Progress, Not Perfection in the Middle East

From John Cleese to Russel Brand, our British brethren have always been known for their cynical yet prescient sense of humor. One of the early Limey zing-meisters was a guy named Winston Churchilll. He laid a sturdy groundwork for Jon Stewart with such gems as: “Democracy is the worst  form of government except for all those others that have been tried.” Well Winston’s best-of-a-bad-bunch form of government seems to finally be leading to results in the Middle East. Yesterday, the pro-Western “March 14″ faction won a resounding victory in the Lebanese elections over a band of merry men known as Hezbollah. This can be interpreted as an outright rejection of extremism and a denouncement of para-military groups that use governance as a veiled cover for terrorist activity. Lebanon has a large Christian population and, despite a crippling civil war in the 80’s, has been grasping for modernity while Syria tried to subjugate the nation into a client state with Iran-sponsored Hezbollah at the forefront. This election was a referendum on this faction and the result was an outright defeat.

Andrew Exum speculates on the motivations behind the Hezbollah rejection, pinpointing the blowback from the Israeli offensive of 2006. While fighting the Israeli army to a standstill was a major PR victory for the group, it did not endear much of the Lebanese population. Maybe they didn’t appreciate their country being destroyed just so Hezbollah could make one worthless soldier kidnapping  and get some good press in Terrorist’s Quarterly. And then we have the less publicized events of this spring when armed Hezbollah militias seized middle class Lebanese neighborhoods. This all leads to a consistent point: extremists, when left to their own accord, will destroy themselves. Without fail. Extremists are great at goading their enemies. They are great at chanting and burning American flags. You know what they are not great at? Governing . And the more governing they do and the less chanting and flag burning, the more their constituents realize this.

Meanwhile, over in Shiite-ville, Iran is quickly approaching its own elections this Friday. With all the noise about Iran being the apocalyptic boogeyman, everyone seems to forget that this country does have a democratic system and a very young, (relatively) pro-Western population. Only 12 years ago, the Iranians elected a reformist, pro-Westerner in Mohammed Khatami. Khatami spent most of his 8 year term constrained by the reactionary mullahs (Ayatollah Khameini apparently doesn’t like to share), but it serves us to remember that Khatami was the expression of the people’s will only 8 short years ago. Various factors (achem, Axis of Evil speech) led to the election of the extremist Ahmedinejad, but whattya know, it’s 4 years later and Iran finds itself an international pariah with its economy in the gutter (Extremists + Governance = BAD). The man Dennis Miller refers to as Aqua Velvet-Jad now finds himself trailing reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who is inspiring Obama-like rallies across the nation.

Those determined to paint Iran as this generation’s cartoonish folk villain, bent on world destruction, might take heed and realize this is a country of vast political diversity. The likely defeat of Ahmedinejad will not bring down the mullahs and make the rivers flow with chocolate, but it will be the first major step in U.S.-Iranian detente. The LA Times had a very interesting interview yesterday with another Presidential candidate challenging Ahmedinejad, Moshen Rezai. Now, Moshen Rezai is not exactly a member of Habitat for Humanity. He is an Iran-Iraq War hero and founded the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. He is the only Presidential challenger labelled a “conservative”. Rezai unequivocally disavows rejection of the Holocaust, calls for engagement with the U.S. , acknowledges the horrors of war, and recommends that Iran’s nuclear operations be turned into a public stock company owned

 and backed by the West (meaning, so that we can constantly monitor the program for non-peaceful means). There is simply more to Iran than meets the eye. Assuming Iranian voters follow the wisdom of Lebanese voters, I am interested to see the reactions of those determined to make Iran into SPECTRE.