Iran's expansionist dash towards the Levant and the Gulf region reminds some of us of a previous dash linked to Nasser's Egypt. The fact is that the nation-state system, in the form on which it settled upon in the region, has not known since its inception anything bigger than these two dashes, which shook and challenged this system. Assad's Syria attempted to mimic this imperial task, but its own resources did not allow it to have what was otherwise possible for Egypt and Iran. Saddam's Iraq also tried its luck at the same time, but only reaped tragedies for itself and others. Concerning the Gulf countries, these aspired to nothing more than strengthening their influence thanks to their financial resources, as part of maintaining the standing nation-state system. And as for the imperial caricature that Gaddafi's Libya showcased from time to time, that only reflected the mood of its leader and his limited abilities. In turn, Nasser's Egypt, whose dash took it all the way to Yemen, had prior to that contributed to causing two civil wars in Lebanon and Jordan, requiring US and British military intervention in these two countries. Even Iraq was not spared the effects of this dash, which then Iraqi Prime Minister Abdul Karim Qassim stood against. As a result, the Iraqis were divided into "Iraqi patriots", with a Shiite majority in their ranks, and "Arab Nationalists," with a Sunni majority. It was clear that the Egyptian dash tempted the countries of the Levant to tear apart the mantle of the state, and fall back to sectarian, tribal, and narrow regional loyalties. Indeed, in addition to Iraq, the Lebanese became polarized with Muslims and Christians on opposing sides, while the Jordanians became divided into East Jordanians and Palestinian Jordanians. And in Yemen, the Zaidi fervor was awoken, as the traditional vessel of Yemeni identity. Naturally, the temptation did not go very far, and the fragmentation did not reach the same extent we see today. To be sure, small identities were still ashamed of themselves, compared to national bonds and some values of modernism that still had the momentum of their initial ascent. Furthermore, the circumstances of the Cold War reined in this trend, and urged compromises for it. And perhaps Egypt's Sunni identity has also helped curb the extent to which fragmentation could have reached, since the Sunni sect represents the majority in the region. However, the Iranian dash is succeeding today where the Nasserist dash had failed in yesteryears. A cross-border line is thus taking shape, dividing societies into Sunnis and Shiites, and putting them together in the midst of a conflict that is almost existential. Obviously, conflicts have their own history and causes in every country, and this existed before the Nasserist and Khomeinist dashes. But what is no less obvious is the fact that Nasser's Egypt and Khomeini's Iran have provided the causes for rekindling these conflicts, until we finally reached what we are seeing today. There are several common traits between the two dashes: Both regimes are anti-democratic, and believe in cross-border ideologies, Arabist in one case and Islamist in the other. The first regime was a friend of the Soviet Union, while the second is a friend of the Russian Federation. They both used the conflict with the West and Israel as a pretext to expand their influence, and their policies both undermine the fragile unity of the societies they deal with, up to bringing in foreign forces to intervene in order to defend the status quo. The Nasserist dash ended with the defeat of 1967, after shaking the entire Arab map from end to end. But before that, Syria, by regaining its sovereignty from Egypt in 1961, had directed an early blow to that dash. As for the Iranian dash, it continues to exercise its ability to shake the map and fragment societies. However, Syria, apparently, might be able to stop Iran dead in its tracks. Today, we count on the courage of the Syrian people to achieve this, despite everything.
