The western media and the Algerian crisis

Race and Class

Volumn 41, Issue 3, 2000, Pages 43-57

  Slisli, Fouzi ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0034338275     PISSN: 03063968     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0306396800413004     Document Type: Review

References (47)

1. After the Hebron massacre, an American reporter in Palestine was asked by his office in Washington whether 'an Arab terorist attack was being prepared' to avenge what they referred to as 'murders'. See Robert Fisk, 'Comment Distinguer un "Terrorist" d'un "Déséquilibré"', Kenneth Brown and Hannah Davis Taieb, eds., Être Journaliste en Méditerranée (Ar Hors-Série publication of Méditerranéenes, 1995), pp. 131-7.
2. After the Hebron massacre, an American reporter in Palestine was asked by his office in Washington whether 'an Arab terorist attack was being prepared' to avenge what they referred to as 'murders'. See Robert Fisk, 'Comment Distinguer un "Terrorist" d'un "Déséquilibré"', Kenneth Brown and Hannah Davis Taieb, eds., Être Journaliste en Méditerranée (Ar Hors-Série publication of Méditerranéenes, 1995), pp. 131-7.
3. Interview with Benjamin Stora, Le Monde (19 February 1997).
4. John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat: myth or reality? (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 191.
5. In France, the Muslim population en bloc is held suspect and constantly watched by the authorities: 'Confusion is thus entertained between terrorism, Islamism and simple believers, a confusion that is sought and maintained in a country where immigrants, Maghrebins in the first place, are designated scapegoats.' Alain Gresh, 'Fantasmes Occidentaux et Dictatures Arabes', Le Monde Diplomatique (December 1993).
6. The original idea for this classification of western assessments of Islam and Islamism comes from Jacqueline Kaye's insightful essay 'Islam, Islamism and Women in the Maghreb, ' The Bulletin of Francophone Africa (Autumn 1992), pp. 2-13. She accurately points out that postcolonial conceptions of the development of the state in Muslim countries have either considered traditional structures and culture (Islam included) as obstacles to development, or blamed colonialism and imperialism for everything, seeing in Islam merely a mode of cultural resistance that will eventually fade away once autonomy is achieved. In neither of these views, Kaye observes, 'does Islam have any authentic role in the post-colonial state and neither offers us a way of dealing with the phenomenal rise of Islamic populism' (pp. 4-5).
7. The original idea for this classification of western assessments of Islam and Islamism comes from Jacqueline Kaye's insightful essay 'Islam, Islamism and Women in the Maghreb, ' The Bulletin of Francophone Africa (Autumn 1992), pp. 2-13. She accurately points out that postcolonial conceptions of the development of the state in Muslim countries have either considered traditional structures and culture (Islam included) as obstacles to development, or blamed colonialism and imperialism for everything, seeing in Islam merely a mode of cultural resistance that will eventually fade away once autonomy is achieved. In neither of these views, Kaye observes, 'does Islam have any authentic role in the post-colonial state and neither offers us a way of dealing with the phenomenal rise of Islamic populism' (pp. 4-5).
8. See, for example, Meriem Verges, 'Genesis of a Mobilisation: The Young Activists of Algeria's Islamic Salvation Front, ' in J. Benin and J. Stork, eds, Political Islam (London, I. B. Tauris, 1997), pp. 292-309: The FIS is not a religious movement, strictly speaking. Rooted in the social discontent that has been expressed in urban violence since 1985, the FIS gives political form to an emergent social movement … It uses religious rhetoric to translate social discontent into political terms' (p. 293). Similarly in 'Les Désarroi d'une Jeunesse sans avenir: avoir vingt ans en Algérie', Le Monde Diplomatique (November 1995): 'The art of the preacher [note the use of Christian terminology] consists in identifying social problems, by redefining the situation in religious terms and translating it in political terms.'
9. See, for example, Meriem Verges, 'Genesis of a Mobilisation: The Young Activists of Algeria's Islamic Salvation Front, ' in J. Benin and J. Stork, eds, Political Islam (London, I. B. Tauris, 1997), pp. 292-309: The FIS is not a religious movement, strictly speaking. Rooted in the social discontent that has been expressed in urban violence since 1985, the FIS gives political form to an emergent social movement … It uses religious rhetoric to translate social discontent into political terms' (p. 293). Similarly in 'Les Désarroi d'une Jeunesse sans avenir: avoir vingt ans en Algérie', Le Monde Diplomatique (November 1995): 'The art of the preacher [note the use of Christian terminology] consists in identifying social problems, by redefining the situation in religious terms and translating it in political terms.'
10. Esposito, op. cit., pp. 230-1.
11. Consider the following by Paul B. Rich: 'the Islamic fundamentalists lack a basic drive for state building', the reason for which is that their 'cause rests on cultural and religious rather than secular foundations and is concerned with resisting what is often termed the Western "cultural invasion" of the Islamic world', in 'Insurgency, revolution and the crises of the Algerian state', Paul B. Rich and Richard Stubbs, eds, The Counter-Insurgent State: guerrilla warfare and state building in the twentieth century (Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1997), p. 113.
12. It is not my concern here to assess contemporary Islamist movements, but western assessments of them. I simply want to show that the tendency to dismiss as political immaturity these movements' efforts (or any effort) to elaborate political and civilisational programmes on the basis of the Islamic religion, is a lazy, unfounded, Orientalist perspective. It wrongly assumes that all religions are the same and that what is valid for Christianity is valid for the rest. It falls very short of understanding the emergence of political Islam as a global phenomenon and unjustly denies the Muslims the right or, as Malek Bennabi put it, the 'duty' to adjust to the modern world. (Malek Bennabi, Vocation de L'Islam (Paris, Editions de Seuil, 1954), p. 149).
13. Stora, Le Monde, op. cit.
14. Atlantic Monthly (Vol. 226, no. 3, September 1990). This third-rate piece was given originally as the prestigious 'Jefferson Lecture' of 1990; the highest honour accorded by the United States government to a scholar.
15. National Review (19 November 1990), pp. 28-31.
16. Orbis (Vol. 36, Winter 1992), pp. 41-6. There is a large corpus of dubious scholarship on Islam and Muslims that benefits from widespread acclaim in the West. See, for example, Samuel Huntington's 'Clash of civilisation' Foreign Affairs (Summer 1993); Michael Youssef, Revolt Against Modernity: Muslim zealots and the West (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1985). For a refutation of these claims, see Yahya Sadowsky, 'The new Orientalism and the democracy debate' in Political Islam, op. cit., pp. 33-50.
17. Orbis (Vol. 36, Winter 1992), pp. 41-6. There is a large corpus of dubious scholarship on Islam and Muslims that benefits from widespread acclaim in the West. See, for example, Samuel Huntington's 'Clash of civilisation' Foreign Affairs (Summer 1993); Michael Youssef, Revolt Against Modernity: Muslim zealots and the West (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1985). For a refutation of these claims, see Yahya Sadowsky, 'The new Orientalism and the democracy debate' in Political Islam, op. cit., pp. 33-50.
18. Orbis (Vol. 36, Winter 1992), pp. 41-6. There is a large corpus of dubious scholarship on Islam and Muslims that benefits from widespread acclaim in the West. See, for example, Samuel Huntington's 'Clash of civilisation' Foreign Affairs (Summer 1993); Michael Youssef, Revolt Against Modernity: Muslim zealots and the West (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1985). For a refutation of these claims, see Yahya Sadowsky, 'The new Orientalism and the democracy debate' in Political Islam, op. cit., pp. 33-50.
19. Orbis (Vol. 36, Winter 1992), pp. 41-6. There is a large corpus of dubious scholarship on Islam and Muslims that benefits from widespread acclaim in the West. See, for example, Samuel Huntington's 'Clash of civilisation' Foreign Affairs (Summer 1993); Michael Youssef, Revolt Against Modernity: Muslim zealots and the West (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1985). For a refutation of these claims, see Yahya Sadowsky, 'The new Orientalism and the democracy debate' in Political Islam, op. cit., pp. 33-50.
20. Lewis, op. cit., p. 59.
21. Quoted in Esposito, op. cit., p. vii.
22. Ibid, p. 189.
23. 'Don't look for moderates in the Islamic revolution', International Herald Tribune (4 January 1995); 'A holy war heads our way', Reader's Digest (January 1995); 'Focus: Islamic terror: global suicide squad', Sunday Telegraph (1 January 1995).
24. 'Don't look for moderates in the Islamic revolution', International Herald Tribune (4 January 1995); 'A holy war heads our way', Reader's Digest (January 1995); 'Focus: Islamic terror: global suicide squad', Sunday Telegraph (1 January 1995).
25. 'Don't look for moderates in the Islamic revolution', International Herald Tribune (4 January 1995); 'A holy war heads our way', Reader's Digest (January 1995); 'Focus: Islamic terror: global suicide squad', Sunday Telegraph (1 January 1995).
26. Esposito, op. cit., p. 195.
27. Sadowsky, op. cit., p. 48, n. 43.
28. See 'Quand la France testait des armes chimiques en Algérie', Le Nouvel Observateur (23-9 October 1997).
29. See Ignacio Ramonet, 'La "marée verte" de l'Islamisme Algérien', Le Monde Diplomatique (July 1990).
30. L'Express (22 January 1998).
31. L'Express (20 January 1994).
32. Verges, op. cit., p. 295.
33. Europe, especially France, Spain and Italy, has incessantly expressed 'concern' about the demographic expansion in the Maghreb.
34. Ghania Moufouk 'Reporter Algérien, temoin objectif', Être Journaliste en Méditerranée, op. cit., p. 36.
35. When families went to enquire about what happened to their children and relatives, the army asked them to prove that they were in the camp. Some of the prisoners were sentenced to death for 'terrorist acts' committed while they were in the camps and were unscrupulously executed. See Abdelkader Bakir, 'Dans les camps d'internement', Le Monde Diplomatique (March 1996).
36. R. Boujedra, FIS de la Haine (Paris, Denoel, 1992).
37. Khalida Messaoudi, Une Algérienne Debout (Paris, Flammarion, 1995). Besides the fact that Messaoudi has been appointed deputy by the generals and given residency in the most prestigious state residence 'Club des Pins', François Burgat has the following testimony for us: 'I remember one day during a debate, where … she heated the room up. The audience had their throats knotted while she talked about Sonia, killed for having refused to wear the Hijab [veil]. At this moment a young girl stood up with tears in her eyes. It took us a while to understand what she was saying. She was indignant: 'Enough! Sonia was my friend, and she was killed by her fiancé because she did not want him. And it has nothing to do with the hijab."' Interview with François Burgat. L'Express (15 July 1995).
38. Khalida Messaoudi, Une Algérienne Debout (Paris, Flammarion, 1995). Besides the fact that Messaoudi has been appointed deputy by the generals and given residency in the most prestigious state residence 'Club des Pins', François Burgat has the following testimony for us: 'I remember one day during a debate, where … she heated the room up. The audience had their throats knotted while she talked about Sonia, killed for having refused to wear the Hijab [veil]. At this moment a young girl stood up with tears in her eyes. It took us a while to understand what she was saying. She was indignant: 'Enough! Sonia was my friend, and she was killed by her fiancé because she did not want him. And it has nothing to do with the hijab."' Interview with François Burgat. L'Express (15 July 1995).
39. Kaye, op. cit., p. 5. See also her The Ambiguous Compromise (London, Routledge, 1990).
40. Kaye, op. cit., p. 5. See also her The Ambiguous Compromise (London, Routledge, 1990).
41. See Ghania Mouffok, 'Attentat contre la liberté de la presse', Le Monde Diplo matique (March 1996).
42. Annual report of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (May 1994).
43. See Ahmed Rouadjia, 'L'Armée et les Islamistes: le compromis impossible', Esprit (January 1995).
44. These three parties represented between them 80 per cent of the vote.
45. See, among numerous other reports, 'Interrogations sur l'origine des attentats de Paris', Le Monde (11 November 1997); 'Algeria's cut-throat regime exposed', The Observer (16 November 1997). It is true that the French ministry of the interior expressed 'reservations' about these allegations (the Paris bombing), but this is to be expected, given the French government's nvolvement with the junta. The Algerian government denied these allegations, too. But how reliable are the generals of Algiers to tell the truth? As to the Italian seamen, how could the Islamists enter one of the most heavily guarded ports in Algeria, cross several checkpoints, kill the Italian crew and run away with tons of merchandise unseen? On the other hand, the fact that the Algerian army aimlessly delayed the ship's departure looks suspect from the start.
46. See, among numerous other reports, 'Interrogations sur l'origine des attentats de Paris', Le Monde (11 November 1997); 'Algeria's cut-throat regime exposed', The Observer (16 November 1997). It is true that the French ministry of the interior expressed 'reservations' about these allegations (the Paris bombing), but this is to be expected, given the French government's nvolvement with the junta. The Algerian government denied these allegations, too. But how reliable are the generals of Algiers to tell the truth? As to the Italian seamen, how could the Islamists enter one of the most heavily guarded ports in Algeria, cross several checkpoints, kill the Italian crew and run away with tons of merchandise unseen? On the other hand, the fact that the Algerian army aimlessly delayed the ship's departure looks suspect from the start.
47. See Patrick Denaud, Algérie, le FIS: sa direction parle (Paris, l'Harmatton, 1997).