Communism in the Middle East and North Africa

Author(s):  
Jens Hanssen

This chapter provides a critical analysis of a selection of Middle Eastern and North African communist parties since the interwar period and the emergence of Marxist-Leninist movements during the Arab Cold War. It focuses on the difficulties the parties faced in the changing national and international settings. Arabs were drawn to communism in the 1930s because of Soviet leadership in global antifascism. But the parties suffered from Stalin’s support for the partition of Palestine in 1947, especially in countries neighboring Israel, and from Soviet support for Arab military regimes during the Cold War. By the mid-1960s, communists no longer had a monopoly on revolutionary ideology as Palestinian-inspired national liberation movements began to vernacularize Marxism-Leninism.

2011 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 317-319
Author(s):  
Paul Thomas Chamberlin

The new Cold War history has begun to reshape the ways that international historians approach the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) during the post-1945 era. Rather than treating the region as exceptional, a number of scholars have sought to focus on the historical continuities and transnational connections between the Middle East and other areas of the Third World. This approach is based on the notion that the MENA region was enmeshed in the transnational webs of communication and exchange that characterized the post-1945 global system. Indeed, the region sat not only at the crossroads between Africa and the Eurasian landmass but also at the convergence of key global historical movements of the second half of the 20th century. Without denying cultural, social, and political elements that are indeed unique to the region, this scholarship has drawn attention to the continuities, connections, and parallels between the Middle Eastern experience and the wider world.


Author(s):  
Paul E. Lenze, Jr.

Algeria is a state in the Maghreb that has been dominated by military rule for the majority of its existence. The National People’s Army (ANP) used nationalism to justify its intervention into politics while ensuring that withdrawal would occur only if national identity were protected. Algeria, similar to other Middle Eastern states, underwent historical trajectories influenced by colonialism, the Cold War, and post-9/11 politics; briefly experimented with democracy; and as a result, experienced the military as the dominant institution in the state. The resignation of Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika after 20 years of rule in April 2019, following six weeks of popular protest, has raised questions as to whether democratization is possible. Algeria’s history of military involvement in politics, the strength of the military as an institution, and its cooperative links with domestic elites and international actors portend the endurance of authoritarianism for the foreseeable future.


Author(s):  
Tsolin Nalbantian

Chapter 2 deals with the 1946-1949 Soviet repatriation drive to collect all worldwide Armenians and “return” them to the ASSR and, specifically, the Lebanese Armenian political-cultural understandings of it. I explore how that initiative formed a chapter of Lebanese (and other Middle Eastern) Armenians’ renegotiation of national belonging in early post-colonial times. And although about a third of all Armenian repatriates travelled via Beirut, I also look at those who remained in Lebanon and in other countries in the Middle East. The emerging Cold War was more than a backdrop to this story. Heating up, the Cold War – and the very divergent readings of, and responses to, the repatriation initiative among Lebanese Armenians – reinforced tensions between Armenian rightists and leftists. Armenians’ response to repatriation did not simply reflect their extant political-cultural positions. Rather, repatriation sharpened those positions. Responses to repatriation echoed issues on the changing Lebanese/Syrian/Armenian identity complex at the dawn of the post-colonial nation-state. The responses to repatriation included a retelling and a reconstitution of the history of the tragedy of the genocide. They also automatically triggered questions about the location and nature of the Armenian homeland, adding fuel to the division between Dashnaks and Armenian leftists.


2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 44-59
Author(s):  
Benjamin Tromly

AbstractThis article examines the post-war activities of the National Labor Alliance (NTS), a far-right Russian exile organisation whose members had served in German intelligence and propaganda structures during the Second World War. Using declassified CIA documents and previously untapped sources pertaining to NTS, it analyses the transformation of a semi-fascistic, collaborationist and anti-Semitic organisation into a Cold War asset of the CIA. The NTS played a role in shaping its association with US power by applying deceptive political strategies it had adopted during the interwar period and the Second World War to the new geopolitical context of divided Europe.


2005 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
VASSILIS K. FOUSKAS

Scholarly research to date has analysed the Cyprus issue from the perspective of Greek–Turkish relations, suggesting that the United States was attempting to strike a balance between them in order to safeguard the cohesion of NATO's southern flank during the cold war. This article, without undermining the validity of previous historical findings on the issue, nevertheless constitutes an attempt to move towards a differing research agenda: it locates Cyprus in the Middle Eastern theatre and suggests that the Yom Kippur war of October 1973 may have more linkages to the Cyprus crisis of summer 1974 than one may at first sight discern.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 58-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niklas Ammert ◽  
Heather Sharp

This article presents a comparative analysis of pupils’ activities dealing with the Cold War in Swedish and Australian history textbooks. By focusing on textbook activities to which pupils respond in relation to their learning of a particular topic, this study identifies knowledge types included in a selection of history textbooks. The study also focuses on the question whether, and if so how, social values are evident in activities concerning the Cold War. The authors develop a matrix that makes it possible to examine knowledge types and social values conveyed by activities. By analyzing textbook activities, this article exposes the hidden curriculum present in the textbooks on the basis of underlying and unstated values present in the activities, and at the same time identifies the way in which the selected textbooks incorporate these values.


2012 ◽  
Vol 15 (10) ◽  
pp. 1835-1844 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mahdieh Golzarand ◽  
Parvin Mirmiran ◽  
Mahsa Jessri ◽  
Karamollah Toolabi ◽  
Mehdi Mojarrad ◽  
...  

AbstractObjectiveMiddle Eastern and North African countries are undergoing nutrition transition, a transition which is associated with an increased burden of non-communicable diseases. This necessitates the evaluation of dietary patterns in these regions. The present study aimed to assess changes in dietary patterns in Middle Eastern and North African countries between 1961 and 2007.DesignAvailability of energy and fifteen main food items during 1961–2007 was examined using FAO food balance sheets from the FAOSTAT database.SettingFifteen countries including nine in the Middle East and six in North Africa were selected and the average availability of total energy and different food items in these regions were compared.ResultsOver the 47 years studied, energy and food availability (apart from animal fats and alcoholic beverages) has increased in the Middle East and North Africa. In both regions the proportion of energy derived from meat and vegetable oils has increased significantly while that from cereals decreased significantly. In addition, the proportion of energy from milk and dairy products and vegetables has shown an ascending trend in North Africa while the proportion of energy from fruits has shown a descending trend in the Middle East.ConclusionsThe study results reveal an unfavourable trend towards a Westernized diet in the Middle East and, to a certain extent, in North Africa. Tailored nutritional education encouraging healthy eating for prevention of the burden of chronic diseases in these countries seems essential.


2011 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 320-322
Author(s):  
Jeffrey James Byrne

One of the more prominent themes to emerge from this roundtable is the desire to integrate the history of the modern Middle East with broader trends in international history, particularly with regard to the recent emphasis on “decentralizing” and “globalizing” the Cold War narrative. My own research interests are consistent with this approach, as one of the central concerns of my current project is to show how Algeria's revolutionary nationalists defied the regional categories imposed on them from the outside by pursuing overlapping diplomatic initiatives under the rubrics of Maghribi unity, African unity, Arab unity, Afro-Asianism, and Third Worldism. After independence in 1962, the Algerian foreign ministry's main geographical divisions differed significantly from those used by the U.S. State Department—and most history departments’ hiring committees—by dividing the world into “the West,” “the Socialist Countries,” “the Arab World,” “Africa,” and “Latin America/Asia.” These categories were the product of both practical considerations and ideological/identity politics on the part of Algeria's new leaders, and to my mind suggest that the “Middle East” may itself be a particularly arbitrary and misleading geographical framework, even in comparison to other parts of the developing world where European imperialism exerted a heavy cartographical influence.


Author(s):  
Piotr Daniszewski

Terrorism is defined as use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to indulge fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, social or religious. Bioterrorism is terrorism by intentional release or dissemination of biological agents, mainly bacteria or viruses. Use of biological weapons is attractive from the terrorists’ point of view because of low production costs, major range and easiness of transmission. The first mention of the use of primitive biological weapons date back to the 6th century. Use of plague-infested corpses as offensive means in the 14th century caused a spread of bubonic plague through the whole Europe. The biggest development of biological weapons took place in the interwar period and in the cold war era. Biological weapon trails and research were conducted by super powers such as USSR, UK, USA and Japan. At the beginning of the 20th century a new form of bioterrorism occurred, which put humanity in the face of a terrifying threat.


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