How the US, Russia and China line up in the Middle East
The intervention of Daniela Coli
Trump's Abrahamic Accords were supposed to make the Palestinians disappear. Indeed, since the beginning of the first Gulf War (1991) and after the American wars of these twenty years in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Palestinians seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth. Rockets from Gaza and Israeli bombardments of Gaza, a densely populated area for which civilian casualties number in the hundreds, brought to the fore an issue that seemed to have disappeared. Israel is protected by the US: Obama gave Israel the Iron Dome and the US gives Israel over $ 3 billion a year in military aid, plus diplomatic, intelligence and ideological aid. The average Italian does not know that the Zionists had been fighting in Palestine since 1932 against the British who ruled Palestine, nor does he know the Nabka, the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes and lands. An operation that Benny Morris, an Israeli historian, justifies as necessary for the birth of the state of Israel. The neocons, the ideologues of the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq, inspired by Leo Strauss, an American Jewish philosopher even against democracy, and Bernard Lewis, a former British spy who passed to the US, theorist of the clash of civilizations, have spread the culture of Islam as barbarism, very useful to Israel, considered the outpost of the West in the Middle East by supporters of the Jewish state.
Trump has granted Israel capital Jerusalem and Biden has confirmed it. Biden is no different from Trump: he reiterates that Israel has the right to defend itself, but does not address the problem of Israeli settlements in the territories occupied since 1967, nor the condition in which Palestinians and Arab-Israelis live in Israel.
The Abrahamic agreements have jumped, except for Morocco which Trump has recognized sovereignty over Western Sahara in exchange for the alliance with Israel. However, the situation in the Middle East is changing. A long article by Kristian Coates Ulrichsen on the Arab Center Washington DC informs us of how much relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran are changing through the Baghdad talks favored by Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al Kadhimi. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) was already frustrated by Trump's US because when the Saudi pipeline was attacked in May and June 2019 and then missiles and drones attacked the Abqaiq oil processing plants and the Khurais oil field , Trump said that the US had not been attacked, while for the killing of an American contractor the US president with the help of the Mossad had Soleimani killed.
Trump has separated American interests from those of the Gulf states and this has shocked the Saudis who can no longer trust the American umbrella. All the behavior of the United States on the occasion of the killing of Khashoggi further angered MbS, because there has not been the same condemnation of the US media for the killing of the Iranian general Soleimani, nor has the CIA released documents on Trump's role in the murder of Soleimani. The Gulf states changed after the killing of Soleimani and the escalation of US-Iran tensions. The Emirates had contacted Iran in July 2019 to clarify that they did not want a war and MbS sent his brother to Washington to clarify that the Saudis wanted a de-escalation. Soleimani, killed at the international airport on January 3, 2020 by Trump, supports the thesis of the Iraqi premier that he was in Baghdad to deliver an Iranian document to alleviate tensions with the Saudis.
Biden treated Saudi Arabia as a pariah during the election campaign, perhaps because he knew about the talks with the Iranians. Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al Kadhimi, who is liked by the US but was also voted for the pro-Iranian militias in Iraq, has favored talks between Saudis and Iranians, only discovered by the FT on 9 April. It is obvious that new relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia (MbS speaks of a special relationship between Saudis and Iranians) will bring tranquility to the region, perhaps peace in Yemen, and there will be no excuse for the United States to maintain the occupation of Iraq. : Iraqi premier wants them not to leave bases in Iraq. The Gulf states have drawn closer and mobilized in support of the Saudi leadership. MbS will surely be king. In general, a new climate of détente, which also involves Turkey, animates the Middle East.
A calm situation in the region can also lead to a solution to the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It should be noted that China, generally very cautious about taking sides in conflicts, condemned the Israeli bombing, provoking Netanyahu's wrath. It is obvious that relations with Israel will no longer be the same and China has consciously chosen this situation. Turkey which ruled Palestine from 1517 to 1918 also changed position, offering a maritime treaty to Gaza and its protection. Given that Turkey has the first fleet in the Mediterranean, this is no small offer. Turkey also applied to participate in Pesco's EU defense policy and received a positive response because, according to Faz , this would lead to a normalization of relations between Turkey, Greece and Cyprus.
Putin has a good relationship with Netanyahu, but this is part of the Russian diplomatic style: to be friends of all, allies of none. However, there is no doubt that Russia has preferential relations with the Arab world, as an oil producer and due to the role exercised in Syria.
It is assumed that Hamas was aware of the violent Israeli reaction in Gaza, but the Hamas rockets, the revolts of the Israeli Arabs, the Palestinian strike in East Jerusalem must be inserted in this new Middle Eastern context.
The United States has not been able to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, nor to ask Israel to cease settlements in the occupied territories and to change its behavior with Palestinians and Arab-Israelis.
Biden rejected the French UN resolution for an immediate ceasefire between Palestinians and Israelis, leaving the decision to Netanyahu. A choice that undermines the role of US negotiator and the human rights foreign policy inaugurated by the new administration, while the Middle East seems to be reshaping.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/blog/come-si-schierano-usa-russia-e-cina-in-medio-oriente/ on Thu, 20 May 2021 14:31:41 +0000.