Bahbah: Who are the Arab People and are They Disunited?

posted on: Feb 7, 2018

By: Bishara A. Bahbah, Arab America Featured Columnist

What a sad sight the Arab World is today!  

Countries are collapsing and brothers are fighting each other.  Despite its massive natural resources, you only find pockets of wealth.  There are more refugees in the Arab world than anywhere else in the world and I am not even referring to Palestinian refugees.  Freedom, as we understand it in the West, is virtually absent.  There are always parameters to what you can and cannot say or do.  Most Arabs cannot travel visa-free from one Arab country to the other.

By contrast, the European Union, made up of 28 countries with different histories, languages, and backgrounds, presents a painful contrast to today’s Arab world.  In the EU, there is freedom, one currency, one passport that allows one to travel and reside in any EU country.  There is a European Parliament and an executive branch representing all EU countries. 

So, what is with the Arabs?

Apparently, there is no uniform definition of who is an Arab.  

• Arabs are not a distinct ethnic or racial group – there are white, black Arabs and in between.
• Arabs espouse different religions; they can be categorized as mainly:   Muslims (the majority), Christians, Druze, Baha’i, and even Jews.
• Arabs speak Arabic as their native language.
• There are 25 countries and territories where Arabic is the official language or one of the official languages – Israel (with a Palestinian population under occupation), ironically, is one of them.
• Classical Arabic or “fus-ha” is the official language of communication in Arab countries.  At the same, there exist many Arabic dialects all the way from Morocco to Iraq.  Often, speaking in their local dialects, one Arab might not understand the other, unless they speak the classical Arabic/fusha.
• There are 22 members of the League of Arab States; occupied Palestine is one of them.

The League of Arab States was founded in 1945 and its aim has never been to unify the Arab world but rather to broaden cooperation among Arab countries.  Even though there have been numerous attempts over the past 70+ years among several Arab countries to unify, all these attempts have failed miserably.  

The best definition of an Arab that I have come across goes back to December 1938 when a conference of Arab students in Europe declared that “all who are Arab in their language, culture, and loyalty (national feeling) are Arabs.” Thus, the term Arab implies linguistic, cultural, and national affinity rather than political unity.

The Arab people are not disunited.  It is the Arab countries that are disunited and fragmented.  This is a very important distinction.  Put a group of Arabs in a room – from Morocco to Oman – and they will be amicable to one another, enjoy similar foods, love Arab music, smoke the shisha, and delight in good strong Arab/Turkish coffee.  Broach the subject of politics, and the mood turns sour as many Arabs will either bemoan the Arab countries’ disunity or they will vehemently defend their own governments.

Historically, the only time Arabs were politically united was from about A.D. 643 to 750.  Before the Prophet Mohammad, Arabs were divided into feuding tribes, and not all the tribes entered into an alliance with the Prophet.  The wars of the “Apostasy” that followed the Prophet’s death ended in Arab political unity under the second caliph until the year 750.  At that time, the Arabs were the ruling political elite of the world in an empire stretching from Spain to Central Asia.

Today’s Arab countries are sadly politically divided and, in some cases, at war with each other.  The internal fragmentation of some Arab countries following the popular Arab Spring of 2012 and the fighting among Arab states, for whatever reason, is shameful.

The only unifying factor among Arabs has been their support of Palestine and the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.  However, as of late, we have been seeing cracks in that support because of the success of some countries, especially the United States and Israel, to reframe Arab countries’ support for Palestine as being less urgent than other outside threats facing the Arab world, namely Iran’s increasing influence in the Arab world. The United States has been forging a not so hidden alliance between the arch enemies of Iran – some Arab countries and Israel.  This has come at the expense of the Palestine cause.

As an Arab Christian who was born and raised in the Old City of Jerusalem, I am proud to be an Arab for the many wonderful reasons that embody being an Arab.  I enjoy speaking Arabic; I feel a close cultural affinity to other Arabs, and I am an Arab nationalist whose ultimate dream is to see the glory of the Arab world is restored. 

At the same time, I cannot but be most grateful for being an Arab American.  This country, despite all its faults, is a melting pot of nationalities and ethnic groups.  It has a constitution that guarantees our freedom of speech, movement, and religion.  Maybe one day, the Arab countries will become the United Arab States.

Prof. Bishara Bahbah was a member of the Palestinian delegation to the Peace Talks on Arms Control and Regional Security.  He taught at Harvard and was the associate director of its Kennedy School’s Institute for Social and Economic Policy in the Middle East

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Arab America.