The Berber Academy and the Amazigh flag between historical truth and political suspicions
?Is what is being promoted about the Amazigh Academy that it was established in France to serve French interests in Algeria true, or is it just rumors to distort the Amazigh struggle that threatens the interests of some of the dominant ideologies in Algeria
I read an article on the Al-Hayat Al-Arabiya website by Dr. Othman Saadi under the headline “The Berber Academy in Paris Tried to Distort Amazigh and Kabyle” (01) in which he wanted to intimidate the Algerians, as usual, from the French project in Algeria represented by Amazigh, according to him, and this is the discourse he has been repeating for decades And because many of our youth spread some of these ideas, which they exaggerated unconsciously through some forums, websites, and even social media and some Arabist newspapers in Algeria, until some recognized that the Berber Academy is a French, Zionist, and perhaps Masonic industry in the near future, based on the Sunnah of sacred ignorance and the Masonic conspiracy against Islam and Arabism.
That is why we liked to respond to some of the inaccuracies in the issue as easy as possible for us and try to read the subject from a rational, historical and objective angle by naming things by their proper names.
First: Everyone should understand the terminology because the term “the Amazigh flag” does not mean that it is the flag of a country or an entity that wants to secede from a country as some believe, and it is not a professional Farhat flag of the Mac movement that emerged after the events of the Black Amazigh Spring 2001, but rather what it carries The Amazigh is a cultural banner that is not political in the official term. It was made for the first time in the valley of the state of Tizi Ouzou in Algeria by the Mujahid Muhannad Aaraf Bousaoud. , But because of the dictatorial regime that was fighting the Amazighs, it did not appear publicly and officially until the Berber Academy embodied it in the seventies, and this is to refer to the Amazigh peoples who live in North Africa and their culture from the Nile Delta in Egypt to the Canary Islands in the west, and from the Mediterranean to The very borders of the desert in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso to the south, and this vast geographical area is in fact like a Amazigh continent called “Tamazgha” translated by the four colors in this flag, blue = the Mediterranean Sea, green = plains and mountains, yellow = desert, red the color of blood Which was asked for the sake of liberating this land from invaders over the centuries
This color is expressed by the letter Yaz (Z, z, ⵣ), which is one of the letters of the Amazigh alphabet. It was chosen from among the letters of the Tifinagh alphabet because it mediates the word “Amazigh”, “ⴰ ⵎ ⴰ ⵣ ⵉ ⵖ”, “amazigh” and the word “Izuran”. "," ⵉ ⵣ ⵓ ⵔ ⴰ ⵏ "," Izuran" which means roots.
This flag was raised for the first time during the Amazigh Spring in Algeria in 1980, which stirred Amazigh awareness in all of North Africa and the world. We must also point out, however, that this flag does not reflect the Amazigh speakers in North Africa only. Rather, to all the inhabitants of this area “Tamazgha” because everyone who inhabits it (North Africa) is Berber by blood or land. The Berber flag was approved by the World Berber Congress in 1996 in the city of Tavira, on the island of Las Palmas in the Canary Islands, which has known an Berber presence since ancient times under The name of the Guanshe, by taking this flag as one of the symbols that refer to the Amazigh identity and culture in the world, which then spread throughout the world, so all the Amazigh organizations took it and we witnessed it in the stadiums of Algeria and Morocco, but even in the stadiums of the world and international demonstrations in Canada and Europe, and he was also present in the so-called In the Arab Spring in Libya, where the Amazighs of Libya were the pioneers of the uprising against the dictatorial Gaddafi regime that persecuted the Amazighs, and August 30 of each year was designated as the International Day of the Amazigh Flag.
Founding of the Barbarian Academy:
The Berber Academy was founded in France in 1966 by Abd al-Qadir Rahmani, and his deputies, who are my successors Muhammad Amqran, Ammar Naqadi, Narum Ammar, Muhammad al-Saeed Hanouz, the general clerk is the first Habib Jaafar, and not from the side of Saud Muhammad Arab only as it is rumored, but rather he is the treasurer of the association and not The academy, we must point out here that the so-called academy is just a modest cultural association called in Amazigh language “Av-Rao Imazighen”, meaning the Amazigh assembly. As for the word “academy”, it was chosen out of optimism about the future of Amazigh and raising the morale of its students, and this was stated by one of the prominent members Basoud Muhannad Arab in his book “The History of the Barbarian Academy” and also stated that the association did not benefit from the support of France.
In 1967, the association obtained official accreditation under the name Academie Berbére D echanges et de Recherches Culturels A.B.E.R.C, meaning the Berber Academy for Cultural Exchange and Research. The accreditation decision came on February 21, 1967 and in accordance with the Foreign Associations Establishment Law issued on April 12, 1939 amending the Associations Law issued on July 1 1901, but it did not have the role of the academy in the official sense of the word, that is, it did not have experts in the fields required by the academic organization. spreading Amazigh awareness in North Africa, So the academy revived the Tifinagh Amazigh alphabet writing and modified it to suit the current Amazigh tongue, even creating some letters to express some of the spoken sounds in the Amazigh tribal tongue and to keep abreast of developments in the world, since Tifinagh engraved in the Tasli rocks was expressing the daily life of the Amazighs in an ancient time period that differs greatly. About our current age, and this is a natural thing that happened with all the languages of the world, including Arabic.
?Why was the Academy established in France and not in Algeria :
The reason is very simple, which is that the Algerian regime after independence, Ben Bella and Boumediene, was a Baathist ideology, totalitarian, tyrannical and dictatorial and was persecuting Amazigh and its activists. He is the author of the provocative saying (we are Arabs, we are Arabs, we are Arabs). Instead of being the president of all Algerians and working to preserve all colors and cultural spectrums in rich Algeria, he preferred anti-Amazigh culturally, linguistically and historically, and he imported an Arabist policy from Nasserist Egypt. He exaggerated the anti-Amazigh identity of Algeria, perhaps because the Kabylie region rebelled against his rule and thwarted two attempts to overthrow him from the Kabylie region, the coup plan led by Karim Belkacem, then Hussein Ait Ahmed and Muhannad Olhaj, then the leaders of the Kabylie region allied in the coup planned by Colonel Chaabani against the rule of Ben Bella as well. (02).
The policy of exclusion and persecution against the Berbers in Algeria increased dramatically during the reign of the dictator Boumediene, who turned against his maker, Ben Bella, and Boumediene included the Amazighs among the crimes punishable by law. Her wave is to enable the Algerians to capture it throughout the national territory. She also prevented the struggling artist, Taous Amroush, from participating in the African Song Festival organized by Algeria in the summer of 1969 AD. President Boumediene also stopped the Tamazight lessons that were being offered by Professor Mouloud Mamari at the University of Algiers, and he was transferred to a private institute for anthropology.
More than that, he banned even Amazigh concerts in the Kabylie region, and he changed the name of JS Kabylie to the “Association of Electronic Tizi Ouzou” after he heard many slogans hostile to him and voices calling for the recognition of the Amazigh over the stands of the 5 July stadium in the capital, where Boumedienne attended the final of the cup that brought together a team The youth of Kabylie and the team of Nasr Hussein Dey in the summer of 1977. All this and that made the intellectuals and activists of the Kabylie region choose the diaspora for fear of being killed and imprisoned, and the establishment of the Akraw Amazigh Association, which later turned into the Amazigh Academy nominally. Despite this, Boumediene's dictatorial policy followed them to France, where Boumediene forced the French government to close the academy in France and expel one of its activist members, Muhannad Arab Boussaoud, from French soil, which prompted him to seek refuge in Britain until his death there. Of course, France would not reject Boumediene's decision, which would lead to damage to relations between The two countries, especially since Boumediene had good relations with France, being from the Oujda group, which turned against the revolutionary legitimacy with Egyptian-French planning. Secondly, because he was the first Algerian president to receive the French president in Algeria, only 13 years after France left Algeria, and the visit extended from 10 to 12 April. 1975 .
Third, because it allowed France to keep its army in the desert of Algeria until the year 1978, violating the Avian agreements. (03)
?As for the voices that accuse the supporters of this academy of collaborating with France only because they founded it there, we ask them, in turn, why do they not dare accuse the members of the national movement of collusion or treason when they established the North African Star in France, and 85 percent of its founder was from the Kabylie region, and it is the party that sparked armed action while Yet, just as we have not heard similar talk about the Association of Muslim Scholars, which was founded in French Algeria with French accreditation? And why did they not accuse the reformers Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad Abduh, who were forced to flee to the French capital, Paris, and published there the newspaper “Al-Urwa al-Wuthqa”
?Why does no one say the same thing about Arabism, which was founded by France
?Wasn't France the one who established the Jesuit University in Lebanon in 1875 through the Jesuits, which was the nucleus of the Arabization of the first Marawneh (Christian sect) and the establishment of the Arab Association by the Christians of Lebanon and Syria. It is a secret Arab nationalist political association established by a group of Arab students in Paris in 1909 AD. Which influenced the Arab national thought and paved the way for the Arab conference in Paris as well in 1913 and contributed to the preparation of the Arab revolution that began in the Hijaz in 1916 against the Ottoman Islamic caliphate.
None of those who attack the barbaric academy also says that the founders of Arabism studied in France, including Michel Aflaq, Salah al-Din al-Bitar and Zaki al-Arsuzi, who studied in French schools under the French mandate for Syria and completed their studies at the Sorbonne University.And that France was the one who supported Arabism in North Africa, whether on the linguistic, economic or political level. For example, the municipal offices in Algeria were named Arab offices and added the Arabic language (at the request of the Association of Muslim Scholars) as an optional language. He said that “French is done through Arabization.” And Jack Burke, who later worked as a supervisor at the Arabic Language Institute in Lebanon! He is considered the first to translate the Qur’an into French, and when the Moriscos came out in Morakoch accusing France of a fictitious “barbarian dahir” made by France and drummed up by Arabists, Jacques Berk came out saying that “France has no intention in Barbaristan” describing the Berbers as “good savages.”
Even the Mujahid Abdel Hamid Mahri admitted that Arabization in Algeria after independence was imposed on us by French President de Gaulle. (04)
We also point out that the idea of a national homeland for the Arabs was a French idea, as Napoleon III declared himself king of the Arabs, and his dream was to establish an Arab kingdom from Algeria to Egypt under the administration of Abdelkader Al-Jazaery, but Napoleon's loss to the Russian army limited his dreams! You can read the book “The Impossible Kingdom – France and the Formation of the Modern Arab World” by Henry Lawrence, and how Napoleon I was among the first to call for an “Arab national tendency” during his campaign against Egypt, then to intervene in the Lebanese crisis in 1860 and call for an Arab kingdom in the Levant! . (05)
And France is also the same who in 1980 established the Institute of the Arab World based on French law and an agreement between France and 18 countries. Why does no one say that Arabism is a French industry and that the founders of the Arab Baathism are agents of France, Britain and the West, which recruited the Arabs to fight and eliminate the Islamic Ottoman Caliphate through a virus? Baathist Arab nationalism within the framework of the so-called Great Arab War against the Ottomans? Although this fact is historically documented, there is no disagreement about it. .
?What is the relationship of a member of the Arab Bessaoud Academy with the French Jew Jacques Bénet:
We have seen a lot of publications here and there attacking the academy and accusing it of collaborating with the Zionists, and the only evidence they presented is a short text extracted from the book of one of the prominent members of the academy, the Mujahid Muhannad Aaraf Bousaoud, in which he expresses his friendship with Jacques Bénet who admired the struggle of Muhannad Aaraf Bousaoud, who He provided him with great assistance in obtaining the Mujahid Aaraf Bousaoud to obtain political asylum in Britain after the French government expelled him from French soil by order of Boumedienne, and it is interesting that the only evidence used by Arab and Islamist supporters to distort the image of this Mujahid in the ranks of the National Liberation Army during the revolution, is a letter he wrote To his Jewish friend Jacques Bénet, in which he says the following:
If the Amazighs, my brothers, should one day remember me to the point of wanting to honor my name, I would ask them to associate it with that of Jacques Bénet, because without the help of this great friend of the Amazighs, my action in favor of our identity would perhaps not have had the success that it does. It would therefore be fair to ---dir---e: Mohand Arab-Jacques Bénet as we say Erckmann-Chatrian
As you can see, the message is normal, but the supporters of sacred ignorance deliberately exaggerate things to stir up strife and spread the philosophy of hate that the Boumediene regime installed in the minds of Algerians, by exploiting the rhetoric that tickles feelings (the Palestinian cause, Arabism and Islam, and hollow patriotic discourses) all in order to win the feelings of the masses who rejected his coup. The military Ali Ben Bella, and the result was an Algerian generation that bows to the Palestinian anthem and whistles the Algerian anthem during a football match that brought together an Algerian and a Palestinian team in Algeria, and more than that, demonstrations took place in support of the Palestinian brothers (and we are not against this) and the national silence on the events of the black Amazigh spring that He claimed the lives of 126 Algerians, as well as the events of Ghardaia later.
?This is because our people today do not make a difference between Judaism as a monotheistic religion embraced by our Amazigh ancestors before Christianity and Islam, and between the Zionist ideological movement, which is no different from the Arab Baathist nationalism that the Ben Bella and Boumediene regime in Algeria believed in and sanctified in an official capacity, and which was considered patriotism and an honor for those who embraced it, while the Amazigh Racism and sedition threaten the unity of the nation
The Arab nationalism imported to Algeria is the same as that sung by one of their poets, the poet Shafiq al-Kamali, who was born in Syria and who is considered one of the prominent fighters in the ranks of the Arab Socialist Baath Party. He also said in another poem praising the former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who is considered one of the most prominent poles of Baathist Arab nationalism as well:
Saddam..
If it weren't for you, the moon wouldn't have risen
If it weren't for you, the trees wouldn't have appeared
If it weren't for you, it wouldn't have rained
Were it not for you, O Saddam, we would not have created human beings.
It is clear to us clearly that Tamazight in Algeria is fought only by the supporters of this fanatical ideological current that rejects the other and rejects diversity, and it does not fight Tamazight only, but even the local Algerian dialect, which is the product of succession and interdependence between the cultures coming to North Africa, as well as the result of the systematic Arabization policy that melted despite This is in the solid Amazigh nucleus, which made this Algerian dialect today one of the local Amazigh dialects as well, as it has an Amazigh linguistic spirit and structure even if some of its words are Arabic. Muhammad Abed Al-Jabri in one of his books reads:
"The comprehensive process of Arabization must aim not only to eliminate the French language as civilization, culture, discourse and interaction, but also - and this is of great importance - to work on killing the local dialects, both Berber and "Arabic". mountainous and rural areas, prohibiting the use of any language or dialect in schools, radio and television other than classical Arabic, dedicating diverse and planned programs for popular political, economic, social and cultural education, programs that derive their material and content from the horizons and dimensions of the general national goal: completing liberation and socialist construction, and advancing In standard Arabic, simplified and schooled, with great care in dialogue and discussion.
It is the same thing that the colonial powers did with all the nations that they conquered by subjugating and enslaving those peoples after stripping them of their language, identity and true history.
What did the Berber Academy present to the Berbers and Berbers?:
Some may not believe that the barbaric academy is merely an intellectual aftershock of the great shake known historically as the “barbaric crisis” in 1949, even though I do not like calling it the barbaric crisis because the truth is an Arab crisis. With the Amazigh thought, which was just a natural reaction, which rejects all ideas imported into Algeria, especially the political ones, which brought about that conflict in 1949 that almost ravaged the country and those in it.
Many of the founders of the Berber Academy are influenced by the movement, and I think of the Berberists, especially the Arabs of Bousaud, as he was in disagreement even with Alda Al-Hussein, may God have mercy on him, and it was said that he insulted Alda Al-Hussein as well. Berberists supported the supporters of Baath Arab nationalism, and one of the Berbers called Rashid Ali Yahya mentions that he spoke with Karim Belkacem, who also stood against them, and Karim told him that he regretted that he did not stand with the Berberists during the revolution, and that they were right in their fear of the Arabists affected by the Baathist thought of Shakib Arslan, who managed Messali Al-Hajj's orientation changed and convinced him of the idea of Baathist Arab nationalism, which caused the barbaric crisis, as mentioned above. (06)
The Berber Academy has contributed to the selection of the Tifinagh Amazigh writing, whose inscriptions are spread all over North Africa. They also adopted the Latin Muammar Amazigh writing and wrote books on the history of the Amazighs, as well as publications that were sent in secret ways to Algeria because of the dictatorship of the regime opposed to the Amazighs at that time. (07)
And I open Qus here to respond to Dr. Othman Saadi, who said in his article that the current Tamazight is from the industry of the Berber Academy's laboratories, and I say to him, and is the current Arabic from the industry of Abu Jahl, for example? Isn’t what we now call the “Arabic letter” or “Arabic calligraphy” a letter that did not develop in the Hijaz, Mecca, or Medina (Yathrib) or even in Yemen? Nabataean (Jordan), and they are derived from the Aramaic letter, which also belongs to the Levant and Iraq. Academics are currently divided on the origins of the Arabic alphabet into two teams: one team believes that the Arabic letter is derived from the Nabataean letter, and another team believes that the Arabic letter is derived, for the most part, from the Syriac letter. Why mess with your assets, Doctor? (08)
?Isn't the non-Arabs who developed Arabic and excelled in it
Wasn't the first one to compose the millennium in Arabic an Algerian Berber of origin, the scholar Shaykh Zain al-Din Abu al-Hussein Yahya ibn Abd al-Mu'ti ibn Abd al-Nur al-Zawawi? Isn't the Arabic ajrumiyah developed by Imam Ibn Ajrum al-Sunhaji the Amazigh al-Fasi (d. 723 AH)? Wasn't the founder of Arabic grammar the Persian Sibawayh?
?Did non-Muslim non-Arabs also contribute to the dissemination of Arabic literature and heritage such as (Hoenerbach, Hirschburg, Wagner, Adolf Hochheim, Habcht Maximilian, Harman Ulrich)... and other orientalists, what prevents Amazigh if foreigners contributed to it, even if it was a colonial structure in that period The researchers of the Amazigh language have benefited from the work carried out by Cardinal Lavigerie's team, including Professor Mouloud Mamari, after brushing off the ideological ideas in it and reading it with an objective eye. Also, for the purpose of understanding and studying Algerian society in order to facilitate its subjugation or Christianization, and these works are present so far in the offices, we summarize them:
French-Kabyle (zouaoua) dictionary essay by Jean-Baptiste Creusat (1873).
French-Amazigh dictionary, dialect written and spoken by the Kabaïles of the division of Algiers, by Amédée Jaubert (1844)
Abridged grammar and dictionary of the Amazigh language by Jean-Michel Venture de Paradis & Amédée Jaubert (1844)
French-Kabyle (zouaoua) dictionary essay by Jean-Baptiste Creusat (1873).
French- Amazigh dictionary, dialect written and spoken by the Kabaïles of the division of Algiers, by Amédée Jaubert (1844)
Abridged grammar and dictionary of the Amazigh language by Jean-Michel Venture de Paradis & Amédée Jaubert (1844)
French-Tuareg dictionary, dialect of the Taïtoq (southern Algeria) by É—mile Masqueray (1893)
Catalog of Arabic and Amazigh names of some Algerian and Saharan plants, shrubs and trees or introduced and cultivated in Algeria, by Fernand Foureau (1896)
There are others, of course. Our problem is that we only see things from a closed and fanatical angle and with negative backgrounds compounded in our minds, which are remnants of colonialism and the policies of the ruling regimes after independence, which did not differ much from the colonial policy.
If our ancestors had invented Tifinagh, which means Thivi (Discovery) Nag (Na), that is, our discovery, and it is the oldest writing of man on the face of the earth, according to a recent discovery by a British scientist (09), and the line was in line with their lifestyle at that time, so what prevents their descendants from inventing Modern Amazigh writing in line with the requirements of the current era I am talking about the Latin letter that was developed by Professor Mouloud Maamari, and not about Tifinagh, which we also cherish.
?And the Latin script does not mean French, as some think, but it is the font in which most of the living languages of the world are written, including English, with which the Arabists cracked our heads as if it was not the language of the enemy either, or is the English invasion of Muslim countries permissible
What many are ignorant of is that the Amazigh Al-Maamari Latin alphabet (attributing to Professor Mouloud Maamari) consists of 35 letters, while the Latin (French) has 26 letters and 29 letters in Arabic, counting the hamza and the alif, and this means that both Arabic and French are unable to cover all the sounds spoken in Amazigh As for the question of which language Tamazight will be written in, it is the prerogative of specialists in the Tamazight tongue only, and not others. The Berber Academy has contributed to reviving the Amazigh awareness of the enthusiastic Amazigh youth again, especially the tribal ones, who expressed the enthusiasm accumulated in his conscience by launching student strikes here and there to express their rejection of the status quo at that time in Algeria, and to demand democratic, cultural and political openness until the promised day came. Which changed the situation in Algeria and North Africa, which is the Amazigh Spring on April 20, 1980, after the Algerian authorities prevented Professor Mouloud Maamari from giving a lecture on the poetry of the Algerian Kabyle philosopher and poet Si Mohand O Mohand, so the students declared a general strike in universities and were supported by high school students and even workers, and the movement moved to the universities of the Algerian capital, On the 20th of April, the security forces stormed the university residence in Tizi-Ouzou at night, so they practiced violence with the students, and as soon as the news reached the villages of the Djerjara mountains, the streets of the city of Tizi-Ouzou were filled with demonstrators, and that was the first and largest popular demonstration since independence, by which the Algerian people broke the complex of fear of the dictatorial regime Things did not calm down despite the arrests, but the demands expanded, so the first Human Rights League was established in Algeria, and a special association for the sons of martyrs. The Berber Cultural Movement (MCB) also appeared, which undertook the defense of the Amazigh cause. The Amazigh Spring was a direct cause and solid ground for the October 5 events in Algeria, which resulted in media openness and partisan pluralism.
a summary :
It becomes clear to us, after we have mentioned, that the Arabists’ attack on this academy and the Berbers in general and in an exaggerated manner, fabricating lies and interpreting concepts as a year of woe to the worshipers without any evidence, is nothing but a buried hatred for what it presented to Algeria because the Arabists (supporters of Baathist Arab nationalism) such as Dr. Othman Saadi and Ahmed bin Noman and others were the most beneficiaries of that situation that Algeria was living through during the time of unilateralism, the totalitarian dictatorial regime, and the idea of the French Jacobin state, which was adopted by the idea of the Socialist Baath Party, which disguises everything that is authentically Algerian and is hostile to the cultural and linguistic diversity in Algeria, which is a sign of God in His creation.
” وَمِنْ آيَاتِهِ خَلْقُ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالْأَرْضِ وَاخْتِلَافُ أَلْسِنَتِكُمْ وَأَلْوَانِكُمْ ۚ— إِنَّ فِي ذَٰ—لِكَ لَآيَاتٍ لِلْعَالِمِينَ ” ﴿ الروم٢ ٢)
This diversity is a healthy manifestation of society and a valuable treasure for the Algerian nation, if our rulers realize its good use.
Margins:
^ The Arabs and the Islamists: By them we mean the supporters of Baathist Arab nationalism and the Islamists who are merchants of religion.
^ The Arabists: Supporters of Ba'ath Arab Nationalism.
^ The Barbarists: They are a group of patriots in the Algerian People's Party, most of them from the Kabylie region. They rejected the idea of Arab nationalism in the party and proposed the idea of an Algerian Algeria as an alternative to Arab and Islamic Algeria. This idea was also rejected by the leaders of the party, which hastened the explosion of the barbaric crisis in the People's Party in 1949, and one of the most prominent leaders The patriots belonging to the Berberists are “Ali Yahya, Benai Wa Ali, Omar or Siddik, Ammar Ould Hammouda, Sadiq Hajris, Ali Aymesh, Mabrouk bin Al-Hassan, Yahya Hanin, Al-Said Obuzar, and Belaid Ait Medri.
(01) An article by Dr. Othman Saadi on Al-Hayat Al-Arabiya website entitled “The Berber Academy in Paris Tried to Distort Tamazight and Kabyleism” link
(02) Rabih Lounisi book, Algeria in the vortex of conflict between the military and politicians, pg. 72.
(03) The stay of the French army in Algeria until 1978 with the approval and blessing of Houari Boumediene
(04) Arabization was imposed on us by De Gaulle
(05) Arabization of the Maghreb a French project
(06) the berberist crisis 1949 rachid ali yahia
(07) Lecture by Ramdane Ahab
(08): A History of Writing Steven Roger Fischer
(09) Tifinagh language tamazight is the oldest Language of the History
Written by: Mustapha Samit.
Source: websites