, with the exception of oil-producing countries, but credit in their case is to God not governments. Why did the angry uprisings take place now, and not one, ten or twenty years ago, so long as all the factors of the present revolution had been in existence over the last decades? I believe that dignity, not sustenance, has awakened the nation from the deep slumber that resembles that of the people of the cave, and then I compare this with other revolutions. I read comparisons with the Iranian Revolution of 1979, but the claim here that the Shah was another pharaoh, or that Hosni Mubarak was both a pharaoh and a shah, is just rhetorical. The Iranian Revolution, for one, was instigated by religious groups, and ended with the Shah fleeing on 11/2/1979, after the army turned against him. The Islamic Republic was thus declared on April 1 of the same year. In Tunisia and Egypt, Islamic groups did not play any role in either revolution, although they are indeed attempting to ride the wave, and may hog a larger share of spoils in the end, at the expense of the angry youths. Do the Arab revolutions today resemble the student revolts in the West in 1968? Again, I do not believe there is a major resemblance. Although the student revolt bore the name of the French one, history books tell us that 400 thousand Americans had demonstrated in New York a year earlier to protest the Vietnam War, and were followed by protests in London for the same cause. They twice attempted to storm the U.S. Embassy, and this is before French students revolted, threatening their standing leaders. However, the issue that motivated the student revolts was the Vietnam War, not the bid to overthrow the regime. Nor do I find great resemblance between the Arab uprisings and the revolutions that swept communist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe. This is because the causes of these revolutions were already present in all the countries of the socialist bloc, since the end of the World War II. The Hungarians thus tried and fail, and so did the Czechs and the Germans. But then the USSR collapsed, and the Europeans escaped their great prison. History tells us that the current Arab uprisings are very similar to the 1848 revolutions that swept Europe, with similar political and social dynamics. While the Arab uprisings have succeeded in ousting two presidents…so far, the 1848 revolutions ousted one major leader who was Chancellor Metternich. Metternich escaped in disguise to Britain, when students and workers stormed the Imperial Palace in Vienna on 13/03/1848, which brings to mind Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's flight from his country. But the Arab revolutionary rebirth is not yet completed, and I hope that it will have better results than what we read about the achievements of the revolts in Europe in 1848, where little had changed in the socio-political order despite uprisings by various peoples, including Germans, Poles, Hungarians, Italians and others. Those revolutions brought Louis Napoleon into the limelight. He was elected president of the French Republic towards the end of 1848, following a workers' uprising that ended with thousands dead. After he was reelected in 1851, he took advantage of the anniversary of the Battle of Austerlitz to carry out a coup against the Republic, and became the ruler of a new French empire and was known as Napoleon III, from 1852 to 1870, until he was defeated by Chancellor Bismarck. He then fled to Britain in disguise. Britain was spared by these revolutions that year, owing to the Reform Act of 1832, and also to the fact that in 1846, it had repealed the Corn Law which was opposed by peasants. When the year 1848 came, there was no major cause that would motivate the British to revolt. In truth, the British lesson of 1848 can be applied to all Arab countries, where governments must enact reforms before reform is imposed upon them, and must pursue policies voluntarily, not in reaction to events, which usually is too little, too late. [email protected]
