Where American Self Loathing Meets Arab Conspiracy Theories
Amir Taheri

The would-be ruler of an oil-rich Arab state is planning a policy reform that includes allowing girls to go to school, and signing an oil contract with China. But days before he takes over he is assassinated when a remote controlled bomb destroys his bullet-proof limousine in the middle of the desert.

But who would want such an enlightened prince out of the way?

The answer given in “Syriana”, the new Hollywood blockbuster starring George Clooney, is simple: the murder was planned and carried out by the CIA, the dirty-tricks arm of the United States of America.

But why would the US want an enlightened Arab leader murdered at a time that President George W Bush is publicly calling for such leaders to emerge in the Arab world?

Again, the answer provided by the scriptwriters is straightforward: the US government is controlled by Texas oil interests that cannot allow any Arab state to sign an oil contract with China.

Amir Taheri has a useful review of the film (reviewed earlier here) that’s worth taking a look at.

Among the things he notes is this:

According to an old saying one can never convince anyone who doesn’t wish to be convinced. The makers of “Syriana” are preaching to the converted if only because an extraordinarily large number of Arabs are comfortable in the certainty of their victimhood. Long before “Syriana” hit the silver screen those Arabs were convinced that whatever misfortune has befallen them is due to some conspiracy by a perfidious Western power.

The film certainly plays upon this aspect of current “analysis” by many in the region. Then he asks,Would it change anything if one were to remind the conspiracy theorists that none of the high profile political murders in the Arab world over the past century had anything to do with the US or any other foreign power?

and answers his question:

The list of Arab leaders murdered since 1900 is a long one. It includes six prime ministers, three kings, a ruling Imam, seven presidents of the republic, and dozens of ministers, parliamentarians and senior military officials. Every single one of them was killed either by Islamist militants (often from the Muslim Brotherhood) or by pan-Arab nationalists or by radical Arab security services.

That many Arabs should welcome the suggestion that their tragedies are due to evil doings by foreigners maybe understandable.

It is less so when so many Americans come together to make a film to portray their nation as evil incarnate.

“Money” may be the simplest reason for making the film, he says. There’s certainly an audience among the “self-loathing,” as he calls them.

But, he cautions, “Adversaries in history often end up resembling each other. So it is, perhaps, not surprising that the Arabs are learning the art of self-loathing from the Americans while the Americans develop a taste for Arab-style conspiracy theories.”

This is a timely warning.

This op-ed also runs in today’s Arab News. That, I think, is helpful as an antidote to the conspiracy theories that too often make their ways onto the editorial page.