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CHAPTER 25

Arab Unity and Disunity (since 1967)

THE CRISIS OF 1973

'Abd al-Nasir lived for three years after his defeat. His position in the

world had been badly shaken by it; his relationships with the United States

and Britain were soured by his accusation and belief that they had helped

Israel militarily during the war, and by the American insistence that Israel

would withdraw from conquered territories only in return for peace. His

position in regard to other Arab rulers was weakened as the limitations of

his power became clear. One immediate result of the war of 1967 was that

he cut his losses in Yemen, and made an agreement with Saudi Arabia by

which his forces were withdrawn.

Inside Egypt, however, his position was still strong. At the end of the

fateful week in June 1967 he announced his resignation, but this aroused

widespread protests in Egypt and some other Arab countries, perhaps

because of skilful organization, but perhaps because of a feeling that his

resignation would be a deeper defeat and humiliation. His hold over

popular sentiment in other Arab countries also remained strong. Both

because of his own stature and because of the recognized position of Egypt, he was the indispensable broker between the Palestinians and those among

whom they lived. In the years after 1967, the growth of Palestinian national feeling and the increasing strength of Fatah, which controlled the PLO from 1969, led to a number of incidents of guerilla action against Israel,

and Israeli reprisals against the lands where the Palestinians had some

freedom of action. In 1969, Egyptian intervention brought about an

agreement between the Lebanese government and the PLO, which set the

limits within which the PLO would be free to operate in southern Lebanon. In the next year, 1970, severe fighting broke out in Jordan between the

army and Palestinian guerilla groups which seemed on the point of taking

over power in the country. The Jordanian government was able to impose

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its authority and end the freedom of action of the Palestinian groups, and

once more it was the mediation of 'Abd al-Nasir which made peace between

them.

Immediately after this, 'Abd al-Nasir suddenly died. The extraordinary

scenes at his funeral, with millions weeping in the streets, certainly meant

something; at least for the moment, it was difficult to imagine Egypt or the

Arab world without him. His death was the end of an era of hope for an

Arab world united and made new.

'Abd al-Nasir was succeeded by a colleague of long standing, Anwar

Sadat (19 1 8-81). It seemed, at first, that Egypt would continue as before.

In other Arab countries, too, changes in 1969 and 1970 brought to power

people who seemed likely to follow a policy roughly similar to Nasirism or at least consistent with it. In Morocco and Tunisia, it is true, there was no

basic change at this time; King Hasan and those around him, and Bourguiba

and the Neo-Destour, remained in power. In Algeria too the change within

the ruling group had come a few years earlier. Further east, the rule of

King Faysal in Saudi Arabia, King Husayn in Jordan, and the dynasties of

the Gulf states continued. In Libya, however, a familiar combination of

army officers and radical intellectuals overthrew the monarchy in 1969;

after a time, there emerged in the new ruling group the dominant figure of

an officer, Mu'ammar al-Qadhafi. In the Sudan a similar group, led by Ja'far al-Numayri, overturned the constitutional regime in 1969. In Syria,

the Ba'thist regime which had been deeply involved in the defeat of 1967,

was replaced in 1970 by a group of army officers led by Hafiz al-Asad, also

belonging to the Ba'th but more cautious in policy. In Iraq, too, a period of

rather shaky rule by coalitions of army officers and civilians was ended

when a more cohesive group linked with the Ba'th took power in 1968; Saddam Husayn gradually emerged as its strongest figure. In South Yemen,

too, 1969 was a critical year. The coalition of forces which had taken

power with the coming of independence was replaced by a more strictly

Marxist group. In North Yemen, however, these years did not mark a

decisive change: the end of the civil war brought to power a coalition of

elements from the two sides, whose relationships with each other still

remained to be defined. It was not until 1974 that a more or less stable

regime was established, with support from the army and some powerful

tribal leaders.

In 1973 there took place events no less dramatic than those of 1967 and

which seemed to mark a new stage on the path of Arab unity and the

reassertion of independence in the face of the great powers. Once more

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there was a confrontation with Israel. Already before 'Abd al-Nasir died,

the desire to compensate for the defeat of 1967 had shown itself in a 'war

of attrition' along the Suez Canal and in the rearming of the Egyptian and

Syrian armies by the USSR. Early in the 1970s the new ruler of Egypt,

Sadat, made a certain change in policy when he asked for the withdrawal

of Russian advisers and technicians, but the army remained one which the

Russians had equipped and trained, and in October 1973 it launched a

sudden attack upon the Israeli forces on the east bank of the Suez Canal; at

the same moment, and by agreement, the Syrian army attacked the Israelis

in the Jawlan.

In the first rush of fighting, the Egyptian army succeeded in crossing the

canal and establishing a bridgehead, and the Syrians occupied part of the

Jawlan; weapons supplied by the Russians enabled them to neutralize the

Israeli air force, which had won the victory of 1967. In the next few days, however, the military tide turned. Israeli forces crossed the canal and

established their own bridgehead on the west bank, and drove the Syrians back towards Damascus. Apart from their own skill, their success was due partly to the equipment which was quickly sent them by the Americans,

and partly to differences of policy between Egypt and Syria which soon

revealed themselves. The campaigns showed once more the military superi-

ority of the Israelis, but neither in the eyes of the Arabs nor in those of the

world did the war seem to be a defeat. The attacks had shown careful

planning and serious determination; they had attracted not only sympathy

but financial and military help from other Arab countries; and they ended

in a cease-fire imposed by the influence of the super-powers which showed

that, while the USA would not allow Israel to be defeated, neither it nor the USSR would allow Egypt to be defeated, and that they did not wish to allow the war to escalate in a way which would draw them in.

Part of the reason for the intervention of the powers was the use by the

Arab states of what appeared to be their strongest weapon - the power to

impose an embargo on the export of oil. For the first and perhaps the last

time, this weapon was used successfully. The Arab oil-producing countries

decided to cut down their production so long as Israel remained in occu- pation of Arab lands, and Saudi Arabia imposed a total embargo on

exports to the USA and The Netherlands, which was regarded as the most favourable to Israel of western European countries and was also a centre

of the free market in oil.

The effects of these decisions were all the greater because they more

or less coincided with another change towards which the oil-exporting

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countries had been moving for some time. The demand for Middle Eastern

oil had been increasing, as the needs of the industrial countries grew faster

than production, and the organization of oil exporting countries (OPEC)

had been growing stronger and more determined to increase their share of

the profits, which were a smaller proportion of the price than was the

amount taken in taxation by the consumer countries which imported oil.

At the end of 1973 OPEC decided to increase the prices at which oil was sold by some 300 per cent; Iran and the Arab countries were the prime

movers in this decision. (The increase in the price paid by the consumer

was less than this, however, since taxes and other costs did not rise as

much.)

THE PREDOMINANCE OF AMERICAN INFLUENCE

Within a few years, however, it became clear that what might have seemed

to be a declaration of political and economic independence was in fact a

first step towards greater dependence on the United States. The lead was

taken, as it had been in every Arab enterprise for the last twenty years or

so, by Egypt. For Sadat, the war of 1973 had not been fought to achieve

military victory, but in order to give a shock to the super-powers, so that

they would take the lead in negotiating some settlement of the problems

between Israel and the Arabs which would prevent a further crisis and a

dangerous confrontation. This indeed is what happened, but in a way

which increased the power and participation of one of the super-powers,

the USA. America had intervened decisively in the war, first to supply arms

to Israel and prevent its being defeated, and then to bring about a balance

of forces conducive to a settlement. In the next two years, American

mediation led to an Israeli-Syrian agreement by which Israel withdrew

from some of the Syrian territory it had conquered in 1967 and 1973, and

two similar agreements between Israel and Egypt. There was a brief and

abortive attempt to bring together the super-powers, Israel and the Arab

states in a general conference under the auspices of the United Nations,

but the main line of American policy was so far as possible to exclude

Russia from the Middle East, to support Israel politically and militarily, to

bring it into agreements with Arab countries by which it would withdraw

from conquered territories in exchange for peace, but to keep the PLO out of the discussions, in deference to Israeli wishes, at least so long as the PLO did not recognize Israel.

This policy changed for a short time in 1977, when a new American

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President, Jimmy Carter, tried to formulate a joint approach to the problem

by the USA and the USSR, and to find a way by which the Palestinians could be drawn into the process of negotiation. These efforts, however,

came to nothing for two reasons: Israeli opposition, which increased

when a more strongly nationalist government took power in Israel, with

Menahem Begin as prime minister; and Sadat's sudden decision, in November 1977, to go to Jerusalem and offer Israel an opening for peace

by direct negotiations.

It was clearly in Sadat's mind to try to put an end to the sequence of

wars which, he believed, the Arabs could not win, but there were also

wider perspectives: direct negotiations, sponsored by the USA, would

eliminate the Soviet Union as a factor in the Middle East; once at peace

with Israel, Egypt might become a more important ally for America, with

all the consequences which might follow in the way both of economic

support and of a more favourable American attitude towards the claims of

the Palestinian Arabs. In the mind of the Israeli government of the time,

the aim was different: to make peace with Egypt, their most formidable

enemy, even at the price of withdrawing from Sinai, and therefore to free

their hands for the essential aim of their policy - to implant Jewish settlers in the conquered territories of the West Bank and gradually annex them,

and to be able to deal effectively with any opposition from Syria or the

PLO. In the discussions which followed Sadat's journey, therefore, the

central question was that of the connection to be established between an

Israeli-Egyptian peace and the future status of the West Bank. When agreement was finally reached, with American mediation, in 1978 (the

'Camp David Agreement'), it was clear that in this essential matter the

Israeli opinion had prevailed against that of Egypt, and up to a point that

of the United States. According to the agreement, there was to be formal

peace between Egypt and Israel, and there was to be some kind of auton-

omy, to be defined later, for the West Bank and Gaza, leading after five

years to discussions about its definitive status; but there was no formal

link between the two. In later discussions on autonomy it soon became

clear that Israeli ideas were very different from those of Egypt or America,

and Israel refused to suspend its policy ofJewish settlement in the conquered

territories.

President Sadat was assassinated in 198 1 by members of a group who opposed his policy and wished to restore the Islamic basis of Egyptian

society, but the main lines of his policy were continued by his successor,

Husni Mubarak. In the course of the next few years, Egypt's relations with

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the United States grew closer, and it received large amounts of financial

and military aid. The agreement with Israel, however, was repudiated not

only by the Palestinians but by most other Arab states, with greater or

lesser degrees of conviction, and Egypt was formally expelled from the

Arab League, which moved its headquarters from Cairo to Tunis. Neverthe-

less, the advantages to be derived from a closer alignment with the United

States policy were so great and obvious that a number of other Arab states

also moved in that direction: Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan, and in particular

the oil-producing countries of the Arabian peninsula, for, after the climax

of their influence in 1973, it soon became clear that the wealth derived

from oil could generate weakness rather than strength.

Judged by all prevous standards, that wealth was very great indeed.

Between 1973 and 1978, annual revenues from oil in the main Arab

producing countries grew enormously: in Saudi Arabia from $4.35 to

$36.0 billions; in Kuwait from $1.7 to $9.2 billions; in Iraq from $1.8 to

$23.6 billions; in Libya from $2.2 to $8.8 billions. Some other countries

also increased their production greatly, in particular Qatar, Abu Dhabi and Dubai. The control of the countries over their resources also expanded.

By 1980 all the main producing states had either nationalized the pro-

duction of oil or else taken a major stake in the operating companies,

although the great multinational companies still had a strong position in

transport and selling. The increase in wealth led to an increase in depen-

dence on the industrialized countries. Producing countries had to sell their

oil, and the industrial countries were their main customers. In the course

of the 1970s the excess of demand over supply came to an end, because of

economic recession, attempts to economize in the consumption of fuel,

and increased production by countries which were not members of OPEC;

the bargaining position and unity of OPEC grew weaker, and a high and uniform level of prices could not be maintained. Those countries which

had larger revenues than they could spend on development, because of the

limits of population and natural resources, had to invest the surplus

somewhere, and did so for the most part in the industrial countries. They

had to go to those countries too for the capital goods and technical

expertise which they needed for economic development and for building

their armed forces.

The increasing dependence had another aspect. The use by the Arab

countries of the weapon of embargo in 1973 had brought home to the

industrial states the extent of their dependence upon Middle Eastern oil,

and there were indications as the decade went on that the United States

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might intervene in force if supplies of oil were interrupted again, either

because of revolutions in the producing countries, or - as the Americans

saw it - because of the danger of an extension of Soviet influence in the

countries of the Gulf. Intervention would be a last resort, however, and for

the most part the United States depended on its main allies in the region of

the Gulf, Saudi Arabia and Iran. At the end of the 1970s, however, the

situation changed. The Russian occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 aroused

fears, whether justified or not, that the USSR might intend to extend its

control further into the world of the Indian Ocean. The Iranian revolution

of 1978-9 destroyed the position of the shah, the strongest ally of the

United States, and replaced his government by one committed to making

Iran into a truly Islamic state, as the first step towards a similar change in

other Muslim countries; there was some danger that the revolution would

spread westwards into, neighbouring countries, which would disrupt the

political system of the Gulf countries and their relations with the United

States. Such considerations led to the formulation of American plans for

the defence of the Gulf in case of need, in agreement with such Middle

Eastern states as were prepared to co-operate. Most of the Gulf states tried,

however, to keep some distance from a full American alliance, and in 198

1

Saudi Arabia and the smaller states created their own Gulf Co-operation

Council.

The opening to the west was more than a change in foreign or military

policy; it was also a change in the attitudes and policies of most Arab

governments towards the economy. It was a change known in Egypt,

significantly, as the infitah (policy of the open door), after a law promul-

gated in 1974. A number of causes led up to it: the power of the United States, as shown in the war of 1973 and its aftermath; the need for foreign

loans and investment in order to develop resources and acquire strength;

perhaps also an increasing awareness of the limitations of state control

over the economy; and the pressure of private interests.

The infitah consisted of two processes, closely concerned with each

other. On the one hand there was a shift in the balance between the public and private sectors of the economy. Apart from Lebanon, which had

virtually no public sector, even the countries most committed to private

enterprise retained some areas of public control, for there was no possibility

of rapid development except through investment and direction by the state;

in Saudi Arabia, for example, the oil industry was nationalized and the

largest new industrial enterprises were owned by the state. In most coun-

tries, however, a wider scope was now given to private enterprise, in

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agriculture, industry and commerce. This was most noticeable in Egypt,

where the 1970s saw a rapid and far-reaching change from the state

socialism of the 1960s. In Tunisia, an attempt at state control of imports

and exports, of industrial production and internal distribution, ran into

difficulties and was ended in 1969. In Syria and Iraq, too, in spite of the

socialist principles of the Ba'th party, a similar change took place.

Secondly, infitab meant an opening to foreign, and specifically to western,

investment and enterprise. In spite of the accumulation of capital from the

production of oil, the capital resources of most Arab countries were

not adequate for the rapid and large-scale developments to which most

governments were committed. Investment from the United States and

Europe, and from international bodies, was encouraged by guarantees and

tax-privileges, and restrictions upon imports were lowered. The results on

the whole were not what had been hoped for. Not very much private

foreign capital was attracted into countries where, for the most part,

regimes seemed unstable and the chances of profit uncertain. Most aid

came from governments or international agencies, and was used for arma-

ments, the infrastructure, and costly and over-ambitious schemes. Some aid

was given on conditions, explicit or implied; pressure by the International

Monetary Fund on Egypt to reduce its deficit led to an attempt to raise

food prices, which aroused serious disturbances in 1977. Moreover, the

easing of restrictions upon imports meant that young indigenous industries

faced competition from the well-established industries of America, western

Europe and Japan, at least in those lines of production where a high level

of technical expertise and experience was needed. The result would be to

keep the Arab countries, like those in most of the Third World, in a

situation in which they would produce consumer goods for themselves but

would continue to import products of the higher technology.

THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF ARAB COUNTRIES

The death of 'Abd al-Nasir and the events of the 1970s weakened what

may have been an illusion of independence, and also an illusion of unity,

but in some ways the links between different Arab countries grew closer

during this period. More inter-Arab organizations were in existence than

ever before, and some of them were effective. The Arab League lost much

of what had always been a limited authority when Egypt was expelled, but

its membership increased: Mauritania in west Africa and Djibouti and

Somalia in east Africa were accepted as members, although none of them

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had previously been regarded as Arab countries, and their acceptance was

a sign of the ambiguity of the term 'Arab'. At the United Nations and in

other international bodies, the members of the League often succeeded in

following a common policy, particularly where the problem of Palestine was concerned.

The differences of interest between the states which had resources of oil

and those which did not were lessened by the creation of economic

institutions through which part of the wealth of the richer countries could

be given or loaned to the poorer. Some of these institutions were supra-

national: the special fund created by OPEC, that set up by the organization

of Arab oil-exporting countries (OAPEC), the Arab Fund for Economic

and Social Development. Others were set up by individual countries,

Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi. By the end of the 1970s the volume

of aid was very large. In 1979 some $2 billions were given by oil-producing

countries to other developing countries, through various channels; this was

2.9 per cent of their GNP.

Other kinds of links were even more important, because they were links

between individual human beings as well as between the societies of which

they formed part. A common culture was in process of formation. The rapid expansion of education which had begun when countries became

independent continued with accelerated speed, in all countries to a greater

or lesser extent. By 1980 the proportion of boys of elementary school age

who attended school was 88 per cent in Egypt and 57 per cent in Saudi Arabia; that of girls was 90 per cent in Iraq and 31 per cent in Saudi

Arabia. The literacy rate in Egypt was 56.8 per cent for men and 29 per

cent for women. In Egypt and Tunisia almost a third of university students

v/ere women and in Kuwait over 50 per cent; even in Saudi Arabia the proportion was almost a quarter. Schools and universities were of varying

quality; the need to educate as many as possible as soon as possible

meant that classes were large, teachers inadequately trained and buildings

unsuitable. A common factor in most schools was the emphasis on the teaching of Arabic, and the teaching of other subjects through the medium

of Arabic. For the greater number of those who came out of the schools, and of graduates of the new universities, Arabic was the only language in

which they were at home, and the medium through which they saw the

world. This strengthened the consciousness of a common culture shared by all who spoke Arabic.

This common culture and awareness were now spread by a new medium. Radio, cinemas and newspapers continued to be important, but to their

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influence there was added that of television. The 1960s were the decade

during which Arab countries established television stations, and the TV set became a part of the household scarcely less important than the cooker

and the refrigerator, in all classes except the very poor or those who lived in villages not yet reached by electricity. By 1973 there were estimated to

be some 500,000 TV sets in Egypt, a similar number in Iraq and 300,000 in Saudi Arabia. What was transmitted included news, presented in such a way as to win support for the policy of the government, religious pro- grammes in most countries to a greater or lesser extent, films or serials

imported from Europe or America, and also plays and musical programmes

made in Egypt and Lebanon; plays transmitted ideas, images and that most

fragile of transplants, humour, across the frontiers of Arab states.

Another link between Arab countries which grew closer in these ten

years was that created by the movement of individuals. This was the period

when air transport came within the range of possibility of large strata of

the population. Airports were built, most countries had their national

airlines, air-routes connected Arab capitals with each other. Road travel

also increased as roads were improved and automobiles and buses became

more common: the Sahara and the Syrian and Arabian deserts were crossed

by well-maintained roads. In spite of political conflicts which might close

frontiers and hold up travellers or goods, these routes carried increasing

numbers of tourists and businessmen; efforts made by the Arab League

and other bodies to strengthen commercial links between the Arab countries

had some success, although inter-Arab trade still accounted for less than

10 per cent of the foreign trade of Arab countries in 1980.

The most important movement along the air- and land-routes, however,

was not that of goods but of migrants from the poorer Arab countries to

those made rich by oil. The movement of migration had begun in the

1950s, but in the late 1960s and the 1970s the flow became greater because

of two different kinds of factor. On the one hand, the vast increase in profits from oil and the creation of ambitious schemes of development

raised the demand for labour in the oil-producing states, and the number

of those states grew; apart from Algeria and Iraq, none of them had the

manpower needed, at various levels, to develop their own resources. On the other hand, the pressure of population in the poorer countries grew

greater, and the prospects of migration became more attractive. This was

particularly true of Egypt after 1967; there was little economic growth,

and the government encouraged migration in the period of infitah. What

had been mainly a movement of educated younger men now became a

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mass migration of workers at every level of skill, to work not only in the

civil service or professions, but as building workers or in domestic service.

Mostly it was a movement of single men or, increasingly, of women who left their families behind; but the Palestinians, having lost their homes, tended to move as whole families and to settle permanently in the countries

of migration.

Estimates of the total number of workers cannot be accurate, but by the

end of the 1970s there may have been as many as 3 million Arab migrants,

perhaps half of them in Saudi Arabia, with large numbers also in Kuwait,

the other Gulf states and Libya. The largest group, perhaps a third of the

whole number, came from Egypt, and a similar number from the two

Yemens; half a million were Jordanians or Palestinians (including the

dependants of workers), and smaller numbers came from Syria, Lebanon,

the Sudan, Tunisia and Morocco. There was some migration also between

the poorer countries: as Jordanians moved to the Gulf, Egyptians took

their places in some areas of the Jordanian economy.

The increased knowledge of peoples, customs and dialects which was

brought about by this large-scale migration must have deepened the sense

of there being a single Arab world within which Arabs could move with

comparative freedom and understand each other. It did not necessarily,

however, increase the desire for closer union; there was an awareness of

differences also, and migrants were conscious of being excluded from the

local societies into which they moved.

ARAB DISUNITY

In spite of the strengthening of such ties, in the political sphere the main

trend of the 1970s was towards difference and even hostility rather than

greater union. Although the personality of 'Abd al-Nasir had aroused

hostilities and led to divisions between Arab states and conflicts between

governments and peoples, it had nevertheless generated a kind of solidarity,

a feeling that there was such a thing as an Arab nation in the making. For

the first few years after his death something of this continued, and its last

manifestation was in the war of 1973 when there seemed for a moment to be a common front of Arab states irrespective of the nature of their regimes. The common front disintegrated almost at once, however; and although attempts at union between two or more Arab states were still discussed

and announced from time to time, the general impression which the Arab

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states gave their peoples and the world by the end of the 1970s was one of

weakness and disunity.

The weakness was shown most obviously in regard to what all Arab

peoples regarded as their common problem: that of Israel and the fate of the Palestinians. By the end of the 1970s, the situation in the regions

occupied by Israel during the war of 1967 was changing rapidly. The policy

of Jewish settlement, begun soon after the war of 1967 for reasons which

were partly strategic, had taken on a new meaning with the coming to power in Israel of the more rigidly nationalist government led by Begin;

settlement took place on a larger scale, with expropriation of land and

water from the Arab inhabitants, and with the ultimate aim of annexing

the area to Israel; the Arab part of Jerusalem, and the Jawlan region

conquered from Syria, were in fact formally annexed. In the face of such

measures both the Palestinians and the Arab states seemed to be powerless.

The PLO and its chairman, Yasir 'Arafat, were able to speak for the Palestinians in the occupied areas and to obtain international support, but

not to change the situation in any appreciable way. Neither of the paths of

action which, in theory, were open to the Arab states seemed to lead

anywhere. Active opposition to Israel was impossible, given the superior

armed might of the Israelis, and the separate interests of the Arab states,

which they were not prepared to place in jeopardy. The path tried by Egypt

under Sadat did result in an Israeli withdrawal from Sinai, but it soon

became clear that Egypt had not obtained sufficient influence over Israel to

persuade it to change its policy, or over the USA to persuade it to oppose Israeli policy in more than a formal way.

Military weakness, the growth of separate interests and of economic

dependence all led to a disintegration of whatever common front had seemed to exist until the war of 1973. The obvious line along which it

disintegrated was that which divided the states whose ultimate inclination

was towards the USA, a political compromise with Israel, and a free

capitalist economy, and those which clung to a policy of neutralism. Those

in this second camp were usually thought to include Algeria, Libya,

Syria, Iraq and South Yemen, together with the PLO, which was formally

regarded by the Arab states as having the status of a separate government.

In practice, however, the lines were not so clearly drawn, and alliances

between individual countries might cut across them. Within each camp,

relations were not necessarily close or easy. Among those which were 'pro- western', the independent policy adopted by Egypt in its approach to

Israel caused hesitations and embarrassment, and virtually all Arab states

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THE AGE OF NATION-STATES

formally severed relations with it, although they did not cut off the flow of

migrants' remittances back to their families. In the other camp, there were

varying relations with the other super-power; Syria, Iraq and South Yemen

obtained military and economic aid from the USSR. There was also a deep

antagonism between the two Ba'thist regimes of Syria and Iraq, caused

both by rivalry for leadership of what appeared for a time to be a

powerful and expanding nationalist party and by different interests between

countries which had a common frontier and shared the water-system of the Euphrates. There was, moreover, endless friction with Libya, whose

dominant figure, Qadhafi, seemed at times to be trying to take up the

mantle of 'Abd al-Nasir, without any basis of strength except what money

could provide.

In this period there were three armed conflicts which gravely affected

the relations between Arab states. The first occurred in the far west of the

Arab world. It concerned a territory known as the Western Sahara, a thinly

populated western extension of the Sahara desert to the Atlantic coast

south of Morocco. It had been occupied and ruled by Spain since the late

nineteenth century, but was of little strategic or economic importance until

the discovery in the 1960s of important deposits of phosphates, which a

Spanish company extracted. In the 1970s Morocco began to put forward

claims to it, because the authority of the sultan had formerly run there.

These claims were opposed by Spain, and also by Mauritania, the country

immediately to the south, which had been under French rule since the early

years of the twentieth century, had become independent in i960, and itself

put forward claims to part at least of the territory. After a long diplomatic

process Spain, Morocco and Mauritania reached agreement in 1975, by

which Spain would withdraw and the territory be divided between the

other two. This did not end the crisis, however; by this time the people of

the territory itself had organized their own political movements, and after the agreement of 1975 one of them, known by the acronym 'Polisario',

emerged as an opponent of Moroccan and Mauritanian claims and called

for independence. Mauritania gave up its claims in 1979, but Morocco

continued to be involved in a long struggle with Polisario, which had the

support of Algeria, a country which also shared a frontier with the territory

and did not wish to see Moroccan power extended. There began a conflict

which was to continue in one form or another for a number of years, and

to complicate relations not only between Morocco and Algeria, but also

within organizations of which they both formed part: the Arab League

and the Organization for African Unity.

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Another conflict, which broke out in Lebanon at roughly the same time,

drew into it, in one way or another, the main political forces in the Middle East: the Arab states, the PLO, Israel, western Europe and the super-

powers. Its origins lay in certain changes in Lebanese society which called

in question the political system. When Lebanon became independent in the 1940s, it included three regions with different kinds of population and

traditions of government: the region of Mount Lebanon, with a population mainly Maronite Christian in the north and mixed Druze and Christian in

the south, the coastal cities with a mixed Muslim and Christian population,

and certain rural areas to the east and south of Mount Lebanon where the population was mainly Shi'i Muslim. The first of these areas had a long

tradition of separate administration under its own lords, and later as a privileged district of the Ottoman Empire; the second and third had been

integral parts of the empire, and were incorporated into Lebanon by the

French mandatory government. The new state had a democratic consti-

tution, and by the time the French left the country there was an agreement

between the leaders of the Maronites and the Sunni Muslims that the

president of the republic should always be a Maronite, the prime minister

a Sunni, and other posts in government and administration be distributed

among the different religious communities, but in such a way as to preserve

effective power in Christian hands.

Between 1945 and 1958 the system succeeded in maintaining a balance

and a certain degree of co-operation between the leaders of the different

communities, but within a generation its bases were growing weaker. There

was a demographic change: the Muslim population grew faster than the

Christian, and by the 1970s it was generally accepted that the three

communities collectively regarded as Muslim (Sunnis, Shi's and Druzes)

were larger in numbers than the Christian communities, and some of their

leaders were less willing to accept a situation in which the presidency and

ultimate power were in the hands of the Christians. Moreover, the rapid

economic changes in the country and the Middle East led to the growth of

Beirut into a great city in which half the population lived and more than

half worked. Lebanon had become an extended city-state; it needed control

by a strong and effective government. The gap between rich and poor had

grown, and the poor were mainly Sunni or Shi'i Muslims; they needed a

redistribution of wealth through taxation and social services. A government based on a fragile agreement between leaders was not well placed to do

what was required, for it could survive only by not pursuing any policy

which would disturb powerful interests.

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THE AGE OF N ATI ON- STATES

In 1958 the balance broke down, and there were several months of civil

war, which ended with a reassertion of the balance under the slogan 'No

victors, no vanquished'. The underlying conditions which had led to the

breakdown continued to exist, however, and in the next decade and a half

another factor was added to them - the larger role which Lebanon played

in the confrontation between the Palestinians and Israel. After the power

of the Fatah and other guerilla organizations in Jordan was broken in

1970, their main efforts were concentrated in southern Lebanon, whose

frontier with Israel was the only one across which they could hope to

operate with some freedom, and with the support of the large Palestinian

refugee population. This aroused the alarm of important elements among the Christians, and in particular their best-organized political party, the

Kata'ib (Phalanges): both because Palestinian activities in the south were

leading to a strong Israeli response, which might threaten the independence

of the country, and because the presence of the Palestinians gave support

to these groups, mainly Muslim and Druze, which wanted to change the

political system in which power lay mainly in Christian hands.

By 1975 there was a dangerous confrontation of forces, and each

protagonist found arms and encouragement from abroad: the Kata'ib and

their allies from Israel, the Palestinians and their allies from Syria. Serious

righting broke out in the spring of that year, and continued, with varying

fortunes, until late 1976, when a more or less stable truce was agreed. The

chief instigator of this was Syria, which had changed its policy during the

period of fighting. It had supported the Palestinians and their allies at the

beginning, but had then moved closer to the Kata'ib and their allies when

they seemed to be in danger of losing: its interest lay in maintaining a

balance of forces which would restrain the Palestinians and make it difficult

for them to pursue a policy in southern Lebanon that might draw Syria

into a war with Israel. To preserve these interests, it sent armed forces into Lebanon, with some kind of approval from the other Arab states and the

USA, and they remained there after the end of the fighting. There followed

some five years of uneasy truce. Maronite groups ruled the north, the

Syrian army was in the east, the PLO was dominant in the south. Beirut was divided between an eastern section controlled by the Kata'ib, and a

western section controlled by the PLO and its allies. The authority of the government had more or less ceased to exist. The unrestrained power of

the PLO in the south brought it into intermittent conflict with Israel, which in 1978 mounted an invasion; this was brought to a halt by international

pressure, but left behind it a local government under Israeli control in a

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ARAB UNITY AND DISUNITY (SINCE 1967)

strip along the frontier. The invasion and the disturbed situation in the

south led the Shi'i inhabitants of the area to create their own political and military force, Amal.

In 1982 the situation acquired a more dangerous dimension. The

nationalist government in Israel, having secured its southern frontier by

the peace treaty with Egypt, now tried to impose its own solution of the problem of the Palestinians. This involved an attempt to destroy both the

military and the political power of the PLO in Lebanon, to install a friendly regime there, and then, freed from effective Palestinian resistance, to pursue

its policy of settlement and annexation of occupied Palestine. With some

degree of acquiescence from the USA, Israel invaded Lebanon in June

1982. The invasion culminated in a long siege of the western part of Beirut,

mainly inhabited by Muslims and dominated by the PLO. The siege ended

with an agreement, negotiated through the US government, by which

the PLO would evacuate west Beirut, with guarantees for the safety of Palestinian civilians given by the Lebanese and US governments. At the

same time, a presidential election resulted in the military head of the

Kata'ib, Bashir Jumayyil, becoming president; he was assassinated soon

afterwards and his brother Amin was then elected. The assassination was

taken by Israel as an opportunity to occupy west Beirut, and this allowed

the Kata'ib to carry out a massacre of Palestinians on a large scale in the

refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila.

The withdrawal of the PLO, while it ended the fighting for a time, moved

the conflict into a more dangerous phase. The gulf beween local groups

grew wider. The new government, dominated by the Kata'ib and supported

by Israel, tried to impose its own solution: concentration of power in its hands, and an agreement with Israel by which Israeli forces would withdraw

in return for a virtual political and strategic control of the country. This

aroused strong opposition from other communities, the Druzes and Shi'is,

with support from Syria. Although the invasion had shown the impotence

either of Syria or of other Arab countries to take concerted and effective

action, Syrian troops were still in parts of the country, and Syrian influence

was strong with those who opposed the government. Syria and its allies could draw upon some support from the USSR, while the USA was in a position to give both military and diplomatic support to the Kata'ib and

their Israeli backers. As one of the conditions under which the PLO left Beirut, a multinational force with a strong American element had been

sent to Lebanon. It had been quickly withdrawn, but returned after the

massacre of Sabra and Shatila. From that time, the American component

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THE AGE OF N ATI ON- STATES

of the multinational force gradually enlarged its functions, from defence of

the civilian population to active support of the new Lebanese government

and of a Lebanese-Israeli agreement which it helped to negotiate in 1983.

By the later months of that year it was engaged in military operations in

support of the Lebanese government, but, after attacks on US marines and

under pressure of American public opinion, it withdrew its forces. Without

effective American or Israeli support and faced with strong resistance from

Druzes, Shi'is and Syria, the Lebanese government cancelled the agreement

with Israel. One result of this episode was the emergence of Amal and

other Shi'i groups as major factors in Lebanese politics. In 1984 Amal took

effective control of west Beirut; it was partly under its pressure that Israeli

forces withdrew from all Lebanon except for a strip along the southern

frontier.

A third conflict in these years involved an Arab with a non-Arab state, and threatened to draw in other Arab states; this was the war between Iraq

and Iran which began in 1980. There were certain frontier questions at

issue between them, and these had been resolved in favour of Iran in 1975,

when the shah was at the height of his power in the world. The Iranian

revolution, and the period of confusion and apparent weakness which

followed it, gave Iraq an opportunity to redress the balance. Something

more important than this was at stake, however. The new Iranian regime

appealed to Muslims everywhere to restore the authority of Islam in society,

and might seem to have a special attraction to the Shi'i majority in

Iraq; the Iraqi regime faced a double challenge, as a secular nationalist

government and as one dominated by Sunni Muslims. In 1980 the Iraqi

army invaded Iran. After its first successes, however, it was not able to

occupy any part of the country permanently, and after a time Iran was able

to take the offensive and invade Iraq. The war did not split Iraqi society,

for the Shi'is of Iraq remained at least quiescent, but to some extent it split

the Arab world. Syria supported Iran, because of its own disagreement with Iraq, but most other Arab states gave financial or military support to

Iraq, because an Iranian victory would upset the political system in the

Gulf and might also affect the order of society in countries in which

Muslim, and particularly Shi'i, sentiment was strong.

The fighting finally came to an end with a cease-fire negotiated by the

United Nations in 1988. Neither side had won territory, and both had lost heavily in human lives and economic resources. In a sense, however, both

had salvaged something: neither regime had collapsed under the stress of

war, and the Iranian revolution had not spread to Iraq or the Gulf.

43*

ARAB UNITY AND DISUNITY (SINCE 1967)

The end of the war between Iraq and Iran opened prospects of a change

in the relations between Arab states. It seemed likely that Iraq, with its

energies released and with an army well tried in war, would play a more

active role in other spheres: in the Gulf, and in the general politics of the

Arab world. Its relations with Egypt and Jordan had been strengthened by

the help they had given it during the war; its relations with Syria were bad

because Syria had helped Iran, and as an opponent of Syria it might

intervene more actively in the tangled affairs of Lebanon.

The problem of Palestine also moved into a new phase in 1988. At the

end of the previous year, the population of the territories under Israeli

occupation, the West Bank and Gaza, had erupted in a movement of

resistance, almost universal, at times peaceful and at times violent, although

avoiding the use of firearms; the local leadership had links with the

PLO and other organizations. This movement, the intifada, continued throughout 1988, changing the relationship of Palestinians with each other

and with the world outside in the occupied territories. It revealed the

existence of a united Palestinian people, and re-established the division

between the territories under Israeli occupation and Israel itself. The Israeli

government was unable to suppress the movement, increasingly on the

defensive against foreign criticism, and faced with a deeply divided public.

King Husayn of Jordan, finding himself unable to control the rising or to

speak for the Palestinians, withdrew from active participation in the search

for a settlement. The PLO was in a position to step into the vacuum, but its own nature was changed. It had to take into account the opinion of those in the occupied territories, and their desire to end the occupation. The

Palestine National Council, the representative body of Palestinians, met in

Algiers and produced a charter proclaiming its willingness to accept the

existence of Israel and to negotiate a final settlement with it. These develop-

ments were taking place in a new context: a certain reassertion of Arab

unity in regard to the problem, the return of Egypt as an active participant

in Arab affairs, and a change in the relationship between the United States

and the USSR. The former declared its willingness to talk directly to the

PLO for the first time, and the latter began to intervene more actively in the affairs of the Middle East.

433