In searching for the roots of the tragedies Arabs are now enduring amid the region's overlapping wars, attention turns again and again to the militias ravaging the area. Their leaders share distinctive traits that betray considerable brutality, cloaked in conduct whose religious basis is questionable. These militias usually emerge from within sects and groups that believe they have been denied the national share they deserve, whether they form a majority or a minority. In every case, they have resolved to seize that share of power by force of arms.
The present examples — Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, and the Houthis in Yemen — show groups that have appointed themselves to represent their countries, the Arab nation, and the Islamic community in waging war on colonialism and "resisting" Israel, without a mandate from the people or any legitimate authority — save the self-granted license of those determined to exploit every sacred slogan in order to plunge into destructive wars.
Hamas has carved out a special status of its own, claiming the right to maintain relations with Israel through which it obtains the assistance that lets it split the Gaza Strip off from the Palestinian National Authority even before a Palestinian state has been established in the first place.
The founding principle of every militia is to divide both the land and legitimate authority. Lebanon's Hezbollah relished its role as the "blocking third," which stops the government from taking decisions, including those needed to meet its constitutional obligations. All these groups pursue a scorched-earth policy that leaves the people of their countries no choice but to surrender everything bound up with power, decisions of war and peace included.
A permanent divide separates the militias from the nation-state, with its sovereignty and its legitimate right to a monopoly over arms. The matter has turned into a bargaining process dressed up as a way out of a tragic reality: the militias' surrender of their weapons is treated as demanding an arduous, drawn-out negotiation that only adds to the toll of dead and displaced. At times it reaches the point where the intervention of major powers is needed merely to free a single prisoner, much as with organized criminal gangs.
The present configuration in the Arab region — the state, its authority, and its army on one side, the militias on the other — has made the Arab world hostage to forces that know nothing of the "national project" the Arab states are pursuing in their bid to catch up with the modern world. Ideologically, these forces are a blend of religion, sectarianism, and doctrines of left and right, adopting whatever serves a militia's capacity to subjugate the rest of the population, so long as it is left free to wage its endless wars.
The leading, mature Arab states — those with comprehensive national projects for advancement and growth — must, in these complex times, build into their strategy for confronting the turmoil a recognition that the militias are a significant component of the ongoing war. Like Israel and Iran, they play a part in reshaping the region through vast chaos, destruction, and bloodshed.
Arab states that have known neither militias nor civil war must strip such groups of any legitimacy outside the framework of the nation-state. The threats the militias pose to the legitimate authorities in Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, Sudan, and Palestine rest on mutual "support." On many occasions these groups have carried out support strikes on Iran's behalf during its running confrontation with the Arab Gulf states.
More recently, the Houthis have grown reckless enough to threaten ships belonging to Saudi Arabia and to try to control the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, following Iran's example in the Strait of Hormuz, while disrupting international trade across the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.
It is no coincidence that these militias keep close ties with organizations of political and religious extremism, from al-Qaeda and ISIS to the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates. The destabilization of the Arab states named above makes it essential to give full backing to the nation-states working to protect themselves and to contribute to regional stability.
The legitimate authorities in Yemen, Iraq, and Lebanon that are defending the nation-state need not only political, economic, and military support, but also help in the current intellectual struggle against the groups and militias that exploit, blackmail, and threaten them by word and by weapon alike.
