السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته
في الجامعة كان علي لاحد المواد كتابة بحث بسيط عن اي موضوع اختاره
واخترت موضوع امريكا بعيون العرب
وهنا اضع لكم موضوع البحث بين ايديكم عله يفيد البعض ولو اردتم مناقشة ما فيه انا مستعد
وقبل هذا
احب ان اشكر
اخي وصديقي الحبيب وزميلي
الاخ TK
فقد ساعدني كثيييييييييييييييييرا في الخروج بهذا البحث
اتررككم مع البحث
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The US in the eyes of Arabs
For the last three decades, the US has been the sole super power in the world. Due to this fact, the US has had its mind set to solve the conflicts of the world. However, parties involved in these conflicts haven’t all been satisfied with the US proposed solutions. Conflicts involving the Arabs seem to be the most controversial. The US has played the role of the peace-maker in the Middle East peace process; however, in the eyes of most Arabs, the US might not have been the peace-maker after all!
I will start by mentioning an event that happened in my childhood. When I was seven years old, I was playing with kids in my town in Yemen. We divided ourselves into two teams and started a water-gun battle. Each team chose a name for their team. Our team chose America and the other team chose Iraq. Although we were little kids, the names of our teams had significant relations to what was going on in the Middle East region. At that time, the Middle East was living the second gulf war, mainly involving the US and Iraq. When the game started, the Iraq team was more anxious to attack us. They started shouting and saying we will defeat you Americans. You are weak and we are strong. I remember that we replied by saying you can’t defeat us, we’re very strong and you Arabs are the weak ones. We can kill you all in one second. As I said, we were still just kids, but because of the surrounding environment, our minds had adopted the idea that the US represented the bad guys even if we didn’t really pay much attention and concern to the matter.
First, let us talk about the Arabs. An Arab person is a person who speaks Arabic as his/her native tongue. The Arabic language is spoken in the Middle East and North Africa. Today, there are twenty one Arab countries. According to the year (two thousand) census, The Arabs' population was about 291 million. Even though the majority
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of Arabs are Muslims, there are Christian and Jew Arabs. I’ve met some people here who thought that Arabs were all Muslims.
From my experience, I think that the Muslim Arabs are more involved with their religion than the people in the US, who are affected by the secular life. Islam as a religion is very important to talk about in this topic. Depending on how much an Arab person is religious, his/her view of the US may vary. Some people do not agree with that idea. They claim that there are religious Muslims who love the US, religious Muslims who hate the US and religious Muslims in between who don’t care. As a result, these people conclude that being religious does not contribute to the feelings of the Arabs toward the US. It is true that there are Muslims with different feelings toward the US, however, this is because Muslims are not all the same and there are different groups of Muslims; Salafi is one of these groups.
The Salafi Muslims believe that love and hate are two different ways of worshiping God; they believe you should love whom God tells you to love and you should hate whom God tells you to hate. Salafis believe that God orders the Muslims to dislike all the non-believers until they believe in Islam. In the perspective of Salafis, the word non-believers, in Islam, means simply non-Muslims. Salafis depend on the Koran (Holy Book of Muslims) to support their ideas. "O ye who believe, take not for friends and protectors those who take your religion for mockery or fun, whether among those who received the Scripture before you, or among those who reject Faith; but fear ye Allah (God) if ye have Faith (indeed)" (Koran Translation, Chapter. 5 Verse 57). "Thou wilt not find any people who believe in Allah(God) and the Last Day, loving those who resist Allah and His Messenger, even though they were their fathers or their sons, or their brothers, or their kindred"(Koran Translation,
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Chapter. 58 Verse 22). Salafis scholars have written a lot of books talking about this issue. Salafis claim that hating non-Muslims does not show Islam in a negative way to non-Muslims because hating in this situation means love of well-being, which is Islam for the others. They believe that Muslims should treat non-Muslims with justice. Bin-Baz, a Salafi scholar, said "When Allah ordered the Muslims to antagonize disbelievers, he also impose Muslims to be just with their enemies. God said "O ye who believe! stand out firmly for Allah, as witnesses to fair dealing, and let not the hatred of others to you make you swerve to wrong and depart from justice. Be just: that is next to Piety: and fear Allah. For Allah is well-acquainted with all that ye do""(Bin-Baz, Bin-Baz Fattawa). "Justice shall be a must for the near and far, the friend and the enemy however, that shall not prevent the hatred of God's enemies" (Bin-Baz, Bin-Baz Fattawa). As a consequence, All Arabs who accept the Salafi ideology hate America which is a non-Muslim country. This shows us how religion affects the feelings of Arabs as Muslims towards the US.
From my experience, I think Salafis represent a very small percent of the Arabs; however, they cannot be neglected. I am sure everybody has heard of Al-Qaida group. The leader of this group, Osama Bin Laden, and most of Al-Qaida members are Arabs. All of Al-Qaida members belong to the Salafi School. This is a known matter to anyone who has knowledge of this issue. Besides the fact that Al-Qaida as Salafis considers the US to be a non-believing country that Muslims should hate, Al-Qaida also believes that the US is an invading country that Muslims should defend themselves against. As a result, Al-Qaida has chosen to take military actions against the US. Although most of the Arabs do not agree with Al-Qaida ideology, the common factor between Al-Qaida and most of the Arabs is looking at the US as an
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enemy that attacks Islam and Muslims. Due to this, there are some Arabs who sympathize with Al-Qaida.
As part of my research, I randomly chose an Arab person, who is not involved in politics. Moreover, I made sure that my interviewee was not a Salafi one. Sawsan Ameen, my interviewee, is a twenty-four-year-old from Yemen. She is a senior student in Sana'a University studying computer science. She has never been outside Yemen. My first question was, do you love America? She replied by saying that she hates America as a government; however, she has no hatred towards the American people. I asked her, what is the reason for this hatred towards the American government? Her answer was "because of their unjust politics of policing the world and the distractive wars that they have caused to the world and specifically to the Islamic world." (Ameen) My following question was what is your point of view about September 11th? She thought of the September 11th events as not being related to Islam and Muslims and said that innocent people among Americans, Arabs and others were killed. My last question to her was, do you believe what the Americans say about Al-Qaida? She replied by saying that she does not know anything about Al-Qaida's ideology; however, she always thinks that the US is saying the Opposite of the truth.
Governments are normally supposed to represent their nations and work towards achieving the needs of their nations. Unfortunately, this is not the case in all Arab countries. First of all, All Arab governments are not elected by their nations. For example, the current president of Syria, Al-Asad, was granted the presidency after the death of his father without any formal elections. Moreover, the Syrian government changed the constitution so that the eligible age of a president would not
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conflict with Al-Asad's age, which was under the required age. The former Syrian president’s “34-year-old son, Bashar, was nominated to replace him after an evidently grief-struck Syrian parliament lowered the age requirement for the presidency.” (Syrian President Hafez Assad dies before regaining Golan Heights, Wedeman)
Second of all, most of these governments came into power by military force, such as the government of Sudan. “Negotiations between the government and the political wing of the SPLA - the Sudan People's Liberation Movement - occurred in 1988 and 1989, but they were overtaken by events, when General Omar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir took power in a military coup in June 1989, banning all political parties in the country.” (World: Analysis Sudan: a political and military history, BBC news)
Due to the fact that Arab governments are not chosen by the citizens, the Arab governments do not represent their nations. Therefore, the attitudes of the Arab governments toward conflicts involving the Arabs don’t necessarily represent what the citizens of their nations want. An opposite side may argue that the Arab governments do represent their people, and the proof is the results of the presidential elections in some Arab countries, which show the high rates that these governments get in the elections. To show how weak this argument is, let us choose Saddam Hussein’s government as an example. A few days before the US took over Iraq, Arabic and some other news channels showed Saddam walking in the streets of Baghdad with a lot of Iraqi people around him calling his name and showing him their support. A few days later, the same channels showed the Iraqi people cursing Saddam and beating up his pictures. During Saddam’s period, he won the elections with 100% result. "Iraqi officials say President Saddam Hussein has won 100% backing in a
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referendum on whether he should rule for another seven years.” (Saddam 'wins 100% of vote', BBC news) This tells us that those elections' results were fake and those governments are using them as a mask to cover their real image; I don’t have any doubts about it since I am an Arab person who lived in an Arab country.
The Arabs as people are convinced that the US and the west are pleased with their governments as long as these governments serve the demands of the US and the west regardless of how they treat their people. It's only when these governments stop listening to the US and the west that the US and the west unveil the illegitimacy of these governments. For example, the Arabs find it hard to understand why the US and the west waited for twenty years to act against Saddam Hussein, though he was a tyrant since the first day he took over. In fact, the survey that I conducted shows that the Arabs believe that it was the US and the west that supported him for a long time. (The US in the eyes of Arabs survey, Algibhah)
Another thing Arabs find hard to understand is why only Saddam! For example, the Egyptian president, Moubark, has been in office for almost three decades. His two sons took over the political and economic life in Egypt. Moreover, it is likely that one of the sons is going to take over after his father, just like what happened in Syria. From all this, Arabs have big doubts toward the US and the west when claiming that they want freedom for the Arabs. "U.S. government officials frequently speak about democracy and human rights, but their actions often do not support either democracy or human rights in the Arab world … This hypocritical behavior is said to be reflected in a U.S. invasion of Iraq to "liberate" those people while a regime in Kuwait was reinstalled without the U.S. demanding major democratic reforms, or America defending Saudi Arabia without asking that
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government to widen political participation to include the masses, or the U.S. not objecting to a military coup in Algeria against the Islamist party after it won the elections" (Arab Nations Hate the United States, Abdallah).
The conflict involving the Arabs and Israelis is the most complicated conflict in the world. One of the most important reasons that makes this conflict very complicated to solve is religion. The Arabs as Muslims and the Israelis as Jews both look at the land of Palestine as a holy land. The mosque of Aqsa in Jerusalem is one of the most important places in the Islamic belief. Muslims believe that Prophet Solomon was the one who built that mosque. On the other hand, Jews believe that King Solomon built a temple known as King Solomon's Temple. Jews also believe that the Temple used to be located in the place where Al-Aqsa mosque is located today. As a result, both sides don’t want to compromise in this issue. Currently, the Israeli government is digging under mining the Muslims mosque searching for clues for the Temple. The Arabs see the US as standing on the Israeli side and supporting them with money and weapons. "Many Arabs hate the United States because of the economical, political, and military support it has given to Israel, support that has enabled Israel to defeat its Arab neighbors in the past" (Arab Nations Hate the United States, Abdallah). According to the article, Arab Nations Hate the United States, during the last fifty years, the United States has stood besides Israel in its conflict with Palestine and the Arabs. The article points out that the reason for this is that America considers Israel to be its closest ally, and in fact the only reliable strategic partner in the Middle East. Therefore, the article goes on, "America has provided political support for Israel at the UN [United Nations] Security Council, the General Assembly, and other international organizations. American political support for Israel
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is widely seen as being unfair and at the expense of the Arabs; consequently, this generated and continues to generate hostility against America in the Arab world.”
In conclusion, the Arabs' feelings towards the US and the west are controlled by many factors, and most importantly religion, the US stand in the Arabs' governments, and the US stand in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Therefore, the Arabs have lost their confidence in the US and the west. Thus, the only way to gain their trust back is by America showing the Arabs that America and the west are justified in their acts toward the conflicts involving the Arabs. Otherwise, Arabs prefer that the US and the west stay out of their lives and let them solve their own problems.
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Work Cited
Abdallah, Abdel Mahdi. Arab Nations Hate the United States.
Algibhah, Hamza. The US in the eyes of Arabs survey. February 22, 2005.
BBC news. Saddam 'wins 100% of vote'. October 16, 2002.
BBC news. World: Analysis Sudan: a political and military history. February 21,
1999. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/analysis/84927.stm>.
Bin-Baz, Abd Al'azaiz. Bin-Baz Fattawa. May 5, 1997.
Wedeman, Ben. Syrian President dies before regaining Golan Heights. June 10, 2000.
Yusuf, Ali. The English Translation Of The Holy Qur'an.[/align
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