MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th January, 2020) This year saw the Arab world convulse with mass anti-government demonstrations, which left in their wake drastic consequences and changes, including the toppling of long-serving presidents in Algeria and Sudan; forced resignation of the prime ministers of Lebanon and Iraq and death of over 500 demonstrators in Iraq.
Tahrir Square in Baghdad, the city center of Khartoum, a post office square in Algiers and downtown Beirut transformed into "hotspots" where people gathered to raise their voices. The waves of demonstrations shattered the Arab nations on such a scale that people on social media started calling the events #arabspring2.0 or simply #arabspring2.
Like eight years ago during the now infamous Arab Spring protests, these countries succumbed to unrest one by one. The same model � general dissatisfaction with an unresponsive government � resulted in extensive civil unrest and, in the majority of cases, a change of power.
Sudan and Algeria were the first to experience this extreme change to their political systems. In the former, a collapsing economy and increased inflation culminated in protests in December 2018. It was not long afterward that the people's anger then turned to 75-year-old President Omar Bashir.
The Bashir administration initially said it had nothing against the peaceful protests yet denounced provocateurs who damaged buildings, including those belonging to the police, and looted and stole during the demonstrations.
After months of catalyzed unrest and disturbance, Bashir was deposed by the country's military and placed under house arrest before being sent to prison. Power was quickly transferred to the Transitional Military Council. However, protesters continued to hit the streets, demanding that the military hand over power to a new civilian government. The uprising ultimately calmed down between August and September when power was given to a new cabinet in which civilian and military representation was equal. The cabinet is due to oversee the 39-month democratic transition.
Months later, the protests shifted to another country in North Africa � Algeria. Demonstrations there erupted in February, 10 days after 81-year-old Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the country's longest-serving president, announced his fifth presidential bid. From February to April, the North African country was swept by millions-strong marches dubbed the "Revolution of Smiles," or "Algerian Spring," whose scale has been compared to the mass unrest seen during the 1954-1962 Algerian Revolution. Despite its peaceful name, the so-called revolution turned violent, with protesters throwing stones at police and the latter responding with tear gas. Algerian authorities confirmed that dozens were arrested for "public disorder, vandalism, damage to property, violence and assault."
Eventually, on April 2, Bouteflika was forced to resign.
Though media tend to put the unrest in Sudan and Algeria under the same category � since they both resulted in toppled presidents � Abdulaziz Alghashian, a middle East expert and lecturer at Essex University, believes that the preconditions and background in both states differed � while there were numerous speculations about the Bouteflika's resignation and ability to continue serving in public office, there were no such thoughts about Bashir.
With regard to Bouteflika, the Algerian people, who knew that their president had been sick in recent years after suffering a stroke, did not expect him to seek another term.
"Bouteflika was ailing. He was a very old individual and he was on his way out anyway. Moreover, when he was old and ailing, there was a lot of suspicion about his governing the country. And Bouteflika was not an effective leader anyway. The transition from Bouteflika to another government, the current government, was a lot easier," he told Sputnik.
In Sudan, however, the transition was much harsher since Bashir was ousted and put in prison.
"Bashir was a leader, but the institution itself, the military, took over," he said, adding that the military took such extreme measures to avoid an even larger scale of protests.
Yet, he did point out that what the leaders did have in common was their lengthy terms in office. Bouteflika was in office for 20 years, while Bashir held on to power for 30 years.
"And that was an easy target because people said: 'Hey, you are there in the office for this long and we still have this aspect of corruption, we still have the economy going down, still have political [elites],'" he said.
In mid-December, Bashir was sentenced to two years in detention for corruption in the first of many cases against him. The Sudanese authorities also opened a probe into the crimes committed in Darfur region in western Sudan by Bashir and the members of his regime. The ex-president is sought by the International Criminal Court over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur.
The lack of trust in the political elite in Lebanon reached a boiling point this year and similarly resulted in mass unrest. This time, it was the government's attempt to introduce new taxes on tobacco, gasoline and WhatsApp calls in mid-October that compelled people to take to the streets. Though the tax initiative was quickly abandoned, the protests could not be quelled.
Citizens called for changes, including for the resignation of the government which, according to them, was embroiled in high levels of corruption. In particular, Prime Minister Saad Hariri was criticized for bringing the nation to the brink of bankruptcy and widening the divide between the rich and the poor. Less than two weeks after the protests began crippling cities across Lebanon, Hariri succumbed to the pressure and announced his resignation, admitting that he had reached "a dead end." The demonstrations did not stop, however, and instead gained a new dimension � protesters started demanding changes to the entire political system.
After announcing his resignation, Hariri stepped up to say that he wanted the future cabinet to be filled with people who were able to solve Lebanon's problems. He added that his decision to quit would help the political deadlock and bring the country out of crisis.
"I am sticking by the rule 'not me, rather someone else' to form a government that addresses the aspirations of the young men and women," he said.
In October, Iraq became one more country in the Arab world where protesters began rallying against mass unemployment and corruption. Specifically, the people demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi. Ensuing clashes between protesters and security forces have resulted in over 500 deaths and 19,000 injuries. Meanwhile, about 3,000 people have been detained between October and November, with a few hundred of them still in custody.
Following weeks of raging unrest, embattled Abdul-Mahdi resigned from his post.
Ahead of his resignation, Abdul-Mahdi ordered an investigation into violence that happened in the Dhi Qar and Najaf provinces, where tens of protesters were killed over two days in November.
Egypt also briefly experienced anti-government protests in September, during which the public voiced its dissatisfaction with the current government, growing level of corruption and President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi himself. However, the crowds were confronted with a solid response from the police, who fired rubber bullets and tear gas to great effect.
From September to October in Egypt, some 4,300 were detained by law enforcement, one of the largest numbers recorded since el-Sisi entered office.
Meanwhile, reports emerged in the Egyptian media claiming that the Muslim Brotherhood Islamist movement (banned in Russia) was trying to stage mass protests across the country. A video released by MBC Masr broadcaster allegedly showed one of the Muslim Brotherhood leaders calling on supporters to gather near their houses and then fill the cities' squares. The Interior Ministry reportedly detained a son of jailed senior Muslim Brotherhood member Saad Katatni for his attempt to organize an unauthorized rally.
The major reason why civilians across the Arab world were making their voices heard lay in unresponsive governments, according to Sarah Leah Whitson, director of the Middle East and North Africa division of Human Rights Watch.
"I think what they are all [protests] have in common, wherever you look is that they are protesting their failed governments that have questionable legitimacy if any, that are not really truly elected in a democratic process that reflects the voice of the people, and that are not accountable to their citizens," she told Sputnik.
According to Whitson, protesters flooded the streets because they could not push their governments to handle their respective crises via "political means."
"If they could push their government to deal with the economy or deal with corruption through normal political means, they would do that. But because there is no 'political normal' in these countries people are forced to go to streets," she stressed.
She went on to say that political stability in these protest-affected countries would not be possible in the near future since their governments had still not addressed the population's concerns.
"I think the one thing we know for sure is that we will not see stability and we will not see security in these countries until they have political various responses to the population. As long as there's such a gross disconnect between the government and the people, then you will continue to see a flare-up of protest and demand for change," she said.
The outcomes of the protests are also difficult to predict, according to Whitson.
"Whether the governments are able to reform, whether the people are able to topple their governments - we don't know. That will depend on the extent of the brutality and the extent of public resistance," she added.
Kanishkan Sathasivam, a professor of international relations at Salem State University, told Sputnik that apart from stiffed democracies and failed economic performance, the rallies were being caused by social triggers.
"The grievances also go beyond just economic issues to include social justice issues, issues of equality for all groups within society, and fundamental reforms of the country's political, economic, and social structures and institutions," he added.
Asked whether the protests were possibly the result of foreign influence, Sathasivam answered in the negative.
"Going out onto the streets and protesting day after day is not an easy thing to do. You really need a powerful motivation to be willing to risk everything and do it, and the only thing that can provide that level of motivation is if you have lost all hope in your life and your life conditions are so utterly deplorable," he said.
According to him, it is "completely illogical" that anyone would protest and put their lives in danger "just because some agent of a foreign country told them to do it or even paid them to do it."
The protests across the Arab world have been characterized by the high level of censorship and digital blackouts across both conventional media and social media, a trend that has been decisively condemned by prominent watchdogs. The tactic is not new � partial or full internet shutdowns were used to hush up the 2011 protests.
In the spring and summer of the year, when Sudan's capital of Khartoum was besieged by protesters, the military-led transitional government introduced an internet blackout as an offensive tactic. The measures forced Sudanese citizens to seek alternative ways of communicating.
Tensions escalated at the beginning of June when security forces brutally dispersed a peaceful sit-in, whose participants were calling for the establishment of a civilian-led transitional government. Over 120 people were killed, according to the protests' organizers. In October, the new Sudanese authorities, under pressure from UN bodies and human rights groups, started an investigation into the massacre.
Security forces in Lebanon were also criticized by watchdogs for their use of excessive force, including live ammunition, to disperse protests. The army was also denounced for failing to protect peaceful demonstrators from men armed with sticks and metal bars.
"It is a human rights abuse when the governments are not accountable to their citizens, or their actions and their policies [aren't]," according to Whitson.
Whitson felt that such types of governments "operate with a total monopoly on power" and influence all aspects of normal political processes and participation. This "monopoly" was the main reason why people came out into the streets.
According to Whitson, police brutality, corruption, crackdowns on free speech were merely symptoms of "the fundamental disease," which was the lack of government accountability for its citizens.
"They don't have normal democratic processes to get rid of these governments through an election. And that's why governments can do whatever they want because citizens are powerless to change them," she added.
PROTESTERS LEARNED FROM ARAB SPRING
Sathasivam said that the recent protests in the Arab world were reminiscent of those that swept the Middle East in 2011, albeit with two major differences.
"The protesters have clearly learned from the 2010-11 protests having largely been failures, and are doing a much better job this time around of being very organized and effective at the grassroots level and trying to bring in as many people into the movement as possible without regard for demographic lines of division," he said.
The other difference was that the demonstrations now targeted the political class as a whole, not just individual politicians.
"In 2010-11 the protests were aimed specifically at the individual rulers of countries at that time. This time around the protests are not aimed just at the one person at the top but rather at the entire political class and system of the country - all politicians at all levels, even including opposition politicians," he said.
Sathasivam also drew attention to the absence of clear leaders among the protesters in the recent uprisings.
"For the most part, these demonstrators are without clear leaders being involved, which also then means [that] leaders are not driving the protests. Ordinary average people are," he added.
Meanwhile, Alghashian also drew parallels between the Arab Spring and this year's events, though he stopped short of classifying the latter as Arab Spring 2.0 or the second wave of the Arab Spring.
"They were fed up with the way they were living, there was still corruption. All the themes that come during the Arab Spring protests in 2011 are still present until now. Moreover, rather than the promise that the Arab spring brought was not fulfilled. That's why it's not surprising that people now want to go to the street," he said.
He stressed that the protesters had more confidence to go out vent their dissatisfactions in 2019 than they had a decade ago because now they "are understanding that they can make a difference."
However, Alghashian does not believe that the protests would have a domino effect and reenergize the whole region as had happened previously.
"Now people have seen the instability that such protests can bring and this is what many states will [stand upon], they would talk about 'look at Syria. You don't want to have another Syria... There is a fearmongering among a lot of states," he said.
In 2011, the uprisings in Syria, Libya and Yemen quickly escalated into civil wars, mired by the surge of terrorism, destruction and numerous casualties. The revolution in Bahrain resulted in the violent crackdown on protesters with the help of Bahrain's ally Saudi Arabia. In Egypt, a coup d'etat ousted President Mohamed Morsi and paved the way for the military to enter government.
Asked whether this year's protests would continue to spread to other parts of the Arab world, Sathasivam suggested new locations where this could happen.
"My guess would be Saudi Arabia first and foremost, as well as perhaps Jordan, Tunisia, and Morocco," he said.
