Opinion: A Response to “Colonial Reckoning in Middle East”

Differences between the colonizers and the colonized manifest in many ways in our world today. Across many types of discourse pertaining to this dynamic, the constant creation of dichotomies is extremely harmful as it simplifies and dissects the multifaceted issues both parties face from a reductionist and Western standpoint. There is no “colonized” and “colonizer.” The power that keeps striking us down is diffused and historic, existent in all of us. Nevertheless, this is not to substitute the fact that power exists differently within us all. Because of our different identities, the words we say, the claims we make, and the thoughts we have impact the world differently. Individually or collectively, power exists on different levels in diverse ways. Before reading this article, examine yourself. How do your life experiences impact the way you are going to understand what I am about to say? Are you going to be happy with what I have written, or are you going to be angry? As an Arab and Middle Eastern student, the spaces accessible to me on this campus are limited. For me to be safe, you must be reflexive. Be critical and think.  

As an acknowledgment, this article’s aim is not to demonize the author of the previous article, Owen Russell ’24 who clearly had good intentions, but whose article I have thoughts about and must respond to. I understand that many of the narratives about the Middle East are represented by biased media and a type of political discourse shaped by a U.S.-centric view. It is important to understand that, for me to be able to speak to you in the language of the article I am responding to, I participate in playing the game of the colonizer. The tongue that continues to mispronounce our names and our struggles.  

Prior to my reflection on the historical explanation of colonialism in the previous article published, I want to address some points that I find problematic. Russell identified the Palestinian genocide as a war between Hamas and Israel. Hamas, as a political group and an extremist organization, is not Palestine. Hamas does not represent the Middle East. It is introduced that the reality regarding Palestine and Israel is a “microcosm of a large conflict between the Muslim World and the Western World.” Who is the Muslim world? Does Islam represent Southwest Asia? Does Palestine represent Islam? Does Hamas represent what the colonizer calls the Middle East? The answer to these questions is no, clearly. And, for the record, not all Middle Easterns are Muslims, nor Arabs. As I see it, the West has always had the right to speak of its identity as it pleases. For the colonized, however, our identities are reduced to our religion, our race, and our traditions. Russell’s first mistake was racializing Islam as a religio-political category void of context. His global explanation of colonialism did not contextualize the politics and ideologies of the Middle East. Second, the language used throughout the article is void of self-criticality. It makes claims on behalf of the colonized and takes up academic and ideological space that is not theirs. The actions of Al Qaeda and Hamas are attempted to be analyzed as post-colonial resistance movements to Western colonialism. This analysis fails to include post-colonial voices in a piece attempting to contextualize and humanize the Middle East. 

As Russell beautifully explained in the first part of his article, France, Great Britain, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Portugal and Spain have, for centuries, manifested their powers in globalized ways that have produced ideologies and economies in our global system that have directly and explicitly harmed people around the world. These people extend to the many crevices of what the colonizer calls “The Global South.” When talking about colonialism, the colonizer is a master at weaponizing history to talk about oppression as a thing of the past.  

Colonialism, as explained in the article, was given a timeline starting from 1492 to the 1970s.  

Everything after that marked date, especially pertaining to the Middle East, is considered a “response.” In 1917, the Balfour Agreement was signed by the British government, which ensured the creation of the Israeli state. Why was this not mentioned in the previous article? Is this not historically significant when talking about colonialism? Does this not show that the fate of the Middle East was never in the hands of its own people? “Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank feel that the creation of Israel was a violation of their sovereignty:” Post-colonial resistance is not about feelings; it is about choices and reality. Colonialism is not about what opinions or feelings colonial subjects have but rather about the execution of choices forced by the colonizer.  

When articles are advertised to talk about colonialism in the Middle East, one would assume that the genesis and inoculation of Middle Eastern reality would be introduced in a just way. However, continually, this is framed and introduced through discourse about Al Qaeda, 9/11 and Hamas, framing the West’s understanding of the Middle East in limited ways. When attempting to contest this, as I perceive it, the author failed to explain how this representation, in its essence, is colonial, contradicting all contextualization done in the first part of his article.  

Discourse on colonialism in the Middle East was transformed into another reminder that thousands of U.S.-Americans were killed on 9/11. Was this a tragedy? Of course it was! No nation or people should ever have to live through something as horrible. However, to me, the narratives that were birthed post 9/11 show discourses on extreme nationalism and an obsession with security coupled with racism, xenophobia and essentialist ideology. Western colonialism was used to understand the psychology of the “Arabs” behind 9/11 and how that impacts the West. Are the effects of global colonialism, coloniality and neoliberalism in the Middle East only represented as having “started” through 9/11? Did we not exist before, and do we not exist now?  

“These attacks were both vengeful and a warning for Westerners to stay away. Muslims in the Middle East, privy to the destructive forces of colonialism and the economic repression of neo-colonialism, targeted civilians because a) they had easier access to them, but b) they wanted to communicate that they don’t trust the West and that Western civilians aren’t safe outside of their bubble.” The author suggests that the attacks he brought up as examples were a “response” from a post-colonial society who deployed colonial ideologies used against them, to introduce themselves to the West. This is a typical way for a colonizer to understand the colonized. No sort of post-colonial theory is used, and any type of resistance is invisibilized. He then flips the  

narrative to frame it as an “unsafe reality for the West.” Do you see the problem? The author frames the Middle East through its extremist groups. Imagine if we applied the same analysis to the West. Imagine if I were to author a paper on U.S. American existence in the 21st century 

through the lens of the far right and the neo-fascists that control a lot of U.S. American society. Who would this serve?  

After all this writing, I want to say that, in an ideal world, the colonized would spend time and energy analyzing their own existence within our neoliberal world infested with coloniality. The colonizer would spend time thinking of how their obsession with security stems from the manifestation of their own identity. The colonizer would critically think about how their race is invisibilized and how, through the exclusion of the voices of the colonized, their analysis does nothing but serve the Western delusion. Now, are you asking yourself these questions?  

The Middle East does not need the West to understand it. We do not need you to understand our post-colonial existence. Instead of understanding the crimes of the U.S. government in the Middle East, the author of the previous article chose to view what is happening in Israel and Palestine as screams of danger to the West. To this, I do not even have words. People are dying, and this is what we are doing. We are all complicit, especially when our tax money goes towards funding a genocide; I find it ridiculous that I am even writing this article. These are not just words; this is our life.  

To my Middle Eastern and Arab students, I am with you. We are together, and we must be alive, healthy and happy to resist the world constantly dehumanizing us. To our Jewish allies, we are with you and will never leave your side.  

If you want to learn more about colonialism, do not just go watch a movie. Please read some Edward Said.