They Love Their Dictators More Than Themselves!

When political parties that call themselves democratic, including Islamist ones, mourn the "martyr and hero" Saddam Hussein, we have to ask ourselves what kind of political future awaits us, says Raja Ben Slama in her commentary

photo: AP — Palestinians in the village of Halhul, near the West Bank city of Hebron, hold portraits of the late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein as they shout slogans during a rally against his execution

When religion mixes with politics and legislation, it has the power to nourish illusions and to distort almost anything imaginable. Confessionalism is one example of this potent combination.

All of the various parties involved have participated in this blend: his enemies see the trial against Saddam Hussein as an act of retaliation by the Shiites; his adherents view the execution of the man who committed so many crimes against humanity as an act of martyrdom while following the path of God, or as a sacrifice on the Islamic Feast of Sacrifice ("aid al adha").

In this context, everything takes on a religious or emotional hue. Meanwhile, other interpretations get buried.

Rejoicing Iraqis cannot be blamed

Why was the Feast of Sacrifice chosen as the execution day? So that criminal law could meld with the religious idea of sacrifice? Where was the alleged neutrality of the state? Where was the state that should have taken responsibility for carrying out the execution in a way that would make it perfectly clear that this was punishment for a crime and nothing more?

One can't blame the many Iraqi citizens who openly expressed their satisfaction at the end of Saddam with rejoicing and parties. They have a right to celebrate since they were the ones who suffered under the dictator. But the state is not entitled to such things.

The way in which the execution proceeded and the media's capitalization on the scenes of the day have transformed the lesson that should have been learned from the enforcement of the sentence into something more ambiguous.

Nebulous and unclear lesson

Although many have reservations concerning the death sentence per se, the execution of this person was meant to demonstrate that the law now has the highest authority – that a murderer has been brought to justice, a dictator made to pay for his crimes, and that the law of the jungle no longer reigns.

But instead, the lesson remains nebulous and unclear. To what extent?

Assuming that the proceedings against Saddam Hussein had been fair, that the files that implicate Western states as being involved in Hussein's crimes had not been closed, and that the sentence against Saddam had been executed according to regulations – would the Arab elites and the common people then have been prepared to learn this lesson?

Since the Saddam Hussein was executed, I have received countless political communiqués and poems mourning and grieving for him. Evidently, the Arabs love their dictators more than themselves! (In this context, Sigmund Freud's comment on his mentally ill patients comes to mind, that they love their delusions more than themselves).

When political parties that call themselves democratic, including Islamist ones, mourn the "martyr and hero" Saddam Hussein, who stood for the law of the jungle and the lack of any form of democracy, we have to ask ourselves what kind of political thinking these elites are demonstrating and what kind of political future awaits us.

Raja Ben Slama

The author is a professor of Arabic literature who splits her time between Tunis and Cairo.

Translated from the German by Jennifer Taylor-Gaida

Qantara.de

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