MIDDLE EAST REPORT
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Number 189 $4.50 / £3.50 MIDDLE EAST RESEAi^CH
& INFORMATION PROJECT July-August 1994 No. 189 Vol. 24 No. 4
Middle East Report (ISSN 0899-2851 ) is pub- THE KURDISH EXPERIENCE
li',h«l SIX lifw;'; a yoar (bi-rnorithly) by the Middle
East Research and Informabon Proiect (MERIP), Inc., Suite 119, 1500 Massachuselts Ave., NW. ARTICLES 2 The Kurdish Experience Wastiin(jton, DC 20005. Second-class postage paid Amir Hassanpour at Washintjlori, DC POSTMASTER: send address
changes to Middle East Report, 1500 Mass¬ 12 Mad Dreams of Independence: achusetts Ave , NW, Washmglon,DC 20005. Sub¬ The Kurds of Turkey
scriptions are $25 per year lor individuals, $50 Chris Kutscliera lor institutions Overseas postage additional. Other
rates on inside back cover. Middle East Report 16 City in the War Zone
is available in microform from University Microfilms, Aliza Marcus 300 North Zeeb Rd., Ann Arbor, Ml 48106. Canadian Distribution: Doormouse Dis¬ 20 Kurdish Broadcasting in Iraq tribution, 65 Metcalfe St. 16, Toronto M4X,IR9. Ann Zimmerman
Indexes and Abstracts: Abstracta Iranica, The Alternative Press Index, Index Islamicus, International 8 The Remains of Anfal Development Abstracts, International Political PHOTO ESSAY Science Abstracts, The Left Index, The Middle East Susan IVIeiselas and Andrew Whitley Journal, Mideast File, Migration & Ethnizitat, PAIS Bulletin, Political Science Abstracts, Universal Reference System. COLUMN 22 Washington Watch: Clinton, Ankara and Kurdish Human Rights Review Books and other items lor review should Maryam Elahi be sen! to: Joel Beinin, MERIP Review Editor, Dept. of History, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.
Copyright: The entire contents of this publica¬ UPDATE 24 Algeria Between Eradicators tion are copyrighted. Requests lor permission to and Conciliators
reproduce in any manner, in whole or in part, in any Hugh Roberts language, should be addressed to: MERIP Copyright, Suite 1 1 9, 1 500 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Washing¬
ton, DC 20005 INTERVIEW 28 The Islamist Movement and the Palestinian Authority For the Blind: Selected articles from this publi¬ cation are available lor blind and visually handi¬ Bassam Jarrar/Graham Usher capped persons on audio tape from Freedom Ideas
International, 640 Bayside. Detroit, Ml 4821 7. REVIEWS 30 DanConneW Against All Odds We encourage the submission of manuscripts Basil Davidson and photographs relevant to our locus on the polit¬ ical economy of the contemporary Middle East and 31 Salma Khadra Jayyusi Anthology of Modern popular struggles there. This includes general the¬ Palestinian Literature oretical contributions relevant to these issues and Salah Hassan connecting developments elsewhere in the world with the Middle East Letters to the editors are wel¬ come All manuscripts must be typed Ptease send 32 Editor's Picks: New and both a diskette and a hard copy A style sheet is avail¬ DEPARTMENTS
able on request Recommended Reading
Contributions to MERIP are tax-deductible
Consider becoming a Sustainer with an annual con- Nadia Benchailah, R. Maro, Susan Meiselas, PHOTOS/ Iribution ol $100 or more, and receive compli¬ Ann Zimmerman. mentary copies ol MERIP special publications and GRAPHICS a one-year subscription. Cover Photo: "Saddam wanted to squeeze us." Halabja, Iraqi Kurdistan. R. Maro/Medico international. FROM THE BNT0R8
Board of Directors: Hady Amr, Dale Bishop, For many decades now, those states whose borders include and Judith Chomsky, Dan Connell, David Cortright, divide Kurdistan have alternately tried to ignore, deny, manip¬ Nina Dodge, Rhonda Hanson, Donna Nevel, ulate and suppress widespread Kurdish demands for political rights. David Nygaard, Doreen Tilghman, John Viste, In this, the rulers have enjoyed the unstinting support oftheir great
Andrew Whitley. power patrons, the broad support ofthe majority communities, and often enough support as well among different Kurdish communi¬ Editorial Committee: Joel Beinin, Sheila ties and social strata. These policies comprise a disastrous record Carapico, Beshara Doumani, Sally Ethelston, that has exacted a horrible price in blood, treasure, and democra¬ Lisa Hajjar, Barbara Harlow, Joost Hiltermann, tic rights ofArabs, Iranians and Turks as well as ofKurds them¬ Peggy Hutchison, Suad Joseph, Fareed selves. These policies have failed miserably in their repressive Mohamedi, Julie Peteet, Marsha Pripstein, goals, and yet they continue as the order of the day. Yahya Sadowski, Susan Slyomovics, We have tried to highlight here several aspects of the Kurdish Joe Stork, Bob Vitalis. experience. One is the tremendous changes over the last two decades,
Contributing Editors: Ervand Abrahamian, as new economic and social forces, as well as armies, have pene¬
Eqbal Ahmad, Noam Chomsky, Jean-Frangois trated and altered Kurdish societies. Another is the persistence
Clement, Nigel Disney (1951-1978), Marion oftraditional political leaderships and rivalries. As Amir Hassanpour
Farouk-Sluglett, Samih Farsoun, Michael points out, the serious clashes in May 1994 between the two dom¬
Gilsenan, Sarah Graham-Browfn, Alain Gresh, inant parties of the Kurdish Regional Government, the KDP and
Fred Halliday, Bertus Hendriks, Jochen Hippler, the PUK, have similarities with the territorially-based opposi¬
Diane James, Penny Johnson, Rashid Khalidi, tion in South Africa of Inkatha to the African National Congress.
Fred Lawson, Ann Lesch, Joan Mandell, Tim What is crucially missing, though, is a regional equivalent to the
Mitchell, Lee O'Brien, Roger Owen, James Paul, ANC. While the main responsibility for this lies with the Kurdish
Karen Pfeifer.MaximeRodinson, Miriam Rosen, leadership, other factors play a rolethe recentness and uneven- ness of social transformations, the meddling of neighboring rivals Philip Shehadi (1957-1991), Mohamed Sid- Iran and Turkey, and, not least, the punishing economic embar¬ Ahmed, Salim Tamari, John Tordai, Fawwaz go and political isolation imposed by the United States and other Trabuisi, Judith Tucker, Anita Vitullo, powers as well as by Baghdad. Martha Wenger, Sami Zubaida. The US remains, for the moment, a most reluctant "protector"of
Publisher: Peggy Hutchison this experiment in Kurdish self-rule, forced by Turkey's need to
stem the refugee crisis that would come with Iraq's reconquest. Editor: Joe Stork Here is where we see how little has changed: Western complicity Assistant Editor: Maggy Zanger and silence in the face of Baghdad's war of extermination in 1987-
Circulation Manager: Esther Merves 88 is reprised, as we write, in the studious inattention to the lat¬ est Turkish "final offensive" to crush Kurdish political militancy Administrative Assistant: Ann Schaub within its borders. The dimensions of this current campaign are Review Editor: Joel Beinin staggering: some 400,000 Turkish troops are deployed against
Design and Production: Julie Farrar 30,000 guerillas; nearly a thousand villages have been depopu¬ lated since 1993; tens of thousands of Kurds in Turkey now seek Interns: Elizabeth Hiel, Deevy Holcomb, refuge in Iraq, and hundreds ofthousands ofothers have been dis¬ Amy Schmidt placed within the country. The economic and political crisis which
Review Intern: Rebecca Stein this war has exacerbated may well trigger a military coup. It is a war that Ankara cannot win, though everyone can lose. Proofreaders: Bryce Giddens, Sarah Shoenfeld What happens in Turkeywhere two-thirds ofthe Kurds live Printing: IVIcArdle Printing Co. and in the self-rule area of Iraq over the coming months and years © Copyrigrit; July-August 1994, Middle Easl Research & is likely to determine the political contours of this region for a Information Project. Printed in the U.S.A long time to come. It is a matter to which we will return. >:*
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Voting lor tlia Congrett, Zakhu, 1982. Ann Zimmerman
The Kurdish Experience
Amir Hassanpour
It is difficult to reach a firm assessment concerning the prospects for the
Kurdish movement. The present circumstances the ability of the PKK-
led movement In Turkey to survive extraordinary state repression, and
the existence In Iraq of a Western-protected Regional Governmentare
unprecedented. Yet the obstacles confronting a political resolution of the
"Kurdish problem" are no less daunting than before.
Middle East Report July-August 1994 Numbering over 22 million, the Kurds are one of the hardly be distinguished from the worldview oflanded nota¬
largest non-state nations in the world. Their home¬ bles of the past. land, Kurdistan, has been forcibly divided and lies most¬ ly within the present-day borders ofTurkey, Iraq and Iran, National Awakening with smaller parts in Syria, Armenia and Azerbaijan. The greatest number of Kurds today still live in Kurdistan, One reason for this may be that Kurdish nationalism
though a large Kurdish diaspora has developed in this cen¬ emerged as an ideology long before the formation of the tury, especially in the main cities of Turkey and Iran and Kurds as a nation, not in a middle class milieu but in a more recently in Europe as well. Between 10 and 12 mil¬ largely agrarian society with a powerful tribal component. lion Kurds live in Turkey, where they comprise about 20 From the 16th century to the mid-19th century, much of percent of the population. Between 5 and 6 million live in Kurdistan was under the rule of independent and
Iran, accounting for close to 10 percent of the population. autonomous Kurdish principalities that produced a flour¬ Kurds in Iraq number more than 4 million, and comprise ishing rural and urban life in the 17th century.' Kurdish destinies changed radically around this time, about 23 percent of the population. In the modern era, the Kurdish nation, with its dis¬ when the Ottoman and Persian empires divided Kurdistan tinctive society and culture, has had to confront in all of into spheres of influence, agreeing on a border in 1639. the "host" states centrahzing, ethnically-based national¬ In order to protect their sovereignty, the principalities ist regimes Turkish, Arab and Persianwith little or no supported one or the other power, and for most of the next tolerance for expressions ofnational autonomy within their three centuries a prevailing war economy destroyed the agrarian system, devastated villages and towns, pre¬ borders. While the modes and scale ofoppression have var¬ cipitated massacres and led to forcible migrations ofKurds ied in time and by place, the conditions of Kurds share some important features. First, the Kurdish areas over¬ and the settlement ofTurkish tribes in parts of Kurdistan. lap nation-state borders: they thus acquire significance for All of this inhibited further growth of urban areas and settled agrarian production relations, reinforcing tribal "national security" and are vulnerable to interference and manipulation by regional and international powers. Second, ways of life. Although the war economy retarded the consolida¬ the Kurdish regions ofthese countries are usually the poor¬ tion of the Kurds as a nation, the destruction and suffer¬ est, least developed areas, systematically marginalized by the centers of economic power. Third, the dynamics of ing stimulated a political consciousness that was unprece¬ dented in the region. This emerged first in the realms of assimilation, repression and Kurdish resistance in each language and literature when, in the 16th century, Kurdish country have affected the direction and outcome of the ulama broke the monopoly of Arabic and Persian lan¬ Kurdish struggles in the neighboring countries. A fourth guages over literary production. In 1597, Sharaf Khan, shared feature, and the focus of this essay, is that these prince of the powerful Bidlis principality, compiled the Kurdish societies are themselves internally complex, and first history of Kurdistan, Sharafnamch. Although writ¬ fraught with differences of politics and ideology, social ten in Persian, this text presents historical data on the class, dialect and, still in a few places, clan. degree of independence enjoyed by different Kurdish states. In spite of a long history of struggle, Kurdish nation- Thus, the first chapter is about the dynasties that enjoyed ahsm has not succeeded in achieving its goal of indepen¬ the privilege of royalty; the second deals with rulers who dence or even enduring autonomy. Do recent events require did not claim royalty but sometimes struck coin and had us to change this assessment? In 1992, a Regional khutha (Friday prayer sermonsj recited in their names, Government of Iraqi Kurdistan was established, but it is economically besieged and functions very much at the suf¬ and so forth. -^ The most important literary manifestation of political ferance of a Western military umbrella. In Turkey, a ten- awareness was Ahmad-e Khani (1651-1706), who in 1694- year-old armed struggle has effectively defied the unre¬ 95 rewrote the Kurdish popular ballad Mem u Zln in strained efforts of the Turkish state to impose a military the form of a poetic narrative romance. "Why have the solution, but a political solution acceptable to the Kurds Kurds been deprived, why have they all been subjugat¬ does not appear imminent. ed?" he asked. He rejected the view that it was because The Kurdish movement, in contrast to many other they were "ignorant" or "without perfection." They were national liberation movements, has experienced a per¬ subordinated, rather, because they were "orphans," i.e., sistent contradiction between its traditional leadership without a king who would unite the discordant princi¬ and the relatively developed society it seeks to liberate. palities and form an independent kingdom. Although they Only to the extent that this may be changing does the future excelled in qualities of munificence and bravery, the hold some promise for Kurdish aspirations. Today, about princes refused to unite under the suzerainty of a Kurdish halfthe population lives in urban centers, and feudal rela¬ king. Khani is explicitly modern in his conceptualization tions ofproduction in rural areas have almost disappeared. of the Kurds as a nation. He referred to Kurds, Arabs, Yet the politics and ideology ofmuch ofthe leadership can Persians and Turks as milal (plural ofmilla) not in the
Amir Hassanpour teaches communication studies and is author of then-prevailing meaning of "religious community" but Nationalism and Language in Kurdistan. 1918-1985. He is from Mahahad rather in an ethnic sense," and presently lives in Montreal.
Middle East Report July-August 1994 Th(! Hfrcond apostle of Kurdish nationalism, Haji Qadiri ly drawn from the urban bourgeoisie, large and small, edu¬
Koyi ( 1H17?-1897), was also a mullah and poet, but even cated youth, and nationalist-minded members ofthe cler¬
more secular. By the time he was composing his fiery poems gy and landed aristocracy.
in ttic laic I9lh century, the remaining principalities had Komala became the Kurdistan Democratic Party in 1945
ijccri overthrown by the Ottoman and Persian states. Koyi in order to establish an autonomous republic in part ofthe
allackcd the shaikhs and mullahs who did not care for the area then in the Soviet sphere of influence. The Kurdish
Kurdish language and the notables who ignored the des¬ Republic of 1946 was the nationalist movement's most
tinies of their people. Living his last years in cosmopoli¬ important achievement in modem state-building: although
tan IsLariijul, hi? was familiar with the nationalist strug¬ it did not claim independence, it had a president, a flag,
gles and l,li(; material advanct-ment of modern nations. He a cabinet, a national army, and Kurdish was the official
coiisl.ant.ly adv(K:al<'d use of the Kurdish language. Although language. It was ruled by a party whose leaders were drawn
his own medium was poc'lry, he urged the Kurds to pub¬ mostly from the ranks of the urban petty bourgeoisie,
lish maga/incs and newspapers. and which showed respect for the rights of minorities and
Ktiani and Koyi's propositions amount to a political certain rights of women. ' Although formed within the bor¬
manifesto: t.tic Kurds ar(,' a distinct people with a dis¬ ders of the Iranian state, hundreds of Iraqi Kurds took
tinct language, homeland and way of life. The road to an active part in the military and civil administration,
( is the formation of an independent and uni¬ including Mustafa Barzani, who became a prominent mil¬
fied Kurdish slate. Ideologically, however, Khani spoke itary leader. The national anthem was a poem composed
for Itie ruling fifinces and sought liberation in unification by a Kurd from Iraq.
under a powerful king. By contrast, Koyi's ideas reflect¬ The US and Britain viewed the Kurdish and Azerbaijan
ed budding modern social forces within Kurdish soci¬ republics as extensions ofSoviet influence, and supported ety.' He advocaU^d l)oth national liberation and trans- the shah's military campaign against them. Soviet troops
formalion of Kurdish society. withdrew from Iran in May 1946, and seven months later
Although these mod(;rnist ideas were constantly repeat¬ Iranian forces forcibly suppressed both autonomous
ed in poetry and journalism, social forces capable of trans¬ republics. Kurds throughout the world still celebrate duy
lating them into political parties and platforms did not rebendan (January 22), the foundation date of the repub¬
ent(!r the scene until the 1940s.'' How can we account for lic; its anthem has been adopted as the national anthem;
this lag? For one thing, the fall of the principalities had portraits of Qazi Mohammad, the head of the republic,
not b(;en due to the rise of new social forces, and did not today decorate public and private spaces in areas controlled l)y any mcians put an vnd to feudal relations and tribalism, by the Regional Government of Kurdistan in Iraq.
leather, the system of Kurdish principalities was over¬ Following the fall of the Kurdish republic, Kurdish
thrown and replaced l)y two centralizing although loose¬ Democratic Parties formed in Iraq and later in Syria and
ly integrated imperial regimes in Istanbul and Tehran. Turkey. The majority of leaders and activists were from The vacant leadership of the princes was filled by the the modern intelligentsia, but included anyone who was
shaikhs, notables and remnants of princely families who committed to nationalist aspirations. Each party aimed at retained property and influence. achieving autonomy for its respective part of Kurdistan These are the elements that continued to shape the and democracy for the country of which they were part. nationalist struggle until the mid-20th century. In spite This was due both to political expediency and to the influ¬
of the diversity of revolts in the first part of the centu¬ ence ofcommunist parties in the opposition movements of
ry, their struggle was for a purely nationalist agenda aim¬ Iran, Iraq and Syria. ing to replace foreign rule by a native rule that would keep traditional structures intact. Democratic rule, the Kurdish Society demands of the peasantry for land and water, the hopes
of urban masses for a decent life, and the freedom of The 1950s were years of major political upheaval in the women were ignored. Militarily, the village and the moun¬ Middle East. In Kurdistan, feudal relations of produc¬
tains were the main sites of armed resistance, and the tion suffered major setbacks, largely due to peasant upris¬
leadership tended to rely on outside powers rather than ings and later to land reforms initiated by the central gov¬
on a strategy of social transformation of their own soci¬ ernments.'^ A visible change in Kurdish society in this period
eties. When opportunistic outside support withdrew, they was the rise ofthe urban population due to the land reforms gave up the struggle. and the wars in the countryside. Newly-freed peasants
moved into Kurdish cities, where the lack of industrial Middle Class Nationalism enterprises seriously hindered their transformation into wage laborers. While some rural migrants engaged in sea¬ The first organizational break with feudal and tribal pol¬ sonal or temporary construction work (contractual or wage itics occurred in 1942, with the formation ofthe Society for labor), others ended up in street vending activities. Some the Revival of Kurdistan (known as Komalay J.K. or as migrants maintained their village ties by working in towns Komala, the Kurdish word for society or leagiie) in while continuing to farm for family consumption.s Mahabad. Iran.* Its leadership and membership were large The differentiation and specialization in urban
Middle East Report July-August 1994 economies introduced new social strata. A small Kurdish work¬ ing class formed in the oil indus¬ try, construction, and a few factories. Small workshops re¬ quired auto mechanics, elec¬ tricians, printers, mechanics, plumbers and painters, while services and transport employed many others. A modern bour¬ geoisie emerged, comprising mainly professionals rather than entrepreneurs doctors, nurs¬ es, engineers, teachers, bank managers, lawyers and jour¬ nalists. Migrant labor male and female travelled as far as
Ankara, Baghdad, Istanbul,
Tehran, Isfahan and Europe.
The traditional intelligentsia, mainly ulama and educated leOKm landed notables, was displaced 100 miles by a growing modern intelli¬
David Mcnowall, The /C«rf/.s7Minority RighU Group gentsia. Another feature of changing social relations was the increasing access ofurban he quickly mobilized peshmerga (guerrilla) forces and women to education, and their participation in social, eco¬ replaced the modernists with a loyal politburo. Unprepared nomic, political and cultural life outside their homes. for what they called a coup d'etat, the modernists lost
These transformations left their impact on the nation¬ the initiative and took refuge in Iran.'" alist movement, expanding its social bases and increasing Between 1964 and 1975, the reformists failed to achieve political, ideological and organizational tension. The urban hegemony in the movement, in spite of considerable sup¬ intelligentsia eventually made their presence felt in the port especially in urban areas. In 1966, they entered an countryside, the traditional domain of the landed aris¬ alliance with Baghdad again.st Barzani. Following the 1968 tocracy this time not as nationalists who sought protec¬ Ba'th takeover, Baghdad and Barzani agreed in 1970 on tion but rather as political and military leaders. This an autonomy plan to be implemented within four years. marked the beginning of a bitter struggle within the auton¬ The modernists again joined the Barzani camp, although omist movement. a group who described themselves as Marxist-Leninist came together with urban intelligentsia to form an under¬
ground organization that later took the name of the Radical Nationalism Kurdfstan Toilers' League (KTL, or Komala).
Conflict between old and new broke out in early 1964 in Baghdad stalled on implementing autonomy, making the Kurdish Democratic Party ofIraq. The KDP was head¬ Barzani increasingly receptive to US, Israeli and Iranian ed by a politburo composed of leftist-minded nationalists offers of support should the KDP take up arms again. In and a traditionaUst tribal leader, Mustafa Barzani. He had 1974, Baghdad unilaterally decreed a Kurdish autonomous a reputation for courageous struggle against the Iraqi state, region on its terms and launched a military offensive. When had been a military leader in the 1946 Kurdish Republic, Tehran and Washington abruptly terminated support and spent 11 years of exile in the USSR. Factions of the for the KDP in March 1975, following an agreement between landed notables, threatened by Baghdad's land reform and Baghdad and Tehran, Barzani announced the collapse of other radical measures, supported the autonomist move¬ the armed struggle. In the absence of any plans for retreat, ment, but were apprehensive about the radical politics of thousands of peshmergas surrendered U) Iraqi forces, while the politburo. They supported Barzani, who cared little for 100,000 to 200,000 peshmergas and their families and sup¬ party organization or peasants' unions. porters fled, mostly into Iran. The conflict erupted when Barzani, without the knowl¬ The KTL and other leftists had long maintained that edge of the politburo, signed what members considered the KDP, with its traditional structure and srxnal base and to be a humiliating deal with a weak Iraqi government. autocratic leadership, could not successfully lead a cam¬ The conflict was not over tactics only, but rather over the paign for Kurdi.sh self-determination. Together with Jalal question of democracy, the role of party organization, Talabani, a leading Barzani critic within the KDP polit¬ and the social component ofthe movement. But while mod¬ buro, they formed the Patriotic Union ofKurdistan f PUK) ernists maneuvered to contest Barzani's abuse of power, .Jiia£ 1975 and resumed armed struggle inside Iraqi
Middle East Report July-August 1994 ^ Kurdistan. 'I'h(;ir success motivated Iran and Turkey to Kurdistan in 1992, the KTL dissolved itself into the
(rncoiirage the rc^mnants of the Barzani leadership to PUK. Today the KDP and PUK run the governmentjoint¬
resume; guc^rrilla activities in Iraq as well." The KDP ly, with small radical and communist groups and newer
had its main strength in the Dohuk governorate(Badinan Islamist groups on the margins. 12
region), while the PUK had the upper hand in the gover- noratesof Ert)il, Kirkuk and Sulaimaniyya, which covers The Movement in Iran more than 75 perctmt of the Iraqi Kurdish population.
(Kurds in this latter region speak a dialect called Sorani, The 1961-75 struggle in Iraq overshadowed the Kurdish
which is also spoken by most Kurds in Iran; Kurds in movements in Iran and Turkey. Although the armed resis¬
Badinan speak Kurmanji, which is also spoken by most tance in Iraq initially contributed to the revival ofthe KDP
Kurds in Turk(.'y.) in Iran (KDPI), Barzani argued that Kurds in Iran should
The period aftc^r 1 975 was one of heavy repression. Iraqi delay their struggle until the KDP had achieved mean¬
forces d(!Stroycd hundreds of villages in order to create a ingful autonomy in Iraq. In exchange for limited sup¬
"security belt" along the; borders with Iran, Turkey and port by Tehran, he ordered those Kurdish activists from
Syria, and ri^settled the inhabitants in camps in south- Iran who had escaped into Iraqi Kurdistan to stop anti-
(!rn and less mountainous areas. Baghdad also bought sup¬ Iranian activism. One faction followed Barzani, but a group
port by distributing some of its risingoil revenues, although of activists split to form the KDPI/Revolutionary
productive investmcmts were channt'led to the center and Committee. The Iranian army was able to crush their
south of the country. resistance, helped when Barzani closed the borders. The
With the outbreak of the Iraq-Iran war in September rest of the KDPI leadership remained in Baghdad and
1980, both regimes tried to use the Kurds against each Europe until the Pahlavi monarchy was on the verge of
other. Baghdad, forced to concentrate its troops on the collapse in late 1978.
.southern front with Iran, stepped up military conscription, During their absence, Kurdish society and politics had
and in the north recruited new lightly-armed militias, changed. In 1969, a group of radical intellectuals came
which Kurds referred to as/«/j.s7? (little donkeys), headed together as the Revolutionary Organization of Toilers of
by traditional clan leaders. Kurdistan, better known as Komala, similar to and helped
Differences of ideology and political practice as well by the KTL in Iraq. Komala, opposing both pro-Soviet ten¬
as tactics produced p(,'riods of heavy clashes between the dencies and the urban guerrilla emphasis of some Iranian
PUK and the KDP. The two came together, at Tehran's revolutionary groups, worked to form peasant unions after
urging, as the Kurdistan Front in July 1987, just prior to the Islamist revolution and acquired much popular sup¬
Baghdad's genocidal Anfal offensive. port among Kurdish peasants and youth.
By 1987, as Ira(| t)egan to gain militarily in its long war As in Iraq, organizational conflict reflected the emer¬
with Iran, it moved to impose a "final solution" in the gence of new social forces and radical perspectives in the
Kurdish region. Ali Hassan al-Majid, a cousin of Saddam nationalist movement. The KDPI denounced Komala's
Hussein, took over as head of the Ba'th Party's Northern activities to organize the peasantry and recruit women,
Bureau, with full authority over state and party resources arguing that issues of class struggle should await the
in that region. Baghdad progressively transferred infantry achievement ofautonomy. The KDPI began armed assaults and armored units from the southern front to the north on the leftist groups as early as 1980, and in 1984 launched where, together with tens of thousands ofJahsh militia¬ a confrontation against Komala that continued for sever¬
men, they carried out the Anfal campaign in eight stages al years and took a heavy toll on both sides. The KDPI from February to September 19HH. has since split, weakened by the assassination of two
In early March 1991, following Iraq's defeat by the general secretaries.
US-led coalition, popular uprisings erupted first in the Unlike Iraq, where the KTL eventually dissolved into south of Iraq and then in the Kurdish cities, towns and the modernist front, Komala has maintained itself as an complexes. The PUK and ICDP quickly moved to take con¬ alternative to KDPI with its call for a socialist Iran in which trol. They declared a general amnesty, inviting the /o/;.s7; Kurdish rights to self-determination will be honored. commanders to join, and in less than three weeks took over However, much like KTL, Komala has not been able to lib¬ virtually all of Kurdistan. In the weeks that followed, erate itself from the burden of traditionalism, or to turn though, Iraqi forces retook much of this territory. After the nationalist movement into a social revolution or a peo¬ millions of Kurds fled to the mountains bordering Turkey ple's war. Since 1984, the leadership and much ofthe orga¬ and Iran, Western forces intei"\ened to set up a small "safe nization of both parties has been based in Iraqi Kurdistan. haven zone" around Dohuk and Zakhu, in the Badinan Although both Komala and KDPI formally demand region dominated by the KDP, and, subsequently, a "no- autonomy within Iran, an increasing number of Kurds in fly zone" above tlie .'Uith parallel. Iran and Iraq are arguing more openly in favor of inde¬
The KTL, despite its formative role in the PUK, was pendence, pointing to the failure ofnegotiations and numer¬ overshadowed by the personality and influence of ous deals between the Kurds and various central govern¬
Talabani, After the fall of the Soviet Union, and then ments, government associations of Kurdish leaders, and the formation of the Regional Government of Iraqi changing international relations. '3
Middle East Report July-August 1994 The Movement in Turkey are no less daunting than before. In Turkey, the state has launched the most recent of
Turkey's Kemalist regime was intent on building a Western- its "final offensives" designed to crush the PKK. The scale type secular nation-state based on Turkish national, lin¬ of repression and devastation has been awesome. Turkish guistic and cultural identity. The Kurdish response was human rights organizations report that many hundreds a series of revolts throughout the 1920s and 1930s led by ofvillages some estimates go as high as 900 or so have a combination oflandlords, tribal chiefs, shaikhs and urban- been "depopulated" and many razed to the ground since based intellectuals. By 1939, the last of these was brutal¬ the beginning of 1993. Scores ofjournalists and human ly repressed, leading many to believe that the Kurdish rights activists have been abducted and tortured, killed
"problem" had been solved. Hundreds ofthousands ofKurds or "disappeared." The ability ofthe PKK to survive to this were forcibly deported to western Turkey. point, and to sustain itself largely on the support of
By the early 1960s, however, nationalist struggle Turkey's Kurds rather than outside powers, indicates that resumed, encouraged by the upsurge of Kurdish nation¬ its claim to represent a new kind of leadership may be alism in Iraq and led by younger Kurdish intelligentsia well-founded. both in Kurdistan and in Istanbul, Ankara and other Unlike in Iran and Iraq, where the movement is led by
Turkish cities, which by then had sizable Kurdish popu¬ rival parties, the independence movement in Turkey is led lations. The political spectrum and agendas, while diverse, by a single organization, one that can boast leading the were influenced, as in Iraq and Iran, by leftist and com¬ longest uninterrupted armed resistance in modern Kurdish
munist formations. history. Also, while the Kurdish parties of Iran and Iraq The period between the military coups of 1960 and 1980 have not been able to undermine the oil-based financial is characterized by recurrent crises within the Turkish and economic power of those states, the PKK has been able
state, cycles of repression, and continuing proliferation to strike at Turkey's economy, particularly the vulnerable
of Kurdish political and cultural groups in Kurdistan, in tourist industry. In addition, Ankara is anxious to become
Turkish cities, and among Kurdish workers in Germany. a full member of the European Union, and if the current
Unlike Iraqi Kurdistan, in Turkey most Kurdish organi¬ offensive fails, it may be persuaded by the Western pow¬ zations in the 1970s espoused socialism. The military regime ers to grant the Kurds .some concessions along the lines following the 1980 coup was able to suppress most of these of token linguistic and cultural rights. But any policy that falls short ofgenuine autonomous rule is likely to fail. organizations. The Kurdistan Workers' Party, better known by its Although the PKK has indicated it is willing to negotiate Kurdish initials, PKK, survived the repression following on the basis of autonomy, Ankara remains determined to the 1980 coup, and launched its first attacks against Turkish crush it. military targets in 1984. The PKK is distinguished from In Iraq, many Kurds view the Regional Government other Kurdish political parties by its social base, which of Kurdistan, with its elected parliament and authority includes a sizable portion ofworkers and peasants. It advo¬ over law enforcement units, as an edifice ofgenuine auton¬
cates both socialism and independence for greater omy. The experience of the Regional Government is impor¬ Kurdistan, and puts a priority on armed struggle. In the tant; elections and the relative freedom of political expres¬ past, it has avoided cooperation with other Kurdish polit¬ sion and association have been politically invigorating. ical organizations. The PKK has been open to women's par¬ Many Kurds insist that they prefer the excruciating eco¬ ticipation, and now claims to have thousands of women nomic deprivations they must endure now to any return in its ranks. Although it has benefitted from some Syrian to rule under Saddam Hussein. aid, it has effectively relied on the organized support ofthe This state-building experiment, though, is threatened Kurds in Kurdistan and in the diaspora in Turkey and not only by external foes including Tehran, Ankara, abroad. While the PKK is not the only Kurdish political Baghdad and Damascus but also by internal conflict. organization in Turkey, its ability to sustain a campaign After .several years of cooperation in building the Regional of armed struggle against the well-armed Turkish army Government, the KDP and PUK began a new round of seri¬ has won it a leading position and popular support in both ous fighting in May 1994ironically on the .'30th anniver¬ urban and rural Kurdish areas, as well as in the Kurdish sary of the 1964 Barzani putsch against the KDP polit¬ buro. As of the end of May, interventions by Kurdish diaspora. government ofTicials and by the Iraqi National Congress (the Iraqi opposition front of which the two Kurdish par¬ Prospects ties are the largest and militarily mo.st significant part)
It is difficult to reach a firm assessment concerning the had been unable to halt the killing. Kurdish public opin¬ prospects for the Kurdish movement. The present cir¬ ion inside and outside Kurdi.stan has accurately assessed cumstances the survival of the PKK-led movement in this as a potentially suicidal civil war. Turkey against extraordinary Turkish state repression, It must be empha.sized, as this essay has tried U) do, that and the existence in Iraq of a Western-protected Regional this conflict, much like that in .South Africa between the Government are unprecedented. Yet the obstacles con¬ African National Congress and Inkatha, is rooted in the fronting a political resolution of the "Kurdish problem" .SV'c Hassanpour /7a^'e 23
Middle East Report July-August 1994
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paign in 1988. Tens of thousands of others perished The physical remains of the General Security during the routine political killings that preceded, and Directorate's victims are strewn throughout followed, Ali Hassan al-Majid's paroxysm of anger. Iraq, buried anojiymously in common graves.
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ing squads after summary trials, or sometimes no trial the truckloads ofsecurity archives captured by the Kurds during their 1991 intifada, and transferred to the US at all, between the Ba'th Party coup of 1968 and the for .safekeeping, the record-keeping was meticulous to fall of 1991, when the Iraqi Kurdistan Front, backed
by Western airpower, took control ofa northern, enclave. Susan Mcisclag is collaborating on a booli about Ihr photographic history of thn Kurdish nationalist movement. In the Shadow ofHistor)' Conservatively, 100,000 men, women and children were (Random House, forthcoming). Andrew WhiDoy is the former executive "disappeared" during the seven month longAnfal cam - director of Human Rights Watch /Middle East.
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Unr Kirwt raTMttt Mirt ,*iMt 1888. tiftririMlc Dr. Oy Middle East Report July-August 1994 the point of obsession. cidal campaign like the Anfal, take oral testimony In the Badinan hills ofDohuk governorate, the vil¬ from the survivors and from relatives ofthe deceased, lage ofKoreme was one of hundreds ofKurdish com¬ and read the government's own account of how and munities lying in rebel-controlled territory to feel the why it committed such gross abuses is probably unique scourge ofthe Anfal. Near the end ofthe campaign, 27 in the annals of human rights work. To have done male villagers none ofthem fighters were summarily all this while that government was still in power, its executed on a hill outside Koreme, after returning from security apparatus yet to be defanged, its armies wait¬ a fruitless attempt to escape into Turkey. In late spring ing only a few kilometers away across an undeclared 1992, Human Rights Watch /Middle East and ceasefire line, was remarkable. Physicians for Human Rights exhumed their bodies Since late 1991, Human Rights Watch /Middle East and conducted a forensic examination to determine has been compiling the facts about the Anfal and, more the cause and circumstance of their death. Dr. Clyde broadly, examining the fearsome machinery ofrepres¬ Snow, the forensic anthropologist renowned for his sion deployed by the Ba'th notjust against the Iraqi work documenting the trail of rightwing Latin Kurds, but against suspected dissidents ofany stripe. American death squads, led a team ofLatin American What remains is to elicit from Baghdad a full account¬ specialists to work with local Kurds on the task of ing for its victims, just as the regime was compelled unearthing, literally, the facts. As all the dead were to divulge its nuclear secrets. Even though the facts positively identified, one by one, the notion of inter¬ should by now be clear, political (and, for some, eco¬ national technology transfer took on new meaning. nomic) considerations are giving some members of To have been able to exhume the victims of a geno the UN Security Council pause for thought. J L. rytt^j: r:-. s / r -t. " .^'" Atavt: EMt Nltdi I lit sfcttttmi MriUl KOTMM t MSlstiiis clearing dhl tpom man graves. Right: Korene graveiite virttli 10 Middle East Report July-August 1994 J^'" >^l'' Vf«*^N 'p' ) !^:,;VV.. v^-r'-.; r -v^^^'-: .,^^^ '* ^* '^S.-; ,. » ^?- - " -/sJffiS-' 9... . - 'T"V*--i - . ' A. . .. . -. . - . -v^^HMsa .«. . - » ^JT I . -.5..*.' --^ . * L' -.:''v > - ^ 1 .. \ .-=?Wm...>*. -w '--^''£* "V- - « "* jIv'- ''k^ jt^ ^, - ^BbT . ^ ^rty Aj'j' - - ^ mT v%r. ^-*^>£;. 1^---.:^ -- SuBjin Meiseiaii'^Magnum ^ ,* ;%tea.,.' at- ^ i^ ..\*-/. \ x--' ifi;fe^.. - Dl» ,lil Tatey. R. Maro/Medico International I Dreams Of Independence Tlie Kurds of Turkey and die PKK Chris K pa Will the Kurdish civil society that has taken shape little by little be doomed to disappear in yet another phase of "total war"? Politics has always been a difficult and risky business tics in Turkey date to the late 1950s and early 1960s, when for Kurdish nationalists in Turkey. The hegemony Kurdish intellectuals in Istanbul and Ankara formed cul¬ today ofthe Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), with its his- tural clubs and organizations. The summer of 1967 saw tor\' ofdogmatic Marxism-Leninism and its attachment to mass student demonstrations in 19 Kurdish cities and armed struggle, is very much a reflection ofthe refusal of towns, including 10,000 marchers in Silvan and 25,000 successive Turkish nationalist regimes to accommodate Chris Kutschera i> the author of Le Mouvement National Kurde (19791. Kurdish aspirations for cultural and political autonomy. This text is excerpted and adapted by Joe Stork from a chapter ivritten for The stirrings of progressive Kurdish nationalist poli an expanded and updated English edition ofthat book. 12 Middle East Report July-August 1994 in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir. The military government proceeded to outlaw leftist Organized activism took two forms, very much as it did Turkish as well as Kurdish organizations, including the in neighboring Iraq. One was the July 1965 formation of TIP and the DDKO, and imprison many of their cadres. an explicitly Kurdish organization, the Kurdistan Dem¬ The prisons functioned as schools, however, and this peri¬ ocratic Party ofTurkey (KDPT), in Diyarbakir. The KDPT od spawned explicitly Kurdish leftist groupings includ¬ program included an explicit demarcation of "Kurdistan" ing the Socialist Party ofKurdistan in Turkey, better known with Kurdish as the official language and an exclusively as Ria Azadi (Kurdish for Road to Freedom, the name of Kurdish government bureaucracy, proportional Kurdish their journal) and Rizgari (Liberation, which also pub¬ representation in Turkey's parliament, and economic invest¬ lished a journal of that name). The 1970s and early 1980s ment. By 1968, many KDPT leaders were imprisoned, was a period of ferment, in which Kurdish left national¬ assassinated or in exile. ist formations experienced serious factionalization. The other path of Kurdish political engagement was through the leftist Workers' Party of Turkey (Tiirkiye Military Option Is9i Partisi, or TIP). Although the TIP officially took a neg¬ ative stand on the Kurdish question, by 1969 the secre¬ Paradoxically, the PKK was born not in Kurdistan but in tary-general and the president ofthe party were both Kurds. Ankara, where Abdullah Ocalan and other Kurdish stu¬ At the end of 1969, TIP president Mehmet Ali Asian chal¬ dents were active in the Turkish extreme left but ques¬ lenged a 1967 decree outlawing "the distribution in Turkey tioned the attitudes of those groups towards the Kurdish of any material offoreign origin in the Kurdish language," question. More surprisingly, some ofthe founders and later and started a bilingual Turkish-Kurdishjournal, YeniAki^ leaders of the PKK were Turks. They disseminated pro¬ (New Current), which raised explicitly the question of paganda, recruited members, and established regional Kurdish national rights until it was suspended after four committees that would only come together on certain occa¬ issues. This period also saw the publication of a Kurdish- sions such as the end of Ramadan so as to avoid attracting Turkish dictionary and socioeconomic studies ofKurdistan. the attention of the authorities. They adopted the PKK Like the Communist Party in Iraq, the TIP, in its fourth name in late 1978 - early 1979. What distinguishes the congress in 1970, acknowledged the Kurdish question PKK from other Kurdish parties is less the "democratic the first time a legal Turkish party had taken even this centralist" organization or the Marxist-Leninist language smallest of steps. than an emphasis on armed struggle distinguished by its The formation in early 1969 of the Revolutionary ferocity. The other distinguishing feature is PKK empha¬ Cultural Centers of the East (DDKO in Turkish) marks sis on the need to mobilize the peasantry: southeastern the beginning ofthe separation ofthe Kurdish nationalist Turkey has virtually no industrial working class, as almost left from its Turkish Marxist counterpart. DDKO came all industry is in the west and center, and the rural eco¬ together initially in the two university cities ofAnkara and nomic structure is marked by very large landholdings with Istanbul before spreading to Diyarbakir and other cities. serf-like conditions for workers. It represented a new generation, some of whose members, The formative years of the PKK as an organization coin¬ like Mahmut Kilin? and Mehdi Zana, are key figures in the cided with the years of martial law that followed the non-PKK political leadership today. September 1980 military coup. The repression ofthe 1980s, The Kurdish attention to culture was a response to a both in numbers of persons seized and imprisoned and in policy of forced, systematic assimilation emanating from the extent ofsystematic torture, was far worse than before. the Turkish center. Starting in the early 1960s, for instance, The few journalists who managed to attend trials in Kurdish peasant children were sent to boarding schools in Diyarbakir wrote that prisoners were sometimes brought large villages in which Kurdish was forbidden. "My father to court in metal cages loaded on trucks, hardly able to was a nationalist," one schoolteacher said in 1980, "but we walk or stand. Prison conditions were so harsh that pris¬ were ten children and he wanted to finish with this mis¬ oners staged prolonged hunger strikes that lasted more ery. To have a teacher's diploma was a dream, it guaran¬ than a month at a time, or, in more than a few cases, com¬ teed economic independence. For this my father forced mitted suicide. On March 21, 1982, Mazlum Dogan lit three us to speak Turkish at home. There was a small box in matches to celebrate .N'owruz and hanged himself in his which we had to put 25 kurus every time we u.sed a Kurdish cell rather than make a televi.sed confession. A few weeks word!" Many Kurdish militants today tell a similar story. later, on May 18, four prisoners wrapped themselves in The Turkish government's alarm at the revival ofKurdish benzine-soaked newspapers and set themselves on fire. nationalism increased following the March 1970 autono¬ When their comrades attempted U) put out the flames they my agreement in Iraq between Baghdad and the Kurdish refused, insisting that it was a "freedom fire." Democratic Party (KDP) led by Mustafa Barzani. Under In Kurdistan, the extent and ferocity of the repression pressure from the army. Prime Minister Suleiman Demirel decimated the Kurdish parties, .some of which decided to launched authorized commando operations against a num¬ disband. The regime thus cleared the way for the PKK. ber ofKurdish towns and villages that set a pattern for abu¬ Abdullah Ocalan left for Syria and Lebanon just prior to sive collective punishment that continues today. This repres¬ the September coup and set about regrouping the PKK sion increased following the March 1971 army coup. there. The first PKK armed assaults on Turkish forces. 13 Middle East Report July-August 1994 in 1 984, w(!re on gf.-ndarme forts. The Turkish regime, much (son of KDP founder Mustafa Barzani) in Damascus in like th(! Fninch in Algeria, recruited "village guards" 1984 and 1985. It was then the turn of Jalal Talabani 16,000 by the end of 1989 and nearly twice that number and the Patriotic Union ofKurdistan (PUK), which signed f)y 199.'i. But this did nothing to impede the growth of the a memorandum of agreement with the PKK in May 1988. PKK, which .systematically attacked them as "collabora¬ The agreement was never implemented but at least the tors." PKK guerrillas they do not use the term pesh¬ parties maintained "bridges." merga b(!cause of its association with Barzani's "feudal" The establishment of a Kurdish government in north¬ mov(,'ment in Iraq were not fussy about who might end ern Iraq in June 1992 brought the contradictions between up in their line of fire. Between 1987 and 1989 they the two movements to a head. One factor was the Iraqi destroy('d somi' l.'i7 schools as "instruments of Ankara's Kurdish leadership's effort to establish good ties with [jolicy of assimilation." It was not until the end of the decade Ankara as a way of maintaining relief supply routes and that Ocalan indulged in an "autocriti(juc," saying that PKK the allied military protective cover over Iraqi Kurdistan. armed actions needed to be "more seh^ctive." In November 1991, Talabani appealed to Ocalan to declare I'KK tactics gave the 'furkish authorities a great deal a ceasefire, or at least to cease operations from camps in of leeway in |)ortraying them as bloody terrorists, a task Iraq. Instead PKK attacks increased, and Ocalan denounced made all the easier by the rigid censorship of events in Talabani as an "agent ofimperialism." As the dispute esca¬ Kurdistan and the obliging attitude of most of the Turkish lated, the PKK enforced a blockade on the only road from press. It was only aftei' some 'I'urkish journalists noticed Turkey into Iraqi Kurdistan in July 1992, exacerbating that many victims of the so-called "Red Kurds" had been the negative effects ofthe UN sanctions and the Iraqi block¬ kill(;d by army weapons that the dimensions and conse- ade on the Kurdish region of Iraq. (|U('nces of Turkish martial law began to breach the wall The PKK and the Iraqi Kurdish parties each consider of silence surrounding "the Southeast." themselves to be the leading force in the struggle for 'fhe 'furkish government has maintained a martial law Kurdish liberation. For the PKK, "the government ofErbil regime over the country's 1 1 Kurdish provinces to this day. does not represent much. ...Each tribe is a power." The PKK 'fhe option of choice has persistently been the military could tolerate "tactical relations" between the Kurds of option: from launching "hot pursuit" raids into Iraqi Iraq and Ankara, but not the alliance that they see the Kurdistan to destroying villages and killing and displac¬ Kurdistan Regional Government having established with ing tens of thousands of people. For a brief period in the the Turkish army and intelligence forces. The Kurds of wakeofthc 1991 Persian Oulfwar, President TurgutOzal Iraq, for their part, are not prepared to sacrifice "a free spoke in measured terms of a more liberal policy towards Kurdistan, with freely elected political institutions. ..for the Kurds, and laws prohibiting the use of the Kurdish lan¬ the death of two Turkish gendarmes that does not bring guage were repealed. But following Ozal's death in April much," said Jowhar Nameq, chair of the Kurdish parlia¬ 1993, it has become clearer than ever that when it comes ment in Erbil, at a Paris press conference in December to the Kurdish question, it is not the civilian elected gov¬ 1992. "The PKK claims there are no borders between the ernment which determines policy but the army-dominat¬ parts of Kurdistan," said Adnan Mufti, formerly a leader ed National Security Council. of the small Kurdistan Socialist Party. "So we ask them Many have lost a great deal in this war, but the least then, why don't you fight Saddam Hussein?" of them is the PKK. "IfJezireh is ours today," says Ocalan, On October 4, 1992, the Kurdish government in Erbil speaking of a town near the Iraqi-Syrian border, "it is issued an ultimatum to the PKK: either withdraw from half thanks to our efforts. But the other half Turkey pre¬ the border bases or be expelled. Iraqi Kurdish attacks began sented to us on a silver platter." The I'KK have an esti¬ the next day, and Turkish government forces intervened mated 12,000 to 15, ()()() full-time fighters. Ocalan declared the following week. On October 27, after heavy fighting, last September that he would have twice as many at including extensive Turkish air attacks, PKK leader Osman the end of 1994. Ocalan (Abdullah's brother) discussed ceasefire terms with Talabani and Barzani. Turkish forces renewed their attacks Tactical Relations two days later. Estimates of PKK losses ranged from 150 (Osman Ocalan) to 4,500 "eliminated" (Turkish chief-of- The recent course of events in Turkish Kurdistan cannot stafTGen. Dogan Giires). By any reasonable measure the be understood without appreciating the relationships of PKK suffered a serious defeat. the PKK with the Kurdish parties of Iraq. Despite sharp For years Jalal Talabani had been striving to convince differences of ideology, strategy and method, the PKK Abdullah Ocalan to proclaim a unilateral six-month cease¬ signed an agi-eement in 1981 with the KDP. which, after fire to test the will and strength of Turkish civilian lead¬ all, controlled the Iraqi part of Kurdistan along the border ers. In the spring of 1993, on March 17, at a base in Lebanon with Turkey. The agreement gave the PKK transit rights with Talabani present, Ocalan announced a ceasefire from and rear bases in KDP territory. Turkish military pres¬ March 20 to April 15 and declared that the PKK did not sures after September 1983 heightened the differences intend "to separate immediately from Turkey." Two days between the two groups that were not overcome even by later, on March 19, a PKK agreement with the Kurdistan "summit" meetings between Ocalan and Masoud Barzani Socialist Party brought an end to the longstanding PKK 14 Middle East Report July-August 1994 vendetta against the other Kurdish parties. More signifi¬ group some saw themselves as close to the PKK, while cantly, the March 19 agreement proposed that the Kurdish others were more traditional social democrats and nation¬ question could be solved in the context of "a democratic alists. The Turkish authorities, though, had little tolerance and federal regime" and set out nine conditions for a polit¬ for anyone aspiring to "the equality of the Turkish and ical solution. Kurdish peoples... within the framework of the legitimate Ankara chose to see only PKK weakness in the cease¬ principles of law," as former HEP chair Feridun Yazar fire. All that was left to Ocalan, said Interior Minister Ismet put it during his trial. On July 3, 1992, the State Security Sezgin, was "to surrender without conditions." Never¬ Court indicted the founders ofthe HEP for "separatist pro¬ theless, on April 16, Ocalan announced an unlimited exten¬ paganda." On July 15, 1993, the Constitutional Court out¬ sion of the ceasefire and repeated the conditions for nego¬ lawed the HEP, a few days after the deputies had resigned tiation outlined earlier. To this Demirel replied, "If [Ocalan] to form the Party of Democracy (DEP). In December 1993, gives up killing, we won't reward him [with] a region of Hatip Dicle, considered close to the PKK, was elected DEP Turkey." Ozal, who had been the most forthcoming Turkish chairperson. On March 3, 1994, the parliament voted to lift leader regarding the Kurds, died suddenly the next day. the parliamentary immunity of seven DEP deputies. They Within a month, Turkish Kurdistan was again engulfed were arrested at the door of the parliament and charged in violence. under Article 125 of the penal code ("crimes against the The Kurds of Turkey are in a paradoxical position. state"), which carries the death penalty. Cultural repression in Turkey is fiercer than in Iraq or The DEP will likely meet the same fate as the HEP Iran, yet Turkey is also where at least the formal attrib¬ before it, but the recomposition of the Kurdish movement utes ofdemocracy are most respected. Scores ofKurds have in Turkey seems irreversible. The access to power of a served in the Turkish parliament over the years, but in "Kurdish government" in Iraqi Kurdistan, the accelera¬ the past these have been landed notables with long-stand¬ tion of the war in Turkish Kurdistan, and the March 1993 ing ties to Ankara and no wish to advertize their agreement between the PKK and other Kurdish parties in Kurdishness. Since 1983, though, the several legislative Turkey can hardly be interpreted otherwise. The question elections have provided an arena in which militant younger now is what course will prevail among Turkish political Kurdish politicians have been able to seize very limited authorities the brief opening initiated by President Ozal maneuvering room. The elections ofOctober 1991 were the before his death, or the military-dictated hardline of first to witness the emergence of a genuine and explicitly President Suleiman Demirel and Prime Minister Tansu Kurdish bloc, when 18 deputies elected on the Social (filler. Will the Kurdish civil society that has taken shape Democratic (SHP) ticket broke offtojoin the small People's little by little be doomed to disappear in yet another phase Labor Party (Halkin Emek Partisi, or HEP). It was a mixed of "total war"? ONE THIRD of our budget comes from individual donors like you. Please help us meet ihis goal. Gi\e as generously as you can to the MERIP Appeal Middle East Report July-August 1994 15 'i r"'- .^V. f i ^. .; 7 HafIM Hifliiri, inyir Cbre, Tirfcay in an omca ot the local Raiel Cetrnntttae. R. Maro/Medico International City in tiie War Zone Aliza Marcus Ankara, In its zeal to crush Kurdisti nationalism, has managed to undermine and destroy non-violent Kurdish movements, in effect helping ensure PKK dominance Saki I^ikfi sits in a coffeeshop below a picture of the lion Kurds. "The government isn't interested in us," says founder of the Turkish republic Mustafa Kemal I§ik9i, whose house and car were firebombed last August Atnturk and ticks offthe problems he faces as the deputy by Tirrkish soldiers claiming to be ferreting out PKK guer¬ mayor ofCizre: bad roads, poor schools, not enough water, rillas. "They are only concerned about the war, and dri¬ no jobs. The city's monthly budget barely covers munici¬ ving us from the southeast. To them, we are all terrorists." pal salaries, and emigrants from outlying villages are Ifik9i, a nervous looking man, these days rarely visits straining social services. the municipality's office, a ramshackle building with bul¬ Ai\d then there is the war between the Turkish army and let-scarred walls and darkened hallways. Last summer, the Kvudistan Workers' Party (PKK) to control southeast the mayor, Ha^im Hafimi, was detained by police who Tinkcy, home to about halfthe coimtry's estimated 12 mil- accused him of aiding the PKK, and now Hafimi, too, Alizn Marcus f'.« a \a\:r::aUsi who fn-qucr.tly iLritcs on Turkey. spends most of his time elsewhere. "Nothing has been 16 Middle East Report July-August 1994 spared," says I§ik9i, marveling for a moment at the lack of 1950 national elections, Kurds were rewarded with some authority elected officials in the southeast hold these days. basic social services. "My house, the mayor's building, even the hospital, they "Since the beginning of the republic, the government have all been attacked by soldiers." didn't give any help to this region," says Mayor Ha§imi. Cizre is on the verge ofcollapse. Decades ofgovernment It was not until 1961, when a Kurd from Diyarbakir became inattention and the United Nations economic embargo minister of health, that the region acquired health facil¬ against neighboring Iraq have crippled the economy. A few ities. "But since then," the mayor adds, "no improvements dimly lit shops struggle on, selling cheap goods, and a cou¬ have been made on the facility." ple of grimy garages hawk smuggled Iraqi fuel. By 1968, Cizre had received a bridge, new roads and If Cizre one day disappears, its people scattered west¬ widened streets, a park named after Ataturk, a cinema ward, far from the widening war zone, it will be due to a and a variety of municipal buildings. Ankara considered confluence of events rooted in the Turkish government's such favors sufficient to bring the Kurds of Cizre and long-standing desire to destroy Kurdish nationalism and throughout the region into the arms ofthe Turkish state. the PKK. And when Cizre finally does cease to exist, as Cizre's economic heyday in the 1980s was thanks to the many here believe will happen if the fighting continues, highway which cuts through the center of the city, a road it will mark yet another setback for Ankara as well as for that crosses into Iraq to the east and Syria to the west. the people who call it home. The human rights abuses of At the height ofcommercial traffic, some 5,000 gaily paint¬ the government and its security forces translates into more ed trucks passed through Cizre daily, lumbering to Iraq support for the guerrillas. Despite the PKK's own violent and back, bringing with them a huge demand for services. practices, the group is respected as the only organization Repair shops, restaurants and cheap hotels cropped up on with the will and strength necessary to pursue Kurdish both sides of the road for miles outside of the city. Young boys sold cigarettes as truckers idled at Cizre's one stop¬ goals of self-determination. light. Others bustled about the tea shops offering to clean the grease off drivers' shoes. Turkey for the Turks "We had the cheapest, best goods in the area," said Cizre and its 24 outlying villages scattered in the sur¬ Ha^imi, recalling the days before the 1991 Gulf war, when rounding plains and mountains were never high on trade with Iraq was embargoed. "From all over people Ankara's Ust ofpriorities. Since the founding ofthe repub¬ came here to buy and sell. Everyone was earning a good lic in 1923, successive Turkish regimes, determined to living, from the small children to their fathers. But when establish a strong central government, have viewed the the border was closed, 90 percent ofthe shops closed down." southeast's periodic displays ofKurdish nationalism with For all its riches, Cizre has never compared with a city in western Turkey. The highway is paved, but the narrow apprehension. The first ofthese localized insurrections erupted in 1925, dirt roads in residential neighborhoods are bisected by and others followed through the mid- 1930s. Although the streams of raw sewage. The shops are well-stocked, but Kurds had fought side by side with the Turks in the war with the cheapest, most basic goods. The .schools are still ofliberation, led by Mustafa Kemal, they emerged with few overcrowded even though some families cannot afford to rights under a regime self-defined as Turkish. Kemal, who send their children to school. Electricity is available only took the name Ataturk (father ofthe Turks) in 1934, moved intermittently and water pipes do not extend to every to destroy Kurdish nationalism by decimating Kurdish house. Cizre never had a proper factory, and some peo¬ social structures and implementing a policy offorced assim¬ ple only survive on migrant labor. Depending on the sea¬ ilation. Leaders ofthe uprisings were hanged and their sup¬ son, families can be found picking cotton in Adana, sell¬ porters imprisoned. Land was expropriated, families were ing fruit in Istanbul, or working in restaurants along relocated to western Turkey and Kurdish language use was the Mediterranean coast. banned. The regime opened cultural and educational soci¬ eties to teach Turkish language and history and implant Good Village/Bad Village a new national Turkish identity. In the summer of 1984, 84 kilometers away from Cizre, Economic investment lagged, however. People in Cizre guerrillas from the PKK opened their first offensive again.st still recall when the trappings of development first Turkish security forces. The military's response was quick appearedit was not until the mid-1950s that the city was and harsh: hundreds were arrested, and security forces hooked up to electricity and running water.* tortured and beat recalcitrant suspects. The government The decade of water and light followed the country's was no doubt caught off guard: the region had been under first multi-party elections in 1947, in which Kurds were emergency and then martial law since 1979, and the 1980 wooed by the new Democrat Party. The party was not pro- military coup had ushered in a whole new round of repres¬ Kurdish, but was untainted by the harsh assimilationist sion. Tens of thousands of Kurds throughout the country policies ofthe Kemalists. When the party triumphed in the were detained, periodicals shut down and restrictions on and other historical details about Cizre come from Abdullah Ya.sin, Bulun Kurdish expression strictly enforced. Yonleriyle: Cizre ( 1983). 17 Middle East Report July-August 1994 Around Cizre, the guerrillas made more enemies than Nor have the guerrillas ignored Ankara's other invest¬ friends. By this time, nearly every village in the area had ments in the region. Oil refineries in nearby Batman have a school, 'furkish television was intermittent, but a prop¬ been bombed, as has the now-idle pipeline through which er transmitter was under construction. Turkish news¬ Turkey used to transport Iraq's oil. Guerrilla attacks have papers were available every day or at least every other slowed road construction (the PKK argues that the roads day. By one count, in 1983 there were more than two transport soldiers), cut tourism (last summer close to 30 sheep for every one of the area's some 32,500 people, not tourists were kidnapped by the group) and halted archae¬ to mention the Angora goats (one per person), cows and ological digs. The burgeoning war in which 11,700 peo¬ water buffalo. With the coal mine up the road and the ple have died, some 500 in the first two-and-a-halfmonths traffic off the highway, many villages found that trade of this year alone is also cited by Central Asian states was a lot smoother if they remained on good terms with that are loath to pipe oil to Western markets through Turkey. the authorities. But Turkish security forces treated everyone harshly. Establishing Autonomy By the late 1 980s, they had separated "good" villages from "bad" by means of a simple test: if villagers did not agree These days, downtown Cizre is a dismal sight ofhalf-shut¬ to join the village guard, a government-sponsored Kurdish tered shops and overcrowded coffeehouses. Under pres¬ militia which paid participants a hefty wage, they imme- sure from the security forces, thousands of people have (liat(!ly came under suspicion. Around Cizre, a number of streamed in from the countryside. The city's population villag(!s provided village guards, some ofwhom joined sole¬ is now around 60,000, up from 20,200 in 1980. Many immi¬ ly to deflect military pressure. grants are not from Cizre's outlying villages of which The PKK attacked villages and guards and also dealt at least a fourth have been forcibly emptied by soldiers severely with villages that refused to support them with but from more distant parts of the region. food and water, or which did not seem amenable to the Some in Cizre fear their city will go the way of Sirnak, group's Marxist-Leninist message of liberation. Still, when a nearby town of 29,000 bombed by soldiers almost two all was said and done, many Kurds around Cizre came to years ago. The attack on Sirnak was ostensibly precipi¬ respect the PKK's campaign of Kurdish nationalism. tated by a clash with the PKK, but when the shooting Feelings toward the PKK grew warmer as the security stopped about 50 hours later, the police station, govern¬ forces upped their pressure. The PKK might come in and ment buildings and military base had escaped virtually kill a pro-government mukhtar and his family, but the unscathed and almost all casualties were civilian. So far, sc'curity forces would detain a whole village, beat the men promised government restitution has not materialized. and women, ransack houses and then kill a couple of peo¬ Cizre may indeed become another Sirnak. Its people are ple just for show. By the end of the 1980s, the army had known for being strong PKK supporters, something that banned villagers from grazing animals and farming on the often sets off a shooting spree by soldiers. "The guerrillas mountains into which the PKK retreated after attacks. are Kurds, they are fighting for our homes, our lives and Tractors were confiscated and nightly curfews were our national identity," says a truck driver who frequent¬ enforced. Villagers fled to nearby towns. ly passes through town. "But the government well, they Around the time the rural economic base started to crum¬ are only interested in beating and killing us. Every night ble, Turkey embarked on its ambitious Southeast Anatolia I go to bed and wonder if I will live to the morning." Project (GAP), a multi-billion-dollar project to harness the Last September, Cizre was closed offfor two days after waters of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The plan envi¬ soldiers clashed with three guerrillas hiding out in a house. sions nearly two dozen dams and some 19 power plants When the smoke cleared, the guerrillas were dead, the which will boost irrigated land by a third and double elec¬ house in which they were hiding destroyed, and lots ofother tricity capacity. The government touts the project as an houses had been damaged. By the time the curfew was lift¬ example of its commitment to developing the southeast. ed, downtown Cizre was littered with shattered glass. A The dams, once complete, will make arable huge swatch¬ month earlier, soldiers had also embarked on a shooting es of now-arid land. The boost in agricultural output will spree no one is quite sure what set it off during which presumably increase jobs and wealth, and attract light they managed to destroy a row of restaurants and ser¬ industry to the region. vice stations just outside the town. Along the way, a cou¬ Some Kurds fear that big landowners will quickly take ple of houses in a nearby village were shot up and, when possession of the new arable land, leaving villagers not his truck was firebombed, a sleeping driver burned to death. much better off than before. The government has also used Local residents say there is no civil authority to which the project as an excuse to relocate Kurds whose homes they can appeal. The mayor and deputy mayor readily were targeted to disappear under vast lakes. The GAP, admit they have no power. The government-appointed meant to integrate potentially productive parts ofKurdistan administrator has not been open to complaints about secu¬ into Turkey's economy, is more likely to marginalize fur¬ rity forces abuses. When M. Ali Dincer, a human rights ther the mountainous region to the east where the PKK lawyer whose office was firebombed by soldiers, tried to is strongest. PKK guerrillas have recently torched machin¬ complain, he was told that the guerillas must have per¬ ery and tried to bomb a couple of dams. petrated the act. "At one o'clock in the afternoon the PKK 18 Middle East Report July-August 1994 is driving around Cizre in tanks?" asks Dincer. "The peo¬ lic and private interests will feel free to invest in econom¬ ple are lying because they are afraid of the terrorists," ic development in the southeast. responds Omer Adar, the smooth-talking government After all these steps are taken, it might turn out that administrator. the Kurds want more. Perhaps the PKK is the party of For now, the only economic aid seems to be going to choice for the Kurds. Ankara, in its zeal to crush Kurdish the neighborhood controlled by village guards. They need nationalism, has managed to undermine and destroy non¬ their own school they are so hated by other residents that violent Kurdish movements, in effect helping ensure PKK their children cannot safely be sent to schools in the cen¬ dominance. Between the state and the guerrillas, Kurds ter of the city. "Soon, when the fighting ends, there are a have not had many options for protesting restrictions on lot ofthings we vrill do all over Cizre," insists Adar, describ¬ their identity. But even without the PKK, a majority of ing proposals for a vast irrigation system, agricultural Kurds may continue agitating for full separation from investment and a host of vocational training programs. Turkish control. Ankara must take the chance and deal A Kurd himself, Adar believes Kurdish agitation for greater with it democratically. Right now, the only thing certain rights is nothing more than PKK propaganda. "Only some is further bloodshed by both the PKK and the Turkish army ignorant people who don't know anything about the world as long as changes are not made. want Kurdish education after all, what use would it be in the world? The Turkish language and culture are very rich, while the Kurdish culture is a very ignorant cul¬ ture. There is no future for Kurdish." Further Reading on the Kurds The PKK cannot add electricity lines or pump more and Kurdistan water, but it does offer a well-functioning judicial sys¬ Martin van Brvine8Ben,Agha, Shaikh and State: The Social tem, after-school classes in Kurdish, and an enforceable and Political Structures ofKurdistan, London: Zed Press, moral code. Tired of being beaten by your husband? The PKK will explain to him that men no longer are allowed to 1992. beat their wives. Trouble collecting on a bill? The guer¬ _, "The Kurds Between Iran and Iraq," Middle rillas do not like it when one Kurd tries to cheat another. East Report No. 141 (July-August 1986). Too many teenage boys getting drunk? The group will ban alcohol. Is pornography ruining local morals? The movie , "Between Guerrilla War and Political theater will be shut down. Was your brother murdered Murder: The Workers' Party of Kurdistan," Middle East in a fight over a woman? The PKK will put the assailant Report No. 153 (July- August 1988). on trial. Bill Frelick, "The False Promise of Operation Provide "There's no longer any need for people to seek out the Comfort: Protecting Refugees or Protecting State Power?" PKK when they have a problem, because the PKK is every¬ Middle East Report No. 176 (May-June 1992). where. It will hear about the problem and take steps to deal with it," explains one local Kurdish professional. "The Amir Hassanpour, Nationalism and Language in PKK has to do this. The government doesn't care anymore Kurdistan, 1918-1985, San Francisco: Mellen Research if one Kurd kills another Kurd." University Press, 1992. Cizre's experiences are reflected throughout the south¬ east. According to the Turkish Human Rights Association, Wadie Jwaideh, "The Kurdish National Movement: Its at least 874 villages have been forcibly emptied and more Origins and Development," unpublished PhD dissertation, than 500 Kurdish activists mysteriously murdered since Syracuse University, 1960. 1991. Torture of police detainees is rampant, as is arbi¬ Philip G. Kreyenbroek and Stefan Sperl, eds. The Kurds: trary arrest and harassment. Economically, much of the region is in a state of disre¬ A Contemporary Overview, London and New York; pair and disintegration. Rarely a week goes by without a Routledge, 1992. politician in Ankara stating that economic factors are at Chris Kutschera, Le Mouvement National Kurde, Paris, the root of the guerrilla war, but establishing a well-func¬ 1979. tioning economy in southeast Turkey means creating a secure environment for businesses and farmers. This would David McDowall, The Kurds: A Nation Denied, London: require halting arbitrary detention and torture, mysteri¬ Minority Rights Group, 1992. ous murders of activists and shooting sprees by the secu¬ rity forces. Villages could no longer be burned down because Middle East Watch, Genocide in Iraq: TheAnfal Campaign the people refused to take up arms against the guerril¬ against the Kurds, New York, 1993. las. It also means an environment in which discussion of _, Bureaucracy of Repression: The Iraqi Kurdish life and aspirations is not throttled as "separatist Government in Its Own Words, New York, 1994. propaganda." Restrictions should be lifted on free discus¬ sion of Kurds in Turkey, their past, present and future. With state-protectedand even promotedfreedoms, pub 19 Middle East Report July-August 1994 Kurdish Broadcasting in I Ann Zimmerman wright described these security offi¬ cers as "thugs who did not understand the art oftheater." In order to present Kurdish nationalist messages, Kurdish TV producers and playwrights used subversive subtexts. Sympathetic translators neglected to interpret such nuances to censor officers. For exam¬ ple, the Ministry ofInformation accept¬ ed scripts on the nationalization of British oil holdings and on Israeli oppression ofthe Palestinians ^topics ripe for comparison with Baghdad's economic and social repression of its Kurdish population. These parallels were highlighted by featuring key char¬ acters in traditional Kurdish cloth¬ ing and using titles referring to Kurdish heroes and nationalist symbols. Iraq later boasted of an increase ititiM It dM PUK li ZiklMi, Iraqi NurdiitM, 1982. Ann Zimmerman in Kurdish language degree holders, In the transition from exile to auton¬ artists from these provinces began and a significant number ofthese were omy, Iraqi Kurdish parties have set producing works for the new channel. earned by Arabs assigned to learn up the first Kurdish-controlled tele¬ Older Kurds living in Zakhu, a border Kurdish for security purposes. "In the vision channels in the Middle East. town, say that before the 1991 upris¬ beginning," recalls a Kurdish actor Their broadcasts now reach more than ings they preferred Baghdad's from Sulaimaniyya, "they really didn't halfofthe estimated 3 to 4 million peo¬ Kurdish station to the channels of understand what we were doing. But ple in "Free Kurdistan."i neighboring Turkey (available at the by 1988, they had well-trained cen¬ The battle over who defines Krudish twist of an antenna) or the national sors. Instead of reviewing a translat¬ culture is inherently linked to politi¬ Arabic broadcasts. ed script, they sat in the studio and cal control. The evolution ofBaghdad's Following the collapse of the marked our performances word for Kurdish-language TV channel reflects Krudish resistance movement in 1975, word. We felt like they knew our cul¬ a history of carrot-and-stick policies Baghdad embarked on an Arabization ture better than we did." aimed at undermining resistance to campaign which included the reloca¬ By the 1990s, television sets had the central government. Iraqi conces¬ tion of thousands of Kurds into con¬ reached necessity status in urban sions to Kurdish autonomy in 1970 centration camp-like complexes with¬ areas. "When Saddam was here, we included adding Kurdish-language in and outside of Iraqi Kurdistan. were not free to move because of the programs to the Arabic channel in Among its efforts to make such repres¬ curfews and military poHce," a Kurdish Kirkuk. By 1972, the station had sive policies more palatable, the gov¬ sportscaster said. "Now we are free added a Kurdish language channel ernment distributed truck-loads of to move, but we still have no enter¬ with programs for other minorities. color television sets to Kurdish civil tainment, no fuel to travel, and many Its transmission covered the provinces servants, casino owners and Ba'th are without jobs. So we spend a lot of of Kirkuk, Sulaimaniyya and Erbil. Party members. In 1979, 30,000 color time watching television." A survey All official mass media produced sets were given to Iraqi Kurdish following the 1991 uprising showed within the autonomous Kurdish refugees repatriating from Iran. In that in Zakhu and Dohuk, 31 percent region was censored by the govern¬ 1986, Baghdad started a second ofhouseholds had pvuchased new tele¬ ment. Attracted by the prospect of Kurdish channel to service the Mosul visions as part of their initial furni¬ reaching larger audiences, however, and Dohuk districts. ture replacements. Kurdish writers, performers and Most government censors were During the uprising, government Arabs, dependent on Kurdish trans¬ television facilities were priority tar¬ Ann Zimmerman worked with Kurdish lators to interpret Kurdish originat¬ gets. PUK leaders ordered their pesh¬ television stations in northern Iraq in 1992 producing health education programs. ed or adapted scripts. A Kurdish play merga to seize transmission towers 20 Middle East Report July-August 1994 and equipment. After people returned enjoy status as local celebrities, though Kurdish identity. Other foreign and from exile, the PUK held a monopoly most had never seen the inside of a sta¬ resistance-made documentaries in this on opposition broadcasts until 1992 tion before the uprising. genre include records of the aborted when election campaigns for the The new channels also provide Iraqi uprisings, the mass exodus, the Anfal Kurdish National Assembly gener¬ intelligence with a window into the campaign, the chemical attack on ated two other channels. north. Some Kurds fear that associa¬ Halabja, and videotapes captured from Regular programming by the three tion with the opposition through their Iraqi security buildings during the channels averages five hours per broadcasts will endanger relatives in uprisings which document torture and evening and all day Fridays and other government-controlled areas. Three executions. "Saddam's Crimes" are Islamic and Kurdish holidays. A typ¬ doctors from Dohuk and Zakhu among the most popular video rentals. ical evening begins with lines from the declined on separate occasions to As one shopowner explained, "Some Quran, followed by cartoons, interna¬ appear on politically neutral progi-ams people sleep through 'Rambo,' but if tional and local news, traditional and to discuss health issues. For Kurds you ask them about any part of contemporary music from Iraq and who continue to cross into Baghdad- 'Saddam's Crimes' they can recall neighboring countries, a weekly local controlled areas to visit family or con¬ every point in detail." feature show, political commentary, duct business, appearance on TV Since its first broadcasts in October 1991, the PUK channel has featured and an international film. increases their risk of being singled The programming reflects party out at government check points. these films on a daily and weekly basis, reflecting PUK determination to con¬ policies, but the sponsors agree on the The new transmissions have pro¬ vince northern Kurds to shut all doors importance ofKurdish self-definition. vided public opportunities to address to future negotiation for Saddam's Local producers create most of their "forbidden" political issues and return. The other parties are less sure own shows, covering topics on educa¬ acknowledge once-banned histories ofthe West's reliability and the limits tion, women's issues, entertainment, and heroes. The increase in foreign on Saddam, and their stations rarely Kurdish history, the performing arts, programming smuggled into the region show "Saddam's crimes." comedy, folklore, arts and sciences, has also served to break Baghdad's medicine, sports, and special programs stranglehold on information from the Footnote for the region's smaller Assyrian, outside. Iraqi government films of 1 Slalions in Dohuk hiivc lit-i-n fiirccti u, a virtual stand¬ atrocities have become important Turkoman, Yezidi and Arab minori¬ still .sinti- AuKu.sl 199:i when l!.iKhd;i(J .slopped providing ties. Show hosts and hostesses now denominations for contemporary ( to the ^ovt-rnorntt'. The Joint Commillcc on the Near and Micklle East oj the American Council of Learned Societies and the ScKial Science Research Council announces an intemational competition for outstanding papers in the The 1994 social sciences and humanities. The competition is open to all graduate students working on Ibn topics relating to the contemporar>' Middle Easl and North Africa or on historical topics in that region since the beginning of Islam. Comparative studies incorporating the Middle Easl and other regions Khaldun of the world are encouraged. There arc no citizenship requirements and submissions will be accepted in either English or French. Prize A prize or prizes totaling SI ,000 will be awarded for the best paper(s) received. Papers must not exceed 35 double-spaced, typewritten pages, including footnotes and bibliography An Intemational Deadline for receipt of papers: September 1 , 1994 Graduate Student For more information, contact: WWting Competition The Near and Middle East Program 605 Third Avenue New York, NY 10158 (212) 661-0280 21 Middle East Report July-August 1994 Washington Watcti Clinton, Ankara and Kurdish Human Riglits Maryam Elahi tion of the human rights situation in southeastern Turkey. The interior minister admits that 600 villages have ^r been emptied. This systematic destruc¬ tion has been accompanied by threats, abductions, "disappearances," torture and killings ofcivilians. On September ...J '-, ^-,w ' rv '? ' 17, 1993, one day after nearby clash¬ If. .- .t.. es between security forces and the PKK, helicopters flew over Palamdzu village tents, pitched on the Cet pas¬ iiiiiii ture in the Ovacik area. The heli¬ copters dropped explosives on the flee¬ Y -'^^m^. ing villagers, killing two and woxmding seven all unarmed civUians. In a sim¬ ilar incident on March 26, 1994, eight people, including three children, were killed when warplanes bombed Kum- .!r%; W^v :.: 1 ' cati village near Sirnak. Official state¬ ments claimed the bombing was "acci¬ dental," although at least three other ttri TMiny. Susan Mcisclas/Magnum Kurdish settlements were bombed the same day. All had refused to join the China makes the headlines, but US facto government endorsement. state armed village guards. policies toward the top three The US is fully aware of the situa¬ Last year, several hundred people recipients of US aid Israel, Egypt tion, yet no clear high-level message were victims of political killings in and Turkey are perhaps the most has been sent warning that the sys¬ southeastern Turkey. The current egregious examples of the failure of tematic abuse of human rights con¬ scale and pattern ofextrajudicial exe¬ the Clinton administration to make stitutes a violation of US law autho¬ cutions is unprecedented in recent good on its commitment to human rizing foreign assistance. To the Turkish history. The victims, who are. rights. While the human rights situ¬ contrary, the Clinton administration often taken from their homes in the ation in the Israeli-occupied territo¬ has signaled Ankara that gross hrunan middle of the night and shot, include ries and Egypt has received some rights violations are acceptable in the members ofthe independent Turkish media attention in the US, that of battle against "terrorism." Meeting Human Rights Association and the Tvu-key has by and large been ignored. with Turkish Prime Minister Tansu Democracy Party (DEP), and jour¬ In 1993, when Turkey re-ceived close Qiller on October 15, 1993, President nalists. The government has denied to $500 million in military assistance Clinton stated: "It's not fair for us. ..to the collusion of the security forces, from the US, the situation had dete¬ urge Turkey to not only be a democ¬ instead pointing to the PKK and riorated to the point where torture ratic country but to recognize human Hizbullah (an Islamist organization), of political prisoners and extrajudi¬ rights and then not to help the gov¬ but has failed to regularly and sys¬ cial killings were the norm in the ernment of Turkey deal with the ter¬ tematically investigate cases or to pro¬ southeast of the country. The gov¬ rorism within its borders." He went on duce sufficient evidence for indict¬ ernment is extremely reluctant to to praise Turkey as "a shining exam¬ ments. The PKK has committed prosecute those responsible for tor¬ ple to the world of the virtues of cul¬ killings, but it frequently claims ture in the name of the state. In fact, tural diversity." Clinton's tribute flies responsibility, as its goal is to intimi¬ human rights violations are carried in the face of overwhelming evidence date and discourage "collaborators." out %vith impunity by members of the ofmassive persecution of advocates of The European Committee for the Turkish security forces, leading one Kurdish cultural rights. Prevention ofTorture monitors mem¬ to conclude that they operate with de The escalation ofthe armed conflict ber states' adherence to the European between the Kurdistan Workers' Party Convention against the Use of MHrj'ain Elahi is program officer on the Middle (PKK) and Turkish seciudty forces has Torture, to which Turkey is a party. East. North Africa and Europe at Amnesty International in Washington, DC. had a direct impact on the deteriora After its third visit to Turkey, the 22 Middle East Report July-August 1994 Committee broke with its tradition of The Qiller government, like its pre¬ 1993 State Department's Country confidential reporting, announcing in decessors, has failed to set up inde¬ Reports on Human Rights Practices December 1992 that it had found pendent commissions to examine the documents systematic abuses, yet both extensive proofthat "torture and other dramatic increase in allegations of the administration and Congi-ess have forms of severe ill-treatment of per¬ extrajudicial executions and prosecute failed to act on it. The first sign that sons in police custody remain wide¬ those involved in human rights vio¬ this may change is a 1994 US House ofRepresentatives Appropriations bill. spread in Turkey." Most torture occurs lations. The government also has failed during the initial interrogation and to put into force legal structures to pro¬ It conditions 25 percent of US aid for detention ofprisoners. Ensuring prop¬ vide safeguards for detainees. In meet¬ the next fiscal year on verification by er access by lawyers is the single most ings in late 1993 with the Turkish the Secretary of State that Turkey is effective measure that the Turkish prime minister, members ofthe House addressing allegations of abuses against civilians in the southeast. It government could take to prevent tor¬ Foreign Affairs Committee failed to remains to be seen if this language ture, but incommunicado detention is press her to take measures to improve will be retained in the final version. common for political detainees. Turkey's human rights situation. The sc^e Amir Hassanpour. "The ,Nal loiialisi Moveiiieiils in ethnic-based nationalism ofthe Middle From Hassanpour, pa^e 7 Azarliaijan and Kurdistan. 191 l-4(i," in .lohii Foran, ed.,/l Eastern states. As for many of the Ci-ulury i,l'lti't'i,luliiiii: /'erspci dies o/i .Socio/ Miin-nifiils III Irnii il'iiiversityof Minnesota Press, liirlhcoTningl. persistence of traditional regionally- democratic and revolutionary move¬ 8 According to llaiina Halatii, the 19fK revolt in 'Arlial vil- based power in the face of a rapidly ments in the region, Kurdish rights to lagc> was"the first uprising of its kind in the Iraqi country¬ side an uprising against the laiuled shaikh instead olunder self-determination continue to be their changing sociopolitical map. In his li'adership-and in this sc-nse set the tone to the fervid, if intermittent, agrarian unrest of the (ill ies."7VieO/(/.S'oiio/ Kurdistan, while the Regional Govern¬ blindspot. In circumstances of uneven CInsscsdiiil till' Hi-iululiimiin- Mm ill Iraq ll'rincvUm ment confronts economic blockade and political and economic development, University Press, 19H2I, p, 614. political boycott by neighboring states, Kurdistan has offered valuable oppor¬ 9 The scope ol capitalist development in Kurdistan has been debated among communist organizations in Iran and Turkey tunities as a base for liberation that the two major parties have themselves liut. interestingly, not in Iraip weakened it by dividing government goes beyond Kurdistan. That these 10 The history of this important conllict liaH not been ode- (]Uatelv studied. According to a contemporary account. offices into their respective spheres of opportunities have not been seized Barzani represented "historically and objectively the last influence. Popular outrage has esca¬ demonstrates the weaknesses ofthese traces of tribal and patriarchal mentality in the very boHom ofthe Kurdish nationalist movement Serge Ountnc-r.'U' movements as well as the problems of lated in Kurdish cities as the two sides movc-ment national kurde," (Innil. Paris, No». 32/.'!.') ' 19(il''190.")l. p. 101. Thi' same issue also includes the KDP have continued to fight. In late May, Kurdish nationalism. Politburo's critique of till- deal. women marched from Sulaimaniyya Footnotes 1 1 The PL'K maintains that this was in ordir toillxirlii polxin- lia I leftist begemoiivof the Kiirdisli movement .See /Come/e to Erbil, the seat of the Regional 1 Towns and citifS have been a p(-Tmiin<-ntff;ilurf()fKurdi.sli iorgaiioflhoKTI.I.No (i'Fall 19791. pp 21-22 Government, demanding that the life. In the mid-I7lh century. liidlis had a p.jpulatiun of ab.)iit 26.000 w]th some 1 .200 shops and w.jrkshops. live mnilniKus 12 At the KDP's nth Congress in 199:). some group- ;ilid killing stop. Like other, earlier mass and .sevenl.v mukluhs. and a sizaljle Kroup ofu/a"i'i. Although individuals who had split alter ll- collapse in lilT.". rejoined trade was flourishinK, they were, much like pre-industrial the party, which r<-named itsi-lf KDP United actions including the uprising of medieval European cities, under the domination ofthe land¬ ISA Parly for Independc-nce of Kurdistan ' Parti Serbe.v.oyi ed aristocracy. Ideolofjy in this context is meant as a more March 1991 in Iraq, this illustrates Kurdistan r was formed in 1990 in the diaspor.a or less coherent set of ideas political, philo.sophical. aes¬ the growing readiness ofurban mass¬ thetic, literary, relipous, etc.that can he attrihuted to ;. es to challenge traditional authori¬ social class or f^'roup. 2 AlthouKh .sources ignore the role of lower classe- in his¬ tarian leaderships and to demand tory, we know, from the earliest recordnlKs of popular bal¬ accountability from the self-centered lads in late I 9th and early 20th centuries, that the peas- antrv was conscious of the question ofstate power. See Amir political parties. Hassanpour. Naliimalium (ind IxiiiMuiini' iii Kunli^tiin. I'llH nside Israe 19nr, iSan ?>anci.sco; .Melbrn Research University I'ress. In Iran, the regime has won the mil¬ 1992). p-.')fi. itary contest against the autonomist 3 See articles -Milla' and -Mtlli-I' in Thi- Kiiiydnpnliii o/ movement, although Komala and the /s/ Volume VII. Fa.scicules 1 i.')-lfi. 1990. pp Ol-fi-l. A monthly investigative, two KDPI factions continue guerrilla 4 For references to the works of Khani and Koyi. political intelligence report Hassanpour. pp. 00-99. operations even in the cities. The .5 -.Modernlsf refers here to a political agenda calling for an providing information Islamist groups organized by Tehran end Ui feudalist and tribal relations, modern education, eco¬ nomic development, and political freedoms. This trend, first unavailable In the foreign are seen by most Kurds as collabora¬ recorded in Koyi's poetry in the late I9th century, was rad¬ icalized in the 1940s and 19')0s under the influence ofthe tors. While there are no prospects for and Jewish media. Communist movement. autonomous rule under the Islamic 6 Later formations in Iran and Iraq al.so had the word for Available by substriplion (Xily. Republic, any serious crack in the state -league" in their names and also became known as Komala They have no organizational link with the Komalay -IK For a sample copy, tonlacl: structure in Tehran will bring 7 Britain and the CSSK entered a tripartite agreetnent in Inside hrael Kurdistan under the control of the 1941 with Iran by which their forces occupied the .sf>uthern I'()B4H9 and northern parts of Iran respectively for the duration of Kurdish parties once again. Bcil SlK-mcsh. Israel World War II The primary objective of S 23 Middle East Report July-August 1994 UPDATE Algeria Between Eradicators and Conciliators Hugh Roberts To avoid open war, a bargain is needed between the Islamist movement and the statea bargain either at the expense of democracy or one that returns to the electoral process and constitutional government. which took power in January 1992, Since becoming president on mise, or the state will continue to dis¬ January 30, 1994, Lamine Zeroual integrate. Zeroual's accession to the had such a strategy and the personal credibility to make it succeed. But his has taken significant steps that point top post makes a functional compro¬ plan for a new catch-all National toward "reconciHation" between the mise between the Algerian state and Patriotic Rally (Rassemblement state and its Islamist opponents. the armed rebellion a possibility for Patriotique Nationale) capable ofwin¬ Zeroual has moved to establish his practical politics. ning over the urban poor and youth authority, notably by appointing a new The guerrilla war that the most government and reshuffling the mil¬ determined elements ofthe Islamist died with him six months later. His assassination ensured that the rebel¬ itary command in the spring. His opposition have waged since 1992 is a lion against a discredited and appar¬ advent to the head ofstate represents response to the behavior ofthe state. ently unreformable state would grow the best prospect of a resolution of The regime adopted a pluralist con¬ Algeria's political crisis since it burst stitution in February 1989, then relentlessly unless and until the state moved to readmit Algerian Islamism open in October 1988. allowed Islamist parties to form (in The crisis in Algeria is profound violation ofthe spirit ofthe law on into a legal and open process. Since the FIS was banned, a guer¬ and multi-faceted, but it is the politi¬ political associations of July 1989). rilla movement known as the Armed cal dimension which is fundamental. It then allowed the most dynamic of Islamic Movement (Mouvement No strategy of economic reform can be these parties, the Islamic Salvation Islamique Arme, MIA), led by successfully undertaken, let alone bear Front (Front Islamique du Salut, FIS), Abdelkader Chebouti, has been at the fruit, while the political framework to win local and regional elections in forefront of armed resistance to the the state itselfis in flux. Only inter¬ June 1990 and the first round ofthe state. The MIA is a revival of an ear¬ nal political forces can achieve a dur¬ national legislative elections in lier movement ofthe same name, led able resolution ofthe political crisis. December 1991. But a month later, in by Mustapha Bouyali between 1982 A definitive victory for one side or January 1992, it suspended the elec¬ and 1987. When the FIS was founded another is not a prospect. The army toral process, and in March it banned in 1989, many former members of has failed to crush the rebellion ofthe the FIS altogether. Bouyali's movement joined and went Islamist opposition, and the rebellion Suspending the electoral process, along with Abassi Madani's strategy has failed to mount a challenge on a while questionable, was legally defen¬ of operating within the framework scale which might overthrow the state. sible: resigning as president when he ofthe 1989 constitution. When the FIS The brutal test of strength which did, Chadli Benjedid made a mockery was banned, many FIS militants, as has been taking place, however, bas ofthe two-ballot procedure. But the sub¬ well as the former Bouyalists, turned done immense damage to the state. It sequent banning ofthe FIS had no local bas lost the allegiance of the bulk of warrant , given the lack ofconstitutional to guerrilla activity as the only remaining strategic option. the population as well as the ability legitimacy and hence the questionable It is not clear that the MIA has ever to maintain order, let alone implement legal authority ofthe men who made seriously envisaged a revolutionary policies. Either stability will be the decision. It made political sense only seizure ofpower. It has never attempt¬ restored through functional compro- as the preliminary in a strategy to co- opt the FIS's mass constituency into a ed to mobilize popular support on a Hugh Roberts urttes on Algeria and works with viable alternative politics. large scale, or to provoke a collapse the Geopolitics and International Boundaries Mohammed Boudiaf, the first pres¬ ofthe state by targeting senior power Research Center at the School of Oriental and holders. The MIA instead has been African Studies of the Cnnersity of London. ident of the High State Committee Middle East Report July-August 1994 24 v«itr / »i K, f AlHrii. .N'ndia Bcnciialiah content to attack security forces and ments which were never part ofthe Algerian media regularly cites its low-level functionaries, especially FIS and always opposed the FIS's con¬ appalling acts of violence as evidence local government officials appointed stitutionalist strategy', including the ofgeneral Islamist barbarism, and thus by the central government in place of "Afghans" Algerian veterans ofthe as grounds for refusing any dialogue with elected FIS members. Its behavior has Afghanistan war and comprises at the FIS. The MIA apparently fears sanc¬ been consistent with a strategy of least four distinct groups operating in tioning a negotiated settlement lest it applying pressure to make the regime different areas: Sidi Bel Abbes in the be outflanked by this radical rival. The regret its decision to ban the FIS, and west, the Medea district south of comp)etition bet-ween the t-wo movements to induce the government to readmit Algiers, the eastern suburbs ofthe cap¬ has forced them repeatedly to up the the substance of radical Islamism to ital, and the Jijel district in the north¬ ante as they strive to expand from their initial bases into new territory. This sit¬ the political process. east. These groups appear to be more uation has made it impossible for the If the MIA had been able to main¬ or less autonomous but share a refusal FIS to respond unequivocally to Zeroual's tain a monopoly ofthe guerrilla resis¬ to negotiate with the state and a pen¬ gestures, which in turn strengthens the tance to the regime, then a political chant for ferocious and savage attacks. faction within the regime opposing nego¬ resolution along the Hne Zeroual favors The GIA has claimed responsibility for might be well advanced by now. But all 36 foreigners killed since last tiation with the FIS. Since the June 1992 assassination there has been ajoker in the pack. The September, and is likely responsible of Mohamed Boudiaf, two tendencies MIA's position is seriously contested for the killing of intellectuals and have been confronting one another by a rival organization, the Armed unveiled women, and for the assassi¬ Islamic Group (Groupe Islamique nation of a former prime minister, within the Algerian power structure broadly speaking, those who favor a Arme, GIA), which began to make its Kasdi Merbah, last August. strategy of brutal suppression ofthe distinctive presence felt last summer. The GIA has been a massive embar¬ Islamist movement fles eradicateursj. The GIA subsumes various ele rassment for the FIS and the MIA. The 25 Middle East Report July-August 1994 and those who argue that a compro¬ The "conciliators" have operated on ment. Only this will repair its frayed mise must l)(! negotiated if the state is the premise that the state's loss of pop¬ unity, which is needed to safeguard to !)(,' pres(;rved Mes conciliateurs). ular legitimacy over the last five years the foundations ofits power. Zeroual's In so far ;is the "eradicators" have makes impossible the implementation problem is that this policy nonethe¬ had a political vision, it has been that of a radical program of Jacobin mod¬ less threatens powerful interests, of a modern states la fran(;aise , imply¬ ernization d la frant^aise . The state, especially within the officer corps. ing a radical rupture with the populist they argue, must strike a compromise Over and above its proselytizing mis¬ tradition ofthe FI^N state and a sec¬ with the substance of the Islamist sion, the Islamist movement is the ularist sepfiration between politics and movement. Only ifthe FIS has a stake vector of a number ofsocial demands, religion. Th(; main adherents of this in the political process and a share of notably those ofthe frustrated Arabic- proj(!Ct have been those officers who power can the state hope to harness speaking majority resentful ofthe s(,'rved in thi; French army and who its formidable capacity for channeling disproportionate status and privi¬ have h(^l(l commanding positions in public opinion on the streets. This is leges ofthe French-educated elite the Algerian military hierarchy since absolutely essential, in their view, to and, more generally, of a demand that 19HH (notably, chief-of-staffMaj. Gen. ensure public acceptance ofthe diffi¬ those guilty of corruption be brought Mohamed Lamari, gendarmerie chief cult terms of a structural adjustment to justice. Maj. Gen, Henahbas (ihezaiel, mili¬ deal with the IMF. The FIS almost certainly considers tary .security chiefMaj. (Jen. Mohamed Zeroual clearly shares the view of that it had tacit understandings with Mediene Vormcr and former Interior the "conciliators," and he is ideally Algeria's rulers between Madani and Minister Selim Saadi) and the French- equipped to translate it into an effec¬ Prime Minister Mouloud Hamrouche educated wing of the political class. tive policy. He never served in the from September 1989 to June 1991, This tendency has enjoyed the sym¬ French army, and has never been a and then between Abdelkader Hachani pathy of Paris and the bulk of the part ofthe coterie that has dominat¬ and Prime Minister Sid Ahmed PVench-language press in Algeria, but ed Algeria's defense establishment Ghozali from July 1991 to January has only minority support within the these last five years. He joined the 1992. The FIS holds the army respon¬ Algerian people. Organized civil sup¬ National Liberation Army (Armee de sible for the breakdown on both occa¬ port has been largely confined to the Liberation Nationale, ALN) in 1957 at sions, and is therefore disinclined to national trade union (the Union Gen- the age of 16, and fought in the guer¬ agree to any third bargain without erales des Travailleurs Algeriens, rilla struggle inside Algeria until inde¬ cast-iron guarantees of good faith. As U{ iTAl, th(! small Berberist party known pendence. This gives him a measure long as the generals responsible for the as the Rally fortkilture and Democracy of personal legitimacy which none of repression in June and July 1991 and (Rassemblement pour la Culture et la his peers in the military hierarchy can since September 1992 are still at their Dem(x;ratie, RtID), and the former com¬ match. The Islamists' propaganda posts, why should the FIS make a deal? munists ofthe Ettahadi Party. against the state as being the tool of It would have little to gain and much Because of its small following, the "hizb franca" (the party ofFrance) has to lose, and could hardly expect to deliv¬ "eradicator" position has been consis¬ been without much of a target since er a ceasefire on the part of the MIA, tently oriented towards the most Zeroual became president. and thus the restoration of order on authoritarian concept ofthe state and Zeroual, moreover, resigned his post which its own ability to resume open the most repressive strategy for deal¬ as Commander ofLand Forces in 1989, political activity depends. ing with the rebellion. The democra¬ when President Chadli overruled his Over and above the hostility ofthe tic aspirations of many who belonged pragmatic views on army moderniza¬ modernist and secularist elements of to the UGTA, the R(^D and Ettahadi tion in favor of Khaled Nezzar's alter¬ the Algerian middle class, then, have increasingly gone by the board, native proposal to refashion Algeria's Zeroual has had to reckon with oppo¬ and the implication of these elements army along French lines. He thus sition from many of his military col¬ in the policy ofthe hardliners bas tend¬ acquired a solid reputation as a man leagues fearful for their own futures. ed to discredit the entire "democrat¬ of integi'ity, and avoided being impli¬ While he is almost certainly unwill¬ ic" discourse in Algeria. Moreover, cated in the army's subsequent deci¬ ing to agree to FIS demands to make when the "dialogue" process was taken sions to smash the FIS demonstrations a public example of any military com¬ out ofthe High State Committee's and an'est Abassi Madani on trumped- manders, he has needed to margin¬ hands and entrusted to a newly-con¬ up charges, or to ban the FIS. Nor is alize those associated with the repres¬ stituted National Dialogue Com¬ he implicated in the assassination of sive strategy ofthe "eradicators" and mission last November, all talk of a President Boudiaf or in General bring on or bring back officers "project do societe" (social project Lamari's policy of all-out repression. with whom the Islamists have no code for the nu)dernist vision) was Zeroual's policy is clearly in the score to settle and who are loyal to dropped. It is no longer clear what the long-term interest ofthe army, which him personally. positive content ofthe eradicators' needs to conduct an orderly retreat It was never realistic to suppose that vision is now, beyond defense of their from its dangerously exposed role in Zeroual would be able to do this all at own Western lifestyles. the controversial business ofgovern once. And it is a measure ofhow thor- 26 Middle East Report July-August 1994 oughly Western media misrepresents and his supporters rather than monstrations two months earlier. And what happens in Algeria that Zeroual, against them, and that the balance they did so despite the fact that, alone universally depicted in late March as of forces within Algeria will eventu¬ ofthe major parties, only the FLN was the helpless prisoner of his hardline ally enable them to restore order actively supporting them. The FIS opponents, should now have proved through a compromise with the clearly refused to mobilize its sup¬ strong enough to sack Malek and Islamist rebellion. porters on behalf of Zeroual's policy Saadi, appoint a new government of What is at issue now is whether until its own demand for legal sta¬ his own choice, and then purge and such a compromise will be at the tus had been conceded. reorganize the army leadership main¬ expense of political pluralism, or If a full descent into open civil war ly to his own liking. This he did on May whether it will be consistent with the is avoided in Algeria, it will be through 5, replacing the "French school" offi¬ principles embodied in the 1989 con¬ a bargain of some kind between the cers commanding the police and the stitution. This is a point which the Islamist movement and the state. This Constantine military region, while also most experienced of Algerian plural- bargain can either be at the expense ensuring that men loyal to him took ists, Hocine Ait Ahmed, appears to ofdemocracy, or it can be to the advan¬ over the Oran and Blida regions as have appreciated all along, while it tage of democracy by permitting a well as the command ofthe army and seems never to have occurred to the retm-n to the electoral process and a constitutional government on the basis air force. secularist die-hards ofthe RCD. One The difficulty he has encountered question worth asking, therefore, is of pluralism. If the FIS is legalized in making these moves is illustrat¬ why the French media have given such again, a return to political pluralism ed by the angry demonstrations which prominence to the inflammatory dec¬ will be in sight. If it is not, a very dif¬ ferent kind of deal, perhaps between his opponents in the Malek govern¬ larations of Zeroual's opponents ment allowed to take place, and by (notably RCD leader Said Sadi's full- the state and armed rebels ofthe MIA articles in the French-language press page interview inLe Figaro on March directly, will be in the cards, and Algerians can forget about democracy accusing him of splitting the army in 30) and have passed over in silence the for a generation. Every statement on the process. While such a split, and a numerous counsels of moderation the situation made by official spokesper¬ consequent descent into all-out civil emanating fi-om more representative sons for the French government since war, cannot be ruled out, it remains, political leaders. January 30 has had the effect, ifnot the on balance, unlikely. Zeroual's poli¬ It is also worth asking why the purpose, ofmaking it harder for Zeroual cy enjoys powerful support with much French media were so dismissive of to re-legalize the FIS. ofthe political class. He can count on the significance ofthe change in gov¬ But then, the idea that France real¬ the FLN and the main Kabyle-based ernment in April, and played down ly wants to see an authentic Algerian party, Hocine Ait Ahmed's Socialist the military changes in May, while nationalist such as Zeroual succeed in Forces Front (Front des Forces making a massive fuss about the restoring order to Algerian politics, Socialistes, FFS), which swept the alleged failure of the pro-dialogue when its own favorites have repeat¬ Kabylia region in 1991. It is more hke- demonstration on May 8. These de¬ edly and spectacularly failed, is far ly that the imperative of maintain¬ monstrations mobilized at least as from self-evident. ing army unity will work for Zeroual many people as the anti-dialogue de A REFUGEE'S HOPE >4NERk AMERICAN NEAR EAST REEUGEE AID Attn: Dr. Pcler Gubscr / //, /ii\ ihiiur i> Fjvc/. Sow I h,n c hope 1522 K Si.. NW#202-P llh]l nn Lfiiih will li\c hcidu^c m\ hither Washington. DC 2OO0.'> jdiiu'd ihc /('//'( lid Li\vs!(H k ('(i(ii)ci,ili\i: YES, I want to give people in the M'e.v/ Batik, Cam and l^banon hope! Will) tin- hclj) ()! .\\[R:\. Amcridin \c.ir _S200 _SI50 Ci-./ K'i';i/l;('c.\;V/. ,in(l pcaplc like \(iu. the _S.500 S Oiher I i> ( linn h) help rchrj,cr ljn)ilu'^ like niiiw. Name: \(i\\ nn hilhci lintl olhrr rctui^ci''- r.ihc hclllhilT li\("-U}l k. Address: Cilv. Slalc:. You can help! WIumi \iiii '4i\c onK SI"). Mill ,irc |)r(i\ idiii'.; cniuiL;!! '.;,is lor ihc ni(jl)il( Zip. Couniri.-: ( lini( iiir cine d.u .iiici ,il SJdl' \oii .ire \ni>- J Please send mt more informalion, udinu ihr wccLK s,il,ir\ liir .i \cliTin,iri,in, ^ y,,in (li.iiuli'iii i\ lu< drdui lihir lir,;iilcirJ >^ illi AJi mil 1 C'lniiiiillrr iiii \ I'liiiilui \ Imriy'i Aid fm {. Sfilti. '^Clti mid liilriA, liini ANERACHANGING LIVES IN THE WEST BANK, GAZA AND LEBANON FOR 2', YEARS. ' liilriiKiliiirnil Sr/iir r Avr'ii ir\ 27 Middle East Report July-August 1994 INTERVIEW The Islamist Movement and the Palestinian Authority Graham Usher speaks with Bassam Jarrar lidssatii Jarrar, a leading Islamist Hamas figures let it be known that they frontations will not promote these thinker in the occupied territories, is a were considering the idea ofan "Islamist objectives. teacher ofIslamic studies at UNRWA 's political party" and that the "resistance Dialogue, however, depends ulti¬ Teacher 'Training Center in Rumallah to occupation" need not be by "armed mately on the attitude ofthe authori¬ in the West Bank and a member ofthe struggle alone, "but also by "words, opin¬ ty. If elections for the Palestinian Hoard of Trustees of the Union of ions and unifying the people. " municipalities and professional asso¬ Islamie Scholars. He ivas among the People here regard these moves as ciations are held in a democratic way, Palestinians expelled by Israel in extremely important, notjust because then this will promote a rapprochement December 1992 for alleged member¬ they imply Hamas' de facto recogni¬ between the opposition and the author¬ ship in the Islamic Resistance tion ofIsrael, but equally because they ity. Ifthe opposition is denied its demo¬ Movement, Hamas. suggest Hamas' metamorphosis from cratic rights, there will be tension. 'There have been two prevailing a sociomilitary movement into the loyal Similarly, in the field ofeducation, views on the role ofHamas in the com¬ political opposition of the new ifthe new school authorities try to fal¬ ing period. For some, it is in the van¬ Palestinian polity. sify certain aspects ofPalestinian his¬ guard of a "rejectionist" Palestinian What Hamas will want in return tory, there will be confiicts. Islamists bloc bent on ivrecking the PLO-Israeli for this compromise is currently the want a curriculum that is based on Declaration of Principles, while oth¬ subject of a fierce debate within Arab and Islamic civilization, not one ers believe the renewed political legit¬ Palestinian Islamism. Jarrar, an that is adulterated by foreign influ¬ imacy and economic sustenance auton¬ informed and significant voice in that ences. I am talking here ofthe cultural omy will supposedly ctmfer on the PLO movement, here spells out some key curriculum rather that the scientific will marginalize groups like Hamas aspects ofPalestinian political strug¬ curriculum. If, on the other hand, the and Islamic Jihad. gle in the new era. authorities take cognizance of these One ivoulddo better to listen to what Graham Usher concerns, then again, there is room for Islamist leaders are actually saying, reconciliation. and to analyze events on the ground. Finally, there is the issue of per¬ Since Oslo, Hamas representatives How would you characterize the sonal status [family] law. This is par¬ have repeatedly said that they do not Islamists' attitude toward the ticularly important for Islamists want conPict luith the nascent interim period of Palestinian because in most Arab countries this is Palestinian authority, hut their peace self-rule, particularly their rela¬ explicitly based on shari'a law. It is will come with a price namely, influ¬ tions with the new Palestinian not necessary for me here to say what ence on the .social and cultural fronts authority? You said recently I think the personal status law should via the schools, mosques and law. that because the Islamist move¬ be. This is a matter for the Palestinian This intervieiv was conducted in ment will form the "main oppo¬ ulama. But ifthe authorities deal wdth March. Since then, events have demon - sition" to self-rule, "this will the law in a subjective way, this could strated that Palestinian Islamists are lead to interaction with the lead to violations ofthe shari'a and so fully cognizant of the neiv realities transitional authority." What do to infringements ofour human rights raised by self-rule, and for the politics you mean? as Muslims. We are not against inno¬ it augers. In April. Hamas offered a vation [ijtihad] in law, but we can¬ "cea.'iefire ivith the occupation "ifIsrael Although the Islamic movement not compromise on rights that are withdrcic to its '67 borders, dismantled rejects the Declaration of Principles guaranteed by the shari'a. all settlements and permitted interna- [DOP], it has no interest in defeating titmal ob.serrers to be stationed along it by force. It views its role as one of If there were cooperation over the Green Line. One ivcek later, Hamas' trying to convince Palestinians ofthe issues like these, wouldn't the and Fatah's military wings in Gaza agreement's shortcomings, and ofdeal¬ Islamists be participating in signed a pact outlawing all violence ing with its negative aspects on both self-rule? between them and placing a morato¬ the Arab and Islamic levels. But it does rium on the vexing issue ofcollabora¬ not seek confrontation with the tran¬ Graham Usher is a journalist uiorking in the tor killings. And in May, leading sitional authority, because con occupied territories. 28 Middle East Report July-August 1994 No. There is a distinction between the ties that will draw up school undoubtedly cause problems for the Islamists' attitude toward the tran¬ curricula or law.... PLO leadership. But what if Hamas sitional authority and its attitude were to hit targets in Tel Aviv or at toward the peace process. "Interaction" But the transitional authority will the Israeli embassy in Cairo? What refers to the relationships that the have to take cognizance of what the has the PLO to do with the protection Islamists want to obtain between the associations and municipalities are of Tel Aviv or Cairo? Palestinian groups during the transi¬ saying if, that is, it wants to build an tional period. Let me repeat: they have atmosphere of genuine national con¬ Does the Islamist movement no interest in fighting the Palestinian sensus during the interim period. want to reform the PLO or does authority. They do, however, have an it want to stand as a political interest in fighting the Israeli occu¬ Under what conditions would alternative to it? pation. Were, say, the Islamists to the Islamist movement, and par¬ stand in the self-rule election, this dis¬ ticularly Hamas, agree to a ces¬ The Islamic movement is very concerned tinction would be lost and would cre¬ sation of the armed struggle about the current state ofthe PLO. For ate confusion among their supporters. against Israel? For example, last example, after Oslo, some Palestinian Firstly, from the Islamists' point of October, Hamas' spiritual guide, factions sought the disintegration ofthe view, participation in self-rule gives Shaikh Ahmed Yassin, is report¬ PLO. The Islamists, however, insisted legitimacy to the peace process. ed to have said that if Israel on the preservation ofthe PLO. The PLO Supposing the Islamists won the elec¬ withdraws to the '67 borders, has a long history ofstruggle and there¬ tion. They would then be in the posi¬ then Hamas would be prepared fore of legitimacy in Palestinian eyes, tion ofnegotiating with the Israelis on to declare a ceasefire with it. and there is currently no real alterna¬ the basis ofthe Oslo accords. They tive to it. Thus it would not be in the would have to recognize the legitima¬ Yes, he did say that. But remember, Palestinian interest including the cy ofthe agreement even though they for Hamas the '67 borders are no more interest of Palestinian Islamists to reject it! For this reason the Islamists legitimate than the "borders" of Gaza have it fall apart. distinguish between elections for the and Jericho, so it would be a cease¬ The Islamic movement's position municipalities and associations, etc., fire and not peace, and certainly not a is quite clear: it wants a national dia¬ where they would participate, and recognition ofIsrael. In my opinion, to logue between all national and elections for the autonomy born ofthe speculate now about what would be Islamic forces based on democratic DOP, where they wouldn't. the possible conditions of an armistice reform ofthe PLO and its decision¬ Secondly, and especially after [the with Israel is futile. In any case, the making structures. If, however, the massacre in] Hebron, the Islamists only possible ceasefire would be one PLO disintegrates because ofthe cat¬ believe that the present atmosphere declared unilaterally by the Islamists. astrophic political decisions its lead¬ in the occupied territories is hardly It certainly won't arise out of negoti¬ ership has made specifically, its conducive to democracy. Palestinians ations with the Israelis. The Islamic acceptance of Oslo then this is due thus feel obliged to participate in the movement refuses, and has always to those decisions. The blame cannot autonomy for the negative reason of refiased, to be hemmed in by conditions be laid at the door ofthe Islamists. wanting to be rid of this atmosphere. dictated by the enemy. It will cease But if it does disintegrate, this does They are like a man in a tunnel: be the armed struggle when it sees it to not mean that there is a political vac¬ is given a "choice" to leave the tun¬ be in its best interest to do so. In other uum. The Islamic movement is there nel or wait for the train to kill him. words, it will take the initiative. hecause it exists independently ofthe Of course, he will leave, but this is The same logic applies to the PLO, and is an integral part of hardly independence. Islamic movement's relations with the Palestinian political culturt.-. Thirdly, should the Islamists par¬ transitional authority or the PLO. ticipate in self-rule elections, then nat¬ While they don't seek conflict with the MIDDLE EAST REPORT urally their supporters would vote for authority, this doesn't mean that the them. In effect 90 percent of Palestin¬ PLO has the right to lay down condi¬ ians in the occupied territories would tions about, say, Hamas' military oper¬ then become involved in the autono¬ ations against the occupation. This my in some way, lending the DOP a is a decision solely for Hamas. credibility it otherwise would not have. Now for sure, the main bone of con¬ tention between the Islamists and the j Your support enables I still don't see how the PLO is likely to be this issue of armed Islamists can wield legislative struggle during the transitional peri¬ us to bring you updates od. And if, for instance, Hamas influence without participation and interviews. in the self-rule institutions. It is launched an attack against settlers not going to be professional or soldiers in Ramallah or Gaza dur¬ Sustain us with a gift of $100 associations or the municipali ing the autonomy, this would Middle East Report July-August 1994 29 REVIEWS Against All Odds, A Chronicle of the Eritrean oppressions exercised with great ferocity by the govern¬ Revolution ment ofEthiopia under the dictatorships ofHaile Selassie By Dan Connell. Trenton, New Jersey: Red Sea Press, and Mengistu Haile Mariam. To justify these outrageous 1994. 277 pages. aggressions, those dictators claimed that Eritrea had been an integral part of Ethiopia in medieval times, or earlier Reviewed by Basil Davidson. tantamount to saying that most of France was part of England, since it had once been so in those same times. After five years oftough and tiring travels and on-the-spot "Diplomacy" preferred to accept that absurdity, and not inquiry and research in Eritrea, Dan Connell gives us a even the Organization of African Unity, to its shame and valuable book of information and conclusions, one that utter discredit, questioned Ethiopia's imperialism. More adds much to our picture ofthe Eritreans who liberated than anywhere else in post-colonial Afi"ica, the young men their country from colonial misery under successive and women of Eritrea's guerrilla bands, and the eventu¬ Ethiopian or Ambaric regimes. Like other serious al army that grew from those bands, had to rely on their observers ofthe Eritrean .scene, he finds it deserving of own skill and daring to seize arms from their enemies and respect and of far closer attention than it has generally defy the whole "established world." This isolation imposed received. For Eritrea's liberators have carried through a heavy burdens and called for effective self-reliance. But "unique experiment in democratic, social and economic it enabled Eritrea to complete its struggle for independence development," an experiment, moreover, that "remains without incurring any external debts, material or ideo¬ directed toward building a more egalitarian, just and multi¬ logical. In the Middle East, in this way if not in others cultural society." These high claims may appear to sig¬ too, Eritrea has indeed stood alone. Scheming or ambitious nal one more exercise in do-gooding optimism, or anoth¬ neighbors, near and far, have persistently tried to fish in er bout of sentimental illusion-mongering. But they arise these waters to no profit. from a very thoughtful and perceptive study, and read¬ Connell's report on all this is vivid in its humane dimen¬ ers of this "chronicle" will find that these claims stand on sions. One sees more clearly how the essential aims ofwin¬ firm ground. ning and conserving unity ofaction were pursued through When the Eritreans about tbree-and-a-half million in a struggle for genuinely democratic participation. One 1994 declared their post-colonial independence in 1993, understands betterjust how and why the style ofthe EPLF they celebrated the joyful end of more than 30 years of since its early days its abrasive realism, its compensat¬ harsh and costly struggle against invaders and aggressors. ing accent on modesty and abnegation, its avoidance of Still more impressively, perhaps, they carried over the rhetoric, its decency of aims and methods, along with a threshold of peace a project in self-development that stands refusal to give much attention to external voices was today in happy and wide contrast to the many years ofpain formed and could become decisive in the desperate years through which this people has been obliged to pass. How ofthe mid-1970s. was it done, using what political and social guides or prin¬ Connell's assessment of women's self-emancipation is ciples? Connell's response derives from his years ofcoura¬ especially good, and the only regret is that the book isn't geous reporting between 1975 and the early 1990s. Together a good deal longer. Even so, much about this very unusu¬ with Stefano Poscia's Eritria (Rome: Edizioni Associate, al people's movement shines through. Consider that the 1989), Connell's book is the mo.st useful of .several books of EPLF was able, as a grassroots resistance movement, to reportage produced out ofthe Eritrean events and dramas raise, maintain and continually enlarge an army of vol¬ ofthe past many years. And since Eritrean developments unteers, about one-third ofwhom were women not count¬ have an all-African field of relevance, no one wanting to ing those women who staffed and often controlled networks have and to test reliable opinions about Africa today is of social, educational and medical self-assistance. In fact, going to be able to ignore Against All Odds. this movement provides a range ofpractical lessons ofmore Connell's title doesn't exaggerate. The Eritrean People's general relevance to Africa and beyond. Liberation Front (EPLF), chief instrument of this anti- The whole Eritrean experience has been largely ignored colonial achievement, began in near total isolation from by the outside world, most disgracefully in Africa and any outside source of aid or even friendly encouragement; the Middle East. Yet whatever may now happen Connell and it had to continue in this isolation for years until, quite leaves the record to speak for itself it can be said with late, reliefcame from UN and NGO sources. Far from being confidence that this small country is going to count for a useful diversion to the Eritreans. the Cold War had thrown much in the unfolding fortunes ofthe whole Horn and its destructive weight entirely in the favor ofone or anoth¬ the Middle East. Its influence, however tactfully brought er enemy ofthe EPLF. Outside powers contributed to the to bear, should weigh in on the scales of peace and good governance. Here is one national community where acute Basil Davidson has written more than 20 books on African political and poverty has not been allowed to march together with self- social history, including The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State (Times Books. 1992). induced frustration. 30 Middle East Report July-August 1994 Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature expresses an ambivalence regarding this relationship: Edited by Salma Khadra Jayyusi. New York: Columbia Because oftheir immediacy, political factors often tend to inter¬ University Press, 1992. 744 pages. fere in the artistic process, sometimes diverting it from its nat¬ ural course in favor of a certain commitment or idcoloKy, However, the hi.story of modern Arabic literature, particularly poetry, and Reviewed by Salah Hassan. especially in the decades since the Palestine disaster of 1948, shows that art has its own way of reasserting' its natural cour.se Salma Jayyusi's Modern Palestinian Literature brings of development and growth, ( l-2l together works by more than 70 writers and is unques¬ Jayyusi's notion of a pristine art undercuts the antholo¬ tionably the most extensive anthology of 20th centu¬ gy's political force. She seeks to identify avant-garde aes¬ ry Palestinian writing available in English. Like thetics and a nascent "modernism" as markers of a specific Jayyusi's other major compilations. Modern Arabic Palestinian literary tradition in order to situate the writ¬ Poetry (1987) and The Literature of Modern Arabia ings within the "acceptable" rubric of a national culture as (1988), the Project of Translation from Arabic (PROTAj opposed to international politics. Yet, by her own admis¬ directed the preparation of this anthology. Its vast sion, while "all Arabic literature nowadays is involved in sampling of Palestinian literature makes it especial¬ the social and political struggle ofthe Arab people, poli¬ ly suitable for libraries, and the bibliographical infor¬ tics nevertheless imposes a greater strain on the Palestinian mation ofthe authors will be useful to students look¬ writer"(2). Jayyusi uses the introduction to .set up an awk¬ ing for other works by particular authors. ward opposition between art and politics characteristic Many ofthe 232 poems, 25 short stories and 14 excerpts of conservative cultural attitudes that require the mini¬ from novels and autobiographies present narratives of mization of political references to legitimize the artistic occupation, exile, imprisonment and resistance which go value of literature. beyond official national discourse. Some foreground Arab Anthologizing is one ofthe principal publishing strate¬ culture. Third World solidarity, feminism, Marxism or gies for presenting Arabic literatures in English transla¬ Islam. Ghareeb 'Asqalani, Mahmoud Darwish, Emile tion. It cannot, however, replace the need to translate and Habiby, Akram Haniyyeh, Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, Sahar publish entire works by individual Arab authors. Unlike Khalifeh, Hisham Sharabi, Fadwa Tuqan and Ghassan PROTA's daring publication of novels, short story collec¬ Zaqtan are only a few writers who connect Palestinian con¬ tions and poetry by various Arab authors, this broad nation¬ cerns with broader movements and struggles against al anthology speaks more to the requirements of US pub¬ homogenization and marginalization. The individual texts, lishers and certain segments ofthe academic community taken together, illustrate the pluralism in Palestinian cul¬ than to the need for a challenging presentation ofArab cul¬ ture and oppose a narrow patriotism. Modern Palestinian ture and politics. The publication of Modern Palestinian Literature appears to provide a format in which diverse Literature satisfies a demand for English translations of Palestinian cultural identities are molded into a collective Palestinian literature; unlike many ofthe pieces includ¬ national shape. However, it is not evident that the can¬ ed, it does not take up the urgent need to question the heg(;- onizing method of a "definitive" national anthology offers monic effects ofthe nationalist project, a wedge against further fragmentation, censorship and repression. MIDDLE EAST REPORT The anthology's claim to comprehensiveness may be Outstanding Coverage fatal for the work ofPalestinian writers not included. Most of those anthologized live outside the occupied territories of the Kurds and Israel, and were born before 1948. It is not enough for Jayyusi to state that "the balance I of good writing?] still tilts decidedly in favor of Palestinian literature written in exile" (pg. 7). Nor can she gloss over the limited selec¬ tion of women authors and writers under 40 years old. Iraq: Why the Special Offer! Uprisings Failed By its very nature, an anthology excludes works and sub¬ Issue I' 176 Regularly $16.50 verts differences in order to advance a constructed unity. (May-June 1992) The editor's introduction should address the political impli¬ plus Now available as a set cations of what seem to be merely practical decisions. Martin van only $12 Jayyusi argues that after 1948 one can trace the con¬ Bruinessen: fS 12 LS & Canada. SH overseas), tours of a modern Palestinian literary tradition di-stinct The Workers' Party includes posla)4e from other Arabic literatures. The overarching national¬ of Kurdistan ist perspective, the detailed political chronology at the in»153(Jul/-Aug1988) Mention this ad wilh payment beginning, excerpts from personal accounts in the final MHKIP, Suite 1)9 and The Kurds section and explanatory footnotes tie modem Palestinian Between Iran and Iraq 1 500 Mass Ave NW Washington DC, 20005 literature to regional political developments. Yet Jayyusi iru«141 (Jul/-Aug1986) 202-223-3677 Salah Hassan is a graduate student in the program of comparaliie literature at the University of Texas at Austin. 31 Middle East Report July-August 1994 EDITOR'S PICKS Ziiid Abii-Anir, Islamic I'undamenldUsin in the We.'it Bank and Gaza: Albert Hourani, Philip S. Khoury and Mary C. Wilson, eds.. The Modern Miiiitiiii Jirolherhood rind Islamic Jihad(JiU>ommgU)n:\nd\ana\JmveTs\\.y Middle Easl (Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press, 1994). $50.00, $18.00. I'rt.sK, ]9!M). SlO.fW. Samir Khalafand Philip S. Khoury, Recovering Beirut: Urban Design and Ali Abdiilhitif Ahmida, The Making ofModern Libya: Slate Formation, Post-War Reconstruction (Leiden, The Netherlands: EJ Brill, 1994). $105.75. CoUmizalion, and lie.sistana-, 1830-1932 (Albany: State University ofNew Gilles Kepel, £i(7s el Royaumes:Les appartenances au monde arabo-musul- York Vn-.HH, V.B4). $49..'50, .'i;l6.9.'5. man aujourd'hui (Paris: Presses de la Fondation Nationale des Sciences Donald JIarman Aken.son, God's People: Covenant and Land in Soulli Politiques, 1994). Africa, Israel and Ulster (Ithaca: Cornell Univer.sity Press, 1994). Miriam R. Lowi, Water and Power: The Politics ofa Scarce Resource in the $29. !).' Jordan River Basin (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993). $49.95. 'Izzat 'Abd al-lladi, Usania Halabi and Salim Tamari, al-Mu'assasat al- Staughton Lynd, Sam Bahour and Alice Lynd, eds., Home Land: Oral iniilaniyYti, al-intihhahal, iiia'l-sulla (National Institution.s, Elections, and Histories ofPalestine and Palestinians (Brooklyn: Interlink, 1994). $14.95. llic SlalcKHamallab, West Hank: Muwatin, ]994). Middle East Watch, Human Rights in Algeria: No One Is Spared (New AbbnK Alnanrawi, Tlie Economy of Iraq: Oil, Wars, Destruction of York: 1994). $7.00. Development and Prospects, Ji)r)0-2010 (Westport, CT: Greenwood I'ubli.sliinnfiroup, Inc, 1994). $515.00. Benny Morris, Israel's Border Wars, 1949-1955 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993). $39.95. AiiincKly J nternational, Jortlan: Unman Rii;lits ReformsAchievements anil Obstacles (London, 1994). Tom O'Loughlin, Tom Mayer and Edward S. Greenberg, eds.. War and Its Consequences: Lessons from the Persian GulfConflict (New York: Harper Ji'T'sflom, Deporlalion ofPalestinians from the Occupied Territories and Collins College PubHshers, 1994). the Mass Deportation ofDecember 1992 (Jerusalem, 1993). Don Peretz, Palestinians, Refugees, and the Middle East Peace Process William L. Cleveland, A History ofthe Modern Middle Easl (Boulder: (Washington: United States Institute of Peace, 1993). $12.95. Wcstview )Ve.sK, 1994). $64.9rj, $24.95. Ahmed Rashid, The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam and Nationalism ])i?b()rali J. Gcrnor, One Land, 'Two Peoples: The Conflict over Palestine (London: Zed Books, 1994). $59.95, $25.00. (second edition) (IJoulder: Westview Press, 1994). $49.95, $13.95. Darius Rejali, Torture and Modernity: Self, Society, and State in Modern lijli.s Goldherj;, ){esat Kasaba and Joel S. Migdal, eds., Rules and Rights Iran (Boulder: Westview Press, 1993). $39.95, $19.95. in the Middle Easl: Democracy, Law and Society (Seattle: University of WashinKton I're.ss, 1993). $35.00, $17.00. Rushdi Said, TVie RiverNile: Geology, Hydrology and Utilization (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1993). $120.00. Al-Ua(|, A Unman Righls Assessment ofIhc Declaration ofPrinciples on Interim Self-Goiiernmenl Arrangements for Palestinians CRamaWah, West Rosemary Sayigh, Too Many Enemies: The Palestinian Experience in Uank:]99;i). Lebanon (London: Zed Books, 1994). $69.95, $25.95. Slilonio llasKon, Urban .Social Movements in Jerusalem (Ithaca: State Jenny B. White, Money Makes Us Relatives: Women's Labor in Urban lhiive7sity of New York Press, 1993). $14.95. Turkey (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994). $30.00, $12.95. I The tVst in-depth account of the PLO's ideolog/. strategy, and tactics, its relationships to ^ f other Arab stales, and its confrontations with Israel, Re.oiuuon U''f'/ Vicior.. is a fasci- n,itin:^ chronicle of a conflia that has commanded the world's attention for decades and i fore, er changed the face ofthe Middle East. vsr* U4 Dra.-.m; on pre.iouii- untapped Arabic sources. BaiT',' Rubin unveils the politics and pe'">on.iiitie5 behind the PLO's seemmgl. endless c,.cle of neanng triumph then weathering re.er5.,ii; o''foitune. It is one ofthe most remai"kable political tales in history; A Selection of History Boole Club and Book-of-ttie-Month Club $24.95 cloth REVOLUTION UNTIL VICTORY? The Politics and History of the PLO Barry Rubin >^ A' bcoi'.s'c'es or ''C" Harvard University Press 32 Middle East Report July-August 1994 BACK ISSUES luul n #1 50 Human Rights & the Palestinian Conllict TURKEY THE US AND THE MIDDLE EAST n #152 The Uprising D #93 The Generals Take Over D #105 Reagan Targets the Ivtiddle East D #154 The Uprising: The Next Phase n #121 State Terror in Turkey D #111 Rapid Deployment & Nuclear War n #157 Israel Faces the Uprising D #122 Turkey Under Military Rule D #128 The Deadly Connection D #164/5 Intifada: Year Three ($6) n #160 Turkey in the Age ol Glasnost D #140 Terrorism & Intervention #175 Palestine and Israel in the New Order Nuclear Shadow D #143 IRAQ AND SYRIA D #1 82 Jerusalem and the Peace Agenda D #151 The Great Powers & the Middle East n #186 Alter Oslo [J #134 Asad's Syria D #155 The Middle East Alter Reagan n #1 76 Iraq: Why the Uprisings Failed Palestine & Israel in the US Arena D #158 LEBANON D #180 Mass Media & the Middle East IRAN n #108/9 War in Lebanon D #187/8 Humanitarian Intervention ($6) n #118 Lebanon in Crisis D #86 The Lett Forces in Iran #87 Iran's Revolution: The Rural Dimension MIDDLE EAST CRISIS D #133 Lebanon's Shi'a n #98 Iran Two Years Later D #120 The Middle East after OPEC D #162 Lebanon's War n #104 Khomeini & the Opposition #129 Egypt & Israel Today EGYPT D #113 Iran Since the Revolution D #141 Hidden Wars D #84 Egypt's Agriculture in Trouble n #156 Iran's Revolution Turns Ten n #144 Living by the Sword n #107 Egypt in the New Middle East D #167 On the Edge of War (Gull Crisis) WOMEN #147 Egypt's Critical Moment #171 The Day After (Gull Crisis) n #124 Women & Labor Migration n #169 America's Egypt n #1 77 Arms Race or Arms Control? n #138 Women & Politics n #189 The Kurdish Experience NORTH AFRICA n #173 Gender and Politics D #127 Insurrection in North Africa LABOR SOCIETY AND ECONOMY D #94 Origins ol the Middle East Worl mi SPECIAL PUB L I C A T I 0 W S n Crisis in the Gulf (selected MER reprints), $7.50 postpaid. 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