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Popular ex-Foreign Minister Amr Moussa spearheads a long overdue facelift of the Arab League.

The familiar gray-suited bureaucrats flitted through the hallways of the Arab League building in Cairo in November, and the robed dignitaries emerged from the limousines lining Tahrir Street in Saudi thoub and Kuwaiti dishdasha. The business before them was serious: In the spiraling aftereffects of September 11, Arab people and nations found themselves being stereotyped on the world stage as the radical enemy of the West. The Arab League, as a United Nations-like forum for Arab countries, would usually apply the tools of politics -- diplomatic dispatches, declarations, rhetoric backed by power.

But on this day in November, as the delegates entered the building, they were joined by an assortment of non-politicians never before seen in the great hall: professors, authors, political analysts and even a documentary filmmaker. The politicians had invited the intellectuals to try to figure out a new way to present Arabs before the world. The unusual conclave shared concerns over the so-called "clash of civilizations." They agreed to create a new board to promote dialogue between the Arab and other civilizations, perhaps with a satellite television channel. As the groups mixed, historian Hisham Sharabi watched from the Arab League's courtyard and remarked that throughout the organization's half-century existence, it had been "unheard of" for the body to turn to cultural and academic figures for answers; in fact, it was "unthought of," Sharabi added.

Then again, this meeting was called by a man whose mission is to bring the Arab League through a metamorphosis. Amr Moussa, secretary-general of the Arab League since May, addressed the gathering with his calmly commanding baritone, his brown eyes conveying a combination of empathy and firmness. He not only struck the note of regeneration in his speech, he appears to have ignited a new energy and optimism within the Arab League. He has wide-ranging plans to reshape the confederation of Arab nations and vastly broaden its function in international affairs. He will need time and the continued cooperation of Arab governments if he is to realize this. But six months after he left the post of Egypt's minister of foreign affairs to take over the Arab League, Moussa has at least lifted the spirits and vision of the organization.

A number of his concrete objectives include changing the organization's flow chart by adding new commissioners; underscoring perennial issues such as economic growth; identifying new missions such as opening a cultural dialogue with the West; and representing Arabs more ably in the world news media. Within the Arab League building, Moussa has served notice that he wants to introduce stricter professional hiring standards in line with the U.N. Staff members describe a more open atmosphere where they feel unafraid to bring comments and complaints directly to the secretary-general's office. The sense that great things are possible is raising the energy level throughout the organization, comments Hisham Badr, Moussa's longtime aide. "It's a changing work ethic. People are working longer to reflect the work ethic of Amr Moussa," says Badr, who worked with Moussa at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs since 1992 and is now his chief of cabinet.

Beyond Tahrir Square, Moussa wants to recruit new human resources into the Arab League's mission. A new commission is aimed at building cooperation among non-governmental organizations in Arab countries, while yet another will reach out to Arabs living around the world. Plans are in the works for a major gathering of Arabs and Arab-Americans in the U.S. in Fall 2002 on economic and cultural issues. Member nations had enough confidence to increase the agency's budget by nearly a quarter.

Unlike most newcomers to an established organization, Moussa didn't have to win the respect of the old-timers. During his decade at the helm of Egypt's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he displayed an eloquent speaking style and gained pan-Arab respect for projecting the sense that he understood and reflected the true sentiment of the public. "Amr Moussa is known. He's very highly respected," says Badr. "But you still have to do the work in a professional manner and deliver. The agreement is clear that we want to move the Arab world forward. They all believe it. It's just a matter of who's offering the strategy to do it. When someone comes in and says, 'I have a solution,' and it's someone who has credibility and has shown results in the past, obviously you're going to trust him."

The infusion of new energy was overdue in the eyes of Arab League critics. And the conditions that make reform possible were in place long before President Hosni Mubarak nominated Moussa for the new post. The League began in 1945 as a means of promoting unity between Arab countries. The founding members -- Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan and Yemen -- had recently won independence from colonial powers, so they emphasized the fact that members retained sovereignty and thus granted no federal powers to the League. Today the membership has reached 21 Arabic-speaking nations and the Palestinian Authority, representing 200 million people over a land area of 14 million km.

The flip side of the Arab League's weak authority, in the eyes of some critics, was its inability to implement the agreements its delegates wrote. "It's a pioneer in international regional relations -- verbally," says Sharabi, a history professor emeritus at Georgetown University in Washington. "The Arab League has put together plans for economic development, economic cooperation and the building of specific projects like the Pan-Arab Highway. They're still sitting on the shelf. The whole thing is a model of non-action."

Meanwhile, the Arab world was forming a real consensus on one big issue: Israel's military control over Palestinian territories. Then a related issue pushed to the fore: Israel's interests were receiving more favorable treatment in the Western media, while Arabs were most likely to be depicted as terrorists. The Palestinian stalemate brewed a frustration among Arab people that demanded new approaches to international relations, in the opinion of Hussain Abd Al-Ghani, Cairo bureau chief for the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite news channel. "Amr Moussa is a very energetic person with a charismatic personality and a lot of experience, but I believe [the catalyst for Arab League reform] is the dilemma the Arab world is facing now. We are still facing the same crises. We have to feel that we have different approaches," says Abd Al-Ghani. According to him, the same popular demand for change is affecting political discourse within Arab countries. Al-Jazeera, for instance, has highlighted dissenting views often to the aggravation of Arab governments. "You may watch in every significant crisis how there is a gap between Arab public opinion and Arab government policies and reactions. Now you hear leaders say, 'I have to respect my public opinion,' " he explains, as when Mubarak declined to lend Egyptian forces to the U.S. military action in Afghanistan. "I think Amr Moussa has brought this institution the energy that was missing for a long time. Maybe he brings the feeling of public opinion because he used to be in touch with it when he was foreign minister."

Arab leaders too acknowledged the need to undergo a transformation. Arab League delegates who met in April in Amman confirmed their support for Moussa's appointment. They closed by declaring that, "The Arab leaders entrust the new secretary-general to reform the different institutions of the League and carry out the necessary restructuring programs in order to enable the Arab League to cater to regional and international developments and requirements."

While Moussa has taken on the job of revitalizing the Arab League, it doesn't start and end with him, says Abdul Aziz El-Hinai, Oman's ambassador to Egypt. "I don't know how someone ... can put all of these changes in the hands of one man," he says. "It's a challenge in the Arab world -- for security, democracy, development, and peace with Israel. The mandate that we gave to Amr Moussa is very strong and comes from the Arab leaders. They chose the right person they think is capable of carrying out this task." *

Dan Bernard

Emad Abdel-Hadi

Excerpts From Amr Moussa's November 26 address to the Arab League

(translated in Al-Ahram Weekly,

November 29 ­ December 5)

"A nation's culture is the living expression of its intellectual and creative capacity, the reaffirmation of its identity and its most important characteristic. A national culture, however deeply rooted in history, is also a regenerative project, one that is in constant motion; nor should it be allowed to stagnate...Are we entering a phase of racial and/or religious discrimination against Arabs and Muslims? We must try to answer this question; our scholars and research institutes must study and monitor the situation closely... I would like to raise another question, which we must also seek to address. Have we, too, made mistakes?...Have we engaged fully with a process of investigation and elucidation that can reaffirm our cultural integrity and its constants, while meeting the demands of the modern era?

"It might seem strange that we should be talking first among ourselves, as Arabs, at a time when we should be engaged in a dialogue with others. My answer to this is that we have never discussed this issue among ourselves, and therefore have yet to determine what our rights and obligations are ... We hope to coordinate a considered challenge to the campaign of distortion, and to initiate a constructive, objective dialogue, a true dialogue of civilizations, built upon solid foundations, that will make understanding possible ... The task before us is formidable, but those engaged in science, culture and politics in the Arab world are equipped to meet the challenge."

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