ve been reading this talk page and I was amazed by the way some people are ready to make such a violent debate about issues they seem not to know the basis of what they re talking about I may understand that some of the contributors to this discussion do not know a world of arabic but that is a shame when discussing the work of someone antoun saadeh who wrote mainly in arabic his complete works is a 17 volume series of around 200 page each and cover a nearly 30 years of writing and a party whose intellectuals at least 4 generations have a massive production of memoires and doctrinal discussions to name a few concerning memoirs Abdallah koberssi Jebran Jreij Julia el mir saadeh Ibrahim yamout Mahmoud Nehme for doctrinal discussions Said Taki el dinne Wassim zeineddine Nassif Nassar Enaam Raed Aboud Aboud I think some due clarifications are to be made 1 concerning racism and Nazi claims a back in 1934 when he was in french mandate jails and when the Reich was at his peak and eugenism was still in vogue in Europe and America Saadeh wrote one of the most central books in his doctrine The Rise of Nations in the second chapter of the book he makes based on a well referenced scientific anthropological findings and other writings regarding the development of national identity in Europe a solid case against races superiority claim he clearly defines social interaction between different people of different origin and culture as basis to any real development in human history and underline that linking nationalism to racism in taking examples not only of Germany but also of France and Europe in early 18th century is a very reactionary and dangerous position that should be combatted in the Arab Levant a land of strong diversity b On the other hand it is well known and referenced even Pipes and Hitchens would agree so that SSNP followers are form very different religious of very diverse sects and ethnic arabs but also kurds armenians greeks turks persians franks origins And they might be with some communist parties in the region the very few who could proclaim such a diversity Hardly a case for racism c concerning the alleged saadeh s anti arabs positions It is striking thow some get to such a conclusion when one of the 4 core objectives of the party clearly stated in its Goal is the cration of a pan arab front saadeh defended what he called true arabism in his view a realistic operative version of arabism capable of mobilizing development and resistance to colonial and then Zionist threts He attacked conventional arabism claiming a one Nation from Mauritania to the comores ilands and mainly based on the sole lingual link and the arab islamic culture negating all minority cultures That does not mean that Saadeh s position is an anti arab cultural position but that of considering the arab golden era of the middle ages as part of a longer history going from antiquity to present days building a certain geographic culture in a certain geographic territory that is in his view the Fertile Crescent He sees his Greater Syria and his party as one of the forces in the rise of the Arab World c most importantly his social nationalism doctrine is contradictory to any racism or even any chauvinism that he denounces plainly in his writings His conception of nationalism has at its core two central founding dynamics social interaction and territorial interaction The Moutahhad is his elementary social and territorial unit it is considered to be the territorial scale in which basic needs mainly security food shelter and community could be achieved via social interaction there is different level of Moutahads incorporating linked nets of smaller Moutahds and responding to different level of human needs As a exemple a village or a town quarter is an elementery Moutahad a territorial region or a metropolis is a different level of Moutahad incorporating a network of villages or of quarters The Watan or Patrie is the Nation level territorial Moutahad For Saadeh beeing part of a Moutahad is a simple choice to live in it and committing ones future to its regardless of racial cultural or religious origin Of course left by itself and ruled by reactionary exclusive cultures set on primary social bodies clans tribes large families religious groups such a space holding great potentials for development will turn out to be a battlefield of tribes and flags and a backyard for colonial exploitation That s where he think his Nahda a Cultural and Political Renaissance is needed to bring in a more liberal modernist spirit in opposition to the racist Toranic movement of Ataturk or the Fascist approach of Mussolini he thought to do it not by deneing the multicultural status of the Levant and consider rich with heritage and by proving in his writings that none of these cultures are fundamentally racis