This article talks about the possible protest movements in the Arab countries of the Middle East to North Africa region, which have internal objective backgrounds but can be started by the incitement of active foreign forces in the region, such as the United States and European countries. In the following, the naming of the Arab Spring, the internal reasons and the motivation of foreign forces for inciting these movements and the regional results and the impact of these possible protests on the freedom movement of the Iranian people are discussed and finally a conclusion is drawn.
Terminology:
Arab Spring: An unprecedented series of marches and protests have taken place in the predominantly Arab countries of North Africa and Southwest Asia (from 2010 to 2012). Rulers were overthrown in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen, and civil uprisings erupted in Bahrain and Syria. Large demonstrations have spread to Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, the Maghreb, and Sudan, and minor protests have occurred in Lebanon, Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Western Sahara (definition quoted from Wikipedia).
According to its attitude, which was waiting for the Islamic revolution to happen in these countries, the Islamic Republic leaders called the Islamic Awakening, which met with a negative and decisive answer from the leaders of these movements, who hated the Islamic Revolution and its leaders. The Iranian monarchists believed that the reason why the kingdoms in the region were the ones who were exonerated from the turmoil was the existence of the institution of monarchy in those countries, which is also a hollow claim, or that the countries with the institution of monarchy in the Middle East region were due to their traditional and backward context, which was out of the circle of these changes. The tranquility of countries with a royal institution reminds one of the tranquility of a graveyard. American think tanks called the Arab Spring the third wave of democratization, and this definition is also problematic because, in many of these countries, the Arab Spring protests led to the rise of extremely fundamentalist and religious forces.
What was the Arab Spring?
The Arab Spring is a series of protest movements that started due to the economic and social inefficiency of the autocratic governments ruling the countries involved and continued to be captured by the strong influence of foreign forces in the region and traditional political actors in the countries as mentioned earlier such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Hizb-ul-Ennahda in Tunisia, the military in Sudan and the clerical Shiite movements in Bahrain and Yemen. These movements by themselves were progressive movements that wanted more involvement of the marginalized masses of these countries in determining their destiny, but as we said, each country found its own destiny. From this view of point; The movements which were known as the Arab Spring originally were progressive movements because they eventually led to the deepening of capitalistic relations in these countries, especially because they provided the basis for the participation of wider masses of people in the capitalist structures in those countries.
If we accept this definition of “Arab Spring”, today there is also a possibility of starting movements with the same characteristics in these countries and even a wider area. Perhaps it can be said that this is the historical fate of countries with ancient civilizations that, in order to pass the stage of religious interference in politics, they have to go through a series of religious states (Iran faced such an event for the first time in 1979).
Other contexts of the beginning of the Arab Spring in the Middle East and the region:
Economic dissatisfactions are rampant especially after the economic recession caused by the corona pandemic and now after the war between Russia and Ukraine and the crisis of grain and chemical fertilizers and raw and strategic production in the countries of the Middle East and North Africa. This is the situation in one of the richest Arab countries in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia. In 2017, Saudi Arabia’s budget deficit reached 61 billion dollars, which is equivalent to 9.2% of the GDP (Gross Domestic Product), and observers believe that this budget deficit, which intensified with the war in Yemen, will continue until 2023. Of course, the increase in oil prices was partially helped by oil-rich countries and it slowed the growth rate of the crisis, but despite this price increase, Saudi Arabia has cut off many subsidies. The young crown prince of Saudi Arabia, “Ben Salman”, who has embarked on extensive reforms to escape from religious traditionalism and connect more with today’s world, can be the second example of Iran’s Mohammad Reza Shah, who thought that he could inject modernity into his country by transferring advanced industries. The actions of Mohammad Reza Shah, the last king of Iran, in importing modernity to the country, which was sometimes similar to Aziz Nasin’s (Turkish writer1915-1995) comedy stories, caused the traditionalists and religious people to panic so much that they, in unity with the leftists and independent Western intellectuals, caused the establishment of an Islamist regime in Iran. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia has angered America by staying away from America and being close to the opposite pole of the United States, i.e. Iran, China, and Russia. The recent numerous trips and consecutive negotiations of high-ranking American officials to Saudi Arabia show the American effort to stop “Bin Salman” from the path he has taken.
What will be America’s reaction to this disobedience?
So far, America’s way of dealing with the disobedient leaders of its allied countries has been encouraging and inciting the political movements of the opposition and political dissidents in the country. If America applies the same formula in Saudi Arabia, although it will increase the price of oil in a short period of time, the possible result will be a political earthquake in the geopolitics of the region and the world if a political force consisting of the Muslim Brotherhood and Western secular intellectuals succeeds to come to work.
In North Africa, the situation is even worse!
Egypt also faces serious challenges. After overthrowing the Brotherhood government of “Mohammed Morsi” with the help of the Saudis, this country used to receive billions of dollars in aid from the Saudis every year, but now this aid has been stopped. Recently, the Egyptian government has also ended the government’s intervention in stabilizing the national currency rate and has submitted a request of 12 billion dollars to receive a loan to the International Monetary Fund. Let’s not forget that in every power vacuum in countries with a large Muslim population, one of the candidates for power is the Islamic parties, among them the Muslim Brotherhood. (Except Iran, in Iran, the rise of Islamic forces began 40 years ago and is now declining). Recently, there have been reports in reliable media about the acceptance of the order for the production of missiles for Russia by Egypt’s arms industry. This has increased America’s dissatisfaction with Egypt. Let’s not forget that one of the staunch supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power in Egypt in 2010 was the American Democratic Party, which is still in power in the United States.
Will America and Europe try to foment another Arab spring in the region?
There is no doubt that in the kingdoms of the Middle East and North Africa, people who are marginalized from political power and deprived of redistribution of wealth in the Persian Gulf countries, and also modern and emerging classes who want to have political power in a democratic system ready to join in a potential movement. The example of Turkey as a country in which a kind of reconciliation between religion, and Western civilization, is a model for the people who seek to share the political power and redistribution of wealth ; on the other hand, the United States and Europe consider unrest in these countries to be probable and are dissatisfied with governments such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and even Yemen. America and especially France in Europe have a network of spies and supporters of their policies in the bureaucracy network and are among the highest political officials of these countries. If we want to comment on the trend that has been common until now, can say that we will soon witness protest movements in these countries, which will be started by young people, celebrities and social networks and will end with the rise of the military and Islamist parties (Muslim Brotherhood?). These protests should be supported by America and Europe.
The continuation of the current situation, day by day, the removal of allies of the West in the highest authorities will reduce the West political abilitues in the countries under discussion. And it is natural that America and Europe will gradually think about changing the political leadership in these countries unless the weakness of America and Europe is such that they accept the process of removing themselves from the region and slowly give in to it.
Conclusion: Dissatisfaction of important parts of the people living in the countries of the Middle East to North Africa, corruption and the lack of fair distribution of power and wealth will be the reason for the occurrence of protest movements in the Arab and North African countries, which is accompanied by the dissatisfaction of the United States and Europe with the current leaders of these countries. It can lead to the incitement of protest movements and widespread riots, which will also be approved by the West. If these moves are approved by Turkey, it will define itself with the discourse of Islamic and not Arab identity. It will strengthen the Islam ic dentitie of the Moslem Brotherhood and aggravate the position of Turkey and Qatar in the Islamic world, which can continue to be a serious challenge for the discourse of the clerical Islamic revolution in Iran. The nature of such movements in the aforementioned countries is completely different from the nature of the current protest movements in Iran. In the abovementioned countries, the leadership of the movements will be in the hands of the political, religious, and even clerical elites under the leadership of the middle and even wealthy classes, but in Iran and in the current movement, the middle classes and Islamic – reformist parties will not be able to fall in with the clerical terror regime. And at the same time, the direction of political protests in Iran is to abandon religion and clergy from political power, which, of course, will not be supported by the West, especially the United States. In Iran, America seeks to strengthen the tendency of the opposition to listen to its orders and even pay its salaries. The all-around support of the West in its meaning, from politicians to artists and public media, to the leaders attributed to the women, life, and freedom movement was precise because these leaders were subordinate and obedient to America.
The impact of strengthening protest movements supported by the West in the countries of the Persian Gulf to North Africa will bring the Islamic Republic closer to the current leaders of these countries, including Bin Salman, Al-Sisi, (Is this the reason why Iran now got closer to the countries of the region?) which can further establish a new pole in regional alignments. This new pole will have a very famous enemy. He is Recep Tayyip Erdogan. President of Turkey.
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