ARMED GOD

There were two events in the past few weeks that brought home the irony of life in the Middle East. The first was a home invasion by Hamas gunman of Muhammad Gharib, a Fatah strongman. Using his cell phone he called a Palestinian television station and pleaded for help to save his and his family’s life. While he shouted, “What did I do?” his murder—carried out by members of the Hamas executive force—was broadcast live via satellite on Arab stations.

The other event was a few days ago in Beirut, Lebanon. An image of a student laying prostate behind a concrete barrier, trying to dodge bullets was sent around the world by a Lebanese photographer. It was not the Israeli bullets he was afraid of.

Last week, Rami Khouri, in an opinion piece in the Lebanese Daily Star tried to explain it all. According to him the Middle East is the new “cold war.” That is, the “major powers,” defined as the U.S. and Iran, are using lesser powers, like the Palestinians and the Lebanese, as proxy pawns for their power struggles. Much the same way Hungary was used. Khouri sees Hamas and Hezbollah as Iranian pawns and Fatah and the Lebanese Sunnis as U.S. and Saudi rooks.

If only it were so. Far deeper into the story is God. In the heat of the battle, both Hamas and Hezbollah have repeatedly accused their enemies of being “against God.” Far more than being stooges of the “Zionist criminals,” Mahmoud Zahar of Hamas has repeatedly accused Fatah of being on God’s bad side. So does Hezbollah, who interprets its political fortunes as being “divine” and its enemies’ fortunes as less so.

The armed and bloody war among the Palestinians and the Lebanese is a war of fundamentalist faith against the semblance of modernity. The political failure of the semi-secular Fatah and post-colonial Lebanese parties to deliver a better life has opened the door to salvation through Allah. Through arrogance, denial, corruption or clan cronyism, suit wearing westernized politicians have led their citizens into a dead end. For all Nasrallah’s glee at the fall of Dan Halutz and the imminent fall of Olmert, it is precisely this western ability to reform and change in the face of reality that is its eternal strength.

The Hamas and Hezbollah regimes can’t do this because they are guided by God. A Lebanese student called the rioting Hezbollah members “animals;” probably reflecting his frustration with their sheep-like mentality. It is no coincidence that in order to calm the inflamed masses, Nasrallah issued a fatwa prohibiting further violence. He is not a politician but a messenger or God, or at least the Shiite God. The same is true for Hamas. Ismail Haniya is leading an armed religious movement. Political compromise is hearsay as it denies God’s will.

So they will fight it out. However, the ground has shifted. From Rydiah to Aman to Rabat those kings and princes and emirs in the know, know it’s not about Israel or the West Bank or the occupation. It’s about themselves; the Muslims. The fundamentalist Sunni (Whabbi/Salafi) and Shiite (Mahdi) sects want power to bring about God’s rule, and they want it now. They will blow up mosques, hotels, embassies and themselves to achieve it. They will kill, maim, and slaughter anyone or any group that stands in their way.

The lens of the media is refocusing its attention away from the occupation and Israel. The headlines now highlight Muslim-on-Muslim killings. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and Lebanon are all aflame. Aflame not from anything Bush said or Sharon did, nor from televised images of Palestinian youths being shot. The entire Muslim word is aflame, from messages being sent from the mosque down the dusty street. The Fatah Hawks have already invaded the weapon depots of the Hamas’s Gaza City mosques, disregarding their pseudo sanctity…an act the Israelis dared not do.

The war being waged is a war of degree of faith in the Koran or to Allah and his successors and to innumerable permutations and interpretations of the Koran. In the coming decade we will see a lot more images of a horrific nature coming out of the Muslim world. Images of burnt flesh, mangled bodies, shot children, and destroyed buildings. There is no reform in the making, only more repression and violence. The little strips of land known as the West Bank and Gaza will fade from thought. There are about a billion people who are hearing God’s voice on different channels. Their actions will be tomorrow’s headlines and news photos as the audio of the phone call from Gaza and the photo of the fearful Lebanese student have shown.