Hee hee, how many times did you travel to Syria during the regime of Hafez Assad, Lydia ?!
Personal experience would help you understand what the Baathist Party was and is about.
Islam is totally unrelated to Arab Nationalism.
Even the definition of an Arab - do you know that without looking it up ?
It has zero to do with Islam.
Did you find the information on Michel Aflaq on wikipedia ? I had never heard that he converted to Islam.
One would imagine his Muslim name would have gone down in history if that were the case.
I don't know either way, as i never heard that.
You are using North American anti-Middle East paradigms for your ideas.
You must have studied what Arab Nationalism IS to grasp why the Baath succeeded amongst Iraqis and
Syrians. Not to say that there were not coups and that the Baath rule was forced on the two neighbors.
But this was a very powerful idea from the Maghreb to Mesopotamia.
You have to know about the history of this part of the world to appreciate what any of these concepts mean.
It is a pity that nothing is ever taught in schools except - at best - a little modern history of Egypt.
Even then, Nasser was likewise a nationalist. But aside from his short-lived union with Syria,
he did not concentrate on the lands beyond Egypt's borders as much as he did revolutionizing -
and secularizing - Egyptian society.
Egypt of course had been a monarchy before, under King Farouk. So opposite ideas had to
be inculcated in the population. But these were foreign ideas and were accompanied by a close
alliance with Soviet Russia. Yet, perhaps you would scramble to pin the blame on Islam for
a terrible rule by Nasser !
I assure you : Arab Nationalism and Islam are ANTITHETICAL. Muslims heartily oppose a nationalist
ideology for that reason.
Conversely, Arab Nationalists despise Islam as backward and retrograde, holding society back from
glorious secular achievements [none of which ever happened anyway. Saddam's Iraq was by far and away
the most advanced of any Arab country, but with all the gigantic oil riches at his disposal, that
was not a tremendous accomplishment to build up Iraq's infrastructure and
give its citizens a decent standard of living. However, Syria and Egypt under nationalist rule yielded few results.]
Where Islam focuses on the entire world, as a unit, and looks down upon the idea of nation=states as
supreme forms of government, the Baathists sought to undermine Islam in order to gain their goals of
building up Arab countries without religion, by subtituting a flag-waving party and a dictator to be
worshipped instead of God. Maybe a shade like Hitler's agenda....he didn't favor ANY religion, and
neither did either of the Baathist neighbors. All 3 leaders engineered a cult of personality to replace
the natural instinct to venerate God.
