European Identity - Individual, Group and Society - HumanitarianNet

IMAGES OF EUROPE: THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE ISLAMIC PEOPLE. FROM ... 265response in “Occidentophobia”, which was represented by a fiercecriticism of the West.Said criticism was launched based on three aspects: a) for theWest’s biased behaviour and inequitable criterion it wielded in itspolitical relations with the Arab-Islamic world —the Palestinianquestion; attacks against Libya, the Sudan and Iraq; the creation of the“axis of evil”— as opposed to with Israel or Saudi Arabia; b) for thesupport given, through advantageous alliances established with the“Westernised” leaders of the Arab-Islamic world, to tyrannical andantidemocratic governments that silenced any opposition or criticalprotest of its political policy. The West’s satanization of the Islamistsperhaps was not based so much on the latter’s supposed “antimodern”character, but rather on the fear that their current leaders were vulnerableto being substituted, thus upsetting the West’s advantageousalliances. This might explain the reasons for which the USA demonisedIran but consented to the radical Taliban movement in Afghanistan;and c) for the West’s inability to recognize ideological and symbolicreferences other than their own, thus monopolising and universalisingits own references and demanding that the rest of the world acceptthe West’s system of values, while rejecting any extra-Westernreferences, a clear demonstration of the West’s inability to integrateinto the current world order.The jail terms and exiles suffered by many opponents, especially bythe Islamists during the nationalist and socialist regimes, would fosterthe appearance of radical movements that would be the harshestcritics of their own rulers and their Western allies, and the creation ofWestern stereotypes which would serve as a frame of reference foraffirming their own identity.This would thus be the beginning of “Occidentophobia”, a phasewhich would fall into the same Orientalist trap of creating a stereotype (inthis case of the West) which did not account for diversity and complexity.The militant and Third World critique of the West created anambivalent situation of attraction and rejection, a constant trait in themajority of the Third World militant writers, even in those from theEuropean world. This militant critique was usually tinged with moralisingovertones condemning materialism.Terms like “Occidentoxication”, similar to the Maoist motto of“spiritual pollution”; “Occidentopathy”, created by Fardid 23 to criticize23Khosrokhavar, F. & O. Roy. (1998) Iran. From Revolution to Reform. Barcelona,Bellaterra, p.201.