Mind you, I was only there a short time; I don’t mean to imply that my leaving is torturous like that of an exile. Rather, I simply note the tears that ran down my face as I walked across the tarmac to the plane, with a heavy feeling like I was leaving forever. I was not, of course, I can say even more certainly now (what, three years later and with enough miles to go the second it’s safe to do so), but I nonetheless had an ache in my chest that I’d never felt upon leaving anywhere else.

There was just…is just…something about Syria. I fell in love with it like no other, and thirty some-odd countries later, it still has my heart. For years I’ve read the blog posts of Yazan, Anas, and Maysaloon, for years I’ve dug through photos, but for the past three years I’ve simply dreamt of going back.

I want what’s best for the Syrian people, for my friends. I believe that’s freedom, but it is not I who decides how to get there.

Three years ago today I left Syria. One year ago today, Syria rose up. In one year, I can only hope I’ll be back.

Today, there are two stories making the rounds that illustrate this “tug of war” perfectly. The first is a New York Times blog post that demonstrates the Syrian state news agency’s (SANA) falsification of evidence in its argument that rebels are funded by foreign agents. Another, on CNN and elsewhere, reports a tragedy: More than 40 Syrian soldiers allegedly executed by the regime. In this case, the story may very well be true…but the only source is unnamed “activists.”

In fact, the latter is entirely illustrative of the mainstream Western (and Gulf) media’s approach to Syria. A quick glance at the reporting done by the New York Times, CNN, Alarabiya, and others shows that “unnamed activists,” “Syrian opposition activists,” and “human rights activists” are their primary–and often, only–sources.

In a paper I wrote for the conference I’m currently attending, I analyzed the reporting of several mainstream news sources on Syrian casualty reports between November 2011 and February 2012. While that paper isn’t quite ready for prime time, here’s a table illustrating what I found:

As I intend to argue in my paper, these sources…and their numbers (which vary wildly) matter. As I’ve written elsewhere, I have personal history with Syria. I have known and talked about the horrors of the regime since long before March 2011. But while even 1,000 civilian deaths are far too many, these numbers matter when they’re being used to justify intervention. The media’s almost total reliance upon activists–not simply citizens, but self-described activists–is therefore problematic.

And yet, criticizing that fact has become even more problematic. As I said on Twitter earlier today, “question activist reports and you’re shabih. Report on regime atrocities and you’re a shill for the GCC.” Seriously…you can’t win. The international community largely appears to view Syria in terms of black and white when the situation is in fact quite grey…or at the very least, unclear, unverifiable.

This brings me back to the point about the media. At the moment, you have what is essentially a divide between journalists, commentators, and media bureaus that are very clearly pushing the opposition line and those that appear to be shilling for the regime. And there’s no middle ground – there’s almost no one condemning the regime, for example, whilst simultaneously questioning the dominant opposition narrative. Those who dare search for truth are immediately labeled as being on one side or the other.

Comments on a recent NYTimes article by Tyler Hicks, who was with Anthony Shadid in Syria when he died.

This post isn’t about which side is right or wrong. As I’ve said before, what I think about Syria is well-known but frankly, it truly doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. What concerns me, rather, is that the media–whose job it is to report facts, objectively*–is not only pushing a certain narrative, but also ignoring certain truths: the non-civilian casualty toll, for example (this one in particular bothers me when I think about all of my friends that did or almost did their compulsory Syrian military service).

What bothers me most, however, is the sheer certainty with which both sides attempt to make their points. The New Yorker in the screenshot above, for example, is so sure that “one side is for life, the other for death.” I’m not so sure. I’m certain that the regime is killing civilians (if you’re going to argue with me on that, just go away), but I’m not sure that there aren’t bad actors amongst the legitimate opposition. I can’t be sure…especially not when the media isn’t doing their job.

*not my favorite term, as you might know, but it’s nonetheless relevant.

(Anas Qtiesh rightly points out my inaccuracy: a lot of opposition have begun to change their avatars to include the flag of the Syrian Republic rather than the current flag of Syria)

And that protectionism was at first, when the uprising began, pervasive in conversations about Syria. The opposition and pro-regime forces alike took a stance that Syria is for Syrians, and Syrian matters for Syrian discussion. Yet, slowly but surely, as the death toll rose higher and higher, the Syrian opposition (or should I say ‘oppositions’) has turned to outside help, leaving them vulnerable to a slew of accusations from the regime and its supporters, as well as the “anti-imperialist” crowd, that has joined the clarion call to delegitimize the opposition.

Before I go any further, I shall lay my cards on the table. Syria, for me, is personal. As I predict this blog post could reach farther than most, I need go no further, but suffice it to say that my connections there go deep, and are multi-faceted. Diverse, even. That said, I am no expert: My time in Syria has been minimal, and my studies of the country academic. In fact, in Damascus I sometimes found it difficult to reconcile my friends’ horror stories of abuse and torture with the beautiful calm city I fell in love with, and yet, their experiences are real, terrifying.

Therefore, when, last March, the first inklings of protest arose, I was both excited for them and wary, knowing the complexities that Syria’s diversity–as well as its place in the world–presents. I did–and do–support my friends who keep risking their lives to protest and report, take photographs and videos, and speak to the press, and I will continue to do so. There shall be no accusations of shabiha here.

So, with cards on the table, I speak. I am an observer of tragedy, and the tragedy is not only the ruthless violence against the Syrian people committed by the regime but also the polarization of commentators, media, and of course (most importantly), Syrians. And as an observer, I would like to talk about what I have observed these past few months; you might call me naive, but surely I am not more naive than the hawks who are permitted to write in respectable publications about Syria, only to compare it to Egypt or call for intervention without serious consideration. Surely I am not as silly as, say, Andrew Tabler, who in the New York Times referred to Druze as a “heterodox Shiite offshoot” or the Reuters journalist who thought it pertinent to use a Texan Christian website as a source for an article on what he called Syria’s “secretive, persecuted” Alawis. So, grant me that.

Opinions

I have spent nearly every day these past few months reading opinion pieces on Syria. The obsession started for one reason: The US media, namely the New York Times and the Washington Post, kept relying on the same two Syrians–both based outside the country–for quotes, and it was maddening. Meanwhile, global media wasn’t much better. And so, reluctant to pester my Syrian friends for opinions, I made it a point to read as many opinions as possible.

What I found is equally frustrating. From opinionators on Syria, be they Syrian or foreign, there are two dominating views: The first is the viewpoint of the Syrian National Council (SNC), or farther right. This “view area,” so to speak, ranges from the precise position of the SNC in calling for intervention, to the hawkish calls–such as this by Daniel Byman in Foreign Policy–for foreign intervention. The second dominant view comes from the anti-imperialist crowd. By and large, the anti-imperialists have largely failed to denounce the Assad regime, and those who have imply that any alternative is worse.

The first set of views is fairly easy to spot, and is indeed in line with the SNC, the public face of Syria’s opposition-in-exile. The second set is a bit more complicated, and for several reasons. First is the fact that the opposition’s legitimacy has been put in question by its opponents, for a few reasons: the SNC’s calls to the West for intervention, the inflation of death toll numbers, the acts of violence committed by opposition and the Free Syrian Army against civilians or officers. The second problem, of course, is the very real concerns about intervention, of which I will only skim the surface: concerns about imperialism are placed first and foremost (contrary to Russia’s stated concerns about the Libya intervention, the Iraqi occupation no doubt formed many’s opinions about the real motives behind intervention), followed by what I can only describe as legitimate concerns about civil war. After that comes a slew of concerns about existing interventions by foreign actors in Syria, from NDI to the CIA to the GCC, concerns which range from entirely legitimate to utterly ridiculous (not in that order).

Finally, what remains is the fact that no legitimate poll of Syrians in Syria exists to determine the veracity of claims that the majority still support Assad. Anecdotally, I wouldn’t doubt that a majority–or at least a very large minority–does, for one reason or another, prefer the regime to the alternative. But while I view that as unfortunate and likely caused by fear, those on the one side (such as Shadi Hamid) use the lack of statistics to imply that the SNC definitively represents the will of the Syrian people, while on the other side, pundits like Ed Husain and Sharmine Narwani use discredited polls (or in the case of Narwani, entirely unscientific ones conducted on Facebook).

In the Arabic media and the blogosphere, doubts about the SNC are more prominent, with distinction clearer between external and internal opposition.  And yet, (anecdotally), friends in Syria tell me that even some of the internal opposition has begun to lean reluctantly toward the outside for fear of no other options.  Whereas once there was trust in the regime to reform, that trust has been sidelined by its actions since.

All of this, of course, points to the fact that there is a genuine lack of understanding of the facts on the ground. Some (such as Narwani) chide the media for reporting unverifiable claims without making such demands of the state, to which the obvious response is that no proper verification can be done until the regime definitively opens its doors to a constellation of foreign observers.

A Third Way?

This all brings me to Joseph Massad’s piece yesterday in Al Jazeera, calling for a third way. Comparing Iraq of ten years ago to Syria today, Massad writes:

The Iraqi exile opposition insisted along with its US imperial sponsors and the chorus of pro-war American intellectuals that people should make one of two choices: for or against Saddam. While the US and its Iraqi partners had their way, the subsequent destruction of Iraq, the dismantling of its state structures, and the destruction of its societal cohesion is the clearest illustration of what such a choice entailed for the Iraqi people and their country.

Massad discusses the repeat of such discourse vis-a-vis Libya, with the same “with us or against us” mentality, adding:

By calling for imperial military intervention, the Syrian exile opposition invokes, without originality, the very same puerile yet insidious choices presented to anti-imperialist and pro-democracy Arabs and non-Arabs by the erstwhile bankrupt Iraqi and Libyan exile oppositions, namely, that there is only one choice to be made: for or against Assad.

I think Massad makes incredibly salient points, and I do believe, based on his track record vis-a-vis Iraq, that he is not simply paying lip service. But as Maysaloon also said yesterday in one of the best pieces on Syria I’ve read in months, Massad’s arguments seem to be out of touch with reality.

An example

Here’s the problem: In arguing for a third way, a domestic uprising without external support, Massad assumes not only that such a thing is possible, but that it would garner significant enough support. Just like Joshua Foust’s argument that Russia’s UN veto was a consequence of the Libyan intervention fails to take into account the fact that Russia has towed the Syrian state line since before a NATO intervention in Libya was on the table, Massad’s argument ignores the fact that many Syrians–long before the SNC became what it now is, and long before intervention was a serious question–failed to support the uprising. As Maysaloon writes:

If [anti-imperialists] were as vocal and enthusiastic in fighting for the moral and intellectual high ground in spite of the cynical attempts of oil potentates and princes to subvert the revolutions, then the miserable farce we are seeing today would never have happened. If there ever was a true third way for the anti-imperialists to follow regarding Syria, this is what Massad should have called for in his piece.

Thoughts

My opinion is not that interesting, nor does it carry any weight whatsoever. But in respect to what I’ve written above, here’s what remains:

Whatever the wrongs of the SNC or the Free Syrian Army, the fact remains that there is a homegrown and genuine uprising on the ground in Syria, regardless of what people like @LindaJuniper have to say.  Like Maysaloon, I would ask: do their wrongdoings make the Syrian revolution “any less deserving of support in light of the repression that it faces?”

To those who would dare to deny the existence of that repression, I have nothing to say, except: You are blind.  To the rest, who acknowledge it but choose to turn a blind eye, I’m simply not surprised.  They remind me of those who recognize Palestinian suffering but prioritize the concerns of Israelis.  To me, it’s no different; repression is repression, whether it comes from an occupier or an occupying, sham-elected dynasty.

But on the question of intervention itself, I am less forthright. With Libya, I kept my mouth firmly shut, choosing to support Libyans in their opposition to madman Qaddafi but stopping short of supporting intervention.  With Syria, with loved ones in Damascus, Aleppo, and Swaida, it’s much more difficult to remain ambivalent.  I know that there are less-than-honest actors involved, and I know that intervention could make things worse.  I also know that whether the widely publicized number of 5,000 or a more modest one of 3,000 or so deaths is accurate, even one death at the hands of a government is too many.

Which is only to say that I don’t know what to think.  I ask my Syrian friends regularly, and find that most are reluctant in their conclusions, whatever they may be.  But ultimately, their conclusions tend to come down to what Rime Allaf concluded in her New York Times piece yesterday:

It doesn’t matter how much support Bashar al-Assad’s regime still commands, nor does it ultimately matter why his fans still cling on to the illusion of his ability to remain in power. The regime has gone on a killing, torturing and jailing spree for nearly a year, and is still unable to crush the resistance that has now begun to arm itself and to exercise self-defense. It is a matter of time, and it is unclear how the transition will be achieved, but the majority of Syrians are sure of one thing: we have reached the end of an era.

And I’m afraid that, like Allaf, I have no solutions to offer.

Dobrá čajovna

Dobrá čajovna, according to Wikipedia, is a teahouse chain originating in Prague. But, two years before I visited Prague, I lived in Burlington, Vermont, where I regularly patronized Dobrá Tea, a teahouse in the center of town. I was told it was a copycat (not a franchise) of the original Prague version – while that may or may not be true, it’s fascinating to me, this element of globalization. Here’s the Burlington teahouse:

Dobrá Tea, Burlington, VT

My other favorites of this phenomenon come from beautiful Syria, where entrepreneurship is (or was, at least) thriving. The first example comes with a small story: In 2007, I moved to Boston from Morocco, upon which I discovered a great little, brand new cafe called In House Café. The owner, whom I quickly befriended, was a Halabi, and he served delicious Halabi food and exquisite cappucinos.

One day, I decided to create a fan page for the cafe, somewhat jokingly. While Googling for a photo of its logo, I was surprised to find not the Boston cafe that I’d become so familiar with, but a very similar one. Even stranger, the photo was taken by someone I know:

In House Coffee, Damascus

As it turned out, In House Coffee was a popular Syrian coffee chain, which I would later discover when I visited in 2009:

In House Coffee, Damascus

Though I can’t find a photo of the Boston edition, BU’s student magazine has a nice writeup of it, with interior photos and a profile of the owner, Ahmed Dairy, who apparently also owns a cafe in Aleppo. No mention, however, of In House Coffee.

But wait! It gets even weirder. Apparently there is also an In House Coffee, with the same logo as the Syrian one (the Boston cafe’s logo is similar, but not identical), in Worcester, Massachusetts!

In House Coffee, Worcester, MA

Now, those darn Halabis are awfully creative. After sharing this anecdote with a friend from Aleppo, he told me of another one…the story of Crema Cafe. What makes this story particularly strange is that it has the same Aleppo-Boston connection as In House.

In Harvard Square, Cambridge (MA), there is a lovely little cafe called Crema, which caters to the local student population, serving delicious baked goods and scrumptious coffees. As it turns out, in Aleppo, Syria, there is also a lovely little cafe called Crema, which caters to the local student population…well, you get the point. No one knows which cafe came first, but I’ve heard it suggested that, in this case, the Cantabrigian cafe is actually the replica. The two cafes’ logos are identical.

Unfortunately, I was unable to find photos of the Aleppo cafe, but here is the Cambridge location:

Crema Cafe, Cambridge

I think what fascinates me most about this phenomenon is not the copyright issues, but the fact that, before the Internet, this would have been an incredibly easy venture. Find an excellent cafe or restaurant, memorize it, and replicate it at home…instant business model! Nowadays, even if you can get away with it legally, you’ve got sleuths like me ready to expose you for your unoriginality.

If anyone has photos of the Aleppo location of Crema Cafe, do let me know.

When Egyptian-American journalist Mona Eltahawy was briefly detained–and beaten–by Egyptian authorities (read her account of that here), there was a concerted and fast-moving effort by her Twitter followers and friends online to quickly mobilize a solidarity campaign for her release, followed–post-release–by much discussion as to whether or not the campaign had actually helped. In Eltahawy’s case, I would wager that her relative fame and dual citizenship played a larger role than anything done online, but the global attention certainly didn’t hurt (for more on this, Zeynep Tufekci has done some fascinating analysis).

Tufekci hints that a campaign like #FreeMona or #FreeAlaa (Abd El Fattah) can improve the situation of other imprisoned Egyptians but doesn’t ask the question of whether campaigns like those can help lesser-known bloggers. As she points out, both Eltahawy and Abd El Fattah are well-known, sympathetic figures. Both received ample attention both from inside and outside of Egypt (by contrast, note how the campaign for Maikel Nabil has lagged). And yet, lesser-known bloggers are regularly made the object of solidarity campaigns: All it takes is one friend, one family member, or one sympathetic blogger from their country to throw up a site and get some attention on Twitter or Facebook. It may take longer, but evidence shows that the majority of these campaigns do result in significant attention. So, the question then, is this: Does that attention really help the individual?

I’ve been wondering this myself for some time, having been involved in numerous solidarity campaigns, including ones where the family of the detainee was somewhat uncomfortable with the campaigning, despite having given permission. There are times when the family or friends think a campaign might make the blogger’s situation worse; in most such cases that I’ve seen, they give in after a few weeks of no changes. Though I don’t think there are any conclusive answers as of yet, I’d like to share what little evidence I have come up with (some of which is, unfortunately, anonymous) to further the discussion.

First, we have a recent interview with Alaa Abd El Fattah, an Egyptian blogger and personal friend who was detained for 56 days, and released on December 25. In it, Abd El Fattah says [ at approximately 11:47]:

They knew that they couldn’t torture me because of the solidarity and the media attention, so they just made sure to try to use every other measure to put me at discomfort or add psychological pressure. But every other person arrested in the Maspero incident were tortured severely, and torture is still very systematic at police stations and in prisons.

In this case, there’s obviously very little to get excited about: Individuals without the benefit of global campaigns were still tortured, and Abd El Fattah was still detained for 56 days and made uncomfortable. And yet, he believes that the solidarity saved him personally from torture.

An account from Razan Ghazzawi’s blog also suggests that Syrian blogger Hussein Ghrer (whom, I should mention, is not well-known outside of the Syrian blogosphere) received better treatment after his case was amplified by the international blogosphere and media:

The 32 year-old blogger was kidnapped in Damascus in an ambush on 24-10-2011 and was taken to security services branches in Al-Khateeb and Kafaقsouseh, then was transferred to Adra prison, a prison that is considered by activists and revolutionaries as “haven” in comparison to security services, or worse, Air Intelligence service- a place where worst kinds of torture is practiced against detainees.

Ghazzawi, detained from 1-19 December, also stated that the campaign on her behalf was helpful in securing better treatment:

A tweet from Syrian blogger Razan Ghazzawi.

Azyz Amami, who was detained in Tunisia in January along with Slim Amamou, recalls that he and Amamou also later declared, on Tunisian television, that the international campaign for their release was helpful.

And speaking to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Azeri journalist Eynulla Fatullayev credited international campaigns with saving his life and securing his release.

I have also interviewed–on the condition of anonymity–three other people who have been detained in various countries, and who have been the subject of solidarity campaigns. Each said a variation on the same theme: That they were treated well, and sometimes even given special privileges, because of their status. One mentioned that it bothered him that the same treatment was not extended to his fellow detainees, a reminder that being a blogger is a position of privilege in its own way. Similar to his sentiment is that expressed by recently-released Bahraini blogger Zainab Al-Khawaja, who tweeted the day of her release:

Zainab Al-Khawaja expresses a desire to give attention to lesser-known cases in Bahrain

Al-Khawaja’s sister, Maryam, had also previously suggested that international support was the reason Zainab was not arrested at an earlier instance:

A tweet from Maryam Al-Khawaja suggesting that international support has been beneficial to her sister

But all of the bloggers I’ve spoken to individually have emphasized the importance of permission from family and/or friends before starting up a campaign (a recommendation cited in a recent post I co-wrote for EFF and Global Voices Advocacy). This isn’t always an easy thing to do, of course, and in some cases, may result in no campaign at all (if friends can’t contact family members, for instance).

There is also, I might add, evidence that some campaigns don’t help at all. Take, for example, that of Tal Al-Mallouhi, the teenaged Syrian blogger now imprisoned for two years, for allegedly spying for a foreign government. Despite ample international outcry, including from such prominent organizations as Amnesty International, Mallouhi remains in prison following an unfair trial. On the flip side, a lack of international attention can be detrimental, as Zainab Al-Khawaja points out:

Zainab Al-Khawaja feels that international attention is crucial

Ultimately, the only definitive takeaway from these cases is that authorities are paying attention to them. And that alone is enough to suggest that, in most cases (taking into consideration a blogger’s personal circumstances), solidarity campaigns that draw on international media are beneficial, if only minimally.

So, how can bloggers who are not as well-connected as Abd El Fattah or Eltahawy ensure that their name won’t be forgotten? At a recent event I spoke at in Istanbul, incidentally, a Turkish blogger asked me just that question. My short response at the time was–and I stand by this–to plug in to international networks, something which social media has made incredibly easy. The aforementioned EFF/Advox post puts forward some other recommendations, but I have no doubt there are others, and I look forward to whatever discussion this might generate.

Before I take on the task of rebutting some of the arguments in Mueller’s posts–which, by the way, I agree with in large part–I should note my own biases, for the sake of discussion. First, I have been amongst the throngs shouting opposition to the surveillance-industrial-complex. I have been doing it for about three years, while all the while not taking a particularly strong position toward any of the proposed solutions. Second, I largely oppose regulation of this industry by the United States government. This is for several reasons, but in a nutshell: I don’t trust them. If you require more detail, read this piece I wrote about it. Third, I think a lot of the current discussion/advocacy about this topic is unfocused and chaotic, which is a failure on our part. Though I have–along with other folks at some of the top human and digital rights organizations–coordinated a series of calls on the matter, it is admittedly a messy and complicated subject, and we don’t all agree on the solutions, which lends chaos to an already-chaotic situation.

Now, Mueller’s posts. The first, published on December 20 and entitled “Technology as symbol: Is resistance to surveillance technology being misdirected?“, starts strong with the premise that the movement against the sale of surveillance tech to repressive regimes–which Mueller applauds for both its publicizing of the issue and its awareness-raising of similar issues in democratic countries–has oversimplified the fight against the regimes using such technology, replacing the target (authoritarian regimes) with another, easier target (makers of the aforementioned technology).

As Mueller rightly points out, “It seems obvious, but gets lost in the shuffle: the problem lies in the users and uses of the technology, not in the equipment or software itself.” He continues, remarking that “this is not, at root, a problem of governments having or not having a specific device or piece of software. It is an institutional problem – one of balancing and routinizing social processes in ways that effectively limit, regulate and distribute political power and hold those who exercise it accountable.”

There is nothing disagreeable in either point, and it can certainly be said that some of the actors advocating for regulation in this space have focused heavily on certain regimes (Syria, Egypt, Libya) whilst turning a half-blind eye to the uses of surveillance technology in the United States, the UK, and other nations with the rule of law. Nonetheless, I would argue that the organizations leading the charge on this issue have been fairly even-handed, attacking restrictions on free expression in democratic and authoritarian countries alike.

Mueller then derides the call for regulation of surveillance technology, stating: “The problem with this approach is that information technology, unlike bombs or tanks, is fundamentally multi-purpose in nature.” On this point, I once again must agree. EFF has consistently chosen not to advocate for regulation of sales (by governments) for the same reason, opting instead to push for regulation at the corporate level and issuing a set of recommendations for companies wishing to do so.

Mueller also points out, as I have before:

Thus, there is little appreciation of the extent to which export controls and other restrictions might retard the overall diffusion and development of information and communication technology, cut off access to good people and good uses as well as bad ones, or restrict our own freedom to use the technology as and how we see fit.

Since I agree with Mueller on this, it’s worthwhile to put forth some of the counter-arguments. Essentially, those who argue for regulations tend to favor a licensing-style of such, in which companies must apply for licenses before being allowed to export their wares to a foreign government (or, in some variations, a foreign government on a particular list of “Internet-restricting countries”). This echoes the current sanctions placed on Cuba, Syria, Sudan, North Korea, and Iran to various degrees. Being well-versed in the regulations on Syria, what this means is that a company–such as Google–must apply for a license before it can release a product (either for sale or for download) in the country. Companies that fail to apply for a license but still make their product available can face severe penalties; violating the Commerce Department’s export controls on Syria, for example, can result in 20 years imprisonment and/or a $1 million fine. This, of course, has a chilling effect for Syrians, as many companies with limited resources find it not worthwhile to apply for the license and restrict their products from the country. Incidentally, EFF has also called for revision of export controls.

In the latter variation, as I mentioned, regulation would be restricted to “Internet-restricting countries,” a punishment for countries that block websites from their citizens’ view. This type of regulation has been presented before, multiple times, as the Global Online Freedom Act (for a timeless criticism of an earlier version of the bill, see Rebecca MacKinnon). The problems with such an approach should be, but somehow aren’t, obvious. First, a question: who creates the list of “good” and “bad” countries? Bahrain, a close ally of the United States, pervasively censors the Internet…would it make it on the “bad” list and would sanctions be levied thus? And even if the list were fair and just, what happens when such technology gets regulated? Do citizens of the “bad” countries suffer like Syrians have for years due to labyrinthine bureaucracy and poorly-worded export regs?

The primary concern about regulations should be, however, that they will do extremely little to curb the sale of surveillance tech. What happens when Cisco refuses to sell to Iran? Huawei steps in. And don’t forget all of those companies that have surreptitiously been selling to embargoed countries all along, such as American company BlueCoat to Syria and Israeli company Allot to Iran.

This is the point at which Mueller’s first post starts to annoy me. After his righteous concerns about export regulation are expressed, he goes on to throw up a giant straw man, advising advocates to “Stop focusing narrowly on information technology, and examine the tools of repression and aggression more generically,” and raising examples such as US arms sales to Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Okay, so perhaps this is not exactly a straw man, but if–as Mueller seems to imply in his second post–his arguments are directed at activists and human rights organizations, rather than say, politicians and journalists, then this is simply unfair. The individual activists taking on this issue–many of whom, I’ve observed, live in the countries where such spyware is being sold–are surely not putting the technology before the arms. And as for the organizations, they’re either semi-single-issue (why would EFF talk about gun sales?) or have been holistically focused, tackling the gamut of human rights abuses, from surveillance to military repression. (I would also add here that current export restrictions on the aforementioned five countries include arms and airplane parts).

The second major argument in the first post is presented next. Mueller criticizes some of the advocacy around the sale of certain products, asking: “If you can blame a video surveillance camera for its misuse by repugnant governments, and argue for blocking the movement of those goods, what about integrated circuits, copper wires and lenses that go into them? What about the plastic housings? What about the shipping services that transported the material there?”

Now, if Mueller’s target here is those calling for regulation, I’m with him all the way. But if we’re talking about targeting companies, if we’re working on naming-and-shaming, then I do believe in a strategy of going after companies for their sale of complete products to governments, when the company has credible concern that the product will be used to commit human rights abuses. The vast majority of highly-publicized cases this year have involved the sale of complete systems to decidedly human-rights-abusing regimes like Libya, China, and Syria. I do see a moral obligation in calling out Cisco for its complicity in the Communist Party’s harassment of bloggers. I do see a moral obligation in calling out BlueCoat for its “oh noes, the embargoes!” response to the news that its products were sold to the Syrian regime (in the end, it turned out that BlueCoat was tracking the devices and was aware of their location, even if the sale was not intentional).

But alas, Mueller was talking about the would-be regulators, and therefore I agree:

If you really want to punish, isolate and sanitize your relationship to a repressive government, you cannot limit the sanctions to specific forms of ICT. There must be a comprehensive system of sanctions that prevents anyone in that country from doing any kind of business with the country involved. Even then, the regime may not change; think of North Korea. Even then, there will be leaks or route-arounds.

But then he concludes:

But activists concerned with real social change must think through this problem more deeply, and come up with strategies that strike more directly at the pillars of authoritarianism, censorship and arbitrary power, rather than lashing out at easy domestic targets.

This is why I accused him (a point he’ll refute in post 2) of taking cheap shots at activists. The assumption here is that those involved aren’t thinking about this problem more deeply, aren’t fighting these regimes from multiple angles. And as I wrote in my accusation, if Mueller’s target here is the journalists and the politicians whose shallow thinking culminates in the conclusion that Cisco is the the real enemy, then I digress. But if it’s the activists (again, many of whom are Egyptian, and Syrian, and Chinese), then I say “meh.”

Since Mueller’s second post starts with a refutation of something I said, I feel obliged to point something out. When Evgeny Morozov’s excellent Net Delusion was released this year, it was dismissed by some who felt that the use of the term “delusion” didn’t apply: after all, hadn’t Egyptians just toppled a dictator with the help of social media? I loved Morozov’s book, and so a point that irritated me throughout readings of both critiques of the book and reads through the man’s own columns was the idea that the main target of his arguments against “cyberutopians” were a very narrow subset of the population: namely, those working in the State Department, or even more specifically, Jared Cohen sycophants.

Mueller’s posts thus strike me the same way: Just as he claims his first post “hit a nerve” with advocates (presumably meaning me, since my comment is in the next line), he then goes on once again to target not the advocates but the journalists. And that’s the thing: Mueller’s arguments are largely ones that I agree with (read: no nerves were hit), but the presumed target is off: his real beef seems to be with the journalists who have kept this story going all year. And in a sense, I get it: after all, we digital rights advocates feed off the news reports, and no doubt we wouldn’t have been so loud on the topic were it not for their reporting. If anything, that’s a call for a more tempered approach (which is part of, I assume, Mueller’s point).

In any case, I have no real problems with the second post. Like Mueller, EFF recognized that the reporting on Israeli company Allot’s sale of their NetEnforcer product to an Iranian ISP was a bit overblown. In fact, the story should have served an even better lesson: Sanctions don’t work. But alas, it did not, for most.

Ultimately, as Mueller reiterates near the end of post #2, the problem with the movement (again, lead in large part by journalists, not advocates), is the transfer of target from regime to corporation:

Western corporations and their shareholders do have a moral obligation to refrain from actively pursuing business opportunities with dictatorships when those opportunities involve supplying products and services specifically designed to aid their crimes and repression. But very few technologies are constructed so as to be only usable for crime and repression.

Post-Script: I wrote this a bit stream-of-consciousness, so if in any way I appear to contradict myself, feel free to point out in the comments. Second, I would note that while I see very different targets in journalists vs. advocates, Mueller does not appear to at numerous points, including journalists in “the movement.” In a sense (as I hinted at above), this is fair, for journalists inform advocates on these topics. In another sense, it feels odd to include the supposedly neutral (though I obviously don’t believe that rubbish) journalist in the makeup of a movement such as this one. But again, therein lies the problem, Mueller might posit: the journalists are establishing a certain policy narrative.

I welcome your comments, discussion, debate, etc, below. Just don’t be an asshole and subtweet me. You know who you are.

Razan had been afraid of arrest. On Wednesday, she warned me that it might happen. I honestly have no idea of the circumstances, though it is said that she was near the Jordanian border. I don’t know if she was trying to escape.

I took this photo of Razan in Beirut, 2009

Razan has been a friend of mine since we met in Budapest in 2008, her first trip to Europe, and her first flight in years. We kept in touch and when I visited Syria the following year, she and Anas and I met up for dinner one night, drinking into the late hours at his apartment, laughing as we always did. I saw her again later that year in Beirut and then most recently in Tunis where, with everything happening in Syria, she seemed to have retreated into herself; we barely had time to connect. Since then, however, she’s been working with the Syrian Center for Media and Freedom of Expression and we’ve therefore had numerous reasons to be in touch, numerous conversations, most recently this week, when she shared her contingency plan with me (part of which involved shutting down her various online accounts so as not to put her contacts at further risk).

I’ve tolerated–to varying degrees–the pro-regime nutjobs on Twitter and Facebook for months, with a semblance of understanding as to why they oppose the opposition (I do not, however, understand in the least support of the Assad regime). But the shitstorm that I witnessed tonight, the hatred I saw toward Razan simply for exercising her right to free expression, a universal right, instills new anger in me. Some of the same assholes who justify the Syrian regime’s violence toward the opposition because the opposition too has used violence balk when other countries do the same. Their standards are different, because to them, because of their brainwashing, the Syrian regime is somehow different.

It’s not different.

A solidarity march for Morocco's #feb20 or #fev20 movement in Boston

A photo of a protest sign (presumably) taken in Egypt

An Occupy Wall Street protester (from the Boston Globe)

A Libya t-shirt utilizes Feb 17, popularized by the hashtag

This tattoo apparently belongs to @ClinicEscort

Photo of #jan25 T-shirts by 0oshi on Flickr

Brazilian cartoonist Carlos Latuff has popularized hashtag imagery in his art

Sami Ben Gharbia wears a SidiBouzid t-shirt on Al Jazeera

From a Paris protest in January, by kaïs miled on Flickr

Anti-SCAF street art in Cairo, photographed by Hossam Hamalawy

If you have any other excellent examples (particularly from Syria), do send them my way.

Social Media Wars

I’ve spent the past few months documenting the tactics of the Syrian Electronic Army and other factions in respect to spreading propaganda to counter anti-opposition sentiment (you can find my writing on the SEA here, here, and here; and an interview with NPR here). I’ve mainly focused on the utility of hacktivism in awareness-raising, with some emphasis on the effectiveness of flooding the dominant media narrative for the purpose of gaining attention for the other side (in this case, the pro-regime side), but what I haven’t touched on is the longer-term effect these tactics are having on people both in-country and outside, as well as where this type of activity fits in the broader landscape of online activism in the region.

I’ll say a few things up front. First off, that these heavy propaganda tactics on social networks are unique to three countries in the region: Syria, Bahrain, and in a different sense, Israel. Let’s ignore the third one for a moment; primarily because its impact is less dangerous, but I’ll nonetheless touch upon it later, because I think its tactics are relevant.

Syria and Bahrain are in many ways two very different cases. While the regime in Syria has at this point been widely condemned and sanctioned (after months and months), Bahrain still enjoys support from the United States and other Western countries, with no end in sight. The state of the Internet in the two countries is also extremely different: While Bahrain enjoys Internet penetration in the high 80% range, Syria’s access remains below 20%. Syria’s uprising has gone on now for nearly eight months, while Bahrain’s has ebbed and flowed. Both countries have nonetheless employed harsh tactics against Internet users, filtering opposition websites and arresting dissenting bloggers.

There is one major similarity between the two countries that often goes unmentioned in mainstream coverage: in both countries, opinion on the ground–and online–is divided. Some bloggers seem hesitant to dwell too much on this; and I, while cognizant of it, am not entirely educated of the reasons. I therefore won’t go deeply into the reasons, though it’s obvious that some are purely sectarian, while others are a result of individuals benefiting from the regimes. It is also, therefore, worth noting that Bahrain and Syria are both controlled by minorities: Bahrain by its Sunni minority (estimated at less than 20% compared to the Shi’a majority estimated at 70%), and Syria by its Alawi minority (Sunnis make up nearly 74% of Syria, Alawis are estimated to comprise 10%).

Countries Divided

The fact of divided opinion differentiates Syria and Bahrain greatly from Egypt and Tunisia on several levels. Online, anyone closely following the blogospheres of those four countries would be well aware of that fact. Whereas the Egyptian blogosphere has been divided for years upon various political lines (e.g., leftists, secularists, Muslim Brotherhood, etc), it has always had one thing in common: disgust for the Mubarak regime. The Tunisian blogosphere, though I don’t know it as well, was similar in its attitude toward Ben Ali.

The Bahraini and Syrian blogospheres, both of which I’ve followed for quite some time, are diverse. In Syria, there has always been a pocket of dissenters, from those willing to speak out harshly against the regime to those who raise more specific points, such as its heavy control over the Internet. There have also always been a range of other views, from those favoring reform to those who outright support the regime to those who choose not to speak of it.

A Protester in Bahrain holds up a sign that reads "No Shia and no Sunni. We are all against the exclusivists."

Of course, as I mentioned, both countries are also divided on the ground. Syria’s pro-regime rallies have become infamous (warning: links to SANA), while Bahrainis in favor of the monarchy also responded with rallies of their own.

Keeping in mind the background, it becomes a bit easier to analyze the (online) events of this year.

The Propaganda Wars

In February, New York Times journalist Nick Kristof visited Bahrain and tweeted about his observations, re-telling the stories of victims and later wrote a column about his experience in the country. Almost immediately, he was hit with accusations of bias on Twitter, as well as petition directed at his Times editor urging him to be let go. Later, the tweets turned uglier, as Kristof was hit with death threats.

Over the course of the next few months, the Bahraini Twitter trolling continued, and was soon followed by a similar phenomenon in Syria. While Bahraini Twitter trolling was organized from the very beginning, with apparent individuals targeting specific commentary, in Syria it was a different story; most trolls appeared to be automated feeds targeting the #Syria hashtag in an attempt to flood it, not with misinformation, but with irrelevant information. Though some individuals, such as myself, were targeted directly (and with my own Flickr photos of Syria, no less), Twitter’s infrastructure makes it relatively easy to block and report accounts for spam, and while many remained up, most were removed from search, making it easier for those using the #Syria hashtag to follow events on the platform.

Flooding the #Syria hashtag with irrelevant content

While Syrian online propaganda is likely state-sponsored (in some way or another) and has utilized a variety of platforms, from the hackings of Harvard University and other websites, to the retaliatory defacement of Anonplus, to spamming Facebook accounts of celebrities and politicians, and smear sites like the Plot Against Syria, Bahrain’s has remained largely on Twitter, and appears to be largely the work of individuals.

Amira Al Hussaini receives a threat from a Bahraini Twitter troll

For some, the Bahraini trolling appears to be effective, at the very least in silencing opposition voices abroad. For each tweet using the Bahrain hashtag, as I noted last week at #AB11, the Twitter user will receive a flood of tweets, and many seem to have decided it simply isn’t worth the hassle. The propaganda therefore succeeds. Of course, Bahrain is also employing a slew of other propaganda tactics, such as placing opinion pieces in American newspapers with the help of American communications firms. Not that they need it, of course. The State Department is all too willing to uphold the Bahraini regime.

In Syria, I’d say it’s a different story. The majority of the efforts are so sloppy and ineffectual that they’re unlikely to convince anyone of their

Your propaganda isn't very effective, sir.

In the end, however, propaganda is just a distraction. It is effective, perhaps, in silencing voices, but the real threats are on the ground and in the tensions in those two countries between opposition and regime supporters. Nevertheless, it makes sense to continue studying it–perhaps by more quantitative means–to understand its effects both on the ground and in terms of external support.

Addendum: Israel

I mentioned Israel in a note at the beginning of my piece. While I don’t think that it fits into the context of this piece, I have seen considerable efforts, both by Israeli companies like Ahava and–apparently–government-supported groups, to utilize some of the same techniques as Syria and Bahrain, particularly on Twitter. Just a few days ago, one account (called @freemiddleeast and associated with this website) tweeted to me after I used the word “Palestine,” indicating that it was using automated software to target certain search terms. The account was quickly blocked for spamming, to Twitter’s credit, but others remain.

I have no idea why Ahava thinks this is effective.

Israel, like–perhaps–Syria, also pays individuals to generate propaganda, which is apparent from some of the accounts that have targeted me (they’re rife with misspellings and often, total misinformation).

Of course, Israel is not alone in its attempts. The US State Department has its own team that targets “inaccurate speech” in Urdu, Arabic, and Farsi (to their credit, however, their paid propagandists are required to identify as such), and earlier this year it was revealed that CENTCOM would undertake similar, less transparent efforts. Thus far, I’m not aware of any other democratic states engaging in such practices, however.

Conclusion

It’s hard to say what long-term effects online propaganda from the aforementioned countries might have. At an event last month, Alec Ross (Senior Advisor for Innovation to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton) proclaimed that the days of (traditional) propaganda were over. I disagreed with him, noting the online attempts at propaganda, and while he assented, I suspected that the administration views these types of propaganda as different from those of, say, state television. I do not. I think the pervasiveness and the distributed nature of social media propaganda makes it potentially more dangerous for its targets, as it creates a gang mentality and allows for the smearing of far more individuals than state media would ever make time for.

Of course, I’m obviously only tipping the iceberg with this post. I’m attempting to raise awareness of this phenomenon in the hopes that someone will take it on as a study, and would be happy to discuss further with anyone with interest.

I know I’m not the first person to ask this question. At conferences this year, I’ve heard rumblings along the lines of “What if Twitter had existed in 1995?”, the year of the Srebrenica massacre. Or in 1994, the year of the Rwandan genocide. Ignoring obvious questions of mobile and Internet penetration, would it have made a difference if Bosniaks had taken out their cell phones and tweeted, or if Tutsis had taken to their laptops and uploaded videos of the massacres?

Hard to say.

What we’re seeing in Syria right now is a war of words online, in which protesters and opposition figures face off against regime supporters, attempting to articulate their own narratives about what’s happening inside the country. And without many journalists on the ground, it’s difficult to determine the facts. We know that the regime has killed innocent, unarmed civilians, but have opposition forces taken up arms? And what do the majority of Syrians really think? Do they want foreign intervention or regime change, or reforms?

With Internet penetration around 20% and mobile subscriptions close to 60%, Twitter users are certainly a minority. And yet the overwhelming majority of tweets from inside the country speak to a desire for the regime to go. More to the point, Twitter is rife with reporting from inside Syria, with activists and citizen reporters alike posting videos, photos, and other content truly damning to the regime.

But does it matter? Can it help change anything? Or are we ‘witnessing’ for the sake of it, condemned to helplessness?

Along that line of thinking is Mark Belinsky‘s SXSW panel from earlier this year, “Tweets from 9/11.” The idea is obvious: Had Twitter existed ten years ago, would events have changed at all, or would their aftermath have been different?

The key, I think, is in the second part of the question. Indeed, the aftermath of events would have been different. We would have had a more accurate assessment of what exactly went on inside those planes in their final minutes, and the possible ramifications of that information are endless.

And so, and sadly, perhaps that’s our limit now. Questions still exist around the specifics of the 1982 Hama Massacre. By ‘witnessing’ the current events in Syria, and documenting them in real time, perhaps we are able to influence their eventual outcome, if only after the fact.