The Foreign Service Journal, March 2004

however, says that the government, backed by some lib- erals, believes that elections should be held and Iraqi political structures put in place before U.S. troops leave. Those against the war from the very beginning want to see U.S. troops out immediately. Some American pundits, along with top U.S. offi- cials, argue that the occupation of Iraq may lead the way for a dramatic change in the Arab world toward democ- racy. Their belief is that the U.S.-led effort to draft a new constitution, hold free elections for a democratic government in Iraq and ensure respect for women will serve as a model for the rest of the Middle East. In the view of a prominent analyst associated with the call for reform in Egypt, however, it is having the opposite effect, stymieing the cautious moves toward reform already under way. “Since the Iraq occupation, various political forces, including the Muslim fundamentalists, the nationalists and the professional associations, have developed a high sensitivity toward reform,” says Abdel-Moneim Sa’id, director of the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, a leading semiofficial think tank in Egypt. Sa’id says that the reforms are now seen either as a response to U.S. dictation or as a conscious move toward adopting the U.S. model of political and social reform — and both are unpopular among Egyptians. Official Caution in Yemen From the Arab world’s most populous nations to Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the region, sen- timent toward the continued U.S. occupation of Iraq is almost the same, though details of context differ. Yemen, which has had first-hand experience in what it means to take positions in regional conflicts, kept quiet on March 19, 2003. During the 1990-91 Persian Gulf crisis, Yemen had stood against the use of force against Iraq, and what was perceived as a pro-Saddam position had its price. “Things were different this time,” says Nabil al-Sofe, editor-in-chief of the Yemeni weekly Al-Sahwa . “This was due to the loss of one million Yemeni jobs in the Gulf states after the 1990-91 crisis, deterioration of Yemen’s relations with its rich Gulf neighbors, the heavy blow suffered by the Yemeni economy and the worsen- ing of living conditions,” he explains. The state-run media in Yemen were given stringent instructions to follow a clearly drafted line in covering developments in the war against Iraq. It was forbidden to refer to the U.S. military invasion as a “U.S. occupa- tion of Iraq” or to describe Iraqi civilians killed in the war as “victims.” At the same time, Yemen’s Satellite Channel was to stay away from talking about any of the Arab countries contributing to the war, such as Kuwait or Qatar. Even though Yemen was busy arranging for elections as the war in Iraq began, the invasion did not appear high in the run-up to the April 27, 2003, polling. And Yemen’s Ba’thists, believed to be aligned with Saddam, did not get even one seat. “Because the media in Yemen is extremely partisan, every group paints the war according to its politics,” says al-Sofe. “Nationalists carry on with their fiery anti- American position, while the government-run media are suffering from a scandal because of the conflicting state instructions.” The Palestinian and Syrian Responses For better or worse, the Palestinians are always in the spotlight. Despite attempts by the Palestinian Authority to disassociate the Palestinian cause from Saddam during the Iraq War, there were some pro- Saddam rallies in the Palestinian Territories. “The invasion of Iraq has been a shock to the Palestinians. Saddam Hussein was known for his declared backing for the intifada and overt support for the Pales- tinians,” says Rami Almeghari, editor at the Palestinian State Information Service. The pro-Israeli public rela- tions machine used reports of Saddam’s financial support for families of Palestinian suicide bombers, referred to in the region as martyrs, to demonize the Palestinians as “terrorists.” Though the Palestinian Authority has been extreme- ly cautious in dealing with the war and reacting to the developments on the ground, Almeghari says, the Palestinians draw a similarity between the tactics of the U.S. occupation forces in Iraq and the Israeli occupa- tion forces on their own soil. Elsewhere, apart from the Iraqis themselves, the Syrians are most directly affected by the continued U.S. occupation of Iraq. Caught between the Israeli army occupying the Golan Heights in the west and the U.S. occupation army in Iraq to their east, the Syrians cannot help but think of both armies as one enemy. F O C U S 52 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / M A R C H 2 0 0 4