The True colors of Asad Abukhalil: A Sectarian Fanatic hiding behind the Palestine Cause

Asad Abu Khalil

Palestine from publicity seeking stunt to the fig leaf to hide sectarian tribal militancy.

The Angry Arab is an Angry sectarian

Abukhalil is a political scientist who rode the Palestine cause to rise from marginality into a fraudulent claim of commitment to Palestine and the Palestinians

One is tempted to think of Asad Abukhalil as the Moammar Ghaddafi of Middle East Studies. That is he is a clown, a raving lunatic, a publicity seeker, an embarrassment to Arabs and Muslims.

There is truth to all that but there is more.

I have written about Asad before and called him out for what he is- a liar. See http://ihsanalkhatib.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-angry-arab-asad-abukhalil-passport.html

But there is more.

Professional Palestinian: Palestine as a publicity stunt

There are Palestinian professionals and there are professional Palestinians. Palestinian professionals are Palestinians who work in the professions. Professional Palestinians are those, and there are many, who use the Palestine cause to advance their own agenda. Asad Abu Khalil is a professional Palestinian who has used the Palestine cause as a publicity stunt to rise from being an obscure political scientist of no particular importance to a self promoter, a publicity seeker, in the name of Palestine. His Palestine business continues to be useful as a fig leaf as he has devolved into a tribal sectarian fanatic.

Palestine and his idol the late George Habash are useful tools of self promotion- stunts- also useful to veil, thinly veil, his sectarian tribalism which has become increasingly obvious with the Syrian crisis.

Repulsive Sectarianism

The “former” communist, current “anarchist,” George Habash as a Facebook Cover page, the “my mother is a Sunni”- as if that makes him any less a radical sectarian fanatic. I must admit that I was one his Facebook friends, like many others that decamped, I was repulsed by this sectarianism and his use, like that of many others, of the Palestine cause as a tool for his own end.

The dominant theme of the man’s comments are thinly veiled sectarian cheerleading and defense of his tribe.

It is becoming increasingly flagrant and laughable.

Asad Abukhalil is a sectarian fanatic who hides behind the Palestine cause to veil his true colors. It has become increasing clear that the fig leaf of Palestine barley covers the angry tribal sectarian fanatic. Unfortunately, many Palestinians desperate for support from any source continue to believe in Abukhalil- a man whose sectarian tribalism has him clinically fixated on the Hariris, the father and the son, obsessed with attacking all whom he perceives as threats to the hegemony of his tribe’s militia in Lebanon- whether it is the Hariri family, MP Walid Jumblatt or Lebanese Forces Samir Geagea.

Using sectarian code

Abukhalil uses Shiite sectarian code in reference to the Sunnis. Commonly used Shia fanatics terms to describe the Sunnis are nawasib and Bani ummaya. He follows the tradition of the sectarian fanatics- and then he claims to be misunderstood.

This is from his FB page:

هناك مَن--بئس هذا العصر الطائفي--أساء فهم صدر البيت الشعري "بني أميّة الخ". قصدته عن كل العرب, سنة وشيعة. أقرأوا باقي القصيدة
http://ar.wikisource.org/wiki/البداية_والنهاية/الجزء_العاشر/ثم_دخلت_سنة_ست_وستين_ومائة

Oh-how could anyone think this man is a sectarian fanatic?

Isn’t his mommy Sunni and he is an “anarchist” who he loves George Habash and has the FB cover page to prove it?

In defense of the extended tribe

This is an exchange on the Sociology of Islam list serve between a British scholar and Asad where Asad blew a gasket defending his extended sectarian tribe:

Thomas Pierret wrote:

Although I have no doubt about the fact that the overall death toll is at least that high, it is hard for me to believe that Alawites account for one third of the victims.

As far as civilians are concerned, Alawites have suffered much less from the war than Sunnis. Regions inhabited by Alawites have been spared major military operations to a large extent. No large Alawite town or neighbourhood was overrun by the rebels, and none of them has known the fate of the countless Sunni cities that were turned into rubble by the regime's artillery and bombers (most of Homs, half of Aleppo, large parts of Deir ez-Zor and Damascus' suburbs, as well as many other smaller cities like al-Rastan, Talbisse, al-Qusayr, Khan Shaykhun, Ma'rat al-Nu'man, A'zaz, al-Atarib - the list is virtually unlimited). Mortar shells and rockets fired by rebels landed in Alawite neighbourhoods in Damascus and Homs as well as (very recently) in smaller towns like al-Qardaha, but these attacks were too sporadic and limited to entail very large numbers of casualties. Same for the few car bombs that exploded in places like Mezze 86 (Damascus). There were sectarian killings on both sides in Homs during the summer and autumn of 2011, as well as two known massacres of several dozens of Alawite civilians (in Aqrab last December, and near a military factory in Salamiyye more recently), but nothing that compares, for instance, with the daily massacres carried out by loyalist forces against Sunnis around Damascus during the regime's counter-offensive in the region in August-September 2012 (several hundreds were executed in Dariya alone, but dozens of dead bodies were found almost everyday in the province during that period). Civilian casualties on the Sunni side also include an unknown (but probably very high) number of prisoners executed while in detention. There is no equivalent for that on the Alawite side.

In such circumstances, it is likely that the largest share of Alawite victims are members of the military, since Alawites constitute most of the regime's fighting units, but here again, the figure mentioned in the report is doubtful. Indeed, since Sunni victims also include soldiers who died while fighting on the regime's side, it would mean that regime forces lost as much or more men than the opposition. Again, this is hard to believe: in conflicts that are characterised by such a massive imbalance in terms of firepower (insurgents have no planes, ballistic missiles, and very few heavy guns), the side with the smaller guns generally suffers considerably higher casualties, even when it wins in the end (think of Vietnam for instance).

In conclusion, I think that either the number of Alawite victims is overestimated by the SOHD, or it is correct, in which case the total death toll is much, much higher than 120.000.

Here is Asad jumping in to defend his extended tribe. Since the British scholar is not a Sunni Muslim Asad could not call him a “Wahabi” -one of his favorite code words for the Sunnis:

Thomas: There is something quite disturbingly sectarian (and even worse) in your purely emotional—nay sectarian—response. You are quibbling with a report that is issued by a group that is unquestionably supportive of the Syrian armed movement. So you may take up the case with them, and not with this group. But while you dispute the report (personally, I treat all reports on the Syrian conflict as propaganda by both sides, pending the arrival of verified information or facts) you go on to say that, well, if this is true, all those `Alawites (or “the largest share of Alawite victims” according to your language) are guilty people who were members of the military. You either accept the finding of the report, or you don’t. Also, do you experience any moral guild at all in giving a long distance verdict about thousands upon thousands of `Alawite victims in Syria? You feel that you are in a position to decide that “the largest share of Alawite victims” are guilty people who deserved to die and be mutilated as well? I mean, really?

as`ad

Inciting against the Palestinian refugees

Now he has stooped to a lower level of sectarianism by inciting against the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon by saying that the next civil war will have the Syrians and Palestinians involved in it too. This is despite the fact that the Palestinians are going out of their way to keep the conflicts around them at bay. That is he is insinuating that the [Sunni] Palestinians will join the fight against his tribe- that is he is providing an excuse/logic for a violent pre-emption or a future massacre of the Palestinian refugees whose cause he has been riding for his own ends through the years.