PRAXIS SUR

Human rights in Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Palestine

Profesor MOHAMAD TAY[1]

The case of human rights in our region is not good; there are problems in each country stumbling blocks in their quest in enjoying these rights.

In Lebanon, for example there are freedoms reach sometimes its limits until it escapes from restrictions, but it stays without effectiveness, and could not make any change, because the goals of the popular components reach in the national issue somewhat to the conflict that reflects in the social sphere for two reasons:

First:  the Poor confidence between components that result stemming from the conflicting in the national issue.

Second: The authority can depict the social struggle of each team with malice as it targets the other team.

However, if we see nowadays a kind of unity movements, therefore, the negative attitude to this unity is from the system itself, so it is easy to turn into divisions in the positive phase which is the construction phase.

The signs of divisions begin to appear from now.

In Syria, the issue of human rights was problematic before the crises, as the social rights were affordable, while the political rights were not affordable; the power was for the intelligence only. When Bashar al-Assad took power, he allows certain level of Freedom with many realistic and legal obstacles.

Directly before the movements and with its beginnings, the president was ready to recognize more rights and freedoms either in kind or in the level of acceptance of each of the rights and freedoms.

In Iraq, the situation is similar to the Lebanese case either in the widespread freedoms or in the social divisions, this situation makes fighting these rights without any effectiveness, and has not changed what happened in Iraq. So fighting these rights paid the public to lead large movements against the rulers in areas where most of the authority figures belong.

As for Jordan, the situation is different, because there are political parties, also there’s an election going on, but the Maestro is the king who actually rules, while the prime minister holds political responsibility before parliament and people. Here the government needs two confidents: the king confidence and the parliament confidence.

If we go to Palestine we can see that Palestinians have a democratic tradition, this tradition was existed before the establishment of authority and has continued until now, in Palestine There's an election going on there, but the balance of power has been exceeded, as The President and the Parliament would continue their functions after the end of their respective terms. However, the authority is local one and they have no sovereignty because the sovereignty is for the Israeli state only.

Furthermore, we can see that the divisions in the arena effect on democracy and human rights as both sides the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas accuses each other in restricting the freedoms of their supporters.

The final sample is Egypt, the human rights situation had declined compared to the previous eras, nowadays, no one is allowed to talk about the president policy who enjoys broad powers makes him the actual leader, however president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has thrown out the Judges attitude in the case of Sanafir and Tiran the two islands at the entrance to the Gulf of Aqaba which enjoy crucial and strategic location, Sisi has waived on the right of these two islands for Saudi Arabia. Sisi tightened the noose on freedoms, especially the freedom of the media, he also impose severe punishments by his own judiciary against journalists.

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[1] Investigador y dirigente político libanés. Partícipe del XIV SEMINARIO INTERNACIONAL ANTONIO GRAMSCI. Vinculado con la revista Pensamiento de Ruptura, y el proyecto COLEGIO TRASCONTINENTAL SUBALTERNO que coordina el Grupo Presidencialismo y Participación y la SOCIEDAD GLOBAL GRAMSCI. www.seminariogramsci.com, presid.y.partic@gmail.com