PERSPECTIVE ON THE GULF WAR : The ‘Arabquake’ Is Just Beginning : The destruction of Iraq to save Kuwait rocked the Arab/Islamic world; a year of soul-searching is releasing new forces.

If the war on Iraq one year ago was a “defining moment” for the United States, for the Arabs it was a turning point in their modern history. The war was for President Bush a harbinger of the so-called new global order; for the Arabs, it was a jolting experience from which we have not yet recovered. The anniversary might be for the United States and its Western partners an opportunity to remember the euphoria of triumphalism; for the Arab peoples, this day accentuates awareness of their vulnerabilities and the collective anxieties that still await expression.

In a way, we see how different our respective worlds are despite the emerging “global order,” how sharply distinct our respective discourses are despite the CNNization that has rendered our parlance nearly uniform. To the United States and the West, the military enforcement of the U.N. Security Council’s measures was a tribute to international legality; for the Arabs, it was a demonstration of their world’s breakdown. True, the Iraqi regime had clearly violated the charters of both the Arab League and the United Nations. For Arabs, the painful question was--and remains--whether the liberation of Kuwait necessitated the destruction of Iraq.

Many suppressed issues were brought forward by the trauma of the event. People from all walks of life were emboldened to inquire, to reach deep into the tortured Arab soul to find the cause of their tragic dilemma. In the process, they discovered that behind the superstructures of oppressive regimes was an increasingly frail body politic. This has led to a growing conviction that popular participation is the only credible means to ensure the recovery of Arab societies.

The invasion of Kuwait has come to be seen as a consequence of the prevalence of systems that entrenched unilateral decision-making and deliberately excluded accountability. Systems that silenced alternative views and crushed opposition. Systems whose ruthless governance led to reckless adventures.

Although the United States-led coalition was the instrument of Iraq’s destruction, the regime’s character and behavior were the cause. How, then, can continued popular Arab animosity toward the coalition be explained?

One must realize that Arab opposition to the war was not an endorsement of Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait. It was--and is--opposition to a catastrophic fate being imposed on Iraq and its people.

Resentment toward Arab failure to resolve an Arab crisis was fueled by the mind-boggling stubbornness of Saddam Hussein’s regime, as well as by the arrogance of those in the Arab world who deliberately frustrated early Arab efforts at mediation. It was sickening to see the dependence on the West behind their claims to be the Arab component of the “new world order.”

As Arabs watched the mounting destruction in both Iraq and Kuwait, they found themselves in the untenable position of being helpless to bring an end to the blood bath. In the West, there was a tendency to think that Arabs had to choose between Iraq and Kuwait. Among Arabs, however, consideration of the people of Iraq and of Kuwait was far more relevant, and in the final analysis, Arab sympathy went to the people who suffered most.

This sympathy became the engine for political and intellectual ferment and inquiry. The perception emerged that the deserved punishment of Iraq was being taken far beyond humane limits by a deliberate indifference to the fate of the Iraqi people. In a way, the sympathy factor signaled an Arab acquiescence to Iraq’s military defeat, but not its destruction; it indicated acceptance of the humbling of Iraq’s regime, but not the humiliation of the Iraqi people.

Subtly, a sorting-out process took place among Arabs. To millions watching the scenes coming live by television from Iraq, the war was a shocking and needless loss of Arab people. To the thousands caught in the grip of primitive vengeance, it was elimination of “the Iraqi enemy.”

As a result of these conflicted attitudes, the Arab concept of a transnational society was threatened with implosion. Untapped and previously latent issues came to the surface, and the whole concept of Arab nationalism--its relevance, validity and future--was questioned, widely and thoroughly.

The invasion of Kuwait was a cruel distortion of the concept of Arab unity. The hurried invitation of foreign forces was an abject demonstration of an embarrassing dependency. Caught in the vortex of these cross currents, the commitment to an Arab common destiny was severely shaken--but not totally abandoned.

Mohammad Heikal, an outstanding Egyptian editor and writer, described the entire episode as “an Arabquake” whose “tremors are bound to be with us for a long time to come.” One strongly felt tremor has been the awareness that more than $100 billion of Arab wealth went into the war effort, not counting the billions lost in the destruction in Kuwait and Iraq. This has brought a sharp sense of guilt, particularly among the intelligentsia. Millions of Arabs and Muslims who are living in abject poverty in Sudan, Somalia, Egypt and Mauritania sorely needed this wealth. This awareness, in turn, has sharpened the consciousness of those in the Arab mainstream who believe in a common Arab destiny; it also has driven the detractors of Arab solidarity to more dependence on the opponents of pan-Arabism.

Amid this overwhelming crisis, the search for answers remains an ongoing pursuit. In the continued absence of coherent responses, and in the continued hegemony of the industrial West, Islamic fundamentalism has acquired new credibility and has staked its claim to inherit the twin mantles of Arab nationalism and Islamic dignity.

In confronting the incipient and paralyzing dependence on the West, Islamic fundamentalists have seized on the Palestinian issue. The current Arab state system, they assert, has failed to deliver the minimum Palestinian national and human rights, or to preserve whatever existential rights the Palestinians still have, whether in the Occupied Territories or elsewhere.

The first free election in Algeria last month was tantamount to an insurrection of the Arab spirit. The outcome, the election of 187 Islamic coalitionists to Parliament, signaled the fever of discontent, anger and anxiety within the entire Arab body politic.

The subsequent foreclosure of the results of those free elections deepens the popular sense of frustration and reduces the availability of rational choices. One year to the week, the tragic dilemma of the Arabs is compounded.