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by
M. Shahid Alam
September
4, 2003
In
June 2003, Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s self-appointed President and strongman,
was summoned to Washington. He returned with two errands from President George
Bush. Pakistan must recognize Israel and dispatch its troops to police
America’s illegal occupation of Iraq. There was money in it for Pakistani
rulers: three billion dollars over the next five years.
Still
in Washington, Musharraf told Pakistani reporters that he had made no “deal”
with the United States. “Whatever we are doing, we are doing in our national
interest, and fortunately our national interest coincides with those of the
United States, which is the beauty of our relationship.” At the least, one must
thank the strongman for his frankness. Here is his public confession that his
government, unreservedly, accepts the new American contract in the Islamic
world. Pakistan is fighting – and will fight – America’s war against terrorism,
which many Muslims see as a cover for America’s emasculation of Islamic
societies.
Is
there “beauty” in this relationship? It is a relationship that was cemented
within minutes of Colin Powell’s call to the strongman on the night of
September 11. Instantly, Pakistan offered not only its airspace to American
warplanes and missiles; it invited Americans to launch their invasion of
Afghanistan from half a dozen bases within Pakistan. Soon, American operatives
were stationed in Pakistani cities and making arrests on Pakistani territory.
It would be difficult to come up with another example of a country which
surrendered its sovereignty more precipitously. And the strongman sees “beauty”
in this surrender.
Now
the strongman has a new charge from America’s Likudniks. “Recognize the state
of Israel,” they demand. This Israeli state had its origin in a brilliant
conspiracy that leveraged the power of the very peoples who hated the Jews. The
Zionists made a compact with their ancient tormentors: We will rid you of your
Jews if you help us to establish a Jewish colonial-settler state in Palestine.
In addition, the Jewish state could serve as imperialist Europe’s outpost in
the Arab world. Western anti-Semites found the offer irresistible. Britain
first signed the compact in 1917, but when it wavered, the United States
stepped in to establish Israel, and since the mid-1960s it has been its chief
protagonist, softening the Islamic world for Israeli hegemony with wars and
bribes.
In
order to establish a lasting hegemony, Israel demand unconditional recognition
from its Arab neighbors. The first break-through came in 1978 when Egypt recognized
Israel in return for an annual US payment of two billion dollars. The second
break-through came in 1993, after the end of the Cold War, when Arafat and his
aging cronies bartered the Palestinian’s historic claims to 78 percent of
historic Palestine1 for the right to police Occupied West Bank and Gaza. Most
Arab states would have happily followed suit – and a few did -- but for the
growing Islamist opposition at home.
The
American pressure on the Pakistani junta to recognize Israel could not have come
at a worse time. There are precious few in the Islamic world who believe any of
the lies used to justify America’s illegal invasion of Iraq; they are convinced
that this was the action of a Likudnik American administration acting at the
behest of Israel. The grand deception of a “peace process,” inaugurated by the
Oslo Accords in 1993, is now in complete tatters. Israel continues to
strengthen the foundations of an apartheid state, completing the separation of
“unequal races” with a wall that reaches twenty feet high. Under the
circumstances, the US pressure can only be seen as more evidence of the Israeli
tail wagging the American dog. The United States is pressing an Israeli demand
on the Pakistani junta.
Incredibly,
the Pakistani strongman has the chutzpah to argue the case for recognition. “In
my view … if the Palestinians themselves undertake discussions and go for
friendship with Israel … then what’s the problem with us? What is our enmity
with Israel?” Is the strongman willing to wait until the Palestinians have made
their peace with Israel; until they have their own sovereign state on a mere 22
percent of historic Palestine; until the four million Palestinian refugees –
ethnically cleansed in 1948 and 1967 – can return to their homes inside Israel?
It is clear that the strongman is in no mood to wait for these results, or that
he has any interest in helping to advance these results. He must do the bidding
of Washington: and he wants to do it now.
The
General asks: “What is our enmity with Israel?” Has he forgotten that Pakistan
is the only Muslim country to possess nuclear weapons, and although these
weapons are pointed at India, Israel cannot regard Pakistan’s nuclear asset
with equanimity, with or without Pakistani recognition of Israel? As the military
chief, Musharraf should know that the Pakistan military expects and prepares
against a pre-emptive strike on its nuclear facilities from India as well as
Israel, or a coordinated strike by both. India and Israel form a natural axis
against Pakistan: and that is a hard geopolitical reality that will scarcely be
altered by recognition.
Several
commentators in Pakistan – with a naïveté that must be rare for self-proclaimed
realists – have offered a list of advantages which recognition will bring to
Pakistan. The list includes reduced risk of a strike against Pakistan’s nuclear
assets, access to Israel’s military technology, and throwing a spanner in
Israel’s growing special relationship with India. These realists forget that
recognition is a one-time act, and once accomplished it carries little or no
leverage. What did the Palestinians get from their recognition of Israel?
On
the other hand, let the realists be warned of some real liabilities that are
likely to flow from recognition. Nearly all Pakistanis will see this as another
treasonous sell-out, a costly concession extracted from their spineless rulers
in exchange for loans that will only deepen Pakistan’s foreign debt; and, this
can only strengthen the Islamist cause that the United States wants to keep at
bay. Normal relations with Israel will improve Israel’s intelligence gathering
in Pakistan, making Pakistan’s nuclear assets even more vulnerable to an
Israeli or Indian strike. We should not discount the disquiet this will cause
to our Iranian neighbor; this may push them even closer to India. Finally, the
realists – who can scarcely afford to ignore the probability of some real
events – should ask if the recognition will be allowed to stand, even if the
Islamists never manage to take power in Pakistan. Can Pakistan guarantee that
the Israeli embassy and consulates in Pakistan will not become the target of
violent attacks from Islamic extremists?
There
is a reasonable chance, then, that this American move may backfire. It could
backfire because it ignores – like nearly all the elements of American policy
towards the Muslim countries – the force of Newtonian dynamics. Just because
every action does not have an instant reaction in the world of social and
political dynamics, short-sighted US policy makers rarely work through the
long-term implications of their policy. If they do, they are convinced they
have the cluster bombs to handle any adverse consequences. For fifty years,
American policy has been building the grass-root forces in the Islamic world that
have now begun to challenge American hegemony in their societies. It is tragic
that as these forces become visible, the United States responds with more of
the same. Perhaps, this is the only logic that makes sense to an imperialist
elite, which has come to believe in the invincible power of cluster bombs and
daisy cutters.
If
Pakistan’s rulers had attended to their country’s national interest – and did
not imagine that these interests were best served by doing America’s bidding –
they would have responded to US pressures by stating firmly that Pakistan and
Pakistanis do recognize Israel – and they always have recognized Israel – for
what it is.
Pakistanis
recognize that Israel is a colonial-settler state; they recognize that this
racist state was – and is – founded on terror and violence; they recognize that
Israel was founded on the ruined foundations of a living Palestinian society;
they recognize that Israel created a Jewish majority by ethnically cleansing
more than a million Palestinians in 1948 and 1967; they recognize that Israel
has a massive arsenal of nuclear weapons aimed at Islamic capitals; they
recognize that Israel has armed and supported the most reactionary regimes
since its creation, including apartheid South Africa and Idi Amin’s Uganda;
they recognize that Israel seeks to deepen its hegemonic dominance over the
Arabs with American men, money and arms.
And
yet, even today, I expect and hope that most Pakistanis would be glad to extend
recognition to a country (by whatever name) – between the River Jordan and the
Mediterranean – if it could grant equal rights to all its peoples, Jewish and
Arab alike, and grant Palestinian refugees the right of return to return to
their homes. But a colonialist, racist, and hegemonic Israel is another matter.
And, if Zengi, Nur al-Din, Salahuddin and the Egyptian Mamluks refused to
recognize the Crusader states, can Muslims today be expected to choose
differently?
M.
Shahid Alam is professor of economics at Northeastern
University. His last book, Poverty from the Wealth of Nations, was
published by Palgrave in 2000. He may be reached at m.alam@neu.edu. Visit his webpage at http://msalam.net. © M. Shahid Alam
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