Tag Archive for: Middle East

Trump’s Middle East stumbles

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The recent six-month mark of Donald Trump’s presidency serves as a reminder not only of how little his administration has accomplished domestically, but also of how his meandering foreign policy has created a geopolitical landscape rife with ticking time bombs. And nowhere have the consequences of Trump’s almost willful incapacity to grasp complex problems, and his obsession with reversing the legacy of his predecessor, Barack Obama, become more apparent than in the Middle East.

Consider Trump’s decision in April to launch cruise missiles at the Shayrat Airbase in Syria, in response to the use of chemical weapons by Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Aside from an unconvincing nod to humanitarianism, Trump’s only rationale for deploying US military capabilities seems to have been that Obama—after famously drawing a ‘red line’ against the use of chemical weapons in Syria—did not respond militarily to the Assad regime’s chemical attack in Ghouta in 2013.

But Trump showed little interest in following up on the attack with diplomacy. Then, earlier this month at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, he indicated that the US might somehow join forces with Russia to enforce a ceasefire in Syria’s southwest, which would serve as a model for other parts of the country, thus setting the stage for an eventual peace process.

No one with even a cursory understanding of the situation in Syria could think that a peace process will emerge from a regional ceasefire. Assad’s government has been importing allies—Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Iran, Russia, and even Turkey (in some respects)—to fight on its behalf for years. The Syrian opposition, by contrast, has received only intermittent assistance, and remains as fragmented as it was when the civil war began.

No one knows what Trump has in mind in terms of Syria’s future borders or governance. In a fractured country with few civil-society institutions and many ethnic and religious groups, will minority rights be protected? What about its borders? If the world learned anything from Iraq, it is that democracy requires resilient institutions and effective governance, not just elections.

The Obama administration’s goal in Syria was to identify and support moderate rebel groups willing to fight Assad. The Trump administration, by contrast, has shut down military assistance to moderate opposition groups altogether, having apparently concluded that no such forces exist. It has offered tacit support for the peace talks currently underway in Astana, Kazakhstan, which were brokered by Iran, Turkey, and Russia. But it has given no indication that it will take the lead on a peace process of its own, or even try to influence the outcome of the Astana deliberations.

Judging by Trump’s first six months in office, one can safely assume that Assad will remain in power for the time being. Trump seems to be encountering the same problem that Obama did when he tried to explain to the American people that overthrowing Syria’s Alawite-dominated regime would help defeat Sunni extremist groups such as the Islamic State (ISIS). In fact, as many Syrians rightly fear, removing Assad without a clear idea of what comes next could pave the way for the emergence of a kind of radical ‘Sunni-stan’.

Islamic radicalism is largely a Sunni Arab phenomenon. It is not simply a consequence of abusive Shia or Alawite regimes in specific countries, and it will not suddenly disappear if those regimes do. After all, ISIS has other footholds in the region as far away as the Maghreb. Beyond Syria, Trump would prefer to think big. In May, when he attended a Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) meeting in Riyadh, he praised Saudi Arabia as America’s top ally in the region. Given their disagreements with the Obama and George W. Bush administrations, the Saudis were eager for a new friend in the White House, and they greeted Trump by adorning Riyadh’s streets with massive posters of his visage.

During the GCC deliberations, Iran was singled out as the root cause of all the region’s problems (although the Saudis did invite Iraq which it often suggests is nothing but an Iranian surrogate). This anti-Iran rhetoric was certainly in keeping with Trump’s own. But Trump’s embrace of Saudi Arabia also seems to be about more than just Iran.

Many Trump supporters regard Saudi Arabia as the missing ingredient for Israeli–Palestinian peace. The Saudis have financial leverage over Fatah, the ruling Palestinian party in the West Bank, and they are open to marginalising Hamas, the Islamist militia that rules in Gaza. Hamas receives support from the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist organisation with extremist offshoots that is sometimes seen as a rival to the Saudi-grown Salafist movement.

By unconditionally embracing Saudi Arabia, Trump unwittingly set in motion a new public spat between that country and neighboring Qatar, which has long supported the Muslim Brotherhood. In June, Saudi Arabia, along with Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, imposed a full-scale blockade on Qatar and issued its leaders a series of far-reaching demands.

The diplomatic dispute between Qatar—a strategically important country to the US—and the other Gulf states sent US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson into crisis mode. But Tillerson has distanced himself from Trump, and rumors are circulating in Washington that he already wants out.

If Trump intends to make his mark on the Middle East, he would do well to mind the region’s complexities, and not behave as if he were still campaigning against Obama or Hillary Clinton. To paraphrase Hippocrates, the first rule of diplomacy is to do no harm.

Israel and the Six-Day War: a response to David Gardner

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David Gardner’s recent Strategist post Israel, the Six-Day War and the end of the two-state solution is what you’d expect from a journalist reporting from Lebanon, a country still officially at war with Israel, and which is so anti-Israel it recently banned the US movie ‘Wonder Woman’ simply because an Israeli actress plays the title role. The reality is different to Gardner’s portrayal.

The Six-Day War was unquestionably a defensive war on Israel’s part, having been preceded by various acts of war from Egypt and its allies, including mobilising forces on Israel’s borders, demanding the withdrawal of UN peace-keepers, and blocking a naval route to Israeli shipping, not to mention blood-curdling predictions of Israel’s imminent demise. Indeed, the West Bank was taken only after Jordan attacked Israel.

Gardner criticises Israel for continuing to hold the West Bank 50 years later, but is this really fair? In the immediate aftermath of its stunning victory, Israel offered to return land captured in exchange for peace. However, that August, the Arab League met, and responded with the ‘three nos’—no negotiation, no recognition, no peace.

In November 1967, UN Security Council Resolution 242 required Israel to withdraw ‘from territories occupied’ in the war in exchange for peace. The resolution specifically didn’t state ‘all the territories’ or even ‘the territories’, because the intention was that final borders be negotiated.

In 1979, in exchange for peace with Egypt, Israel returned the entire Sinai, an area larger than Israel itself. A peace agreement with Jordan followed in 1994.

However, despite numerous attempts, Israel has been unable to conclude a final peace agreement with the Palestinians. The Oslo Accords, reached in 1993, determined that the newly established Palestinian Authority (PA) was to progressively administer more of the West Bank and Gaza, while confidence was built between the sides, and ultimately a Palestinian state would be negotiated.

By 1999, over 95 per cent of Palestinians lived in areas administered by the Palestinian Authority. Then the following year Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, negotiating with Arafat at Camp David, with Bill Clinton mediating, offered a Palestinian state consisting of Gaza, most of the West Bank, land swaps to compensate for areas Israel was to keep, and shared sovereignty in Jerusalem, including the holy places.

Arafat was urged to accept the deal, including by some Arab leaders, but refused point blank. Instead, he launched his terrorist Intifada, which killed over 1,000 Israelis, maimed thousands more, and was only ended by Israeli security measures including the checkpoints and security barrier.

The 2002 Arab peace initiative, endorsed and over-simplified by Gardner, was certainly an improvement on the ‘three nos’, but still had many shortcomings. It demanded a return to the 1967 borders, without the land swaps generally regarded as necessary, it implicitly required the ‘return’ of millions of descendants of Palestinian refugees to Israel, which would end Israel as a Jewish state, and it demanded Israel accept these conditions not as part of negotiations, but as a prelude to them.

It is also untrue to say Israel has refused to ever discuss the proposal. In the years since, various Israeli governments including Netanyahu’s have signalled willingness to negotiate the terms, but have been meet largely with disinterest.

In 2005, after Arafat’s death, Israel under Ariel Sharon tried a different tack, fully withdrawing from Gaza. Instead of a peaceful neighbour, using the infrastructure Israel left behind to prosper, Israel got a Hamas takeover, over ten thousand rockets and mortars, and three wars.

In 2008, Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert improved on the Camp David proposal, offering land equivalent to the entire West Bank and Gaza, with a land bridge between them, and compensation and limited return for refugees. As PA President Mahmoud Abbas has admitted, he rejected the offer ‘out of hand’.

More recently, he has refused to negotiate in good faith, and then, to talk at all, despite confidence-building steps by the Netanyahu government including freezing settlements and releasing Palestinian terrorists from prison, and an ongoing offer from Netanyahu to negotiate anywhere, anytime, without preconditions.

Instead, the PA incites hatred against Israel through all levels of its society, and encourages terrorism by paying terrorists and their families, to the tune of US$1.1 billion in the last four years alone.

Netanyahu has many times expressed his support for a two-state peace, but he currently has no peace partner. It was in that context that Trump made his comment about a possible one-state solution, meaning that he wasn’t about to try to impose a solution one of the parties, the Palestinians, seemingly has no interest in.

Gardner, and the Palestinians, portray settlements as a major problem, but even Palestinian leaders admit the settlements take up less than two per cent of the West Bank, and most settlers live in areas generally slated for land-swaps. Settlements didn’t prevent the 2000 and 2008 offers.

The real sticking points are that the PA refuses to accept that any agreement means no further claims against Israel, and that it will not be able to flood Israel with a ‘right of return’ for in excess of five million descendants of refugees.

Just as the Six-Day War ultimately led to peace between Israel and Egypt and Jordan, it could ultimately lead to Israeli/Palestinian peace, but that can only happen if the Palestinians have a change of heart and genuinely accept Israel’s right to exist.

Saudi Arabia holds the Trump card

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Image courtesy of Flickr user Daniel Coomber.

Since President Trump’s visit to Riyadh last month, the events that have played out on the ground in the Gulf have exposed long-standing rifts between powerful Sunni monarchies that belie the simplistic logic of sectarianism that’s been used to analyse Middle Eastern conflicts.

Addressing the Muslim world on the threat of extremism, Trump made the decision to divide and conquer by shrouding his message in the cloak of sectarianism—an oversimplified analysis of the complex conflicts taking place in the Middle East. He made no apologies for singling out Iran as the government that fuels ‘the fires of sectarian conflict and terror’, yet chose to wilfully ignore the human rights violations, indiscriminate bombing of innocent civilians and unreserved disregard for democracy by some of the region’s most powerful Sunni despotic rulers—with Saudi Arabia at the helm.

The sectarian conflicts that plague the region are not as deep-rooted and innate as have been claimed; nor are they beyond political resolution. Rather, contemporary sectarianism has become the focus of international proxy wars between nations competing for regional power and influence. External influencers—such as the US—have been central to fuelling rather than quelling those conflicts by supplying arms and funds in the interest of brokering trade deals and promoting economic stability, at the expense of human life.

Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Bahrain have all experienced ‘Sunni–Shia’ conflicts; however, what happens on the ground is tied in to a much larger geopolitical power struggle involving an extension of old Cold War anxieties between the US and Russia, played out through Saudi Arabia and Iran. The proxy wars that are being fought in the region require a much more nuanced and in-depth understanding of the local socio-cultural histories that have paved the way for current manifestations of conflict to take root.

For example, while Iran has helped coordinate local military coalitions in the fight against ISIS in Iraq, its support for President Assad has undermined the coalition’s preference to unseat the regime. In addition, Iran’s role in maintaining the presence of Hezbollah in Lebanon has helped to create the strongest non-state military force in the country.

On the other hand, the Saudi bombing campaign against the Houthi rebels in Yemen created an atmosphere that enabled al-Qaeda to proliferate in the Arabian Peninsula. The Saudis’ support for the military-led coup to oust democratically elected Egyptian President Morsi, and subsequent support of President Sisi’s military regime, demonstrated their fear of ideological competition as vanguards of the Muslim world, at the hands of the Brotherhood.

Furthermore, the Saudis’ longstanding ideological and financial relationship with Hamas deteriorated in the late 2000s following US scrutiny of their funding of terrorist groups. The curtailment of Saudi funding of Hamas paved the way for increased Iranian support for the group—an unlikely alliance, in theory—demonstrating that the Sunni–Shia sectarian narrative doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. An analysis by the Brookings Doha Center (PDF) detailed the multifaceted forces at play: ‘Sunni versus Shia makes for a simple headline, but does not do justice to the complexities of the new Middle East cold war.’

Qatar’s bold support for both the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas reveals deep tensions between the two monarchies, but former emir Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani’s public pursuit of relationships with Israel and Iran demonstrated a rejection of the status quo across the regional GCC monarchies. Those actions further challenge the idea that Sunni regimes will stick together, and that sectarian disagreements are at the foundation of issues in the region.

The regional disputes are in fact clearly based on geopolitical ties of power and influence, which are playing out both regionally and internationally. For example, Saudi Arabia’s cessation of diplomatic relations with Qatar over accusations of terrorist funding was part of its broader campaign to ‘discredit Doha in the eyes of the Trump administration’ and to reassert itself as the sole regional Sunni power by isolating the nation ideologically and physically.

The return to the status quo was reinforced by President Trump’s address in Riyadh. The US$400 billion worth of deals signed, and Trump’s firm commitment to isolate Iran, have bolstered the Kingdom’s confidence, which was severely weakened during the Obama era. Trump’s speech openly toed the Saudi line of playing the blame game with Iran, framing the nation as the ‘source of all evil in the region’. That approach ignores Saudi-endorsed extremism across the world, and reinforces a sectarian rhetoric that’s fundamentally flawed. Saudi Arabia is a known theocracy that has funded and exported extremism from Indonesia to South Korea.

The reignited Saudi–US alliance demonstrates a shift back to old comforts and relationships in the Middle East. During the Obama era, traditional foreign policy conventions that dictated a tacit alliance with Saudi Arabia were undermined. The administration’s sincere attempts to bring Iran to the negotiating table, topped off with the nuclear disarmament deal, fuelled domestic anxiety and reproach among Saudis. With Trump in the White House, it appears as though the Kingdom can resume order as normal and return to being the primary regional powerhouse.

Beyond the public display of extravagant hospitality, sword dances and glowing orbs, a more sinister message of autocracy and regional influence can be discerned: Saudi Arabia is trying to reshape US priorities and relationships in the region.

The Six-Day War at 50

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Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

The world is about to mark the 50th anniversary of the June 1967 war between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, and Syria—a conflict that continues to stand out in a region with a modern history largely defined by violence. The war lasted less than a week, but its legacy remains pronounced a half-century later.

The war itself was triggered by an Israeli preemptive strike on the Egyptian air force, in response to Egypt’s decision to expel a United Nations peacekeeping force from Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula and to close the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping. Israel struck first, but most observers regarded what it did as a legitimate act of self-defense against an imminent threat.

Israel did not intend to fight on more than one front, but the war quickly expanded when both Jordan and Syria entered the conflict on Egypt’s side. It was a costly decision for the Arab countries. After just six days of fighting, Israel controlled the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza strip, the Golan Heights, the West Bank, and all of Jerusalem. The new Israel was more than three times larger than the old one. It was oddly reminiscent of Genesis: six days of intense effort followed by a day of rest, in this case the signing of a cease-fire.

The one-sided battle and its outcome put an end to the notion (for some, a dream) that Israel could be eliminated. The 1967 victory made Israel permanent in ways that the wars of 1948 and 1956 did not. The new state finally acquired a degree of strategic depth. Most Arab leaders came to shift their strategic goal from Israel’s disappearance to its return to the pre-1967 war borders.

The Six-Day War did not, however, lead to peace, even a partial one. That would have to wait until the October 1973 war, which set the stage for what became the Camp David Accords and the Israel-Egypt peace treaty. The Arab side emerged from this subsequent conflict with its honor restored; Israelis for their part emerged chastened. There is a valuable lesson here: decisive military outcomes do not necessarily lead to decisive political results, much less peace.

The 1967 war did, however, lead to diplomacy, in this case UN Security Council Resolution 242. Approved in November 1967, the resolution called for Israel to withdraw from territories occupied in the recent conflict—but also upheld Israel’s right to live within secure and recognized boundaries. The resolution was a classic case of creative ambiguity. Different people read it to mean different things. That can make a resolution easier to adopt, but more difficult to act on.

It thus comes as little surprise that there is still no peace between Israelis and Palestinians, despite countless diplomatic undertakings by the United States, the European Union and its members, the UN, and the parties themselves. To be fair, Resolution 242 cannot be blamed for this state of affairs. Peace comes only when a conflict becomes ripe for resolution, which happens when the leaders of the principal protagonists are both willing and able to embrace compromise. Absent that, no amount of well-intentioned diplomatic effort by outsiders can compensate.

But the 1967 war has had an enormous impact all the same. Palestinians acquired an identity and international prominence that had largely eluded them when most were living under Egyptian or Jordanian rule. What Palestinians could not generate was a consensus among themselves regarding whether to accept Israel and, if so, what to give up in order to have a state of their own.

Israelis could agree on some things. A majority supported returning the Sinai to Egypt. Various governments were prepared to return the Golan Heights to Syria under terms that were never met. Israel unilaterally withdrew from Gaza and signed a peace treaty with Jordan. There was also broad agreement that Jerusalem should remain unified and in Israeli hands.

But agreement stopped when it came to the West Bank. For some Israelis, this territory was a means to an end, to be exchanged for a secure peace with a responsible Palestinian state. For others, it was an end in itself, to be settled and retained.

This is not to suggest a total absence of diplomatic progress since 1967. Many Israelis and Palestinians have come to recognize the reality of one another’s existence and the need for some sort of partition of the land into two states. But for now the two sides are not prepared to resolve what separates them. Both sides have paid and are paying a price for this standoff.

Beyond the physical and economic toll, Palestinians continue to lack a state of their own and control over their own lives. Israel’s objective of being a permanent Jewish, democratic, secure, and prosperous country is threatened by open-ended occupation and evolving demographic realities.

Meanwhile, the region and the world have mostly moved on, concerned more about Russia or China or North Korea. And even if there were peace between Israelis and Palestinians, it would not bring peace to Syria, Iraq, Yemen, or Libya. Fifty years after six days of war, the absence of peace between Israelis and Palestinians is part of an imperfect status quo that many have come to accept and expect.

The battle for hegemony in the Middle East

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The story of the Middle East for decades to come is of a battle for the hegemony of Sunni Islam, especially in the Arab world, and of the efforts by non-Sunni Muslims and non-Muslims to ensure that no dominant Sunni power capable of uniting the Sunni Arab world, and ultimately the Sunni world more broadly, emerges.

The Sunni world in general, and the Arab Sunni world in particular, lies in ruins. In some cases, quite literally. However, the current malaise of the Sunni Arab world shouldn’t cover the simple fact that Sunni Muslims make up the majority of Muslims around the world and that the Arab world is almost exclusively Sunni. After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, due to the intervention of the conquering British and French powers, Sunni Arabs had little to say about their political organisation. Now that they are emerging from a century-long political hiatus, a united Sunni Arab world constitutes one of the biggest, but still contestable, geopolitical prizes.

Should a united Sunni Arab polity emerge, especially if it unites under the banner of the more extreme interpretations of Islam, it could constitute an existential threat to the non-Sunni, non-Arab and non-Muslim minorities of the Middle East. Those minorities therefore have no greater strategic imperative than to ensure that no such polity, as well as no hegemonic power capable of creating such a polity, emerges.

The battle to replace the lost hegemony of the Ottoman Empire is waged among those who could credibly claim leadership of the Sunni world over which it once held sway. In the grand strategic game of the Middle East—defined here as the battle to lead or thwart Sunni, and especially Sunni Arab, unification and hegemony—the players are grouped into those capable of leading (Turkey, Egypt, Saudi, Islamist contenders) or thwarting (Iran, Israel, Russia). The board on which they are playing the game includes four major ongoing battlegrounds (Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen) and five or six potential battlegrounds (Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the various Gulf states, Egypt, perhaps Turkey). Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco are likely to remain at the margins but will be profoundly affected by the outcomes of the other battles.

With the game, players and battlegrounds defined, the ability of the players to achieve their aims depends on the tools at their disposal and whether they make effective use of them. In terms of the traditional tools of power— territory, people, military and economic resources—the various actors differ, and none emerges as the absolute clear hegemon. There’s no natural hegemon to the Sunni world, or to the Sunni Arab world, as exists in other regions of the world. There’s no single country that can make a credible claim to uniting the Sunni Arab world that also enjoys a preponderance of power in all its various forms. This means that not only is the struggle for hegemony likely to be drawn out over decades, if not longer, but also that the ability of the various actors to be effective and have an edge depends on their sophisticated use of other forms of power, such as so-called ‘soft’ power.

Ultimately, Australia and other Western countries have to come to terms with their limited role in shaping the outcomes of the battle for hegemony in the Arab Middle East. This doesn’t mean that there’s nothing to be done, but those outside the region must clinically and dispassionately consider their interests in the region and what they can reasonably expect to achieve.

To avoid importing or expanding the Middle East’s conflicts, those outside the region need to develop a greater understanding of its various layers of complexity. And, in doing so, they need to avoid the temptation to seek an over-simplistic ‘fix’. In the realms of domestic, border and international security, what’s to be done is arguably much more about Islam in the West than about the Middle East.

Divided tribes: the impact of colonial boundaries in the Middle East and North Africa

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In their grab for influence and resources, colonial powers drew artificial borders across the Middle East and North Africa, often arbitrarily splitting traditional tribal territories into new states. Clans and families found themselves living in different countries. It was bearable at the beginning since no real physical barriers were erected, meaning that the nomad and semi-nomad tribes continued their routine movements and family contacts weren’t interrupted. Most states established patterns of dependence and inclusion with these tribal populations which included representation in state institutions, financial subsidies and assurances of non-interference in their jurisdiction and practices.

It wasn’t a perfect formula but it created a modus vivendi that served both the tribes and the regimes so long as the states could provide the means to keep the tribes loyal mainly through financial subsidies. The model worked for more than half a century from Algeria, through Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Iraq and the Horn of Africa. Little was invested in education, so tribal leaders were kept busy maintaining their tribal authority and prestige—prerequisites for survival in the unforgiving sands of Arabia and the Sahara desert.

This comfortable equilibrium started fraying at the edges towards the end of the 20th century when literacy improvements coincided with the rapid spread of cellular communications. Tribes in Egypt, Syria and Yemen began to feel disenfranchised by privatisation policies brought about by globalisation. The trend was accelerated by the 2011 upheavals naively dubbed ‘The Arab Spring’. Central authority was severely weakened in most places across the Middle East and North Africa, preventing authorities providing the tribes with the essentials, which were mainly economic, needed to maintain their loyalty.

These tectonic changes want hand in hand with the spread of social media. The practical disappearance of international borders in some places contributed to the meltdown. Remote tribal clans, spread across three or four countries in Northern Africa like the Tuareg in Algeria, Tunisia and Libya or the big Annazah, Rawallah, Shammar tribes in Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Jordan in Western Asia which had managed to stay in contact over decades, began communicating intensively through new media and taking advantage of the breakdown of the borders. Doing so helped them to spread ideas and to coordinate moves and policies. This happened also with the Bedouin tribes in the Sinai Peninsula, Southern Israel, the Gaza Strip, Jordan and Northern Saudi Arabia.

To complicate the situation, dangerous new elements in the shape of al-Qaeda and ISIS took advantage of the governance vacuum. These Jihadi-Salafi groups influenced some tribes through a combination of financial benefits and a show of cruel power which sometimes disrupted their organic and traditional structures. In other places (such as Syria), the tribes split between opposing the regime or supporting it. That new factor turns the traditional equation into a triangle: state, tribes and Jihadi-Salafism.

Here we come to the contemporary challenge: who’s going to find out what happens among those dispersed tribes and how are they going to do that? This isn’t an academic or social question but an intensely practical one. European, North American and Australian diplomats, armed forces and NGOs operate in those areas but most of their quarters are either closed or fortified by barbed wire and concrete protective walls, hindering efforts to discharge their classical duties. Baghdad’s ‘Green Zone’, home to most of the embassies, is an example of such disconnect, as is the phenomenon of trying to monitor the situation in Syria through the staff who have been withdrawn from Damascus and rehomed in Beirut.

Operational and political decisions have to be made and policies adopted now to help resolve situations created over a century ago. How much support, in equipment and finance, should be extended to tribes in return of fighting against ISIS or turning their back on their current “allies”? That’s a current and valid issue in Syria, Libya, Yemen and Iraq. Such complex decisions must be based on the best information available. How can one sense the mood of the tribes in Deir Al-Zour Province in Eastern Syria and Al-Anbar Province in Western Iraq who reside along the Euphrates River on whether joint regional self-rule will work in the future? How much support may the Ruwallah, Shammar and Annazah factions in different countries provide to their brethren in other countries? And how are Kurdish tribal groups in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey planning for their common future at the same time as their nations of residence are using them as a proxy against their rivals?

The complicated picture on the ground gives rise to the question of who should monitor and research these cross-border issues. At the moment there exists no cohesive architecture or mechanism to carry out such activities. Such an oversight obscures our vision of what is happening in the Middle East and North Africa, where the sands keep shifting.

Iran’s 2017 elections: more than just a presidential ballot

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Iran’s presidential elections on 19 May will not only determine who and which political faction, moderate or conservative, will head the government during the next four years, but may also decide who succeeds Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The Guardian Council announced on 20 April that six candidates, three from each faction, were ‘approved’ to contest the election. The council, of six clerics appointed by the Supreme Leader, and six jurists appointed by the Supreme Justice (himself a Supreme Leader appointee), reviews the eligibility of candidates for presidential, parliamentary and some other elected bodies.

The three moderate candidates are the president, Hassan Rouhani, Eshaq Jahangiri, Senior Vice President, and Mustafa Hashemitaba, a former Vice President. Of the conservative candidates, two are hard-line: Ebrahim Raisi, a senior cleric and a former Deputy Chief Justice and Attorney-General; and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, mayor of Tehran and a former Commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Air Force. The third, Mostafa Mirsalim, a former Minister of Culture, is a more traditional conservative.

Whether some candidates withdraw to avoid splitting their faction’s vote, remains to be seen. Candidates don’t know if they will be ‘approved’ by the Guardian Council so usually at least two members of the major groupings within each faction (technically, there are no political parties as such in Iran) will nominate in the event one, or more, are disqualified.

Amongst the conservatives, Jahangiri is a supporter of Rouhani but does not have his electoral appeal and he is likely to withdraw. Hashemitaba also has less electoral appeal than Rouhani, but, if he does contest, the split vote could affect the outcome.

Raisi and Ghalibaf are from the same hard-line conservative group. Ghalibaf has long standing presidential ambitions, having stood in 2005 and in 2013. If he withdraws, it’s unlikely the Guardian Council would approve his candidacy in future so he would be very reluctant to pull out. If Raisi stands firm and both contest the election, they’ll split the vote. Mirsalim has electoral appeal among moderate conservatives. Whether he would consider withdrawing to avoid further vote-splitting is not clear, but a three-way conservative split would significantly affect their chances.

This election will position future candidates to replace Ali Khamenei. He has prostate cancer and could die or become seriously incapacitated within the term of the next president. Rouhani and Raisi are the front runners to replace him. Both are members of the Assembly of Experts which selects the Supreme Leader. If both contest the elections, victory would improve the winner’s prospects of becoming Supreme Leader.

It’s difficult to assess who will become president. Rouhani’s re-election is not a foregone conclusion, although all presidents since 1989 have won a second term. Rouhani’s campaign is focused on continuing his 2013 platform: economic development, a constructive role in seeking to resolve the multiple crises in the Middle East, improved relations with the West and social reform.

Progress on the first three has been mixed. The signing of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2015, and its implementation in 2016 was critical because it defused, at least in part, concerns about Iran’s intentions and ability to develop nuclear weapons. The lifting of many economic sanctions opened up opportunities for significant new foreign investment in Iran’s domestic economy, including the infrastructure sector, leading to the creation of desperately needed jobs. The close relationship between Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, and former US secretary of state, John Kerry, also helped Iran/US-West dialogue and understanding.

But continuing sanctions by many Western countries, especially the US, and uncertainty about the extent of US restrictions on international financial movements that would enable investment, have significantly slowed economic development. The Trump administration’s brake on the Iran-US dialogue has raised uncertainties about its future.

While the US Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, announced on 18 April that Iran had complied with nuclear restrictions despite strong allegations to the contrary, he added that US-Iran policy remained ‘under review’. He cited Iran continuing to be a sponsor of terrorism, especially by supporting anti-Israeli elements of Hamas and Hezbollah, and its support for Syria’s Assad government and backing of regional Shia militia, now engaged in proxy wars with Sunni militia, backed by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states. Another factor is Iran’s alleged breach of UN restrictions on the development and test firing of nuclear-capable ballistic missiles and other military provocations in the Gulf area.

Potentially, the elections could deliver a hard-line conservative president, and down the track, a replacement hard-line Supreme Leader. Either, or both, would have significant implications, not only domestically in terms of the direction of economic and social change, but also for Iran’s international relations.

Rouhani’s re-election would allow him to continue his past policies, notwithstanding their deficiencies as perceived by the West. But delivery will be a challenge. If the US, backed by other regional states, raises its level of confrontation with Iran, it’ll be an outcome with no winners. Rouhani’s ability to shape domestic and international relations will be compromised, and could encourage the hard-liners to push for greater confrontation, regionally and internationally.

President Erdogan: Turkey’s uncrowned sultan

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President Erdogan has achieved his long-cherished ambition to be acknowledged as the uncrowned sultan of Turkey. However, his goal has been attained at great cost to the country. Turkey is divided down the middle regarding the wisdom of this course. A referendum, changing the constitution to a presidential system with almost unbridled powers for the chief executive, passed on Sunday with the barest majority—51 to 49 percent. Moreover, the CHP, the leading opposition party, is demanding a recount of up to 60 percent of the ballots cast, saying that unstamped voting papers were considered valid.

Additionally, international monitors from the OSCE and the Council of Europe have delivered a scathing report, casting serious doubts about the integrity of the referendum. They have declared that the referendum was held on an “unlevel playing field,” with disproportionate media coverage going to the “Yes” campaign.

The outcome of the referendum shows a glaring regional divide. The most developed parts of the country, the entire Aegean coast and much of the Mediterranean coastline voted against the constitutional amendment. So did the Kurdish-majority provinces in the southeast of the country. Equally important, if not more, the three largest cities—Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir—also voted against changing the constitution.

While Izmir has always been a holdout against the AKP’s domination, the “No” votes in Istanbul and Ankara were astounding, amounting to a political slap to Erdogan’s face. Istanbul is Erdogan’s home turf, where he cut his political teeth and gained the sobriquet “the bully of Kasimpaşa” for his no-holds-barred style of politicking. As the mayor of Istanbul in the 1990s, he gained a reputation as an efficient administrator, which stood him in good stead during his later career. It was during those years that he also made his reputation as a courageous fighter against the Kemalist elite, for which he was briefly jailed.

Ankara is the bastion of state power presided over by Erdogan and his AKP colleagues. Notwithstanding its reputation as “Atatürk’s city,” it has repeatedly elected the AKP in local elections in recent years. Losing Ankara despite all the state’s pomp and show at his command should force Erdogan to rethink the wisdom of his stance on constitutional change.

So should the slim majority—now being challenged in court by the opposition parties, for electoral irregularities—by which the measure was won. The margin of victory should in fact be interpreted as a sign of Erdogan’s defeat, in light of the fact that the referendum was held under the most inauspicious conditions for opponents of the change.

Erdogan and his government used the excuse of rooting out the proponents of the failed July coup to purge the media, academia and judiciary of all dissenting voices. The media was cowed into submission, and consequently the opponents of the amendment were mostly unable to put across their point of view to the voters.

It was an uneven playing field if ever there was one. Only a small percentage of coverage on electronic media was available to the opposition. With opposition media, both print and electronic, mostly closed down or taken over by the government, opponents of change were severely hobbled during the campaign. Pro-AKP private TV stations effectively shut out the opposition from their coverage. The state-run media, which was supposed to give equal time to the two sides, refused to cover opposition rallies except perfunctorily. That the opposition still managed to garner approximately half the votes is an astonishing rejection of Erdogan’s claim of victory in a free and fair referendum.

What does the referendum bode for the future? It is obvious that the outcome allows Erdogan to consolidate power and act as the sole decisionmaking authority in the country. He was launched on such a course in any case, but the constitutional amendment now gives his actions legal cover. Given his vindictive nature, this means that his opponents will be in for a rougher time than before.

It also means that any stirrings of opposition within his own party will be nipped in the bud. He has already sidelined the cofounder of the AKP—former president Abdullah Gül, who has been sent into political hibernation. So has his former handpicked prime minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu, who served as the fall guy for the president’s errors. President Erdogan has surrounded himself by advisors who are more sycophants than counselors, because he does not like to hear dissenting views. This means he will be cut off further from learning the real state of affairs in the country.

In order to further bolster his legitimacy, in view of the slim majority with which he won the referendum, he is likely to emphasize his increasingly ultranationalist postures, thereby alienating the Kurdish population even further. Most Kurdish leaders, including the coleaders of the parliament’s HDP party and several of their colleagues, are already in jail. For many Kurds, the militant PKK appears to be the only viable option. An increase in Kurdish terrorism will provide Erdogan with the opportunity to crack down viciously on the Kurdish population in southeast Turkey, a path he has already embarked upon over the past couple of years. This would burnish his ultranationalist image, but at the same time widen the chasm between Turks and Kurds in the country—a recipe for continuing instability.

The EU and major European countries, such as Germany, France and the Netherlands, were harshly critical of Erdogan’s unabashed display of autocratic tendencies prior to the referendum, and have earned his ire. He accused the Dutch government of acting like Nazis when it prevented a visit by one of his ministers to campaign for the referendum among Turks residing in the Netherlands.

Erdogan’s high-handed actions have indefinitely postponed the prospects of Turkish membership in the EU, thus reducing Europe’s significance in Turkish foreign-policy priorities. This means that Turkey’s incentive to conform to the Copenhagen criteria to gain entry into the EU is no longer in place. In victory, Erdogan is likely to be even less concerned about European views about democracy and human rights than he was before the polls. Erdogan has made a deal with the EU that has slowed the movement of refugees into Europe to a trickle. This gives him additional leverage that could help minimize European criticism of his authoritarian actions following the referendum, and leave him free to do what he desires.

Turkey’s differences with the United States, unlike those Turkey has with the EU, are not primarily related to Erdogan’s authoritarian tendencies or to Ankara’s human-rights record. They have more to do with concrete policy differences over U.S. support for the main Kurdish force in Syria: the YPG, which is the military wing of Syria’s leading Kurdish party. However, Turkey considers the YPG to be an arm of the PKK, which has been engaged in major acts of insurgency and terrorism in Turkey for over thirty years. Turkey perceives the American-supported YPG presence across its border with Syria as a major security threat, as it boosts Kurdish nationalist sentiments within Turkey. As the war against ISIS proceeds, Turkish forces may come to clash with the YPG militia—they have come close a few times recently—to prevent the latter from extending control over territories currently held by ISIS near the Turkish border.

This dimension of Turkish-American relations is expected to become more salient following the referendum, which is likely to presage greater conflict between the Kurds in Turkey and the Turkish state. Therefore, America’s relations with Turkey could face a setback as it gets further embroiled in the Turkish-Kurdish conflict as a result of the war against ISIS. Erdogan’s abrasive personality, fresh from victory in the referendum, could add to tensions between Washington and Ankara. This could happen both over the Kurdish issue and over Ankara’s demand for the extradition of Fethullah Gülen, who lives in Pennsylvania but whom the Turkish government considers to be the mastermind behind the abortive July coup.

The future of post-referendum Turkey appears uncertain, if not completely bleak. Societal divisions, both along ethnic and political lines, have hardened. Erdogan’s authoritarian style exacerbates both domestic and external problems, rather than alleviating them. Relations with the EU have reached a low point not seen in many years. Problems with the United States can be expected to increase, as ISIS begins to crumble and members of the polyglot anti-ISIS alliance, including inveterate enemies the Turks and the YPG, make a dash to conquer territory, thus bringing them into open conflict with one another.

Erdogan may have won the referendum, and may survive the challenge to the result in court, but his domestic and external problems can be expected to increase. His autocratic operating style, his refusal to countenance opposition and his societally divisive strategies adopted in order to consolidate personal power do not bode well for Turkey, especially if he remains in power for another ten years, which was the chief objective of the referendum. In the end, it may turn out to be a Pyrrhic victory for Turkey’s president.

 

The Counterterrorism Yearbook 2017: the Middle East

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Image courtesy of Pixabay user 3dman_eu.

Across the Middle East there has been a marked increase in terrorist attacks in the wake of the Arab Spring, the rise of the Islamic State (IS), and the revival of al-Qaeda and its offshoots. Beyond Iraq and Syria, IS has established regional affiliates elsewhere in the Middle East—including in Egypt, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia—that have reignited terrorist activity in those countries after years of relative quiet. Following years of waning influence, al-Qaeda has also regained some traction, aided by the continuing conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Yemen. Here I have outlined the key CT developments in 2016 by country.

Egypt: A consolidated military rule under Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and the passage of a restrictive new CT law haven’t diminished the terrorist threat in Egypt. In fact, 2016 was a particularly violent year, the country experiencing its highest level of terrorism since the late 1990s. Various terrorist actors targeted security forces, government officials and minorities. The year ended with two bomb attacks; one targeted security forces in Giza, killing government personnel; the other targeted the Coptic Botroseya Church in Cairo killing 26 worshippers. It was the deadliest terrorist attack on Egypt’s Christian minority since the 2011 New Year’s Eve bombing of the Two Saints church in Alexandria.

Jordan: Jordan’s CT and intelligence agencies are widely seen as being among the most capable in the region but they experienced a number of setbacks in 2016. In June, Jordanian security installations were compromised on two separate occasions: a lone attacker shot and killed five officers at a General Intelligence Division building before escaping, while a car bomb at a military base on the Syrian border killed six soldiers. An exodus of Jordanian fighters to Syria (estimated at over 2,500) was also a key concern for Jordanian authorities.

Kuwait: During 2016, Kuwait continued to build its CT capabilities, although the Kuwaiti government lacks a clear legal framework for prosecuting terrorism crimes. It’s also a cooperative partner in international and regional CT efforts, including its membership of the Small Group of the Global Coalition to Counter IS. In a joint operation with Indian security services in 2016, a Kuwaiti citizen was arrested and charged with making arrangements to fund the trip of the first group of Indian IS recruits to Syria. That action spurred broader investigations of terrorist financing networks in Pakistan and Afghanistan paying for IS foreign fighters’ travel to Syria.

Saudi Arabia: The kingdom of Saudi Arabia has long been a target and an incubator of terrorism. It’s rightly viewed as both ‘the arsonist and the firefighter’. The kingdom is also a source of terrorism financing and has actively exported its brand of extreme Wahhabi Islam. In 2016, the country experienced five major terrorist attacks, resulting in 44 people being killed. Aside from this, the kingdom did take significant steps to stifle other terrorist funding in 2016. In March, it took joint action with the US to disrupt the fundraising networks of a number of terrorist groups by blocking money transfers and imposing sanctions on networks across the region.

Yemen: In 2016 Yemen remained beset by conflict, and was rarely controlled by a single power. AQAP is based in Yemen and is al-Qaeda’s most capable affiliate. AQAP has a long-established presence in Yemen, but the most recent civil war has been a boon to the group. With no decisive victor in Yemen’s civil war and a situation exacerbated by the Gulf Arab states and Iran playing out their regional conflict by proxy, Yemen will remain divided and politically unstable, providing fertile ground for AQAP and IS for the foreseeable future.

Looking ahead, substantial changes in the region in 2017 are unlikely. IS will remain a significant terrorism threat, and al-Qaeda will continue to play the long game, exploiting tactical openings to consolidate its presence in the region. Competition between IS and al-Qaeda is likely to intensify in 2017 as IS transforms into a more traditional terrorist organisation. Both groups will compete for recruits and ideological leadership within the movement.

The underlying regional conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran and its proxies will continue to play out in 2017. There appears to be no significant prospect for political reform in this year.

Middle Eastern governments have historically played a cat-and-mouse game with violent Islamist extremist groups, alternately tolerating and cracking down on them. However, the rise of IS has demonstrated how tolerance of such groups can turn and destabilise the region. State tolerance of terrorist groups and terrorist financing continues, however, as Iran, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states are still using proxy groups to promote their own interests. Middle Eastern CT strategies and policies remain entangled to various degrees with those of the West, particularly the US led Coalition to defeat the Islamic State.

Alawism, the Syrian conflict and the prospect of a resolution

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Image courtesy of Flickr user Sharnoff's Global Views.

The recent peace talks at Astana in Kazakhstan between the Assad regime and a select group of rebels underlined the Assad regime’s approach to the conflict and its resolution. The regime continued as it had done at other talks by focusing primarily on procedural matters, thus avoiding dealing with the substantive issues such as resolving the conflict. That approach allows it to keep chipping at the opposition, which is now more divided and fragmented than ever, whereas the Syrian army, with the support of the National Defense Force remains committed to victory.

To understand the reticence of the Assad regime, its steadfast refusal to settle and willingness to engage in an all-out war against its opponents, one must understand Alawism: the religious orientation of many of Syria’s leaders and soldiers. It is also important to note Hafez al-Assad’s pragmatism and ruthlessness, inculcated in his son, ‘Dr. Bashar’.

Alawism serves as the mobilizing tool for its Syrian adherents, linking them through a sense of ’asabiyya (solidarity of a group). The term Alawism was invented by the French to describe the inhabitants of Greater Latakia in the French mandate in Northwest Syria.

Until then the Alawites were known as the Nusayris, named after the sect’s mystic progenitor Muhammad ibn Nusayr (d. 868), who was a pupil of the tenth Shia Imam, Ali al-Hadi (d. 873). Ibn Nusayr claimed that he had divine powers, and he instilled a belief in reincarnation among his followers (these traits are ascribed as divine qualities to the first Shia Imam and the Fourth Caliph, ’Ali ibn Abi Talib).

The Nusayris are a syncretistic sect drawing influence from Phoenician paganism, Mazdakism and Manichism as well as Christianity. Much of the Nusayri faith is shrouded in mystery, as they don’t divulge their religion or practices to outsiders, which only serves to heighten the sense of ’asabiyya.

The French-sanctioned name raised the notion the Nusayris are adherents of Ali (the son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad and the person whom Shi’ites claimed should have to succeed the Prophet Muhammad after he had died in 632). The name change allows the Nusayris, or Alawites, to be placed within the Shia camp and not as apostates. The significance of the name change is that the Shia saw the Nusayris as ghulat (exaggerator) whereas Sunni Muslims saw them as infidels, apostates or heretics, as seen with the famed Islamic jurist Ibn Taymiyya, who issued three fatwas (religious edits) condemning the Nusayris as ‘heretics’ and ‘enemies of Islam’, leading to centuries of brutal persecution.

Two key events helped remove the apostasy association from the Nusayri. The first was a July 1936 fatwa by the grand mufti of Jerusalem, Muhammad Amin al-Husayni, which recognised the Nusayri as Muslims. The Mufti allegedly did that to promote Arab nationalism and solidarity, which may explain why, within months, the Nusayri ceased their opposition to the establishment of a Greater Syria, even though it was under French control.

The second event was a successful petition by Alawite clerics to the mufti of the Syrian Republic in 1952 to have Alawism recognized as part of the Twelver Shia creed. Six years later, the al-Azhar clerics recognized Twelver Shia Islam as ‘religiously correct’, which meant that Shia Islam was recognised—the fifth madhab (school) within Islam. In 1973, 80 religious leaders, representing the different parts of the ‘Alawi country, unqualifiedly affirmed that their book is the Qur’an; that they are Muslim and Shia; and that whatever else is attributed to them is an invention by their enemies and the enemies of Islam.

Bashar al-Assad depicts the same ruthlessness and pragmatism that took his father from a small village in the coastal hills near Latakia, where the Assad family name was known for centuries as al-Wahash (Beast), to the presidency of Syria in 1970. The 1982 Hama massacre—often referred to as al-Ahdath (the ‘events’)—, underlined Hafez’s ruthlessness. The rebels were crushed in a matters of hour by his brother Rifaat, and Assad authorized a three-week aerial and ground bombardment that left as many as 20,000 dead—the goal appeared to have been to terrorise people into submission.

Hafez’s obduracy was seen in the way he approached numerous overtures by the United States and Israel for improved relations. Hafez wanted to be recognized as the quintessential Arab leader, and he wanted it on his terms. When Yassir Arafat and King Hussein reached out to a more receptive Washington, Assad was willing to go back into the cold and wait. During that time, he fortified his power base in Syria and Lebanon, improved his relations with Iran and prepared the ground for Bashar’s succession. In May 2000, a month before Hafez died, Israel unilaterally withdrew from Lebanon, and much of Syria’s ability to withstand such fierce opposition over the past six years stems from the way Assad shaped the military and the state.

The latest peace talks at Astana amounted to very little beyond emphasising the regime’s intractability. They highlighted the regime’s strategy of no compromise, ruthlessness, and pragmatism, as it knows that if it’s not in power, the Alawites would return to being murdbi (sharecropper) or fellah (agricultural labor), and endure the persecution that they’d experienced for eight centuries. And for Assad and his close allies, defeat would either mean death, as was the case of Gaddafi, exile or imprisonment for war crimes.