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A changed Middle East

Sunday, 20. December 2015 - 15:36

This week marks five years since the beginning of the Arab Spring, which unrecognizably altered the face of the Middle East and sent the Arab world back hundreds of years to a period of chaos, anarchy and most of all, extremism and radicalism.

The Arab Spring started with street protests in Tunisia in mid-December 2010, which within months led to the ouster of former Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali after two decades of rule. Following Tunisia came Egypt and deposed Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who had ruled the country for nearly three decades. Then came Libya,Yemen and Syria.

The turmoil that rocked the Middle East was in large part the result of an ongoing crisis suffered by the Arab world in recent decades. This upheaval was led by the young generation, the result of rapid population growth over the second half of the 20th century. In the early 1960s, the Arab world was home to about 100 million people -- 50 years later, that number has reached about 400 million. By the year 2050, it is expected to reach 700 million. All these people were lacking the necessary resources to ensure their quality of life.

Around the world, people looked on in joy as the upheaval in the Arab world began. They hoped that the youth of Tahrir Square and their peers would bring on change that would help bridge the yawning gap between the Arab world and the West, driving economic prosperity and, above all, democracy. Many Israelis were also excited, urging their country to "go with the flow" of this historical process in the Middle East and not to come out against it. If Israel did oppose it, they warned, it would be identified with the wrong side of the changing Middle Eastern map, the side of Arab dictatorships that oppressed their populations and would be swept into the dust bin of history.

However, it quickly became clear that this was no Arab Spring, it was an Islamic Winter. In many Arab countries, Muslim Brotherhood groups came to power, looking to paint the Arab world green (a color that symbolizes Islam and is often used in the flags of Islamic movements). In some countries, including Egypt and Tunisia, stability was restored -- at least in part. But nothing happened in other Arab countries. In those countries, state institutions collapsed -- having rested on shaky and even artificial foundations in the first place -- and society collapsed along with them. And so, Syria, Libya and Yemen joined the growing list of failed states, alongside Iraq, Lebanon and Somalia. With that, in the summer of 2014, the Arab Spring and the Islamic Winter became the summer of the Islamic State, after the terrorist group took over northern Iraq and eastern Syria, painting the area black, like its flag. Islamic State and similar groups in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen rose out of the regional turmoil, taking advantage of young people's failure to lead and control the revolution they had started.

Israel was perhaps the only country to express reservations about the events unfolding around it out of concern that -- as was the case in the beginning -- instead of moderate regimes, these countries would be overtaken by Islamic movements, like the Muslim Brotherhood. But even Israel did not imagine that the Arab Spring would lead to chaos and anarchy, allowing radical jihadi groups to take root along its borders. With groups like Islamic State, Israel finds itself without the deterrence capability to ensure long-term calm along its northern and Sinai borders.

One way or another, the Middle East has changed. Diplomatic efforts have collapsed, and more importantly, the Arab world has been replaced by a world of tribes, clans and radical Islamic movements that threaten to push Arabs backward by centuries.

Eyal Zisser

Source: 
www.israelhayom.com
Tags: 
Arab Spring
Arab World
Middle East
radical Islamic movements