Democracy in the Middle East?

Those who oppose the war in Iraq endless talk generally talk about things such as the WMD’s, the “lies,” etc.  They’re trying to make a moral case out of it.

For us, the matter is simpler: because of the nature of Middle Eastern society, democracy is presently impossible.  Thus the whole premise of bringing democracy to the Middle East was a chimera to start with and remains so today.

To buttress our case, one only needs to consider the following said on Memri by the Syrian poet Ali Ahmad Sa’id (“Adonis”):

First of all, I oppose any external intervention in Arab affairs. If the Arabs are so inept that they cannot be democratic by themselves, they can never be democratic through the intervention of others. (emphasis ours)

If we want to be democratic, we must be so by ourselves. But the preconditions for democracy do not exist in Arab society, and cannot exist unless religion is reexamined in a new and accurate way, and unless religion becomes a personal and spiritual experience, which must be respected.

Personal religion is, of course, what this site is ultimately about.