On April 27, 2011, Dr. George Bournoutian from the History Department, an expert on Middle East countries, took some time during his office hours to have an interview regarding the situation in the Middle East and Africa.

“The situation in the Middle East was really not that unstable in their own countries” Bournoutian said. “Very little conflict was within their own countries.” Countries such as Syria, Jordan, Tunisia, Egypt and Libya generally had no major internal conflicts.

“There were there, but it was not big enough to make the news,” Bournoutian said.  The conflicts were not severe enough to create explosions. Most countries in the Arab world internally looked well run and organized.

“People who were against the government did not have too much power,” Bournoutian said. Although there were people who held opposite opinions against the government, just like many countries, those people were usually silent or in jail. While the situation may look fine in general, it is more problematic from the surface.

However, when problems are investigated, the crisis and turmoil becomes understandable. Most of the countries in the Middle East and Africa were under colonial rule. After the European power backslide, the colonies become independent one-by-one. Unlike the European countries and the USA, countries in the Middle East and Africa did not start with a well-organized framework.

“In most cases, it was the Arab armies, the local armies, or the Ardent Nationalists who created the new governments,” Bournoutian said. Most of the countries started being independent based on military power and nationalism.

Most of the leaders in the Middle East and Africa are not well educated because they were in the military. “The people in charge were not constitutional lawyers, educators, or professors and philosophers,” Bournoutian said.

“The entire policy, therefore, was to create strong military government which will be united under the military and national flag with no dissent, no voice of opposition,” Bournoutian said.

The new independent government created an emergency law because of Israel. Syria and Egypt are still using this emergency law. “The emergency law remains intact for 50years up to now. Syria still has it,” Bournoutian said.

The problem with emergency law is the government can arrest people without going to trial or questioning. People could not question the government because they were afraid of being put in jail or suspected of criminal activity.

The leaders did not want to implement democracy because they kept the same mindsets and did not want to give up their powers. Even though many civilians in Middle East and Africa did not like the regime, they found no way to make their voices heard because they were severely suppressed by the leaders. At same time, since the civilians were being suppressed for many years, they could no longer tolerate the restricted situation. Because the Internet is global, information has become more transparent and the new generation is more educated. These factors stirred up the revolutions. President Barak Obama did not support Egypt leader Hosni Mubarak. People took the situation in Egypt as a role model and wanted to overthrow the dominant military power one-by-one.

“People realize that there is no job for them, there is no future for them, the government is corrupted, the military and the few people control everything. They realize that the only hope for them is the true democracy,” Bournoutian said.

Bournoutian thinks that it is hard to point out whose fault it is to create such tremendous turmoil. However, what is certain is that people are desperate for civil rights and civil liberties; therefore, the suppressed silent dissents are now spilling from the people.

Many questions related to the USA arise. Will these new governments be friends with the USA? Will they move towards more conservative Islam? Bournoutian said that the Muslim power is another force that was put in the jail by the military power for a long time. Another focal problem is whether the new government will make peace with Israel since Israel was previously deemed to be their biggest menace.