Is the state of Israel a model for democracy in the Middle East?

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Is the state of Israel a model for democracy in the Middle East?                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

The purpose of this essay is to address the question: is the state of Israel a model for democracy in the Middle East? To do so, the conditions that led to the creation of Israel will be briefly explored, in an attempt to explain the history behind the Arab-Israeli conflict. The notion that the conflict is rooted in the Zionist movement will be discussed, and the problems of defining a collective Jewish identity explained.  Certain theorists have suggested that Israel exists as an ethnic democracy which, based on a tribal identity, does not offer full rights of citizenship to all of its people. The collective identity of the two players in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict will therefore be explored from a psycho-social perspective. After reviewing the theoretical opinions put forward in this essay, a conclusion will be reached as to the Israel’s suitability as a model for democracy, in the Western liberal sense.

Several theories have attempted to address the question of the lack of democracy in the Middle East. Huntington (1993), in ‘The Clash of Civilizations’, posits that there is less likelihood of democracy in countries where Islamic revivalism and Shi’a fundamentalism exist. Scrutiny of the Middle East has led some theorists to adopt the term, ‘Middle East exceptionalism’ when attempting to explain the region’s history of conflict and economic struggle. The term implies that the region is for some reason more prone to such problems than other parts of the world.

There are, however, a number of pro-democracy movements in the Middle East. For example, the Islamic Democratic Current is a political group that openly calls for democratic reform in Syria; Kifaya, which means ‘enough’ is has become Egypt’s main pro-democracy group and spearheads demonstrations against the government; Iran’s Green Movement has recently mobilised over three million people protesting against the re-election of President Ahmadinejad and called upon the American President Obama to side with them against the regime (Allen, 2009).

Sorli et al (2005), comparing the Middle East with other regions find it to be characterised by ‘authoritarian regimes, oil-dependent economies, Islam and the protracted Israeli-Palestinian conflict’, (p.142). Fawcett (2005), places the Arab-Israeli conflict within the broader historical arena of colonialism and post-war international relations: after the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Arab countries aspired to national independence. However, the Arab states, divided as they were by factionalism and in-fighting, were new to European diplomacy and faced problems negotiating with Europeans still influenced by imperialist interests in the region (pp.18-19).

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Arab-Israeli hostilities are rooted in the Zionist movement and first began to emerge in the late nineteenth century, as Zionist ideology developed with the increased immigration of European Jews. Many of the Jews settled in Palestine and Israel, which were at that time still part of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans had managed to maintain a degree of stability in the Middle East and at that time Arabs, Jews and other minority groups lived in peaceful co-existence. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the region was divided and in 1917 the British government issued the Balfour Declaration, confirming ...

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