There is only ONE country in the middle east where arabs can democraticaly elect...

[Panag]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
Algeria is most certainly democratic. Only their war with the terrorists kinda screwed up that process.

hi ,

aint it an irony that a democratic act ( elections ) are responsable for this , ......

have a nice day

[Saint Marcus]

it sure is. The FIS was going to win, and the military stepped in, thus putting the democratic on process a hold.

Once (if ever) this whole civil war thing is over, I'm sure there will be new elections.

Not that Algeria ever was a pinnacle of freedom and democracy, but it would have been a moderately free and democratic Arab state if the terrorists hadn't taken up arms against the governement.

Right now, I consider it a democracy under a state of emergency, but a democracy nonetheless.

[Panag]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
it sure is. The FIS was going to win, and the military stepped in, thus putting the democratic on process a hold.

Once (if ever) this whole civil war thing is over, I'm sure there will be new elections.

Not that Algeria ever was a pinnacle of freedom and democracy, but it would have been a moderately free and democratic Arab state if the terrorists hadn't taken up arms against the governement.

Right now, I consider it a democracy under a state of emergency, but a democracy nonetheless.

hi ,

" on hold " , in the thrashcan you mean , .....

the dumpster behind the dicatorship , .....

have a nice day

[Saint Marcus]

question of semantics

[Az]

What would've prevented the situation in Algeria is the existance of a strong liberal democractic constitution.

[introvert]

Re: Re: Re: There is only ONE country in the middle east where arabs can democratical

Originally posted by Tassadar5000


NO!

The Egyptians are a dead civilization. Egypt is egyptian in name only. The country is arab, and technically the middle east stretches from Iran to some west-african costal country

I have never heard of anyone refering to North Africa as part of the MIddle East. I'd have thought it's location south of Europe would require it to be called South East if anything. The MIddle East is that part of the East which isn't the Far East. Oh well, just goes to show that there are many different views about what exactly the Middle East covers. And incidentily, you are just plain wrong. ;P

As for Egypt, lets have a quote from the CIA world fact book..:

Ethnic groups:

Eastern Hamitic stock (Egyptians, Bedouins, and Berbers) 99%, Greek, Nubian, Armenian, other European (primarily Italian and French) 1%

That's the ethnic description for Egypt. I don't see Arab mentioned in there anywhere, which does actually surprise me a little. However the point is that the Egyptians have been there for thousands of years, and the Arab ethnic group did not displace them when they invaded. So Egypt is ethnically less of an Arab country than say, Israel.

And why don't we just drop this whole Jewish-Arab distinction, and call them all Semites?

Hah. And I notice no one is trying to dispute that Yemen is an Arabic, Democratic country in the Middle East... hah.

[TCO]

Re: Re: There is only ONE country in the middle east where arabs can democraticaly elect...

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Yes. It's called Turkey.

1. Very few Arabs in Turkey.

2. And the military is quasi in contorl without election.

3. Turkey is the Near East (but that is a kvetch).

[TCO]

Originally posted by Maniac
Iran.

[pedant]Not Arabs either[/pedant]

[Maniac]

*sigh* I've gotten many comments on that alrady in this thread... To clarify:
I know Iranians aren't Arabs/Semites. They are Aryans. The name "Iran" is after all merely a through time modified way of saying "Aryan". So Iran refers to the whole country, and the ethnic identity of most of it people, while "Persia" only refers to the region of "Fars".
However I assumed (so I'm absolutely not sure) that the Iranian democracy wouldn't discriminate based on ethnic origins, and that a person with an Arab ethnie but with the Iranian nationality, being born there, would be allowed to vote.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by paiktis22
whats "druze"?

It's an Islamic sect that believes a particular Egyptian ruler was a prophet or something. I forget the specific ruler's name, but he was known as "... the Mad." He persecuted Christians and Jews, outlawed dogs, and used to prowl the markets of Cairo with his servant Masoud. If he found a seller gouging his customers, he orderd the man sodomized by Masoud.

AFAIK, they are Arabs.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Heresson


Iran isn't Arabic, it's... Iranian,

There is a large Arab community in the SouthWest of Iran.

[Sirotnikov]

How about Lebanon? They're arabs and have democracy, no? Also Tunisia?

LOL

Not only don't they have democracy, they are also not independant but rather have a puppet government ruled by Syria.

Syrian government writes speeches for Lebanon's "President".

Egypt is definitely Arabic, though Egyptian dialect differs much from the classical speech.

The language is arabic.

If you'd call them arabs though, they'd take offence.

whats "druze"?

It's an Islamic sect that believes ...

Heresson wrote correctly about them being a split off Islam.

However, they would take offence being called muslim. Infact they may get nasty on your ass. They see the difference between Islam and Druze religion as the difference between Judaism and Christianity.

You mean Yemen surly?
A democratic contry, populated mainly by Arabs, in the Middle East...

Although it is democratic in law, it is hardly democratic in essense.

CIA FACT BOOK on YEMEN

chief of state: President Field Marshall Ali Abdallah SALIH (since 22 May 1990, the former president of North Yemen, assumed office upon the merger of North and South Yemen); Vice President Maj. Gen. Abd al-Rab Mansur al-HADI (since 3 October 1994)

head of government: Prime Minister Abd al-Qadir BA JAMAL (since 4 April 2001)

cabinet: Council of Ministers appointed by the president on the advice of the prime minister

election results: Ali Abdallah SALIH elected president; percent of vote - Ali Abdallah SALIH 96.3%, Najib Qahtan AL-SHAABI 3.7%

elections: president elected by direct, popular vote for a seven-year term (recently extended from a five-year term by constitutional amendment);
election last held 23 September 1999 (next to be held NA 2006); vice president appointed by the president; prime minister and deputy prime ministers appointed by the president

As you see, the President has all the power concentrated in his hands. He's Field Marshall of the army. He appoints the govt., and the prime minister. He's been in charge since 1990, and has won a whopping 96% of votes .

a new constitutional amendment ratified on 20 February 2001 created a bicameral legislature consisting of a Shura Council (111 seats; members appointed by the president) and a House of Representatives (301 seats; members elected by popular vote to serve six-year terms)

Hmmm, the president also appoints the members of the top legislative body.

The House of representatives:

seats by party as of January 2002: GPC 223, Islah 64, Nasserite Unionist Party 3, National Arab Socialist Baath Party 2, YSP 2, independents 7

So, 74% of the house of representatives is in the hands of the GPC

General People's Congress or GPC [lead by] (President Ali Abdallah SALIH);

Oooops... the majority party is also lead by the president.

Great Democracy

[introvert]

Originally posted by Sirotnikov

You mean Yemen surly?
A democratic contry, populated mainly by Arabs, in the Middle East...

Although it is democratic in law, it is hardly democratic in essense.

CIA FACT BOOK on YEMEN
[q]c
election results: Ali Abdallah SALIH elected president; percent of vote - Ali Abdallah SALIH 96.3%, Najib Qahtan AL-SHAABI 3.7%

Great Democracy

Well at least he got a clear majority of the vote, unlike some other "democratically" elected leaders.

It may not be a Western Style democracy, but ancient Athens, Rome [during the Republican period, obviously] and Carthage didn't have Western Style democracies either, yet we still say they were democracies.

Saying Yemen isn't democratic would be like saying Israel [or most European states] aren't democratic because their form of "democracy" is quite different from the form used in the Anglo-American sphere. [and really an argument the other way would make more sense, because is the effective two party states of the Anglo-American sphere really so democractic?]

So the President and his party dominates the government of Yemen. What's wrong with that? That is just democracy at work. The real test of Yemeni democracy will come when the ruling party is facing the possibility of losing office. Will it relinquish power gracefully, or pull a Mugabee.

Until then though it is fair to say that Yemen is an Arab country in the Middle East where Arabs get to vote for their leaders.

[Sirotnikov]

Well at least he got a clear majority of the vote, unlike some other "democratically" elected leaders.

LOL

No democratically elected leader ever gets that clear a majority, except tyranical leaders who make "shows" for western countries to watch.

It may not be a Western Style democracy, but ancient Athens, Rome [during the Republican period, obviously] and Carthage didn't have Western Style democracies either, yet we still say they were democracies.

That's nonsense.

Athens and Rome had completely different democracies in the sense that the people really had a say on the events. They would usually have direct democracies (when the people would vote on each issue) or representatives to a senate.

A president that holds ultimate power in a state, and gets 96% approval in elections, decides on the government and personally approves members of the congress, and holds 70% of the lower house, isn't really a democratic president at all.

He's a ruler and a leader, but there's nothing in that system resembling democracy since he has total control of the country, and the fact that he has the unnatural number of 97% approval just proves that the elections are a sherade.

Saying Yemen isn't democratic would be like saying Israel [or most European states] aren't democratic because their form of "democracy" is quite different from the form used in the Anglo-American sphere. [and really an argument the other way would make more sense, because is the effective two party states of the Anglo-American sphere really so democractic?]

That is again silly.

The whole point of democracy isn't how many parties there are, but whether the representatives are chosen by the people or not, whether they answer to the people or not, and whether they have ultimate power or not.

In Israel and every european country, and in england and america, the president is chosen by the people, answers to them (he needs to get re-elected), and is limited in his power by congress and high court.

The Yemeni president has total control of the government and congress, has 70% of the senate. (nothing there about the court system).

He's also a Field Marshal and thus also has direct rule of the army, unlike western states where there is seperation between army leaders and government, where the army is subjected to the government.

And the crazy number of almost 97% support, is just as much as Saddam got in Iraq in the stages elections, as much as Assad got in Syria in staged elections, as much as Mubarak got in Egypt in staged elections, and as much as Hitler got in germany in staged elections.

Great company for the "democratical" leader of yemen

So the President and his party dominates the government of Yemen. What's wrong with that? That is just democracy at work.

Huh?

Do you see the difference between when his party is elected to congress, and when he appoints all the 111 members himself?

Do you see that it is absolutely impossible to democratically get 97% support vote, unless your a dictator who is staging the elections?

The real test of Yemeni democracy will come when the ruling party is facing the possibility of losing office. Will it relinquish power gracefully, or pull a Mugabee.

LOL

The real test already showed what happenned, when the constitution was changed by the government (all appointed personally by the president) to give the president a longer term, when elections were due this year.

Until then though it is fair to say that Yemen is an Arab country in the Middle East where Arabs get to vote for their leaders.

How is it fair to say that, when the president's term is getting longer and longer , and the people actually DON'T GET TO VOTE???

How is it fair to say that they get to vote for a congress... when the congress members are appointed by the president?

How is it fair to say that the president is democratically elected, when 97% of the voters have supposedly supported him?

Are you really imagining a democratic country where all the people can't find a single issue on which they disagree with the president?

You should really go study some political science and history...

[Az]

Athens and later Rome weren't democracies.