Talk:Syrian Social Nationalist Party

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Contents 1 Fascism? 2 SSNP Is Arabist 3 "Official" site 4 Ghastly mess 5 Degree of territorial ambition 6 1949 7 Fascist? (II) 8 Questionable recent edits 9 Wrong references 10 logo 11 The Racial theories of Antoun Saadee 12 Fascism

[edit] Fascism?

Copied from User talk:Jmabel

i found the reference cited in the ssnp article at the following address

http://past.thenation.com/doc/20050103/irwin

and it does not state "and its ideology drew heavily on the European fascists of the period, especially Benito Mussolini. "

it is an article about a Syrian poet (adonis) and the only refernce to fascism in it is "The charismatic Sa'ada put forward quasi-fascistic arguments for the future destiny of a Greater Syria "

? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Objktv (talk • contribs) 25 Aug 2005.

My sincere apologies. I didn't have the article in front of me, and that's where I thought this came from. I'll try to do some research and back it up with a citation. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:56, August 25, 2005 (UTC)

I think we are best off leaving this out unless someone wants to do some legwork. 45 minutes or so of web searching finds quite a few blogs suggesting that Saadeh's politics were more or less fascist, but not much from anything like a solid source. I did turn up a rather interesting New York Times article "'Pink Communism' in the Middle East; Though doctrinaire Marxism is negligible, Arab nationalism and an urge for rapid social betterment serve Russian aims in a troubled area" by Elizabeth Monroe (of The Economist), Jun 7, 1953. p. SM9 (6 pages). The article is rather condescending to Arabs, but nonetheless has an interesting thesis that the "Communism" of the time in Arab countries was more of a veneer for politics more resembling fascism or national socialism. Its one reference to Saadeh is in this context: "The right label for the doctrine he [the Arab of the time] is absorbing is not Communist; it is national socialist or—or as the Greater Syria shirt movement of the late Antun Saadeh prefers to call it—"social nationalist, which is less prone to misunderstanding." (p.26) -- Jmabel | Talk 05:44, August 26, 2005 (UTC)

I think that thesis is somewhat politically driven. Certainly, there were a couple of different strands of Arab political opinion at the time presenting themselves as broadly socialist or progressive. Communists were (contrary to that writer) a significant element in Iraq at that time, and by no means negligible in Syria. More important (except in Iraq) were movements considering themselves "Arab socialists" such as the Baath, Akram al-Hurani's Arab Socialist Party in Syria, and, soon afterwards, Nasserism. The Baath party founders were clearly influenced by, though by no means fully accepting of, Marxism, and the Baath party in later years, cf the 1963 Sixth Party Congress and the 'shubatiyyin' government in Syria, were heavily "Marxisant". Saadeh, I think it's fair to say, was influenced by fascism, but he was relatively unusual in that among the Arab socialist organisations. The other organisations should perhaps be better compared with socialist but non-communist organisations in other ex-colonial countries, such as Latin America and Africa. These generally had a nationalistic leaning, and in some cases resorted to statism as much as a necessary means of economic development as for Marxist-inspired ideological reasons. They also, in many cases, ended up in the Soviet camp (Cuba and Nicaragua being cases in point), while others remained non-aligned (e.g. Tanzania). But to point to the use of the term "socialist" in conjunction with nationalist tendencies and draw a paralell with fascist regimes in Europe is quite inaccurate, I would think. Palmiro | Talk 17:10, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] SSNP Is Arabist

There is much which appears to be wrong with the article.

Antun Saddeh was not anti arab nor did he believe that the Arab Conquest had done damage to the greater syrian nation.

Article III of the SSNP charter states.

The aim of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party is the creation of a Syrian Social Nationalist renaissance which will fulfill its declared principles and return the Syrian nation to vitality and strength; the organization of a movement seeking the complete independence of the Syrian nation and the vindication of its sovereignty; the establishment of a new order to protect its interest and raise its standard of living; and the endeavor to form an Arab front.

Syria is one of the Arab nations and indeed is the nation qualified to lead the Arab world as the Syrian Social Nationalist Party proves conclusively. It is obvious that a nation with no internal cohesiveness to insure its unity and progress cannot help revive other nations and lead them along the path of progress and success. Syrian nationalism is the only genuine practical way, the first prerequisite for the awakening of the Syrian nation and its ability to work for the Arab Cause.

Those who believe that the Syrian Social Nationalist Party seeks Syria's withdrawal from the Arab World, because they do not distinguish between Syrian national awakening and the Pan-Arab cause, are grossly mistaken.

We shall never relinquish our position in the Arab World, nor our mission to the Arab World. We want first and foremost to be strong in order to accomplish our mission more adequately. Syria must forge ahead in its national revival so that it can fulfill its great mission.

http://www.ssnp.com/new/ssnp/en/ssnp.htm#III Here is the whole thing.

70.128.227.112 18:47, 9 January 2006 (UTC)TheLibyan

For the record, the cute material was:

Saadeh believed that Syria's greatness had been tarnished through a series of invasions, especially the invasion of Arab Muslims shortly after the founding of Islam. Saadeh in his writings often dismissed the Arab influence on Syria as being "of the East". To him, Syria was a "Western" nation, and its people Syrians, never Arabs.

I'm not sure who wrote this passage (although I believe I copy-edited it), but the source appears to be [1]. I have no idea how seriously to take that source. It is clearly Lebanese nationalist, so would not be well disposed toward the SSNP. -- Jmabel | Talk 20:49, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

The problem here is that the SSNP nowadays is trying rather hard to pretend that it has always held its current positions, including its current positive view of Arabism. In fact that's not the case at all.

As for cedarland.org, this particular material doesn't appear on it, though something similar does. Mostly their stuff on political parties seems reasonably accurate and balanced, but I don't know enough about the topic to give a definitive judgement on that, and it's not exactly ideal source material. Somebody somewhere must have a book about Saadeh... Palmiro | Talk 14:37, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Official" site

http://www.alqawmi.com/ was recently substituted for http://www.ssnp.net/ as an "official" site. I suspect they should both be linked; I don't read Arabic, so I don't know their respective statuses. Can someone please sort this out? -- Jmabel | Talk 06:28, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

i read a bit of arabic, and after a quick check they both seem official enough (although i didn't find exact ownership of the sites). probably just a new page, but of course it could competing branches or something. i dunno. why not have both links, both pages are big? Arre 06:52, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I also noticed this change and had a quick look at them both but coudn't tell what was going on. I also think they should both be there, at least until we can work out what exactly the situation is. If people are determined to remove one of them and say in big bold letters that the other is the genuine official site, that certainly suggests some sort of rivalry, perhaps between different factions. Palmiro | Talk 15:22, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ghastly mess

Could someone who understands these things better than me please try and sort out the mess caused by the dispersal of the intro, table of contents and text at random between various pictures and templates? Please?? Palmiro | Talk 15:26, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Degree of territorial ambition

The lead paragraph says that the party "advocates the establishment of a Greater Syrian national state, including present Syria, Lebanon, Cilicia, Israel, the Palestinian territories, Cyprus, Jordan, Kuwait and Iraq." A map in the article shows even greater territory, including Sinai. The statement in the lead is cited to Irwin, who says only that "The charismatic Sa'ada put forward quasi-fascistic arguments for the future destiny of a Greater Syria (so great that it was to include Palestine, Lebanon, Cyprus and even Iraq, which was to be redesignated Eastern Syria)." Lebanon and Jordan are clearly implicit in Irwin's description, and Kuwait pretty much so (as "part" of Iraq), but Cilicia and Sinai are not. Do we have separate citation for those? - Jmabel | Talk 22:15, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Picture on this page tends to suggest that this may be entirely correct, but I do not know how official that site is, and do not read Arabic so I am not confident of the significance of the map. - Jmabel | Talk 22:19, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Just calling by - I'm not back! I'm not sure about Sinai, but where does Cilicia come into it? The map doesn't seem to show any Turkish territory that wasn't part of Syria at least initially in 1920 (you can check this against any historical map of the French mandate, but that's what it looks like to me). I never checked the Irwin citation, but I have seen all sorts of SSNP maps in various publications and as far as I recall they all looked like that - but that's just going on memory. I think, also from memory, the ssnp.info site is an amateur supporter's site. I don't have time to check any of this at the moment. User:Arre might be able to help. Palmiro

Just noticed a citation for this on Antun Saadeh. Palmiro

http://www.ssnp.com/new/about.htm - It doesn't get any clearer than that, folks. Joffeloff 17:56, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

So I'll remove Cilicia and cite this. - Jmabel | Talk 15:50, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 1949

An uncited, anonymous edit removed "after the cancellation of legislative elections in Lebanon in which he had hoped for electoral success, the party attempted a coup d'état, which failed", replacing it with "Lebanese authorities incited the phalangists to attack the offices of the SSNP newspaper when Antun Saadeh was in it's offices, the gouvernment then used this attack to start a massive crackdown on the SSNP and it's leader". I'm pretty sure the old version was correct, so I have restored it. I'd appreciate citation for either. - Jmabel | Talk 18:46, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fascist? (II)

Discussed here. --Filius Rosadis 23:59, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I have asked you a question there. Palmiro | Talk 00:20, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Questionable recent edits

• 900,000 members in Syria??? The article used to say 90,000.
• "Its popular support in Lebanon is now rather limited," which I think is true, was replaced by the quite contrasting "Its popular support in Lebanon remains untill this day."
• Added "Bachir Gemayel was mainly killed because of his close ties with the Israeli government and his hatred towards non-Christian Lebanese." This may even be true, but it looks to me like an uncited opinion as to why something occurred.

- Jmabel | Talk 06:04, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

I've reverted these changes. The first two are incorrect and unsourced (hint to editors: your changes are more likely to stick if you can provide a reliable source) to back them up, and that article bears reading). The third is one point of view, and not an entirely invalid one by any means, but it is indeed "an uncited opinion as to why something occurred". Let's leave such conclusions to the historians (i.e., once more, Wikipedia:Reliable sources). Palmiro | Talk 22:43, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wrong references

"References" include the following point:

• Irwin, Robert, "An Arab Surrealist". The Nation, January 3, 2005, 23–24, 37–38. There is an online version, but only the first two paragraphs are shown to non-subscribers.

But the article "An Arab Surrealist" seems to deal entirely with contemporary Syrian poet Adonis, with no mention of or clear link to the party this Wiki entry is about. There's a similar problem with reference #1: it points to SSNP's webpage; so why is "Irwin, p. 24" mentioned? --Filius Rosadis 16:19, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Irwin is referenced for the following passage in that article: "In Damascus he became involved with Antun Sa'ada and his Syrian National Party. This party put Syria and its legends and history before pan-Arabism or Islamism. The charismatic Sa'ada put forward quasi-fascistic arguments for the future destiny of a Greater Syria (so great that it was to include Palestine, Lebanon, Cyprus and even Iraq, which was to be redesignated Eastern Syria). After a failed attempt at a coup in Lebanon, Sa'ada was executed in 1949." - Jmabel | Talk 23:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] logo

Is there any reliable source on the origin of the logo? It looks suspiciously like typical 1930s/40s fascist symbolism (a stylized swastika or sonnenrad), but obviously a better source than speculation would be nice. --Delirium 05:58, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The Racial theories of Antoun Saadee

I found this link. it is very interesting.

The Racial theories of Antoun Saadee

http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.lebanon/browse_thread/thread/921a7bfbb5fbf68d/7bc91510d2b05598?lnk=gst&q=the+racial+theories+of+antoun+saadee&rnum=2&hl=en#7bc91510d2b05598

Although the SSNP is constantly on the defensive when accused of having incorporated Nazi and racial elements into the body of its ideology, I want you to compare and contrast the following passages from the Nazi Bible with those of Antoun Saadee's.

. "Mein Kampf " by Adolf Hitler, page 286.

"if Nature does not wish that weaker individuals should mate with the stronger, she wishes even less that a superior race should intermingle with an inferior one; because in such a case all her efforts, throughout hundreds of thousands of years, to establish an evolutionary higher stage of being, may thus be rendered futile.

History furnishes us with innumerable instances that prove this law. It shows, with a startling clarity, that whenever Aryans have mingled their blood with that of an inferior race the result has been the downfall of the people who were the standard- bearers of a higher culture. In North America, where the population is prevalently Teutonic, and where those elements intermingled with the inferior race only to a very small degree, we have a quality of mankind and a civilization which are different from those of Central and South America. In these latter countries the immigrants ââ???¬â€œ who mainly belonged to the Latin races ââ???¬â€œ mated with the aborigines, sometimes to a very large extent indeed. In this case we have a clear and decisive example of the effect produced by the mixture of races. But in North America the Teutonic element, which has kept its racial stock pure and did not mix it with any other racial stock, has come to dominate the American Continent and will remain master of it as long as that element does not fall a victim to the habit of adulterating its blood.

In short, the results of miscegenation are always the following:

(a) The level of the superior race becomes lowered;

(b) physical and mental degeneration sets in, thus leading slowly but steadily towards a progressive drying up of the vital sap. "..

From Saadee's "Ten Lectures" we read that "the Syrians in the case of the Canaanites who colonized Africa considered Negroes and Libyans to be lesser breeds." Carthage fell at a later stage, we are told, at the hands of the "Romans, a superior race at par with that of the Canaanite Syrians."

Further, we see "the Arabs allowing under Islamic Sharia, copulation with all races and peoples ......in Africa which did not result in any real civilization, unlike that of Carthage of the Syrian Canaanites, because the granting of equal rights to all peoples made the Arabs lose some of their racial ingredients and vitality which were gained by the Africans, but between the lifting of the African racial mix and the lowering of the Arabs' , a middle mix was created that was closer to the lower or decadent racial mix,"- from "The Ten lectures" pp-71-72.

Hitler advocated and saw in the Aryans but one superior Race . For Saadee, on the other hand, The Syrians were a "mixture of races." However, the end result, as we saw in the above passages, was the same. The Syrian is compared, and is at par, with the European, Italian, Roman or peoples that are on a higher civilisational plane. But The Syrian according to Saadee is "superior to the Arab, the Afghan, the Indian."

While Saadee rejected Nazism in theory, he ended up accepting it in practice (see "The SSNP, An ideological analysis" by Labib Zuwiya Yamak, 1966).

These rather racist and embarrassing passages from the Zaim confuse SSNP partisans and an attempt to refute was made by a new breed of SSNP intellectuals, especially amongst those that settled in Australia and attended Melbourne University. A recent analysis came from Adel Bicharra , "Syrian Nationalism; An inquiry into the political philosophy of Antun Saadee" (unpub.M.A Prelim. Diss. Melbourne University, 1987) Quote "On the contrary, Sa'adeh regarded racial fusion as one of the driving forces of human history. Although he distinguishes between higher and lower civilizations he never lost sight of the common sense approach of the race relations......Higher civilization was thus seen as the product not of racial purity, as the nationalist socialists would have us believe, but of the group's ongoing interracial mixture, and vice versa in relation to lower civilizations."

One can easily see a certain desperation on the part of this zawba3je becharra trying to defend his master. He fails to explain why this "Syrian mix" would get degraded, if it were to fuse with "lower or inferior races-whatever that means." Saadee's racism has nothing to do with the far superior ecosystem of the fertile crescent but is rather a pure Nazi biological racial theory and a direct borrowing from Hitler.

Perhaps the SSNP should tell us if "their Syrians are far superior" to say someone like the secretary general of the UN, Mr. Koffee Anan, a negro from Ghana with a PHD from Harvard who is married a swede. Maybe their children have lower racial mix than the scandinavian blood of their mother? Or maybe they should check out another negro like nelson Mendella or an Indian like Ghandi?

The SSNP is still stuck with its Nazi past and has yet to evolve. No book or cosmetics will help it here.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by PIERRE4 (talk • contribs) 11 February 2007.

[edit] Fascism

I note that someone keeps removing all references to fascist influences early on, despite these having been well cited for. I am registering my dissent here; I hope someone will take this up and follow through; but I am simply removing this from my watchlist, because I frankly don't care enough about this topic to keep fighting over this and I am heartily sick of trying to collaborate on an article with people who show no intellectual honesty. - Jmabel | Talk 07:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC)