In The Absence Of Truth —

The first Sysnagogue in Tunisia has been burning. This may serve us all as a warning of things to come.

1. People on the street are pointing their fingers to the remnants of the Ben Ali regime, arguing that his thugs would have an interest in derailing the revolution, and defaming it. They wanted, they argue, to spark a civil war.

Now, we don’t know who did it; but one thing is for sure: things like that are probable to happen again, and far worse.

That is not the same as to claim that there had been anti-semitic undercurrents in the Tunisian revolution. Though we know that there is indeed such an undercurrent in Tunisian society, as in all Arab societies and, indeed, all capitalist societies, it has been remarkable, especially in Tunisia, how much this current has been sidelined by the protests.

The Tunisian revolution taught the people that they, themselves, can make history, and that may have, to a degree, sapped the source of power of the abundant and omnipresent conspiracy theories that lie at the heart of anti-semitic thinking. Anti-semitism, today, may be at an historic low-point in Arab societies.

So why then, now, these arson attacks? And why the warning of more to come?

2. Every Arab regime has a vested interest in the stability of every other Arab regime, regardless of its character, because of fear of exactly that which is happening today: a chain reaction of uprisings. Every regime stands to lose a lot, even everything, if anywhere in the Arab world democracy is allowed to flourish.

And not only that. Every Arab regime is bound to exploit every weakness of all its neighboring regimes. This is not because of the innate wickedness of a certain regime but because of rational mistrust: no ruler can be sure some other ruler is not trying to harm him, by supporting so-called opposition groups. And so, prophylacticly, every Arab ruler is bound to operate secret-service operations with so called opposition groups from neighboring countries.

This works not only with Arab regimes, to be sure, but in the whole wider Middle East and everywhere in the world; but because of its strange interdependence with the basic solidaraity of Arab regimes, it has a quality of its own in the Arab world. The Arab regimes are basically hostile brothers.

Now, wh could have seen in the Lebanese Civil war, and indeed even today in Lebanon, that whenever a so called power vacuum exists, things tend to head to civil war, not only because of their own weight, but because every neighboring Arab regime will rush to have a stake in the game, and run their own militia on the ground, and try to out-maneuvre eyery rivaling regime; and so, even if the Lebanese war lords at some points really had wanted to make peace (which they did), their principals, or allies, be it Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Libya, Saudia would not have let them.

3. The same holds true for Iraq after 2003. The neighboring countries (Arab and non-Arab alike) all had an interest in not letting transition to some kind of democracy happen smoothly; and not letting any of the other regimes having better relations in Iraq than they themselves had. The result was a downwards spiral of terrorism and civil war, fueled by virtually every player, with multiple mercenary „resistance“ groups on the ground, whose principal aim proved to be killing off every trace of Iraqi civil society, secular or left wing opposition.

They have very much succeeded, without any protest from the so called left. Not that the left had been afraid from taking sides. It took. The side of the killers, that is. In some way or another.

What has happenend in Iraq stands to happen again in Tunisia, too. And hopefully, this time the Left, which has covered itself so deeply in shame in Iraq ans Iran, will, at least, stand on its feet this time.

4. We all know there is a man in Libya called Qadhafi, and we all know who he is. Libya borders Tunisia. And Qadhafis regime this time really felt the heat. Qadhafi has lost no time to ally himself firmly with Tunisias „Muslim brothers“ (Ihkwan al muslimun). He knws that the stakes are high, and he would rather see Tunisia be drawn to the 9th circle of hell than to see it flourish.

Everybody knows that, in Tunisia. Everybody knows whats at stake. Hopefully anybody learned the lessons from Iraq. Or from neighboring Algeria (where, I will not deny that, nobody can draw the line between the forces of the state, and the Islamist militias they are supposed to hand down. Point taken? Point taken.)

If the Tunisian people don’t stand firm, and if the Left doesn’t defend their cause with steadfastness, there will be a time when death squads and truck bombs roam in Tunisia. It all starts, and all ends, with harassing and persecuting the Jews. Then come other non-Muslims, then anyone not sufficiently Muslim. Then they will come for the free women and the labor activists. We all know that. We have seen it in Iraq, and many places before. It’s time to learn the lesson, and fight back.