Arab Nationalism

An interesting comment from Instapundit concerning the protests in Beirut has me thinking:

What's interesting, in fact, is the Christian/Muslim unity that's emerged in these anti-Syrian protests.

One look at the pictures from Lebanon and it is hard to miss the level of nationalism being shown. We are finding out that despite historical claims by Syria, the people of Lebanon do not see themselves as lost cousins of the Syrians, but an independent people. This lays to rest the last vestiges of pan-Arabism from the 1950s.

This has ramifications throughout the Arab world. The "Arab street" is a myth. Arabs have local and national concerns like any other people, and they are increasingly self-identified as citizens of their countries rather than as Arabs, or even their religious identities. Liberals have "warned" that Iraq will ultimately fail as the Kurds, Shia and Sunni each go their own way, either peacefully or through civil war. They underestimate the nationalism among Iraqis, who after the elections were very forthright about being Iraqi first, and Shia or Sunni second. Events are proving that the idea of national permanence has taken root, despite the artificial nature of these countries' origins.