Asia Times Online


	December 5, 2001	atimes.com

Front

Battle lines drawn in Kuwait

KUWAIT CITY - The war in Afghanistan might be far away from Kuwait, but it still feels close. This is not only because people watch the news about the developments every day, but because Osama bin Laden's spokesman, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, is - or was - a Kuwaiti and there are rumors that about 60 Kuwaitis have died over the past two days in the fighting in Afghanistan.

Abu Ghaith materialized as a member of the Al-Qaeda network for the first time on television on October 7, sitting next to bin Laden in a videotaped message broadcast by the Qatari-based al-Jazeera Television. Abu Ghaith claimed that at least 20 Kuwaitis were members of Al-Qaeda. But even worse, he said that Gulf states, including Kuwait, had been a source of funding for bin Laden. His statements sent shock waves through Kuwait, whose authorities were quick to say Abu Ghaith was a traitor to his country and then stripped him of his nationality.

Abu Ghaith was known in Kuwait for his fundamentalist thinking. He had often been at odds with the government for his sermons. In 1994, he went to Bosnia for two months to fight with Muslims there. But never did it emerge that he was linked to Al-Qaeda.

His comments triggered fierce criticism from Kuwait's liberals who say the government has been too lax on Islamists and did not monitor Islamic charities closely enough. Many Kuwaitis are now warning against the growing power of the Islamists.

Liberals also believe there is a reason people like Sulaiman Abu Ghaith exist. "Our schools feed hatred toward non-Muslims. By portraying yourself as grandiose, you demonize the other," says Ahmad Bishara, a political analyst and secretary general of Kuwait's National Democratic Movement. "We are not a tolerant society and we need to scrutinize ourselves, the upbringing in schools, the sermons in mosques."

Although there are Kuwaitis who have fought or are still fighting in Afghanistan, there is no proof of an Al-Qaeda network in Kuwait or wide popular support for bin Laden in a country where most people still feel grateful to the United States for ousting Iraqi forces from their soil in 1991. "Maybe there are Kuwaitis who support bin Laden, a few or maybe even a hundred, but it is a negligible phenomenon," said Ismail Shatti, a senior member of the Islamic Constitution Movement, Kuwait's Muslim Brotherhood.

In his new office in the Salmiyya shopping area, Shatti is surrounded by objects of art, beautiful carpets and antique furniture. He dismisses Abu Ghaith's claims that Al-Qaeda had been receiving money from Kuwaitis. "Kuwaiti Islamists are not the terrorists that liberals here are portraying them to be."

With a small population of 825,000, Kuwait is the only Gulf country with an elected parliament. It is also a welfare state with substantial social benefits that keeps everybody in line, unlike for example Saudi Arabia, where petrol wealth is concentrated in the hands of thousands of princes and where pro-bin Laden feelings are on the rise. But the ruling family here is clinging to power and although none of its members are "enthusiast Muslims", as one Kuwaiti put it, it has for decades used the Islamists to fend off the threat from democrats, leftists and nationalists.

Unlike other Arab countries with the same alliance of convenience, in Kuwait this has never degenerated into violence, carefully shunned by the Kuwaiti Islamists. "Everybody here is wealthy, even the Islamists. There is no reason for them to turn to violence, when they drive Cadillacs and go on holidays to Europe," said Ali el Baghli, a former oil minister.

But the ruling family's power game has turned Islamists into the most powerful group in Kuwait, with considerable financial and political clout. They control the student union and teacher's unions. A small majority of members of parliament is Islamist or pro-Islamist. They have made small gains over the years, managing to keep voting rights for women from being passed by parliament and recently pushing through a bill for segregation in universities.

Since September 11, liberals in Kuwait have been hoping the ruling family will distance itself from the Islamists, who are viewed with suspicion in many other Arab countries and especially in the West.

They point to some of the steps taken by the government over the past two months, mainly the decision to scrutinize Islamic charities more closely to detect any channeling of funds to Al-Qaeda, but mostly the rejection by the government of a parliamentary proposition to Islamise the penal code. This would have introduced flogging and the cutting off of hands as punishments for adultery or theft.

Although some Kuwaitis feel their country is becoming more Islamic, an Islamic penal code would not go down well here. While almost all men dress in the traditional and cooling white robe or dishdasha', women, veiled or not, are heavily made up, dressed fashionably in often revealing ways. Adultery is reportedly rampant and cruising to pick up women is an ongoing favorite activity among some. Still, there is worry as to how far the ruling family will go to appease the Islamists.

Although it is possible that the recent events might cool the relations between the ruling family and the Islamists, it will probably not last long and will not necessarily benefit the liberals.

"Wishful thinking from the liberals," says the deputy editor of a local newspaper. He believes that the ruling family will continue to play a game of balance between the two political forces in the country, setting them off against each other to distract both from the main issue, the ruling system. He adds that with both the ruling emir and the crown prince ailing and old, the fight for the succession is in the air - and Islamists will again be heavily courted.

(Inter Press Service)

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