Generally speaking, the peoples of the Middle East have not been able to reach the establishment of the nation-state and the consecration of the national principle. In fact, nationalist rhetoric has receded over the past few decades in favor of religious and sectarian rhetoric. Thus the notion of Arabism, "whose soul is Islam" as Michel Aflaq wrote, has become a mere slogan that dates back to the early 20th century. No state seeks to achieve it, and no official considers its fulfillment to represent salvation from successive crises. No political party considers it to be its goal. Indeed, the Baath Party in Iraq has nearly disappeared, turning into a part of a sect. In Syria, it is neither active nor influential, with regard to the blood-spattered events that have nearly destroyed the country with all of its sects and constituents, turning it into quarreling sectarian microstates. The involvement of various parties and sects in internal wars in Syria, as well as the foreign international and regional assault the country is being subjected to, are proof that nationalist leanings have receded. Yet the fact that the assault involves the entirety of the Arab Levant, on the other hand, confirms the unity of its countries and of their fate. If these countries are not aware of this, or if they are aware but fear to speak of it publicly and to draft strategies on its basis, the West, and most prominently the United States, conceive all of their plans on the basis of the unity of those countries. Receding nationalist thinking has affected everyone, except for the Kurds. Thus, the more others sink into a state of fragmentation, the more they find the opportunity to distinguish themselves and work on seceding from them. Perhaps the words of the President of Iraq's Kurdistan Province, Masoud Barzani, best express this state of affairs. Barzani called, in his name and in the name of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and of leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) Abdullah Öcalan, Kurdish political parties in Iran, Syria and Turkey to a "national conference" to be held in Erbil. During a meeting in preparation for this conference, he said: "the situation in Syria today represents a historical opportunity for the Kurdish people to obtain its rights". The fact is that with support from the Province, international sponsorship, and the willingness of Ankara and Damascus to turn a blind eye, Syria's Kurds have managed to gain military control of most of the areas, in which they represent the majority. They have also started to work on forming their own administration, independent from Damascus, which could later represent the core of the government of the "West Kurdistan" province, as they are calling it. This has aroused Turkey's anger, its parliament giving the army the freedom to act beyond the country's borders if necessary, i.e. with regard to the Kurds of Syria who coordinate their activity with the PKK in Anatolia. The upcoming Kurdish National Conference will discuss the situation of this ethnic group in Turkey, Syria and Iran, and the possibility of achieving autonomy in each of them, similar to the autonomy they enjoy in Northern Iraq. They will doubtless discuss the unity of "their land" and the possibility of their uniting in the future. Although they have reassured the countries of which they are currently part that they seek peace and security in coexistence with their other constituents, the path they have taken in Iraq is indicative of quite the opposite. Indeed, Barzani himself threatens to secede from Baghdad every time the federal government rejects one of his requests, or every time it demands his respect of the fact that it represents all of Iraq and objects to his signing contracts with oil companies without its knowledge. The Kurds have rights in all the countries they are part of, just like all other ethnic groups, sects and confessions. Erdoğan committed a major blunder when he started dealing with them in Iraq as if they were an independent country. He also sought to gain their approval internally, as they are Muslim, not realizing that the political Islam he represents has not been able to unite even those of a different confession than his own. How could he then achieve unity with a group that considers itself to be completely different from everyone else and to have its own national identity? He should have, as a Neo-Ottomanist, turned to history and realized that Sultan-Caliphs have failed at this before him, and have seen their empire fragmented on national-ethnic bases. The rise of Kurdish nationalism is being faced with Arab fragmentation, and one fears that the remaining sects and ethnic groups in the Arab World may follow the example of the Kurds, taking us back to the age of the city-state, or the sect-state.
