The Martyrs' Revolutions: The Role of Martyrs in the Arab Spring

Abstract

AbstractThis article examines popular representations of modern martyrs in the Arab world, comparing national models of martyrdom representations prior to the Arab Spring, namely those from Iran, Palestine and Hizbullah in Lebanon, to portrayals of martyrs during and after the Arab Spring. It argues that the Arab Spring brought forth a new model for the martyr in the Arab world, which (a) moves the production of martyrs' images from the state to the citizen; (b) personalises portrayals of martyrs through stories of their personal lives; and, (c) transitions from portrayals of victimisation to empowerment and agency. In the Arab Spring model, the martyr is both a symbol and narrative framework used to galvanise opposition to state regimes. Unlike the pre-Arab Spring models, which portrayed the martyr's death as an honourable sacrifice for the larger national or religious community, the Arab Spring martyr is portrayed as a needless victim in the fight for the universal values of dignity and human rights, as both a product and producer of meaning associated with agency. As the meaning of the 'martyr' continues to evolve in the post-Arab Spring era, it has come to represent the power of the people more broadly. Notes 1 M. Hamarneh, Egypt 2011: From Movement to Revolution. Case Analysis. (Doha: Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, 2011), 2. 2 P. Chelkowski and H. Dabashi, Staging a Revolution: The Art of Persuasion in the Islamic Republic of Iran (New York: New York University, 2000), 305. 3 L. Calhoun, 'Islamic Martyrdom in the Postcolonial Condition', Text and Performance Quarterly 24, nos. 3/4 (2004): 327–47. 4 G. Hasan-Rokem, 'Martyr vs. Martyr: The Sacred Language of Violence', Ethnologia Europaia 33, no. 2 (2003): 100. 5 M. J. Al-Mashhadani, Ash-shahid fi manthour arabi islami (Baghdad: Dar ash-shou'oun al-thaqafiyya al-'amma, 1988), 14–15. 6 K. Lewinstein, 'The Revaluation of Martyrdom in Early Islam', in Sacrificing the Self: Perspectives on Martyrdom and Religion, ed. M. Cormack (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 78–91, 79–80. 7 Ironically, he himself was hailed as a martyr after his assassination in Beirut in 1989. 8 H. Khaled, Ash-shahid fi al-islam (Beirut: Dar al-'ilm lil-malayeen), 171. 9 A. Al-Shorbasi, Al-fida' fi al-islam (Cairo: Dar al-maaref, 1969).10 D. Browne and A. Silke, 'The Impact of the Media on Terrorism and Counter-terrorism', in The Psychology of Counter-terrorism, ed. A. Silke (London: Routledge, 2011), 89–110, 109–10.11 It is worth nothing that the Arabic word for martyr, shahid, is not used in the Qu'ran in its contemporary sense. Rather, the idea of martyrdom is explained in the Qur'an as 'For the Cause of God' (fi sabil illah) (See F. Shirazi, 'Death, the Great Equalizer: Memorializing Martyred (Shahid) Women in the Islamic Republic of Iran', Visual Anthropology 25, nos. 1–2 (2012): 98–119). There is also an established tradition of commemorating martyrs in Shi'ite history, which dates to the murder of Imam Hussein in Karbala. Contemporary Shi'as continue to reenact the martyrdom of Imam Hussein ritually on the Day of Ashura. (See: F. Ali and J. Post, 'The History and Evolution of Martyrdom in the Defensive Jihad: An Analysis of Suicide Bombers in Current Conflicts', Social Research, 75, no. 2 (2008): 615–54).12 The models are not meant to be comprehensive, but as characterizing dominant tropes of representation that are also found in other countries in the Middle East.13 L. Volk, Memorials and Martyrs in Modern Lebanon (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2010).14 I. Gershoni and J. Jankowski, Commemorating the Nation: Collective Memory, Public Commemoration, and National Identity inTwentieth-CenturyEgypt (Chicago: Middle East Documentation Center, 2004).15 K. Endres and A. Lauser, 'Contests of Commemoration: Virgin War Martyrs, State Memorials, and the Invocation of the Spirit World in Contemporary Vietnam', in Engaging the Spirit World, Popular Beliefs and Practices in Southeast Asia, ed. K. Endres and A. Lauser (New York: Berghahn Books, 2011), 121–43, 123.16 Y. Papadakis, 'Nation, Narrative and Commemoration: Political Ritual in Divided Cyprus', History and Anthropology 14, no. 3 (2003): 254.17 Ali and Post, 'The History and Evolution of Martyrdom in the Defensive Jihad', 616.18 Shirazi, 'Death, the Great Equalizer', 100.19 H.E. Chahabi and C. Fontini, 'The Art of Persuasion and Iran's Revolutionary Murals', Persica 22 (2008): 3.20 C. Gruber, 'The Message is on the Wall: Mural Arts in Post-Revolutionary Iran', Persica 22 (2008): 27.21 Ibid., p. 27.22 Ibid., 34.23 Shirazi, 'Death, the Great Equalizer', 115.24 Nonetheless, Shirazi also documents how the Green Movement was successfully able to frame the death of Neda Aghasoltan as an example of martyrdom, and thereby give the political resistance movement legitimacy. Neda's classification as a martyr, and her personalization, are a clear precursor to the martyrs of the Arab Spring (See Shirazi, 'Death, the Great Equalizer', 114).25 L. Khalili, 'Heroic and Tragic Pasts: Mnemonic Narratives in the Palestinian Refugee Camps', Critical Sociology 33, no. 4 (2007): 732.26 Ibid., 748.27 Ibid., 75028 Ibid., 73129 L. Allen, 'Martyr Bodies in the Media: Human Rights, Aesthetics, and the Politics of Immediation in the Palestinian Intifada', American Ethnologist 36, no. 1 (2009): 162.30 L. Allen, 'The Polyvalent Politics of Martyr Commemorations in the Palestinian Intifada', History and Memory 18, no. 2 (2006): 107–38.31 See N.L. Whitehead and N. Abufarha, 'Suicide, Violence, and Cultural Conceptions of Martyrdom in Palestine', Social Research 75, no. 2 (2008): 395–416.32 Allen, 'The Polyvalent Politics of Martyr Commemorations in the Palestinian Intifada'.33 Allen, 'Martyr Bodies in the Media'.34 D. Matar, What It Means to Be Palestinian: Stories of Palestinian Peoplehood (London: I.B. Tauris, 2010).35 Allen, 'The Polyvalent Politics of Martyr Commemorations in the Palestinian Intifada', 114.36 Khalili, 'Heroic and Tragic Pasts', 743.37 The parallels with the Iranian model are not surprising, considering that Hizbullah is a Shi'ite organization and partly sponsored and created by the Islamic Republic of Iran and has adopted many of the Republic's institutions and much of its discourse, particularly in its early years. See for example A. Saad-Ghorayeb, Hizbu'llah: Politics and Religion (London: Pluto Press, 2002).38 See L. Khatib, Image Politics in the Middle East: The Role of the Visual in Political Struggle (London: I.B. Tauris, 2013).39 One billboard commemorating the war depicts Israeli soldiers crying; their photograph is captioned, 'It's Lebanon, you fools!'. Another shows a destroyed house in Lebanon, with the English caption 'Extremely accurate targets!'.40 Hizbullah also celebrates the organizations' own martyrs, a mixture of those who died in combat, were involved in suicide operations, or were assassinated by Israel, with the highlight being the annual Martyr Day on November 11, the day of istishhad of Hizbullah's first martyr Ahmad Qassir (who died in a suicide operation in 1982).41 An example is the Hizbullah 'documentary' Al-Abaya, part of the 'Divine Victory' campaign, where the on-screen narrator, presented as an 'ordinary citizen', echoes this wish. For a discussion of this film and the general argument on martyrdom and empowerment, see Khatib, Image Politics in the Middle East.42 Ibid.43 Papadakis, 'Nation, Narrative and Commemoration', 267.44 S. Tarrow, 'Mentalities, Political Cultures, and Collective Action Frames: Constructing Meanings through Action', in Frontiers in Social Movement Theory, ed. A.D. Morris and C.M. Mueller (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), 174–202, 189.45 Allen, 'Martyr Bodies in the Media'.46 Even in Palestine, where symbolic production is not centralized, there is a strong trend of martyr representations being used to serve the aims of political organizations, such as in the case of Hamas. For further discussion, see A. Alshaer, 'Towards a Theory of Culture of Communication: The Fixed and the Dynamic in Hamas' Communicated Discourse', Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication 1, no. 2 (2008): 101–21.47 S. Khamis and K. Vaughn. 'Cyberactivism in the Egyptian Revolution: How Civic Engagement and Citizen Journalism Tilted the Balance', Arab Media and Society, 13 (2011) (Summer), http://www.arabmediasociety.com/?article = 769.48 S. Cottle, 'Media and the Arab Spring', Journalism 12, no. 5 (2011): 647–59.49 B. Al-Sheikh, 'Athawrat al-arabiya faradhat shouroutaha "ala al-i'lam... ila an yaheen maw'id thawratih"', Sada Journal May 11, 2012, http://www.carnegieendowment.org/sada/index.cfm?fa = show&article = 48094&lang = ar&solr_hilite = الاعلام.50 For example, see the publication 'Abjadiyyat ibda' 'afawi' published in 2012 by Dar Laila in Cairo, which is based on social media content by Arab activist and dedicated to Arab Spring Martyrs. (See '84 mudawwinan yahdoun shouhada ar-rabi' al-'arabi awwal isdar electro-waraqi', Al-Shorouk, March 21, 2012, http://www.shorouknews.com/news/view.aspx?cdate = 21032012&id = cec66f90-ade4-4ddd-a227-7e4cd6a5d95c.51 For example, see the entries for individual martyrs from different Arab countries in the online database 'Sijill shuhada' thawrat ar-rabi' al-'arabi', http://arab.yesegy.com/52 The title for the Facebook page is itself 'El-Shaheed', which translates into 'The Martyr' in English. Accessed at: 'We are all Khaled Said' Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/elshaheeed.co.uk53 E. Moosa, 'Aesthetics and Transcendence in the Arab Uprisings', Middle East Law and Governance 3, nos. 1–2 (2011): 178.54 Image available at: http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/photo-gallery-a-slap-heard-around-the-arab-world-fotostrecke-65800.html55 Image available at: http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/photo-gallery-a-slap-heard-around-the-arab-world-fotostrecke-65800-2.html56 B. Hooks, Yearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural Politics (Boston: South End Press, 1990).57 Moosa, 'Aesthetics and Transcendence in the Arab Uprisings', 178.58 J. Goodwin, J.M. Jasper and F. Polletta, 'The Return of the Repressed: The Fall and Rise of Emotions in Social Movement Theory', Mobilization: An International Quarterly 5, no. 1 (2000): 78.59 There are many examples of memorialization initiatives. One initiative: 'Lan-Nansahom' (We will not forget them) provides ages, professions, dates and circumstances of the deaths of all the martyrs of the Egyptian revolution (http://www.lan-nansahom.org/#!martyrs.) A similar project, from Syria, collects extensive information and statistics on the deaths of the Syrian revolution. (http://syrianshuhada.com/).60 W.H. Sewell, 'The Concept(s) of Culture', in Practicing History: New Directions in Historical Writing after the Linguistic Turn, ed. G. M. Spiegel (New York: Routledge, 2005), 76–95.61 Khatib, Image Politics in the Middle East.62 W. Armbrust, 'The Ambivalence of Martyrs and the Counter-revolution', Hot Spots: Revolution and Counter-revolution in Egypt, online forum by Cultural Anthropology (January/February 2012), http://www.culanth.org/?q = node/49163 For example see the digital archive of graffiti in Cairo, 'Cairo Street Art', set up by the Egyptian graffiti artist Ganzeer: http://ganzeer.com/cairostreetart/index.html64 Image http://www.cyberdissidents.org/bin/content.cgi?ID = 682&q = 3&s = 65 See 'We Are ALL Hamza Al-Khateeb' Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/pages/We-Are-ALL-Hamza-Al-khateeb/22900674711408266 Armbrust, 'The Ambivalence of Martyrs and the Counter-revolution'.67 M. Somers, 'The Narrative Constitution of Identity: A Relational and Network Approach', Theory and Society 23 (1994): 617, emphasis in original.68 J. Hearn, 'Narrative, Agency, and Mood: On the Social Construction of National History in Scotland', Comparative Studies in Society and History 44, no. 4 (2002): 748.69 Hearn, 'Narrative, Agency, and Mood', 749.70 Al-Jazeera, 'Mathaf yukhallid dhikra al-thawraal-misriyya', Al-Jazeera website (accessed August 22, 2011), http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E6A95EA4-6707-4B24-AFA2-CB22474FDAB6.htm?GoogleStatID = 9.71 71.B. Groys, Art Power (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2008), 27.72 G. Kavanagh, 'Melodrama, Pantomime or Portrayal? Representing Ourselves and the British Past through Exhibitions in History Museums', in Museum Studies: An Anthology of Contexts, ed. B.M. Carbonell, (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), 348–55.73 Hearn, 'Narrative, Agency, and Mood', 746.74 D. Archard 'Nationalism and Political Theory', in Political Theory in Transition, ed. N. O'Sullivan (New York: Routledge, 2000), 155–71, 165.