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Hybrid Political Entities!
In the hustle of political and media work, and under the umbrella of a packaged democratic experience in most countries experimenting with new political systems, bizarre political entities emerge on the stage of its three authorities and its chaotic media. They resemble a strange mix resembling “the soup of the beggars,” presented by the ruling class at their tables and occasions through models created by their cooks, stirring laughter and tears at times, and grief and sorrow at others. The distinction between right and wrong has become blurred, colors have merged, and barriers have faded. Amid this chaos, men of religion have intruded into the political realm, leaving their pulpits, columns, or seminaries behind, breaking into the world of political circuses and the theater of contradictions and both legitimate and illegitimate interests. They engage with everything that intersects with the tenets of their creed, indulging in deception, fraud, lying, hypocrisy, embezzlement, black market trade, commissions, and bribes, thereby accepting to partner with those labeled as “fornicators, thieves, and drunks,” mingling with them to the point of intoxication, thus earning hypocrisy and debauchery, as defined in their religious texts.
From the far right to the far left and on another plank of the new democratic circus, another model, with unprecedented enthusiasm, rushed alongside our man of religion into the world of political vices. He continues to pound our heads with his leftist theories, opposing the Ba'ath regime, and rejecting socialist experiments that have tarnished his proletarian theory, claiming to be a champion of the oppressed class and a fighter for “the dictatorship of the proletariat,” all while sharing in the exploits of those who drain the blood of the poor and deprived, forgetting his theories and principles, allying with what he calls “the dregs of the proletariat,” as he classifies different societal segments.
Amid these two models, diverse creatures with varying genetics and backgrounds surged forth to form alternative systems that developed unparalleled political entities. They participate in governance and act as an opposition to extort the government. They have also succeeded in mixing opposing concepts, as you can hear or see a deeply corrupt individual speaking about integrity, another known for deceit and fabricating stories talking about honesty, a third who is tainted to the core claiming purity and chastity, and a fourth without roots speaking of authenticity and heritage. Strangely, they all agree amongst themselves and share the “cake” of corruption, boasting about it as an achievement or gain for themselves and their parties or for those who nominated them for positions in the ruling authorities!
Indeed, this is the tragedy of the top-down change that has befallen these countries and their peoples who awaited honorable leaders to govern after a dark era of authoritarian rule. They were surprised—except for a very few who do not conform to the general measurement—that a gang of thieves had robbed a bank, as the notable Egyptian writer and journalist Mohamed Hassanein Heikal so aptly described.
These gangs have made our countries some of the most corrupt and failed in the world, adept at manufacturing sharp contradictions and the disgusting mixes of corrupt individuals, adventurers, and self-proclaimed integrity advocates who both play the roles of the corrupt and the honest, the victim and the perpetrator, the oppressed and the oppressor, in the tragedy of the Arab Spring that has made us laugh until we cry and cry until we go mad!
**Levant: Kifah Mahmoud**
