Sazzad Hussain
The classical view of the conflict affecting the vast stretch of land from the Persian Gulf to the Levant and beyond up to the Maghreb has been the seven decade old confrontation between the Israel and Palestine over the occupation of the Arab land by the Jewish state. For that firstly Arab states fought collectively against Israel to wipe it out from the world map at the initial stage leading to 1967. At that time it was Arab identity or nationalism that made Arab leaders like Nasser of Egypt to drive and rally popular support across the political boundaries in the Middle East to stand up for a cause—the liberation of Palestine and formation of a grand Arab identity as a political block in the international arena. At that time it was Arab nationalism which was propagated and voices of Islamism, despite its overwhelming majority, was pushed or rather crushed harshly by these secular regimes. At that time, like today, all the Arab nation states liberated or freed from western colonialism, were run by monarchs and dictators and were devoid of democracy. Most of the monarchs, except the kings of Morocco and Jordan, were absolute rulers with American military protection and full endorsement from the Minaret. On the other hand, the dictators were westernized, socialist and though despotic, were secular in principle and functioning providing modern education, scientific development, women empowerment and protection to minorities like Christians, Yazidis, Kurds, Druze and even Jews. They caused two problems to the west—first their antagonism towards Israel and second their nationalization of natural resources—from Aswan dam in Egypt to petroleum and gas fields in Iraq, Syria, Algeria and Libya. The absolute monarchies, led by Saudi Arabia were favourite allies of the west allowing energy giants Chevron, Exxon-Mobil, Total, Gulf, BP and the great ARAMCO. Though their subjects were vehemently anti-Israeli, their voices and opinions were diverted by the strong clergy patronized by the royal palaces. Across the spectrum of the Arab Middle-East, it was Iran, the Persian state which was critically important to this conflicting landscape. Under the imperial rule of the Shah, Iran was the launch pad of all American and western interests in this region in which its oil reserves, once nationalized by its socialist Premier Mossadegh, was owned by Anglo-American corporations. The 1979 Revolution of Iran, which had ousted Shah Pahlavi, changed the equilibrium of power in Middle-East as the Islamic Republic of Iran started perusing a hot policy of reaching out to Arabs in the name of Shiite Islam and vehemently opposing the pro-western Arab regimes and the existence of Israel.
Much of the politics and development in Middle-East known to us here in India has been defined by this scenario of the late 1970s which was also the height of the Cold War. Middle-East in the post-Revolution Iran period was characterized by the polarization of the anti-Israeli Arab world on strategic interests. It was preceded by the Camp David agreement between Egypt and Israel and later two more Arab recognition of the Jewish state—by Jordan and Morocco. While the Gulf monarchies remained diplomatically at distance from Tel Aviv, other Arab republics, notably the regimes in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Algeria and Tunisia staunchly opposed any dialogue with Israel and supported various Palestinian groups fighting occupation. These secular Arab nations, mostly Iraq, Syria and Libya armed themselves with sophisticated weapons procured from the Soviet Union along with non-conventional arsenal like nuclear, chemical and biological weapons to bully Israel and pro-western Arab monarchies. On the other hand, the Gulf monarchies used their oil revenues in big business and infrastructure development by leaving their kingdoms guarded by US army, navy and air force bases on their soils. This non-confrontational policy perused by the Gulf monarchies with Israel allowed them to emerge as important global business players with hubs like Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Doha etc. After the great oil boom of 1974, Saudi Arabia, with full American knowledge and endorsement, started patronising transnational Islamism to check the secular Arab regimes in the Middle-East and in the Islamic world. Pakistan became its first destination following in Lebanon which resulted in a devastating civil war till 1993. The Iranian Revolution and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan on the same year made this Saudi move to be an effective Cold-War ploy for the west.
While the Saudi-American led Islamist armed campaign called Mujahedeen created the Afghan Jihad on the Af-Pak border and paved the way of the formation of Al-Qaeda and the global jihad, it was Iran which started a counteroffensive to exert its clout in the Middle-East by reaching out to the Shiite Arabs in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and among Palestinian refugees. Libyan leader Col. Gaddafi too became a close ally of Iran though he was a Sunni. The Baathist President Hafez al-Assad of Syria used this new strategic partnership to wrest his influence in this region, particularly to pressurize Israel. But his fellow Baathist Saddam Hussein of Iraq differed with Iran on sectarian lines. Saddam was armed and supported by Saudi Arab and other Gulf monarchies and the west to fight an eight year war against Iran (1980-88). In it, the west had duel objectives—to weaken anti-American/anti-Israeli Iran as well as to crumble the nationalized welfare state of Iraq so that it does not pose a threat to Israel (Israel bombed the nuclear facilities of Iraq in 1982). Iran’s involvement in Middle-East conflict paid off well despite its armed hostilities with Iraq as it successfully established its leverage in Lebanon torn apart by civil war on sectarian divide and outside intervention for the PLO. Israel invaded Lebanon to drive the PLO machinery out from Beirut in 1982 and to form a strong Sunni-Maronite (Christian) power sharing to evict Iranian influence (as wished by Saudis and Americans). But the Israeli involvement paved the way for a strong resistance movement of Shiite Arabs in Lebanon—the Syrian backed Amal and the Iranian backed Hezbollah. In the course of time Hezbollah emerged as a key player in the west-Asian conflict in broking peace with Israel by engaging in both hostilities and negotiations and unifying the Lebanese society with all its professed groups including the Maronites.
The success of the Afghan Jihad, the fall of the USSR, the emergence of Al-Qaeda and the global Jihad (read Sunni extremism) and the stalling of Israel-Palestinian peace talks created a different landscape in the Middle-East after the 1991 Gulf War. Syria backed America in that multi-national campaign against Saddam’s Iraq while Iran remained neutral. A weakened Iraq sans Saddam was Iran’s gain and so far the biggest winner in Iraq after Saddam’s fall is Iran and its every government is heavily influenced by Tehran. This has contributed the deep rooted sectarian divide in Arabian societies across Middle-East in the last two decades. Sunni resistance and extremism, in opposition to Shiite rise in Iraq with Iranian intervention has led to the emergence of groups like al-Qaeda up to IS in this region in the last one and half decade. Various Sunni militant groups, starting from the one led by al-Zarqawi in Jordan has been operating against various opponents across this region and all are affiliated to al-Qaeda after 9/11. They have been active in Algeria, Yemen and Iraq for a considerable period and many US drone attacks have been carried out against their leaders in Yemen. In all this changing landscape in the Middle-East, its focal point has gone missing—the Palestinian problem. The cause for an independent Palestinian state, free from Israeli occupation is lost from the collective memory of the people of this region as the entire area got engulfed in sectarian violence within. After Saddam’s fall, the only remaining Arab opposition to the western interest remained as Libya’s Gaddafi and Syria’s al-Assad. In the new scenario, Gaddafi too abandoned his previous policies and reached out to the west. So only the regime in Damascus, an ally of Iran and Hezbollah, remained as a problem for the US-Saudi grand alliance. The Syrian regime was cornered first with the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a Sunni in 2005. The objective of reigniting the Lebanese society on sectarian lines through that assassination did not succeed because of the all-inclusive stand of Hezbollah. After that the world saw the pounding of Beirut by Israeli war planes on Hezbollah targets and massive and disproportionate offensive on Gaza by the Jewish state against Hamas. The oil-rich gulf monarchies spoke nothing against them. Then came the so-called Arab Spring in late 2010. Beginning with Tunisia, it was the first public outpouring to bring down undemocratic despots—both dictators and monarchs across the Arab world for establishing democracy. Though it was successful in Tunisia, its script was not the same in other Arab states. People protested for more than ten days in Tahrir Square, Cairo demanding removal of President Hosni Mubarak. But as this Egyptian dictator was a long-time ally of the west, Washington took ten days to condemn his repressive measures against the protestors. Though Mubarak was ousted and elections brought former Islamist Mohammad Morsi as president, the Egyptian army removed him from power less than a year re-establishing the same old authoritarian measures to serve the western interests. Other pro-democracy demonstrations in Arab monarchies like Bahrain, Jordan, Morocco, UAE, Qatar and Kuwait were crushed by the authorities with full US nod. The largest of these demonstrations, seen in Bahrain was declared a sectarian one, as majority of its subjects were Shiite and Saudi Arab sent troops to crush that rebellion. Fearing same kind of public fury, the Saudi king declared largesse to its youth including cash benefits—a bribe for not demanding democracy. In Yemen, the pro-democracy movement forced the long serving President Saleh to flee the country. However in Libya and Syria the story was different. Former al-Qaeda activists and sectarian militants were aided by NATO war planes to bring the fall of Gaddafi to establish ‘democracy’. But it became a second Iraq—with militancy dividing the country on tribal lines. In Syria, NATO member Turkey facilitated Islamist militants including al-Qaeda operatives to enter the country through its border to topple al-Assad regime—the last secular bastion in the Arab world, to bring ‘democracy’.
The armed and financial support to al-Qaeda affiliated groups by Arab monarchies like Saudi Arabia and Qatar in Syria and the Turkish transit from different parts of the world of its personnel quickened the rise and spread of IS. It is a Sunni extremist group bent on annihilating Shiite, Kurds, Christians and Yazidis living in peaceful coexistence in Syria and Iraq for centuries under all previous regimes. This new emergence of power and authority in the Middle-East has again pushed the elusive Palestinian issue, the core point of the conflict of this region, to the background. As US refused to deploy its ground forces against the IS nor the NATO air power—it is the old classic inclusive forces of Iraq—Shite militia, Kurdish Peshmarga and the regular Iraqi army that are fighting united against them. Only Jordan has joined the limited air-strike by the west against the IS inside Iraq and Syria. On the other hand Egypt, Saudi Arabia and UAE have participated in air-strikes against IS targets in Libya. Interestingly, the IS has not showed any hostility against Israel.
The transition of power in post-Arab Spring Yemen has not been smooth as president Hadi was installed by its oil-rich Gulf monarchies. A majority of his opponents belongs to the ethic Hauti, an Arab tribe of Zaidi Shiite sect. As confrontations escalate, the Hauti militia seized a considerable area of Yemen including capital Sa’na on late March. The belligerent president called his gulf neighbours for help and responding to his SOS, Saudi Arab launched air-strikes in Yemen from 28th March. Other Arab states like Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Sudan are also joining this campaign. The apparent objective of this military adventurism seems to be neutralizing Iranian influence among the Hautis with approval by the Arab League. However, without any UN mandate, this Saudi led strike in Yemen creates a new landscape in the ever volatile Middle-East on sectarian lines. The powerful Arab unity required to crush the menace of the IS is now applied against a lesser and insignificant threat for the Sunni kingdoms. The world in general now wonders what the real problem of the Middle-East is. With the core issue of Palestine gone missing and chances of its any breakthrough seem bleak as the re-election of Bibi Netanyahu in Israel, it is the fighting within the elements of clan, tribe and sect of the Arab Muslims that characterizes the present landscape of the Middle-East conflict.
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