October 2, 2009--No Degrees of Separation
Especially in the Middle East all politics is both local and interconnected. There are no degrees of separation. And nothing is fixed in place. Everything is negotiable. Like how much to pay for a Persian rug in a souk in the Casbah.
With the US and Iran right now in Geneva for the first time in decades engaged in hopefully substantive discussions, leaders of other Arab nations are not only anxious and conflicted about a possible wide range of outcomes—from some sort of understanding to the unleashing of Israel to take out Iran’s nuclear facilities—but they are also struggling to figure out how to reconfigure their own foreign and regional policies and relationships based on whatever new calculus between Iran and the West might emerge.
For example, in an incisive report in yesterday’s New York Times (linked below), in a place such as small but oil-rich Bahrain—a country few of us could easily locate on the map and is rarely in the headlines-- if the Iranians, in spite of their denials, develop nuclear weapons, how will Bahrainians react? They are not likely to start a weapons program of their own though they would certainly feel threatened by Iran. They might though, in response, ask nuclear powers such as the United States to place nuclear weapons in their country as a form of deterrence. All that would be required, if the US were to agree, would be for us to ship a few nukes to our already-existing naval base in Manama, Bahrain’s capital.
In the words of Abdul Khaleq Abdulah, a professor of political science at United Arab Emirates University, “It’s a whole new ballgame. Iran is forcing everyone in the region into an arms race.”
And in the spirit that the reality of nuclear can make strange bedfellows, mainly off the record of course, many autocratic Arab regimes in the Gulf are hoping that Israel acts to remove Iran’s uranium enrichment plants. The editor of the pan-Arab newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi, Abdel-Beri Atwan, wrote that based on Iran’s recently revealed new nuclear capacities, “the Arab regimes, and the Gulf ones in particular, will find themselves part of a new alliance against Iran alongside Israel.” (Emphasis added.) And an increasing number of regional policy experts are actually openly calling for either the US or Israel to take military action. The head of a well-regarded research center in Dubai said recently that it would be good if the West—or Israel—bombed Iran rather then letting them produce nuclear weapons.
In Saudi Arabia there is emerging some of the same kind of thinking. Abdulaziz Sager, a wealthy businessman and former diplomat says that “The region can live with a limited retaliation from Israel better than living with a permanent nuclear deterrent [in Iran]. I favor getting the job done now instead of living with a nuclear hegemony in the region that Iran would like to impose.”
Ironically, the likelihood that Iran is working on weaponizing nuclear materials—and they already have missiles supplied by Russia to deliver warheads if and when they develop them—it appears that Saudi and Egyptian officials are more seriously than in the past seeking ways to reconcile their differences with Syria so as to present a united front against Iranian ambitions. And various Gulf states that have important trade relationships with Russia and China are pressing them to end their support for Iran. The Saudis, in another example, have told the Russians that if they reduce their weapons trade with Iran—to Russia, among other things, an important source of hard currency—the Saudis would agree to buy many billions of dollars of Russian armaments. To wean the Russians away from their interdependence with Saudi Arabia’s neighbor and potential enemy. And, to up the ante, the Saudis have indicated that they would work on creating an alliance with other Gulf states to come up with a million visas to allow Chinese citizens to work in the region.
Further, after the recent revelation that Iran may be moving more quickly than thought to develop nuclear weapons, Arab states, which had been worried that President Obama, eager to strike some sort of deal with Iran, might appease them, these leaders are no longer so worried. Their fears about increased threats from Iran have neutralized much of that concern about US actions. In fact, during just the past week, most Arab states have come around to fearing Iran more than any deal the US might strike with them.
As Hossam Zaki, spokesman for Egypt’s Foreign Ministry said the other day, “No one said it was an easy situation.”
Amen to that.
With the US and Iran right now in Geneva for the first time in decades engaged in hopefully substantive discussions, leaders of other Arab nations are not only anxious and conflicted about a possible wide range of outcomes—from some sort of understanding to the unleashing of Israel to take out Iran’s nuclear facilities—but they are also struggling to figure out how to reconfigure their own foreign and regional policies and relationships based on whatever new calculus between Iran and the West might emerge.
For example, in an incisive report in yesterday’s New York Times (linked below), in a place such as small but oil-rich Bahrain—a country few of us could easily locate on the map and is rarely in the headlines-- if the Iranians, in spite of their denials, develop nuclear weapons, how will Bahrainians react? They are not likely to start a weapons program of their own though they would certainly feel threatened by Iran. They might though, in response, ask nuclear powers such as the United States to place nuclear weapons in their country as a form of deterrence. All that would be required, if the US were to agree, would be for us to ship a few nukes to our already-existing naval base in Manama, Bahrain’s capital.
In the words of Abdul Khaleq Abdulah, a professor of political science at United Arab Emirates University, “It’s a whole new ballgame. Iran is forcing everyone in the region into an arms race.”
And in the spirit that the reality of nuclear can make strange bedfellows, mainly off the record of course, many autocratic Arab regimes in the Gulf are hoping that Israel acts to remove Iran’s uranium enrichment plants. The editor of the pan-Arab newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi, Abdel-Beri Atwan, wrote that based on Iran’s recently revealed new nuclear capacities, “the Arab regimes, and the Gulf ones in particular, will find themselves part of a new alliance against Iran alongside Israel.” (Emphasis added.) And an increasing number of regional policy experts are actually openly calling for either the US or Israel to take military action. The head of a well-regarded research center in Dubai said recently that it would be good if the West—or Israel—bombed Iran rather then letting them produce nuclear weapons.
In Saudi Arabia there is emerging some of the same kind of thinking. Abdulaziz Sager, a wealthy businessman and former diplomat says that “The region can live with a limited retaliation from Israel better than living with a permanent nuclear deterrent [in Iran]. I favor getting the job done now instead of living with a nuclear hegemony in the region that Iran would like to impose.”
Ironically, the likelihood that Iran is working on weaponizing nuclear materials—and they already have missiles supplied by Russia to deliver warheads if and when they develop them—it appears that Saudi and Egyptian officials are more seriously than in the past seeking ways to reconcile their differences with Syria so as to present a united front against Iranian ambitions. And various Gulf states that have important trade relationships with Russia and China are pressing them to end their support for Iran. The Saudis, in another example, have told the Russians that if they reduce their weapons trade with Iran—to Russia, among other things, an important source of hard currency—the Saudis would agree to buy many billions of dollars of Russian armaments. To wean the Russians away from their interdependence with Saudi Arabia’s neighbor and potential enemy. And, to up the ante, the Saudis have indicated that they would work on creating an alliance with other Gulf states to come up with a million visas to allow Chinese citizens to work in the region.
Further, after the recent revelation that Iran may be moving more quickly than thought to develop nuclear weapons, Arab states, which had been worried that President Obama, eager to strike some sort of deal with Iran, might appease them, these leaders are no longer so worried. Their fears about increased threats from Iran have neutralized much of that concern about US actions. In fact, during just the past week, most Arab states have come around to fearing Iran more than any deal the US might strike with them.
As Hossam Zaki, spokesman for Egypt’s Foreign Ministry said the other day, “No one said it was an easy situation.”
Amen to that.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
5:36 AM
2 Comments:
So finally Israel and the Arabs are going to be reconciled because of Iran. Does this mean that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gets the Nobel Peace Prize?
Jared
Could be. The world is strange. Recall, Arafat did!
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