Paris Attacks Blowback From Syrian Civil War?
BY ABDELHAMID MAHMOUD
@HAMIDMAHMOUD12
SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER
The Paris terrorist attacks, which killed 129 and injured more than 350 on November 13, cannot be disassociated from the current carnage in Syria, says Sean McMahon, assistant professor of political science at AUC.
According to French President Francois Hollande, the attacks were planned in Syria and organized in Belgium.
Official reports have stated that mostly EU citizens who have spent time in Syria conducted the attacks, while the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility.
McMahon says that the Paris attacks are ‘blow back’ resulting from intense imperialism in the region.
There has been an outpouring of shock on major global news networks and while many in the region have condemned the attacks, some have questioned why the same kind of attention and grief has not been expressed regarding the loss of life in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, to name a few.
Just a day before the Paris attacks, two suicide bombers blew themselves up and killed at least 40 people in South Beirut.
“We can see a clear double standards [when we look to the attacks], the day before there were shootings in Beirut, that didn’t gain the same publicity that the Paris shootings gained,” says McMahon.
He added that there should be no difference between a French and a Lebanese life.
McMahon sees that the events in Paris will be “mobilized to increase the suffering of the weak and marginalized.”
But Ambassador Ibrahim Mohieldeen, director of the European department at the Arab League, told The Caravan that the choice of soft targets – a concert hall, a restaurant, and a football stadium – indicate that ISIL “means to launch a war on European life.”
“What happened in Paris will be a turning point, just like 9/11 was for the United States,” Mohieldeen said.
Mohieldeen also predicts considerable socio-political change following the attacks.
“While the French president was addressing the parliament, he said that there will be constitutional changes [to adapt to the current situation].”
Mohieldeen also alluded to the French tradition of joie de vivre – in the aftermath of the attacks, they insisted on going to restaurants and bars, in defiance of the ISIL threat.
Last week, the pyramids were lit up in the colors of the French and Lebanese flags in solidarity with the victims and survivors of the attacks there.
The Caravan interviewed over 200 students to gauge campus opinion about the attacks. Many said that life will now become harder for Arabs heading to Europe.
“Islamophobia raised by the event will get Europeans to fear Muslims, not only extremists,” said Ahmed Nasser, a construction engineering junior.
Some students said they were worried that the discovery of Syrian and Egyptian passports could impact Egypt and those expats who live there.
The Syrian passport was found to have been forged, French police later said, and the Egyptian passport was that of a man who had accompanied his brother there for cancer treatment.
On Wednesday, French police killed two suspects and arrested seven. Four security officers were wounded in the raid in northern Paris.
But the raid reportedly killed Abdelhamid Abaaoud, suspected mastermind of the November 13 Paris attacks.
“These attacks induce fear in everyone,” says Psychology major Jumona Abdel Kader.
“If they can do that in France, then what can they do in Egypt, which has a weaker infrastructure?” she asked.
AUC students are worried that Egypt will bear the brunt of this global terrorism.
“It has a disastrous impact on Egypt, as this easily might happen to us too,” communication media arts major Lara Ziad said of the deadly attacks in Paris.
Hossam Reda and Rami Hassan contributed to this report.
