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MORE THAN SEMANTICS
Al-Ahram, Egypt
Sept 12 2014
Syria's Kurds are complaining about the notional Arab character of
Syria, but their actions could open another can of worms, writes
Bassel Oudat in Damascus
Differences surfaced over the current name of Syria when Kurdish
members of the opposition to the government of Syrian president Bashar
Al-Assad objected to the word "Arab" in the name of the country,
the Syrian Arab Republic.
The argument is simple. Minus the word "Arab", Syria belongs to all
its ethnic groups. But with this word it belongs less to the Armenians,
Assyrians, and Kurds than it belongs to its Arab population.
What began as a semantic question has now become a full-blown
confrontation in which not only politicians but also ordinary citizens
have traded remarks, not always benign, on social media.
For now, the rest of the opposition is apprehensive about the Kurdish
request. Many note that discussion of such matters should be made in
future elected bodies, not by the non-elected parties of the opposition
and not while the nation is still bleeding in a conflict with no end
in sight.
A few days ago, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and
Opposition Forces (NCSROF) said that it agreed to the use of the name
Syrian Arab Republic on the school certificates of students wishing
to pursue their studies abroad.
This name is internationally recognised, and changing the country's
name at present could jeopardise the students' futures, argued
officials of the NCSROF, a coalition of opposition groups that includes
nearly a dozen Kurdish parties.
But the Kurds say that the current name of the country jeopardises
the interests of non-Arab citizens.
The Kurds make up nearly 12 per cent of the Syrian population, and
Kurdish groups joined the opposition on condition that the latter
would recognise and support their rights. But until the issue was
raised, no one thought of the country's name as something that could
undermine the rights of minorities.
When the Kurdish parties joined the NCSROF, they made several demands,
including that Kurdish should be an official language of the coalition
and that a Kurd should be appointed as deputy leader.
But the recent row over the country's name seems to have ruffled
feathers across the ethnic divide. The NCSROF says that its decision is
"technical" in nature, as it is about the legality of students applying
for colleges abroad. But the Kurds are adamant that Syria should avoid
the epithet Arab, just as Tunisia, Lebanon, Iraq, and other nations do.
If Syria is to remain united, its name should not have ethnic
connotations, argue the Kurdish parties. Some have gone further,
saying that they can only live in a united Syria as long as its
name is ethnicity-free. If the country is called "Arab," they say,
secession might become an attractive option.
Many question the right of the Kurds to dictate the name of the
country, asking whether a 12-per-cent minority should have the right
to tell the entire nation what kind of name it should adopt.
>From a legal point of view, a country's name, just like its flag and
national anthem, are things to be decided by elected bodies, not by
opposition groups, however well intentioned they may be, observers say.
Strictly speaking, the opposition parties that exist today have no
more legitimacy than the regime, for none of them have been chosen
through free-and-fair elections. Some matters of national consequence
will have to wait until elected bodies are formed once the current
regime is gone, observers say.
Among those who believe that the moniker "Arab" needs to be excised
from the country's name is Kurdish opposition member Radif Mostafa.
"To call a country Arab because most of its population are Arabs is
like calling a country Islamic because most of the population are
Muslims or Sunni because most of the population is Sunni. Perhaps a
certain sect of Sunni Islam will want the country named after them,
if they are the majority," he told the Weekly.
"Syria must be a civil, democratic, pluralistic country that respects
human rights and citizenship," he added.
Opposition journalist Mohammad Mansour is among the supporters of the
"Arab" epithet in the country's name.
"For centuries, Syria has been home to diverse nationalities, but
it is also considered part of the Arab world, indeed its throbbing
heart," he said.
Many orientalists, travelers, historians and geographers passed
through the region and spoke of Syria as its epitome, a country that
encapsulates the oriental heart of the Arab world, Mansour argued.
Some have argued that the Arabism of Syria was an invention of the
ruling Syrian Baath Party. Mansour, however, considers such views to
be untenable.
"Anyone who links the Arabism of Syria with the experience of the
Baath Party is mistaken. We, the Arabs, despise the fake nationalism
of the Baath Party. We cannot stand its racism and fascism, which
paved the way to dictatorship," he said.
"We refuse to link the Arabism of Syria to the experience of the
Baath Party." Mansour recalled that one of the men who founded the
Arabic Language Academy in Damascus was a Kurd.
"The founder of the most important scientific board for the Arabic
language was a Kurd called Mohammad Kurd Ali. No one asked him
to conceal his ethnicity or change his name in order to do so,"
Mansour said.
It is true, however, that the Kurds have been treated unfairly in the
region, mostly because the Sykes-Picot Agreement after World War I
led to the dismemberment of Kurdistan, which was subsumed by Syria,
Iraq, Turkey and Iran.
In Syria, the policies of the Baath Party further obliterated Kurdish
rights. President Hafez Al-Assad, father of Bashar, surrounded Kurdish
areas with a so-called "Arab belt," bringing in immigrants to make
sure that the Kurds were surrounded by Arabs and forcing them to live
in cantons shorn of their identity and many of their basic rights.
Hafez Al-Assad refused to have identity cards issued to a considerable
section of the Kurdish community, denied them government jobs, and
banned them from teaching their own language, or even celebrating
their national feasts.
Still, the Kurds suppressed their national aspirations in order to
join the current revolution. They eagerly adopted the slogans of the
revolution and have truly believed that it will give them back the
rights the Baath Party has denied them.
Once the regime started using force against the revolution, the Kurds
adjusted their position. Some stayed within the NCSROF, continuing
to work in tandem with other ethnicities in the country, while
others took up arms with the help of the Kurdish Democratic Union,
an offshoot of Turkey's Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Some say that the regime gave the Kurdish militants the chance of
a lifetime when it almost nodded its approval of self-rule in the
northeastern part of the country.
>From this point forward, a rift occurred in the Kurdish ranks. The
Kurdish Democratic Union is said to have expelled, arrested, or even
assassinated members of other parties. Some say that the self-rule
leaders have either made a deal with the regime or are hoping to
make one.
Other Kurdish parties, such as the National Kurdish Council, a member
of the NCSROF, have disapproved of self-rule, calling it a ruse.
Instead, they want Syria to become a federation, with equal rights
for all minorities.
For now, Kurds across the political divide say that they want Syria to
remain united, but in a formula that ensures their rights as citizens
and as a cohesive minority. They are also afraid that the moniker
"Arab" may undermine their status in the future Syria.
Home to many ethnicities, Syria needs to walk a thin line between
its integrity as a nation and the rights of its minorities. Syria
will lose much if it antagonises its minorities, for the country's
rich legacy is a function of its diversity.
But if the minorities push their rights too far, they may risk breaking
the fabric that keeps their country great and united.
One option is for the opposition, Kurds included, to write a kind of
Magna Carta of the rights of the ethnicities and put the whole matter
to rest. All nationalities, Kurdish and others, would thus have full
rights within the perimeters of a unified country, one in which all
citizens were equal regardless of race, colour or creed.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/News/7219/19/More-than-semantics.aspx
Al-Ahram, Egypt
Sept 12 2014
Syria's Kurds are complaining about the notional Arab character of
Syria, but their actions could open another can of worms, writes
Bassel Oudat in Damascus
Differences surfaced over the current name of Syria when Kurdish
members of the opposition to the government of Syrian president Bashar
Al-Assad objected to the word "Arab" in the name of the country,
the Syrian Arab Republic.
The argument is simple. Minus the word "Arab", Syria belongs to all
its ethnic groups. But with this word it belongs less to the Armenians,
Assyrians, and Kurds than it belongs to its Arab population.
What began as a semantic question has now become a full-blown
confrontation in which not only politicians but also ordinary citizens
have traded remarks, not always benign, on social media.
For now, the rest of the opposition is apprehensive about the Kurdish
request. Many note that discussion of such matters should be made in
future elected bodies, not by the non-elected parties of the opposition
and not while the nation is still bleeding in a conflict with no end
in sight.
A few days ago, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and
Opposition Forces (NCSROF) said that it agreed to the use of the name
Syrian Arab Republic on the school certificates of students wishing
to pursue their studies abroad.
This name is internationally recognised, and changing the country's
name at present could jeopardise the students' futures, argued
officials of the NCSROF, a coalition of opposition groups that includes
nearly a dozen Kurdish parties.
But the Kurds say that the current name of the country jeopardises
the interests of non-Arab citizens.
The Kurds make up nearly 12 per cent of the Syrian population, and
Kurdish groups joined the opposition on condition that the latter
would recognise and support their rights. But until the issue was
raised, no one thought of the country's name as something that could
undermine the rights of minorities.
When the Kurdish parties joined the NCSROF, they made several demands,
including that Kurdish should be an official language of the coalition
and that a Kurd should be appointed as deputy leader.
But the recent row over the country's name seems to have ruffled
feathers across the ethnic divide. The NCSROF says that its decision is
"technical" in nature, as it is about the legality of students applying
for colleges abroad. But the Kurds are adamant that Syria should avoid
the epithet Arab, just as Tunisia, Lebanon, Iraq, and other nations do.
If Syria is to remain united, its name should not have ethnic
connotations, argue the Kurdish parties. Some have gone further,
saying that they can only live in a united Syria as long as its
name is ethnicity-free. If the country is called "Arab," they say,
secession might become an attractive option.
Many question the right of the Kurds to dictate the name of the
country, asking whether a 12-per-cent minority should have the right
to tell the entire nation what kind of name it should adopt.
>From a legal point of view, a country's name, just like its flag and
national anthem, are things to be decided by elected bodies, not by
opposition groups, however well intentioned they may be, observers say.
Strictly speaking, the opposition parties that exist today have no
more legitimacy than the regime, for none of them have been chosen
through free-and-fair elections. Some matters of national consequence
will have to wait until elected bodies are formed once the current
regime is gone, observers say.
Among those who believe that the moniker "Arab" needs to be excised
from the country's name is Kurdish opposition member Radif Mostafa.
"To call a country Arab because most of its population are Arabs is
like calling a country Islamic because most of the population are
Muslims or Sunni because most of the population is Sunni. Perhaps a
certain sect of Sunni Islam will want the country named after them,
if they are the majority," he told the Weekly.
"Syria must be a civil, democratic, pluralistic country that respects
human rights and citizenship," he added.
Opposition journalist Mohammad Mansour is among the supporters of the
"Arab" epithet in the country's name.
"For centuries, Syria has been home to diverse nationalities, but
it is also considered part of the Arab world, indeed its throbbing
heart," he said.
Many orientalists, travelers, historians and geographers passed
through the region and spoke of Syria as its epitome, a country that
encapsulates the oriental heart of the Arab world, Mansour argued.
Some have argued that the Arabism of Syria was an invention of the
ruling Syrian Baath Party. Mansour, however, considers such views to
be untenable.
"Anyone who links the Arabism of Syria with the experience of the
Baath Party is mistaken. We, the Arabs, despise the fake nationalism
of the Baath Party. We cannot stand its racism and fascism, which
paved the way to dictatorship," he said.
"We refuse to link the Arabism of Syria to the experience of the
Baath Party." Mansour recalled that one of the men who founded the
Arabic Language Academy in Damascus was a Kurd.
"The founder of the most important scientific board for the Arabic
language was a Kurd called Mohammad Kurd Ali. No one asked him
to conceal his ethnicity or change his name in order to do so,"
Mansour said.
It is true, however, that the Kurds have been treated unfairly in the
region, mostly because the Sykes-Picot Agreement after World War I
led to the dismemberment of Kurdistan, which was subsumed by Syria,
Iraq, Turkey and Iran.
In Syria, the policies of the Baath Party further obliterated Kurdish
rights. President Hafez Al-Assad, father of Bashar, surrounded Kurdish
areas with a so-called "Arab belt," bringing in immigrants to make
sure that the Kurds were surrounded by Arabs and forcing them to live
in cantons shorn of their identity and many of their basic rights.
Hafez Al-Assad refused to have identity cards issued to a considerable
section of the Kurdish community, denied them government jobs, and
banned them from teaching their own language, or even celebrating
their national feasts.
Still, the Kurds suppressed their national aspirations in order to
join the current revolution. They eagerly adopted the slogans of the
revolution and have truly believed that it will give them back the
rights the Baath Party has denied them.
Once the regime started using force against the revolution, the Kurds
adjusted their position. Some stayed within the NCSROF, continuing
to work in tandem with other ethnicities in the country, while
others took up arms with the help of the Kurdish Democratic Union,
an offshoot of Turkey's Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Some say that the regime gave the Kurdish militants the chance of
a lifetime when it almost nodded its approval of self-rule in the
northeastern part of the country.
>From this point forward, a rift occurred in the Kurdish ranks. The
Kurdish Democratic Union is said to have expelled, arrested, or even
assassinated members of other parties. Some say that the self-rule
leaders have either made a deal with the regime or are hoping to
make one.
Other Kurdish parties, such as the National Kurdish Council, a member
of the NCSROF, have disapproved of self-rule, calling it a ruse.
Instead, they want Syria to become a federation, with equal rights
for all minorities.
For now, Kurds across the political divide say that they want Syria to
remain united, but in a formula that ensures their rights as citizens
and as a cohesive minority. They are also afraid that the moniker
"Arab" may undermine their status in the future Syria.
Home to many ethnicities, Syria needs to walk a thin line between
its integrity as a nation and the rights of its minorities. Syria
will lose much if it antagonises its minorities, for the country's
rich legacy is a function of its diversity.
But if the minorities push their rights too far, they may risk breaking
the fabric that keeps their country great and united.
One option is for the opposition, Kurds included, to write a kind of
Magna Carta of the rights of the ethnicities and put the whole matter
to rest. All nationalities, Kurdish and others, would thus have full
rights within the perimeters of a unified country, one in which all
citizens were equal regardless of race, colour or creed.
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/News/7219/19/More-than-semantics.aspx