What Can We Learn From an Arab Perspective of Iran?

by Micah Schuurman

Non-Muslims often lump all the Muslim peoples together into a monolithic bloc. We tend to ignore the subtle distinctions between the various people groups. For example, we sometimes forget that Iran is not an Arab country. The largest ethnicity in Iran is Persian and Persian also happens to be the main language. Furthermore, Iranians are predominantly from the Shia branch of Islam whereas countries such as Egypt, Indonesia, Turkey, Morocco and Saudi Arabia are almost entirely Sunni. Practically speaking, this means that Iran is very much a foreign country.

Having lived in the an Arab country and having spent a significant amount of time paying attention to Arab media outlets, I have come into contact with some themes in an average Arab’s perspective of Iran. Since I began my introduction with a caution against lumping the people of the Muslim world together, I should issue a caveat regarding my own words. That being said, I think that there is still some value in stepping outside of our own perspectives of Iran long enough to imagine how an average Arab might view this member of the so-called “The Axis of Evil.”

One of the ways in which an Arab might view Iran is as a valiant hero, defending the Muslim world from the imperialist power of the West. France and the United Kingdom carved up the Middle East after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. In the 50s, the secular, democratically-elected Iranian government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh attempted to nationalize the Iranian petroleum companies. In response, in August of 1953, the CIA initiated Operation Ajax at the order of Dwight Eisenhower for the purpose of deposing Mosaddegh and set up the reign of Mohammad-Reza Shah Pahlavi more commonly known as the Shah of Iran. Pahlavi brutally oppressed his people with the help of American-made arms until 1979 when the Iranian Islamic Revolution deposed him and set up the Ayatollah Khomeini as the supreme leader of Iran. Even then, the United States didn’t stop meddling. The US funneled millions of dollars worth of weapons to the young Iraqi dictator named Saddam Hussein to fund his war against Iran in the early ‘80s.

Another example of perceived imperialism is the state of Israel. Arabs view the nation as a European colony. This carries more weight when one tries to understand why the survivors of the Holocaust were given a piece of land which belonged to the Arabs rather than a chunk of Germany.

More recently, Osama bin Laden cited the presence of American troops in Saudi Arabia after the first Persian Gulf War as an act of imperialism and as one of his main reasons for declaring war on the Saudi Royal Family and the United States. Concerning the Iraq war, the neo-conservative arguments used to justify the war are virtually indistinguishable from the arguments used to support European colonialism of the Americas, Africa and Asia.

Given these perspectives, it is little wonder that the peoples of the Middle East are afraid of Western Imperialism and often look somewhat admiringly at Iran, one of the few countries in the world that seems capable of standing up to the West.

Yet, Arabs are also concerned about Iran’s growing influence in the region. Saddam Hussein had acted as a buffer, keeping Iran at bay and preventing Iran from meddling in the Arab world. With Hussein’s fall, Iran’s political tentacles began to spread throughout the region. It is no coincidence that Hezbollah’s Iranian sponsored war with Israel took place scarcely three years after the invasion of Iraq. Similarly, much of the recent unrest in Northern Yemen has been linked to Iranian support for the Shia rebels in the area. The power vacuum created by the fall of Saddam Hussein has allowed Iran unchecked influence in the region. Many Arabs are aware of this and are naturally concerned.

We who live in the West certainly do not need to agree with everything that an average Arab might think concerning Iran. Yet, if we do not take these thoughts seriously, we are destined to become more and more alienated from the Muslim world due to preventable misunderstandings.

We can learn, however, that Iran’s bravado and intransigence may have its roots in a resentment towards Western dominance. Ever since the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Iran has felt that it has been unjustly ostracized, marginalized and ignored. Iranians are tired of their country being treated condescendingly by nations in the West. This may be the roots of Iran’s attempt to develop nuclear technology. In terms of the nation’s psychology, they may be saying to themselves, “This seems to be the only way that you in the West will ever treat us with any respect.”

We can work with the Arabs to diminish Iranian power in the region provided we can convince them that we have given up our imperialistic aspirations and our meddling ways. This won’t be easy. But, recent administrations have taken small steps to make amends. In a speech in 2000, then Secretary of State, Madeline Allbright said, “The Eisenhower administration believed its actions were justified for strategic reasons. ... But the coup was clearly a setback for Iran’s political development. And it is easy to see now why many Iranians continue to resent this intervention by America in their internal affairs.” Similarly, in his 2009 speech at the University of Cairo, President Barak Obama took responsibility for the coup and offered Iran the opportunity to move forward in relations with America rather than leaving both nations trapped in the past.

Our relationship with Iran can and must change. Iran poses a serious threat to the general stability of the Middle East. A powerful Iran is a danger to our allies, particularly Israel. But, we ought not fool ourselves into believing that sanctions and strategic bombings will solve anything. In terms of hard-line approaches, nothing short of a full-scale invasion will end Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons. A missile strike would only delay Iran’s quest to produce a bomb by a few months at most. If the West wishes to tame Iran through peaceful means, it will have to use diplomacy to address the fundamental reasons for Iran’s aggression. Hopefully, this will involve convincing Iranian leaders that they can gain more international respect and legitimacy by abandoning their quest for a bomb than by continuing to pursue nuclear warheads.

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