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A star-spangled flag to the
bull
By Paul Belden
AMMAN -
In the early part of the last century, in an essay on
American adventurism in the Philippines, Mark Twain
suggested that, in the interest of accuracy, Congress
might consider creating a modified flag for use in
Manila: The white stripes, he wrote, could easily be
painted over black, and the field of stars replaced by a
skull-and-crossbones.
In Amman this past
Saturday they didn't take the Betsy Ross act quite that
far. But as huge, unmarked, four-jet military cargo
planes screamed overhead and shook the sky - a
five-times-a-day occurrence in this
strategically-located Jordanian capital city - at least
one of the 5,000 anti-war protesters who marched against
American war plans in Iraq carried a version of the
Stars and Stripes in which the starfield had been
replaced by a swastika.
And, as you'd expect,
the slogans followed suit: "Bush, you coward, the Arabs
will not be humiliated!" the crowd chanted in Arabic,
along with other mantras branding Bush as, by turns, a
"terrorist", a "hegemon" and a "fool".
One
difference between Saturday's wave of worldwide anti-war
protests, and those that occurred exactly one month ago
last weekend, was that this time around the protests had
a significant presence in a number of Muslim countries -
including key American ally Jordan.
Not only did
they march in Amman, but sizable crowds also gathered in
the politically-sensitive city of Irbid, located near
the three-cornered border separating northern Jordan
from Syria and Lebanon. Irbid, significantly, is one of
several staging centers in Jordan for American and other
coalition troops whose forces are officially
acknowledged by authorities in this Hashemite kingdom as
numbering about 5,000 but whose unofficial rumored force
is at least double that number.
Irbid is also
home to a large and volatile population of Palestinian
refugees originally coming from the West Bank.
In Amman, at least, authorities were careful not
to let tempers and crowds get out of control. For good
reason: Last November, this country experienced its
first armed conflicts between security forces and armed
political groups since the Black September Palestinian
uprisings in the early 1970s. The latest conflict
occurred in the southern city of Ma'an in the wake of a
police manhunt for suspects in the slaying of US
diplomat Laurence Foley. In their search for a suspect
named Mohamad Shalabi (also known by the nom de
guerre Abu Sayyaf), police surrounded the city and
cut off all communications. In the ensuing gun battles,
four local militants and two soldiers were killed.
For all the shouting and the passion on display
in Amman Saturday, there was no violence in the
protests. Indeed, in the somewhat-disgusted words of a
local university student who marched in protest: "At the
end of the day, they [the Jordanian security forces]
told us to disperse, and poof! - just like that - we all
went home."
Authorities in Iraq had no
misgivings about letting marchers vent their feelings.
Scenes of shouting and waving marchers in the southern
religious city of Karbala were flashed around the world
via all major cable news channels. "Don't kill us," read
a sign held by a pretty little girl who looked to be
about five years old.
It was powerful television
- and also something more.
Karbala holds special
significance to followers of Islam, as it was the site
of the last stand of Husain, son of Ali bin Abi Talib
and the grandson of the holy Prophet Mohammed, against a
large army mobilized by the Umayyad regime. Today the
martyrdom of Husain is celebrated throughout the Muslim
ummah - and it was clear that the Iraqi
government was very aware the resonances involved when
it allowed the media to cover the latest protests.
(Old resonances matter in the Middle East, and
the city of Irbid is mentioned in the Bible - Book of
Hosea, 10:14 - thus: "Therefore shall a tumult arise
among thy people, and all thy fortresses shall be
spoiled, as Shalman spoiled Betharbel [Irbid] in the day
of battle ...")
Iraqi authorities were also very
much aware of modern resonances in the form of
sentiments being expressed throughout most of the rest
of the world. Asked by CNN whether Iraq did not feel
isolated, a Ba'ath Party official named Hamis Sahan
Bashir responded, "No, it is America who is the enemy of
the world."
There's a certain irony in the
recent protests and the often scathing anti-American
feelings prevalent in the Arab world. One of the express
goals of the "war on terror" was to find a way to
somehow end the phenomenon of anti-Americanism being
used in the Muslim world as a "safety valve" for
people's anger and frustration over the failings of
their own governments. The protests in Amman on Saturday
made clear that this phenomenon has never been so strong
or pronounced.
It is also clear that the
American flag - the flag of which Twain lovingly wrote,
"When we [Americans] have seen it in far lands -
glimpsing it unexpectedly in that strange sky, waving
its welcome and benediction to us - we have caught our
breath, and uncovered our heads, and couldn't speak, for
a moment, for the thought of what it was to us and the
great ideals it stood for ..." that flag has never
before, never in its history, been so hated and reviled
by so many.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd.
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