Thursday, September 4, 2003
I came across this Bernard Lewis article again, first published back in April, and thought it was worth taking another look at. It's a quick look at the roots of the Ba'ath and its ties to Naziism and Communism (remembering that there's still an extant Ba'athist regime - its home, Syria), and how Islam could potentially be a moderating influence on some of the more dangerous Western influences.
Amongst other thoughts, two things stood out: One is the helpful perspective such historical information gives. The Ba'ath's National Socialist influences help put context on the incredibly virulent and seemingly unreconcilable anti-Semitic ranting (and yes, I mean anti-Semitic, not anti-Zionist) that comes out of the Syrian regime - and came, and still comes from Iraq and all over the Arab world.
The other thought I had was how religion (and I've said this somewhere here before), at its best, at least has the potential to act as a sort of Constitution for humanity. A basic structure that holds against the worst human passions and murderous fads of the moment.
FrontPage magazine.com - Saddam's Regime is a European Import By Bernard Lewis
In 1940, the French government accepted defeat and signed a separate peace with the Third Reich. The French colonies in Syria and Lebanon remained under Vichy control, and were therefore open to the Nazis to do what they wished. They became major bases for Nazi propaganda and activity in the Middle East. The Nazis extended their operations from Syria and Lebanon, with some success, to Iraq and other places. That was the time when the Baath Party was founded, as a kind of clone of the Nazi and Fascist parties, using very similar methods and adapting a very similar ideology, and operating in the same way -- as part of an apparatus of surveillance that exists under a one-party state, where a party is not a party in the Western democratic sense, but part of the apparatus of a government. That was the origin of the Baath Party...
