Intel Brief / IntelBrief: Pre-conflict trends in the Middle East likely to continue after the Israel-Hamas war
AP Photo/Hussein Mara
bottom line up front
- Many Middle Eastern leaders seek to maintain core principles of policy toward Israel and the United States while appealing to public pro-Palestinian sentiment.
- It is highly unlikely that Arab countries that have normalized relations with Israel will sever ties over Israel’s operations against Hamas.
- Many Arab leaders have long seen Hamas as an obstacle to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has jeopardized a year-long effort to rebuild relations with Israel by praising Hamas’ resistance to Israel.
Many world diplomats and strategists assess that an Israel-Hamas war could bring about profound and lasting changes in the region, derailing the trend toward detente that prevailed before the war. However, the reactions of a wide range of regional leaders suggest that the geopolitical trends that existed before the outbreak of the conflict are likely to persist after the conflict ends. Despite the Israeli operation causing emotion and anxiety among the citizens of many Middle Eastern countries, most leaders in the region believe that Israel’s operation to remove Hamas from power in the Gaza Strip is They seem to see this as insufficient reason to change strategy or geopolitical strategy. Some Arab leaders, including Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi and Jordan’s King Abdullah, have long seen Hamas as an obstacle to productive Palestinian negotiations with Israel. Their views suggest that many of the region’s leaders may privately welcome the fall of Hamas at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Virtually all Arab countries support a two-state solution that recognizes Israel and a Palestinian state. In 2002, Saudi Arabia’s late King Abdullah proposed the Arab Peace Initiative, calling for a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict within the framework of a two-state solution. The initiative was approved by the Arab League at the Beirut Summit in 2002 and re-endorsed at the Arab League Summits in 2007 and 2017. After representatives from 40 countries in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa met in Barcelona on Monday, European Union foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said almost all countries in the Middle East and North Africa agreed to a two-state solution. He said he supports it. Officials also advocate the following long-term prescription for the region: Although critical of what they claim is America’s unconditional support for Israel, none of the region’s leaders has indicated any intention to scale back the close security relationship with the United States, which they consider vital to their national interests. .
Rather than abandoning the strategic strategy, regional leaders have taken a balancing act, maintaining key policy pillars while expressing a position sympathetic to public anger over the high number of Palestinian casualties. I’ve been trying. Most regional leaders, including Iran, have publicly called for an immediate ceasefire to protect the lives of Gaza civilians. Many have also criticized Israel for the use of excessive force and what they see as collective punishment against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas. Several Arab leaders have said their country will not participate in the post-war peacekeeping mission in Gaza, but their objections include the possibility that the United Nations or U.S.-led peacekeeping forces, such as the Sometimes there is a nuance of subconscious recognition. Reflecting popular will, elected legislative and advisory assemblies in some Arab countries have enacted non-binding laws or issued tough statements against Israel. Kuwait’s elected parliament adopted a resolution calling for Israeli leaders to be prosecuted as “war criminals before international organizations.”
Among the Arab leaders who have normalized relations with Israel, including the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain, which were normalized in 2020 based on the “Abraham Accords” mediated by the United States, some Arab leaders have severed ties with Israel. or reneged on a bilateral peace treaty with Israel. The Israelis. That said, Bahrain’s elected National Assembly, which Reuters describes as an “advisory body with no authority in the field of foreign policy,” announced earlier this month that the country’s ambassador is scheduled to return from Israel. Yes, the Israeli ambassador to Bahrain claimed to have left the country. And economic relations between the two countries were severed. Bahraini leaders downplayed the statement, claiming that Israel “has not received any notification or decision from the Bahraini and Israeli governments to return their ambassadors.” Nevertheless, Bahrain’s Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa harshly criticized Israel’s operations in Gaza earlier this month, calling the situation in Gaza “untenable,” but on October 7 He also blamed Hamas for the attack on Israel on Sunday.
Sudan, which re-established ties with Israel through the Abraham Accords, also resumed diplomatic relations with Iran, Israel’s main adversary and supporter of Hamas, two days after the October 7 attack. Jordan, which signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994, withdrew its ambassador from Israel on November 1, and his foreign minister announced on November 16 that Jordan would withdraw its ambassador from Israel from a deal brokered by the UAE in return for supplying solar energy to Israel. announced that he would be leaving. For desalinated water. In contrast, Egypt, which has played a key role in the Gaza Strip since 1948, having signed a peace treaty with Israel from 1979 and governing the Strip from 1948 to 1967, has resigned its ambassadorship and other did not worsen relations with Israel in any way. Since the crisis began, Cairo has worked with Qatar, the United States, and Israel to organize a hostage release agreement and the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza. Cairo has categorically refused to accept Palestinian refugees from the Gaza Strip, signaling that it opposes any change in the region’s demographic structure, and has apparently refused to allow Palestinian refugees to return to Gaza after the conflict. They seem to be worried that they won’t.
The Hamas attack was widely expected to derail ongoing talks between U.S. and Saudi leaders on a potential normalization deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel, but U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said told reporters on Oct. 31 that Saudi Arabia assured U.S. officials that Saudi Arabia remains in the agreement. There is an interest in normalizing relations with Israel. Kirby’s statement comes after Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman, brother of de facto leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, visited Washington to discuss the fighting in the Gaza Strip. It was done. During this crisis, Saudi air defense personnel were used to shoot down missile volleys fired at Israel by the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen, to demonstrate Saudi-Israeli cooperation against Iran’s “axis of resistance”. Patriot batteries, supplied by the United States, were deployed. Saudi Arabia also firmly rejected Iran’s proposal for Islamic countries to boycott oil sales to Israel early in the crisis. Saudi Arabia’s position, and statements by Saudi and other Islamic State leaders, suggest that there is no regional appetite to destabilize global oil markets to protest the US position on the crisis. ing. This is a striking juxtaposition with the 1967 Yom Kippur War, when oil powers in the Middle East imposed trade embargoes on the United States and other countries for supporting Israel.
One of the regional leaders, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkiye, risks important relationships with Washington and European leaders to express the anti-Israel sentiments of his political platform, the Justice and Development Party. Looks like they’re ready. In late October, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan attended a pro-Palestinian rally in Istanbul, denying that Hamas is a terrorist organization, and instead characterizing it as a “liberation group” while accusing Israel of war crimes. The comments derailed Erdogan’s more than year-long effort to rebuild ties with Israel, prompting experts and some U.S. officials to call for a review of U.S. policy toward Turkey, including NATO membership. caused a voice. In early November, Turkiye’s government recalled its ambassador to Israel, citing the “humanitarian tragedy” in the Gaza Strip and “refusal of Israel’s request for a ceasefire.” Prior to Turkey’s diplomatic withdrawal, Israel’s ambassador to Turkiye had already left Ankara. Still, U.S. officials are coordinating with their Turkish counterparts, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken stopping in Ankara in early November during a regional crisis tour, and the two governments are trying to avoid a widening rift over the Middle East crisis. It was suggested that he was trying to avoid it.