Text of Manal El-Tibi's Resignation Letter to Egypt's Constituent Assembly

[Protester demanding \"Constitution First\" in Egypt. Image by Maggie Osama via Flickr] [Protester demanding \"Constitution First\" in Egypt. Image by Maggie Osama via Flickr]

Text of Manal El-Tibi's Resignation Letter to Egypt's Constituent Assembly

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following letter was originally issued in Arabic on 24 September 2012 by human rights activist Manal El-Tibi at the time of her resignation from the Constituent Assembly, the body tasked with writing a new Egyptian constitution. The report was translated into English by Bassem Sabry and published by Ahram Online on 26 September 2012.]

Mr. Hossam El-Ghiryani, head of the Constituent Assembly,
Warm greetings,

I have issued a statement to public opinion before, culminating in the suspension of my membership in the Rights And Freedoms Committee in the general assembly for drafting the constitution, while still retaining my membership in the assembly. The aforementioned statement was both a clarification and a warning of such matters that are being prearranged so that the revolution`s constitution would come out in a predetermined and pre-prepared manner, one that does not lead to the fulfilment of the goals of freedom, social justice, and human dignity – the goals of the glorious Egyptian revolution. However, I had accepted to become a member of the assembly, despite the advice of many not to participate, for I had preferred to fully partake in the experience, to be a witness to it; an experience that I can now describe – honestly – as a bitter and black one.

I have reached a final conviction that there is no use in continuing to be a member of the Constituent Assembly, given that the final product – despite my struggle to present many suggestions for constitutional clauses that reflect freedom, social justice, and human dignity for all citizens without discrimination – would never meet the expectations of the majority of Egyptians. Rather, it became clear that the constitution was being prepared to serve one particular group, entrenching the idea that the religious state might obtain power in such a manner. Eventually, the process would create a constitution that would maintain the same primary foundations of the regime that the revolution had risen up to overthrow, while only changing the personnel; not a radical change in the structure of the regime as an inevitable result of the glorious Egyptian revolution.

The truth is that my primary political position throughout this time had displayed itself in boycotting the parliamentary and presidential elections, within the context of my boycott of the entire current top-down political process. The reason is that – within the context of this process – the state institutions that are being reconstructed would never become institutions of the revolution, but institutions of the counter-revolution. This means that all of the state`s institutions that have been, and are now being, constructed will represent a big step backward in the history of Egypt, and that they would be worse than the institutions of ousted president Hosni Mubarak.

And experience has proven the correctness of my position. Egypt has obtained a backward parliament as a result of parliamentary elections whose integrity is shrouded in doubt. Even if this parliament was dissolved, its effects remain standing. It [Egypt] directed itself towards choosing between two real nightmares for the presidency: a president for an authoritarian, corrupt state for the military and the intelligence apparatus [Ahmed Shafiq], or a president that would lay the foundations of a religious, authoritarian and corrupt state based on what is called `Political Islam` (Mohammed Morsi), elections which led to the victory of the latter.

All regrettably, and after the bitter experience in the Constituent Assembly, the drafting of the new constitution was not an exception of this context. We are approaching the drafting of a constitution that is worse than all previous Egyptian constitutions, through a Constituent Assembly based on the military`s overwhelming use of power and authority, and the Brotherhood using the parliamentary majority of the Brotherhood and Salafists and Wahhabis. This was all to draft a constitution that would form the solid foundation not just for reproducing the former regime, but for creating the state for the counter-revolution, whose direct job would be to neutralise the political, popular and glorious revolution of 25 January  2011.

Consequently, the new constitution and system do not carry any sign of fairness for all of its impoverished segments of society, including my generous family in Al-Nuba, who honoured me by nominating me for assembly membership.

Thus, building upon all that has been said, and in alignment with my conscience as an Egyptian citizen and with my principles as a political activist loyal to our glorious revolution, one who refuses to participate in the construction of institutions of the counter revolution, I hereby submit to your Excellency my resignation from the Constituent Assembly and my withdrawal from it.

 

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Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 


[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412