“Where American self loathing meets Arab conspiracy theories”

The future leader of an oil-rich Arab state is working on a reform policy which will allow women, in particular, to go to school. At the same time, this man is getting ready to sign an oil contract with China. However, a few days before his election, he is assassinated by the CIA. This is the story of the film Syriana with George Clooney.
Why would the United States assassinate a sagacious leader when George W. Bush wishes the rise of leaders like this one? The scriptwriters’ answer is that the American government is controlled by Texan oil interests, which will never allow the signature of an agreement between an Arab country and a Chinese company.
I watched the premiere of the film exhibited for the press, though it is already circulating very easily in the Arab world thanks to pirate cassettes. There, it’s considered an “evidence” of the United States’ rejection of the existence of democratic leaders in the Arab world. Actually, the film praises the converts and underscores martyrology and Arab conspiracy theories. Since 1900, the list of assassinated Arab leaders has been long and they have been killed by Islamists, Pan Arab militants or members of the radical Arab security services. Many Arabs prefer to deal with this problem as something coming from abroad. It’s an understandable reaction. What is not that understandable is the fact that Americans make films in which they present their nation as the incarnation of evil.
Syriana not only describes an assassination, but presents the United States as the invisible hand controlling terrorism in the Middle East. It all has to do with the thirst for making money. Dissidence and self-hate are a fashion right now. However, by doing it, those in favour of self-degrading do three things:
– Justify the attacks against the United States by radical Arabs by presenting this country as the Evil.
– Affirm that the democratic discourse is senseless.
– Evidence ethnocentrism by presenting Arabs as objects and not as main actors of the story. They steal their story from the Arabs.