Arab world weighs Iraq war lessons

By Martin Asser BBC News Online, Amman

The Arab world is teetering in the balance following the ignominious toppling by US-led forces of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, after a bloody three-week campaign.

The mood today is one of despondency and bewilderment, with people asking:

• Why did the Iraqi regime - seen by many as the last Arab hope to resist American neo-colonialism - promise to fight to the death, and then suddenly allow US troops unopposed into Baghdad?

• What role did Arab governments play in facilitating Saddam's downfall, against the wishes of the vast majority of their citizens?

• What hope now for the development, democratisation and independence of Arab countries?

The question that we journalists, along with the political analysts, government officials and diplomats, must ask is: "How will these feelings translate themselves - into the 100 Bin Ladens feared by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, or into a new Middle East which bows to American might?"

Clinging to familiar values

For the moment, the firebrands and the moderates in the Arab world agree it is too early, and America's victory too overwhelming, for anything but stunned silence.

Stunned silence for now

Take events in the centre of Amman at the first Friday prayers since Saddam Hussein's downfall.

The Husseiniya Mosque was previously the scene of angry demonstrations, with riot police having to quell enflamed popular protests proclaiming "Victory to Saddam Hussein" and "Death to America".

This time the faithful would have left without a murmur but for the appearance of Prince Hassan, the late King Hussein's brother and ex-crown prince, and a possible candidate for a role in the new Iraq.

Instead of wandering off, people pressed around the diminutive princely figure, his round, smiling face barely visible amid the jostling crowds, who cheered and clapped him and waved as his motorcade drew away.

Hardly the whiff of revolution that one might have expected, after Arab regimes were seen to have let their people down so badly.

On the contrary, it was as though these Jordanians, at this time of deep crisis and national malaise, were rallying round the state's tried and tested institutions.

'Unconventional resistance'

April 2003 is already being seen as a pivotal moment in the Arab world.

If the Washington hawks are to be believed, it is the dawning of a new era of Middle East peace, stability and human rights.

But in the same way that few here believed America's stated war aims - to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction - few now believe the outcome will be the one envisioned in Washington.

"Yes, people feel hopeless the moment," says Amman-based political activist Khalid Ramadan. "But they will soon see that US plans benefit only Israel and America's quisling rulers, like Ahmed Chalabi."

Mr Ramadan believes that, having learnt the lessons of Iraq's failure to repel the overwhelmingly superior US forces, the Arab masses will soon take matters into their own hands to launch "unconventional" resistance to what he calls American-British-Zionist colonialism.

"Look at history and remember how the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 sparked the rise of Hezbollah, and the 1967 defeat of the Arabs marked the beginning of Palestinian resistance," he says.

"I can't predict what form the new resistance will take," he adds. "But if the Americans say they lost 100 soldiers during the invasion, wait and see how many they lose in the next phase, the occupation."

Nothing to lose

It may therefore be more a case of whether Washington has the stomach to push through its plan to rebuild the Middle East, than whether the Arabs will be receptive.

"I'm afraid there is a kind of hatred for the United States and Britain at the moment, as well as criticism for our Arab governments for their invisible support," says Adnan Hayajneh of Jordan's Hashemite University.

And Mr Hayajneh says all the ingredients exist for things to turn very hostile, with underdevelopment, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, no democracy and the lack of credibility enjoyed by Arab regimes all feeding popular anger.

"The question is what might trigger an explosion," he says. "It doesn't have to be much, if someone wants to undermine stability - all they need to do is raise the price of sugar, or bread, or gasoline.

"And unfortunately we have people who have nothing to lose - and therefore everything to gain - who might carry out what are seen as acts of terrorism."