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<div class="gmail-header gmail-reader-header
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href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/10/01/should-hamas-hezbollah-learn-from-the-taliban/"
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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Should Hamas, Hezbollah Learn
from the Taliban?</h1>
<span class="gmail-post_author_intro">by</span> <span
class="gmail-post_author"><a
href="https://www.counterpunch.org/author/ramzy-baroud/"
rel="nofollow" moz-do-not-send="true">Ramzy Baroud</a></span>
- October 1, 2021<br>
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<p><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-215614"
src="https://2vynjo3oi9ijs29xb3fmjtn1-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Banner_Save_Sheikh_Jarrah-680x510.jpg"
alt="" style="margin-right: 0px;"
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<p id="gmail-caption-attachment-215614"
class="gmail-wp-caption-text">Sign in Arabic reading
“We will not leave” on the walls of the Sheikh
Jarrah neighborhood. Photograph Source: Osama Eid –
<a
href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"
moz-do-not-send="true">CC BY-SA 3.0</a></p>
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<p>An urgent task is awaiting us: considering the
progression of events, we must quickly liberate
ourselves from the limits and confines placed on the
Afghanistan discourse, which have been imposed by
US-centered Western propaganda for over 20 years, and
counting. A first step is that we must not allow the
future political discourse pertaining to this very
subject to remain hostage to American priorities –
successes, failures and geostrategic interests.</p>
<p>For this to happen, the language itself must be
confronted. This is critical if we are to truly glean
valuable lessons from Afghanistan and to avoid a
repeat of the previous failure of comprehending the US
<a
href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/z342mp3/revision/4"
moz-do-not-send="true">defeat</a> in Vietnam
(1955-1975), the way it should have been understood,
not the way Washington wanted Americans – in fact, the
whole world – to understand. Vietnam was not merely an
American ‘debacle’, and did not only culminate in an
American ‘defeat’. It was also a Vietnamese victory
and the triumph of the will of the people over the US
imperialist war machine.</p>
<p>In US mainstream media and, to a large extent,
academia, the Vietnam War history was almost entirely
<a
href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/vietnam-war-reexamined/vietnam-war-in-history/8FB0A214DB45CE266D2390721852B9F1/core-reader"
moz-do-not-send="true">written</a> from an American
point of view. Even the anti-Vietnam war version of
that history remained American-centric.</p>
<p>Alas, in the case of Afghanistan, many of us, whether
in journalism or academia, whether wittingly or
otherwise, remain committed to the US-based discourse,
partly because the primary sources from which our
information is gleaned are either American or
pro-American. Al Akhdar al-Ibrahimi, former United
Nations Peace Envoy to Afghanistan, from 1997 to 1999,
and again from 2001 to 2004, had recently, in an <a
href="https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2021/08/31/lakhdar-brahimi-la-paix-etait-possible-avec-les-talibans-mais-encore-eut-il-fallu-qu-on-leur-parle_6092908_3210.html"
moz-do-not-send="true">interview</a> with French
newspaper, Le Monde, reminded us of the importance of
using proper language to describe the unfolding events
in Afghanistan.</p>
<p>“Why always speak of an American defeat? First of
all, this is a victory for the Taliban, which must be
attributed to their tactical genius,” al-Ibrahimi
stated. (Translated from French)</p>
<p>The answer to al-Ibrahimi’s question can easily be
deduced from his own words because, to speak of a
Taliban victory, is to admit to their ‘tactical
genius’. The admission of such a truth can have
far-reaching consequences.</p>
<p>The use of the terms defeat vs. victory is critical
because it situates the conversation within two
entirely different intellectual frameworks. For
example, by insisting on the centrality of the
question of the American defeat, whether in
Afghanistan or Vietnam, then the focus of the
follow-up questions will remain centered on American
priorities: Where did the US go wrong? What urgent
changes must Washington implement in its foreign
policy and military agendas to stave off its
Afghanistan shortcomings? And where should the US go
from here?</p>
<p>However, if the focus remains centered on the victory
of the Afghan resistance – and yes, it is Afghan
resistance, not merely that of the Taliban or Pashtun
– then the questions that follow would relocate the
conversation somewhere else entirely: How did poorly
armed fighters manage to defeat the world’s combined
greatest powers? Where should Afghanistan go from
here? And what lessons can national liberation
movements around the world learn from the Afghan
victory?</p>
<p>For the purpose of this article, I am concerned with
the Afghan victory, not the American defeat.</p>
<p><strong>The Rise and fall of the ‘Terrorists’
Discourse</strong></p>
<p>The <a
href="https://europe.unc.edu/iron-curtain/history/the-fall-of-the-soviet-union/"
moz-do-not-send="true">collapse</a> of the Soviet
Union in 1991 had a massive impact, not only on the
geopolitical map of the world but also on relevant
global political discourses. As the USSR, its Warsaw
Pact and global alliances began to disintegrate, the
US quickly moved into action, asserting its dominance
from <a
href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-50837024"
moz-do-not-send="true">Panama</a> (1989) to <a
href="https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2016/01/operation-desert-storm-25-years-since-the-first-gulf-war/424191/"
moz-do-not-send="true">Iraq</a> (1991) to elsewhere.
The American objective was not merely a violent
declaration of its triumph in the <a
href="https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/cold-war-history"
moz-do-not-send="true">Cold War</a>, but a message
to the rest of the world that the ‘American century’
had begun and that no form of resistance to US
stratagem could be tolerated.</p>
<p>In the Middle East, in particular, the new narrative
was in full display, with clear and repeated
distinctions between ‘moderates’ and ‘extremists’,
friends and enemies, allies and those marked for
‘regime change’. And, per this new logic,
anti-colonial forces that were celebrated as
liberation movements for decades <a
href="https://www.state.gov/foreign-terrorist-organizations/"
moz-do-not-send="true">fell</a> into the category of
the ‘terrorists’. This definition included Palestinian
resistance groups, Lebanese and others, though these
groups sought liberation from illegal foreign
occupation.</p>
<p>Years later, the discourse on terrorism – summed up
by George W. Bush’s <a
href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/with-us-and-against-us/9780231168113"
moz-do-not-send="true">statement</a> in September,
2001, “Either you are with us or you are with the
terrorists” – became the yardstick in which the world,
according to Washington, was to be divided:
freedom-loving nations and terrorists, extremist
regimes. The latter category was eventually expanded
to include Iraq, Iran and Syria. On January 29, 2002,
North Korea was also <a
href="https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/bush-describes-iraq-iran-north-korea-as-axis-of-evil"
moz-do-not-send="true">added</a> to Washington’s
so-called ‘axes of evil’.</p>
<p>Afghanistan, of course, topped the American list of
terrorist states, under various pretenses: initially
the <a
href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-islamic-state-group-afghanistan-europe-middle-east-70451c485d46908ef5c6a83a1de9f0f6"
moz-do-not-send="true">harboring</a> of Osama Bin
Laden and al-Qaeda and, later, the mistreatment of
women, and so on. Eventually, the Taliban became a
‘terrorist’ group, leading an ‘insurgency’ against the
‘democratically-elected’ Afghan <a
href="https://ecfr.eu/publication/the-fall-of-the-afghan-government-and-what-it-means-for-europe/"
moz-do-not-send="true">government</a> in Kabul. The
last 20 years were spent in the construction of this
false paradigm.</p>
<p>In the absence of any strong voices in the media
demanding an American withdrawal and defending the
Afghan people’s right to resist foreign occupation,
there was a near-complete absence of an alternative
political discourse that even attempted to raise the
possibility that the Taliban, despite all of their
questionable strategies and practices, may, in fact,
be a national liberation movement.</p>
<p>The reason we were discouraged from considering such
a possibility is the same reason why
US-Western-Israeli propaganda insisted on <a
href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/target/etc/modern.html"
moz-do-not-send="true">removing</a> any distinction
between ISIS, Al Qaeda, Taliban, Hamas, Hezbollah,
Al-Houthis and many other such groups. On the one
hand, discussing the particularities of each movement
requires real knowledge of the history and formation
of these groups separately, and the political
circumstances through which they continue to operate.
This kind of knowledge is simply non-existent in the
cliche, soundbite-driven mainstream media. On the
other hand, such understanding is inconvenient, as it
complicates the deception and half-truths necessary
for the US, Israel and others, to depict their
military occupations, unlawful military interventions
and repeated wars as fundamental to some imagined
global ‘war on terror’ and, as some European
intellectual circles <a
href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/bernard-henri-levy-a-france-united-against-radical-islam-1420760414"
moz-do-not-send="true">prefer</a> to dub it, a war
on ‘radical Islam’.</p>
<p>However, unlike al-Qaeda and ISIS, Hamas, Hezbollah
and the Taliban are not trans-border militant groups
fighting a global agenda, but national liberation
movements which, despite their emphasis on religious
discourses, are political actors with specific
political objectives confined largely within the
borders of their own countries – Palestine, Lebanon
and Afghanistan, respectively.</p>
<p>Regarding Hamas, London-based author, Daud Abdullah <a
href="https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2103/S00014/engaging-the-world-the-fascinating-story-of-hamass-political-evolution.htm"
moz-do-not-send="true">wrote</a> in his
just-released volume, ‘<a
href="https://www.memopublishers.com/publications/item/engaging-the-world-the-making-of-hamas-foreign-policy"
moz-do-not-send="true">Engaging the World</a>: The
Making of Hamas Foreign Policy’ that “Hamas sees
foreign relations as an integral and important part of
its political ideology and liberation strategy. Soon
after the Movement emerged, foreign policies were
developed to help its leaders and members navigate
this tension between idealism and realism. This
pragmatism is evident in the fact that Hamas was able
to establish relations with the regimes of Muammar
Gaddhafi in Libya and Bashar al-Assad in Syria, both
of whom were fiercely opposed to the Muslim
Brotherhood.”</p>
<p>Consequently, it was also Abdullah who became one of
the first to draw the parallels between Palestine and
Afghanistan as soon as the Taliban declared victory in
Kabul. In a recent article in the Middle East Monitor,
Abdullah <a
href="https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20210817-whether-its-afghanistan-or-palestine-occupations-dont-last-forever/"
moz-do-not-send="true">wrote</a>, “Palestine and
Afghanistan are salient examples. Throughout history,
their peoples have witnessed numerous invasions and
occupations. After two decades the US has finally run
out of stamina. Similarly, they will eventually
realize the futility of supporting the Zionist
occupation of Palestine.”</p>
<p>Indeed, the lesson of Afghanistan must be studied
carefully, especially by resistance movements that are
undergoing their own wars of national liberation.</p>
<p>Now that the US has officially ended its military
operations in Afghanistan, albeit not by choice, the
emphasis on the so-called ‘war on terror’ discourse
will certainly begin to fade. But what will come next?
While another <a
href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-10-13/no-exit"
moz-do-not-send="true">interventionist discourse</a>
will certainly fight for prominence in the new
American thinking, the discourse of national
liberation, based on legitimate resistance, must
return to the center of the conversation.</p>
<p>This is not an argument for or against armed
struggle, as this choice falls largely, if not
entirely, on nations that are struggling for their own
freedom, and should not be subject to the selective,
frequently self-serving, ethics of Western moralists
and activists. It is worth mentioning that
international law does not prohibit people from using
whatever means necessary to liberate themselves from
the jackboot of foreign occupations. Indeed, myriad
resolutions <a
href="https://www.refworld.org/docid/3b00f0c428.html"
moz-do-not-send="true">recognize</a> the “legitimacy
of (oppressed people’s) struggle by all means at their
disposal, including armed struggle”. (UN Commission of
Human Rights Resolution 1982/16)</p>
<p>Nevertheless, armed struggle without popular,
grassroots support often amounts to nil, for a
sustainable armed campaign, like that of Hamas,
Hezbollah or the Taliban, requires deep-rooted social
and socio-economic support. This proved as true in
Vietnam as it did earlier in Algeria (1954-1962), Cuba
(1953-1959) and even South Africa, which history of <a
href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/1960-1994-armed-struggle-and-popular-resistance"
moz-do-not-send="true">armed struggle</a> has been
largely written out in favor of what is meant to
appear as a ‘peaceful’ anti-apartheid struggle.</p>
<p>For nearly 30 years, partly as a consequence of the
dismantling of the Soviet Union and the seemingly
uncontested rise of the American empire, almost any
form of armed struggle in national liberation contexts
has been depicted to be a form of terrorism. Moreover,
in the post-September 11, 2001 US-dominated world, any
attempt at arguing otherwise earned any daring
intellectual the title of ‘terrorist sympathizer’.</p>
<p>Twenty years have elapsed since the American invasion
of Afghanistan culminated in the defeat, not just of
the US but also of the US political discourse on
terrorism, resistance and national liberation. The
resulting victory of the Taliban will extend well
beyond the borders of Afghanistan, breaking the limits
imposed on the discussion by western-centric
officials, media and academia, namely the urgently
needed clear distinction between terrorism and
national liberation.</p>
<p>The American experiment, using firepower to control
the world, and intellectual hegemony to control our
understanding of it, has clearly failed. This failure
can and must be exploited as an opportunity to revisit
urgent questions and to resurrect a long-dormant
narrative in favor of anti-colonial, national
liberation struggles with the legitimate right – in
fact, responsibility – to use all means necessary,
including armed struggle, to free itself from the yoke
of foreign occupation.</p>
</div>
<p> <em>Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of
The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five
books. His latest is “</em><a
href="https://www.amazon.com/These-Chains-Will-Broken-Palestinian/dp/1949762092"
moz-do-not-send="true"><em>These Chains Will Be Broken</em></a><em>:
Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in
Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud
is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center
for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim
University (IZU). His website is </em><a
href="http://www.ramzybaroud.net/"
moz-do-not-send="true"><em>www.ramzybaroud.net</em></a>
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