By Ramzi E Khoury
Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, 11 December 2007

The year 1982 was pivotal in my life. I had been accepted at a university in London despite the fact that I was only 16 years old. On the sidelines of my regular schooling for the Jordanian Tawjihi exams, with the help of my fluent English bestowed upon me by my mother’s dedication to the cause of English language, I had sat for and passed a few GCE O-Level exams, and one A-level. The A-Level was in classical Arabic that was a breeze due to my interest in Arabic poetry with focus on the works of the infamous Abu Nuwas whose talent was in taunting the rulers and religious establishment with dramatic descriptions of alcohol and deviant sexuality. I found in Abu Nuwas’s utter filth an answer to the most important questions of the exam and landed a “C” despite the fact that I had not studied for it nor expected to pass it. If I were superstitious, I would insist that luck landed me a deprived academic who really enjoyed grading my paper and may have photocopied it for future reference at times of need.
The word “If” is not as bad as it is made out to be, because if it wasn’t for Abu Nuwas, I wouldn’t have headed to London at the age of sixteen but would have had to stick to my grounds for a couple more years in Amman through the tedious and very difficult Tawjihi exams; a nightmare Jordanians go through that determines one’s future with a sense of irrevocability. I still stand ardent against Tawjihi because it never made sense to me that the future of a person is determined through the results of one set of testing rather than the education learned throughout schooling. As a matter of fact, history has proven that achievement during schooling does not mean achievement in life.
But I had my own nightmare that year: what was going on in Lebanon was devastating. The Palestinians had plunged into the Lebanese civil war and the Israelis invaded Lebanon, drove the revolution out of the south and cornered them in Beirut where they became sitting ducks in the besieged capital alongside the allies and enemies. In 1982 I had become totally focused on the notion that the Palestinian revolution could get wiped out by Israel and the need to defend it from a fate that would bring an end to our national aspirations for a liberated Palestine.
In addition to Abu Nuwas’s historic poetry, that of the patriots such as Mahmoud Darwich, Samih Qassem and other living poets of our time I had plunged since before I was 14 into heavy studying of politics including but not limited to communism.
Despite the fact that I had been a member of a very comfortable and cushy capitalist family with no political affiliation, I pretty much became a mainstream self-declared high-school communist for a couple of years until in 1980 the family chose the Soviet Union for our vacation destination and vacations abroad had always been an acceptable capitalist activity for me, even if the less-privileged couldn’t afford them.
What a revelation it was for me when people bargained over my jeans and a gold chain hanging around my mother’s neck! I suddenly had the urge to donate my jeans and underwear to help the masses of comrades in their dilemma of a life without commodities. I too indulged in exchanging money through the black market because I also wanted more for the money than the ridiculous official exchange rate offered!
My criminal act made it clear for me: This version of communism sucks, and the Russians are no comrades of mine. Maoism is the same and I am no farmer, therefore I have no choice but to adopt Trotsky’s “permanent revolution.”
Now let us not exaggerate, Trotskyite or not, I truly wanted all people equal: driving Ferraris and wearing gold chains. No, they should all wear diamonds if they were mined with justice and equality in mind!
The thing about leaders who get killed before they rule is that they are not tarnished with dirt because they never had the opportunity to put their hands in the dirt. They are clean despite the fact that they had achieved zilch.
Leon Trotsky, a Jew, was such a leader and what made him a hero was the fact that Stalin the notorious dictator who “crushed the principles of communism” killed him and turned the Soviet Union into the terrible prison it was. The masses had become equal in alcoholism rather than wealth!
History has repeated itself so many times since Trotsky, and the latest example of how rule can reveal the true colors of a “holier than thou bunch” is how popular Hamas became before it decided to move up the ladder and play government and how unpopular it is today. I predicted this for Hamas when they ran elections, because years ago I had decided that had Trotsky took over the Soviet Union, he may have been worse than Stalin as a dictator and people would be spitting at his memory today. Why? Because just like Stalin, Trotsky had no true respect for human nature: he did not believe in individuality.
Hamas and those who push dogmatic radical ideologies all strive to wipe off individuality for the sake of uniformity; forcing all to look and act the same way despite the fact that their religion clearly states that the Almighty has created people as individuals; each with their own mind. Just like all forms of communism failed, the Islamist ideologies will also fail if and when they reach power and they are judged on deeds rather than hollow slogans that tickle the ears and hearts.
But I went to London at the age of 16 as a Trotskyite who had no place in any Palestinian communist party because they were all variations of “Stanilism.” Fateh, the only party that enjoyed no ideology, housed most Palestinians and the mothers of the rest, from the extreme right to the extreme left.
The saying went until very recently: All Palestinians are born Fateh, but some change at a later age! So in London I was confirmed Fateh, yet enjoyed the respect of most other parties because of my left wing inclinations. In less than a year, at the age of 17, I was elected head of the General Union of Palestinian Students in London. The PFLP and DFLP, at the time Fateh’s main political adversaries, also voted for me even though I did not run for elections. They figured better this Fateh guy who understands our language than another who is dumbfounded by the word “proletariat.” But most importantly, I spoke the language most Palestinians at the time subscribed to: the language of militancy which tickled the masses may they be Fateh, PFLP or DFLP, and I was true to the poison I pushed; it was not an act nor was I interested in leadership.
Sure my family is not refugee and I didn’t come from a household of politicians or activists, but when I had arrived in London I was militant by all means. As a student leader, I would summon and slap silly a Palestinian who drank Coke or drove Ford or consumed any product blacklisted for its support of Israel. I carried out a witch-hunt against those who dared enter Marks & Spencer, famous for its Israeli made products, even if they went in to buy the only Labaneh (goat cheese) that tasted Palestinian in town. Down with Labaneh if its cost bought Israel the bullets that ripped our bodies! There is still merit in boycotting the products of those who use the income to kill you. But what troubles me today about the Labaneh of the past, is how easy it was to call a human act, an act of treason, and how easy it is still today to label a person a traitor over a difference of opinion on how to liberate Palestine.
Israel was my enemy but also those Palestinians who didn’t believe in armed struggle as the only solution such as the Palestinian Communist Party or those who sold out their independence to Arab regimes such as the Arab Liberation Front whose master was Saddam Hussein or the PFLP-General Command who chose to be stooges of the Syrian regime.
With these qualities that are far from adorable I was so successful that year that at the age of 18, I became a spokesperson of the PLO in the UK; with responsibilities ranging from media work to delivering speeches before the British political parties and unions. Being an unrelenting radical militant may not be adorable and cuddly but it sure makes you popular and therefore powerful.
Unlike playing student leader who could afford to pull off “holier than thou” on his peers and get away with it, representing Palestine with the British society was a different matter. This is when I was faced with two options without a third: accept that life is not about Black and White but a full range of grays… or fail royally.
I don’t like to fail, therefore my choice was to open up my mind and learn the complex art of communications through which I also learned that what you achieve is what counts, not the unrealistic dreams that rally people and for which they are willing to give up their lives; only unrealistic dreams are escapes that don’t deliver solutions.
The lessons I learned at the age of 18 are the lessons Hamas is yet to learn, despite the fact they are 20-years-old in their struggle against Israeli occupation. Those who do not see how similar they are to the failed communist revolutionaries of the past lack realistic vision and must be very slow learners!

The lessons to be continued next week…