Jahan Salehi – Page 5

Patrick Seale, “Eight Dream Solutions to Middle East Conflicts”

October 5, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

This year’s session of the UN General Assembly in New York was a fiasco. Not only did it illustrate the way great power rivalries had paralysed the international organisation, but it was also marked by misleading, misguided — and sometimes simply comic — interventions by several world leaders.

For example, President François Hollande declared that France was ready to recognise a Syrian government to replace the regime of President Bashar al-Asad — although no such government seems even dimly in prospect. Meanwhile, in blatant contravention of international law, Israel’s Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu continued his campaign for a pre-emptive war against Iran — a country he fears might challenge Israel’s nuclear monopoly and put a check to its aggressions against its neighbours. The child’s cartoon of a bomb which Netanyahu displayed to make his case of an imminent Iranian threat aroused international hilarity as well as serious doubts about his sanity.

The Emir of Qatar, Shaikh Hamad, called for an Arab military intervention to put an end to the fighting in Syria, as if unaware that there was no will or capability among the Arab states to engage in such a fratricidal action. In any event, Egypt’s President Muhammad Morsi promptly shot down the Emir’s suggestion by rejecting any military intervention in Syria.

U.S. President Barack Obama did not do much better. Instead of putting American power, and his undoubted eloquence, to work in resolving problems and conflicts — such as the on-going catastrophic war in Afghanistan, the poisonous Arab-Israeli conflict, the cruel and dangerous sanctions against Iran, the Muslim rage at American policies — he contented himself with hollow rhetoric, including such gems as that Americans had “fought and died around the globe to protect the right of people to express their view.” Tell that to the oppressed and besieged Palestinians, to the tens of thousands of impoverished and displaced Iraqis, still mourning their dead, to the Afghan, Pakistani and Yemen villagers slaughtered daily by American drones.

Just imagine the world reaction if, instead of these inanities, the following dramatic events had occurred:

Imagine the cheers if Obama had announced that, after prolonged secret talks in Delhi, American and Taliban representatives had agreed to a ceasefire in Afghanistan and to the formation of a transitional national unity government pledged to bring peace at last to the war-torn country and oversee the departure of American troops.

Imagine the prolonged applause if he had announced that, if he were re-elected in November, he would put an end to the brutal — and wholly counter-productive – “war on terror,” and, as an immediate measure to protect innocent civilians, he was grounding all U.S. drones and discontinuing their missile strikes on alleged terrorists.

Imagine the excitement if he had announced a plan to phase out U.S. bases in the Gulf region and had instructed the U.S. Navy to revert instead to “over the horizon” deployments.

Imagine the relief and jubilation if he had gone on to declare that he would be ready, on re-election, to engage in comprehensive talks with Iran, in order to resolve all differences between them. The proposed guidelines for the talks would be an agreement by Iran to end all enrichment of uranium above 3.5% under strict international supervision in exchange for American guarantees of Iran’s security against military attack or subversion, the lifting of sanctions and the restoration of diplomatic relations between Tehran and Washington, thus putting an end to more than thirty years of hostility and undeclared war.

Imagine if, in the wings of the UN General Assembly, leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council and Iran had initiated a strategic dialogue aimed at concluding a pact of non-aggression and of non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, as a first step towards integrating the Islamic Republic into the security architecture of the Gulf.

Imagine if King Abdallah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia and President Morsi of Egypt had issued a joint appeal to senior Sunni and Shia ulema of all persuasions and schools to attend a conference in Mecca aimed at putting an end to mutual demonization and abuse; at bridging the sectarian divide, and at uniting all Muslims against the enemies of Islam.

Imagine if Prime Minister Netanyahu had put away his crude cartoon and had instead declared that, after long reflection and much heart-searching, he had concluded that his dream of a Greater Israel was unrealisable. Instead, his great and overriding ambition was to ensure Israel’s future by making peace with the Palestinians and with the entire Arab world. Accordingly, he called on Arab leaders to appoint ministerial delegates to meet with their Israeli opposite numbers at a neutral venue such as Oslo to plan the immediate implementation of the Arab Peace Initiative, including the creation of Palestinian State.

Imagine if the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey and Iran were to issue a solemn joint declaration calling on the Syrian government and on leading opposition factions to end all fighting by 15 October, pull armed forces back from towns and villages, and send delegates to a peace conference at Medina. At the same time, Saudi Arabia and Qatar declared their readiness to create a joint fund of $15 billion to rebuild Syria, create jobs for the unemployed, and re-launch the economy once free and fair elections had been held and a national unity government had been formed.

Needless to say, it was no surprise that these dramatic developments in New York aroused intense international interest. On hearing the various statements, declarations and pledges, delegates attending the UN General Assembly and the horde of journalists covering the event were further astonished and overjoyed to see Barack Obama embrace Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov gallantly kiss the hand of Hilary Clinton, the U.S. Secretary of State; Israel’s Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu force himself to give Mahmud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, a very brief and rather lukewarm hug; the Emir of Qatar exchange friendly salutations with the Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallim; and Egypt’s President Muhammad Morsi win long and fervent applause from all sides for his emerging role as an indispensable peace-maker on the Middle East scene.

Dear readers, dream on!

Patrick Seale is a leading British writer on the Middle East. His latest book is The Struggle for Arab Independence: Riad el-Solh and the Makers of the Modern Middle East (Cambridge University Press).

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Released: 05 October 2012
Word Count: 1,022
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Patrick Seale, “Syria’s Long War”

September 28, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

The pitiless, vengeful, blood-thirsty battle now being waged in Syria is not something new or unexpected. Nor is it a mere by-product of the Arab Spring, although events in Tunisia and Egypt have undoubtedly contributed to creating an insurrectionary atmosphere in the whole region. Rather, the Syrian uprising, as it has gradually evolved over the past eighteen months, should be seen as only the latest, if by far the most violent, episode in the long war between Islamists and Ba‘thists, which dates back to the founding of the secular Ba‘th Party in the 1940s. The struggle between them is by now little short of a death-feud.

This is not to suggest that the present rebellion is driven only by religious motives and sectarian hate. Although these are real enough, other grievances have piled up over the past decades: the ravages of youth unemployment; the brutality of Syria’s security services; the domination of key centres of economic, military and political life by the minority Alawi community; the blatant consumerism of a privileged class, grown rich on state patronage, in sharp contrast with the hardship suffered by the mass of the population, including in particular the inhabitants of the ‘poverty belt’ around Damascus, Aleppo and other cities. These deprived suburbs are largely the result of inward migration from the long-neglected countryside, which in the past decade has suffered catastrophic losses from a drought of unprecedented severity.

But beyond all this is the decades-long hostility of Islamists for Syria’s Ba‘th-dominated regime. Formed by two Damascus schoolmasters soon after the Second World War, the Ba‘th party was created as a secular and socialist movement dedicated to bringing about Arab unity and independence. Schoolboy members of the party clashed repeatedly at that time with members of the conservative Muslim Brotherhood. When the party seized power in Damascus in 1963, its clash with the Islamists burst into the open. The civilian leadership of the party had by then been largely displaced by Ba‘thist officers — including Hafiz al-Asad, father of the current President — mostly from minority backgrounds. In turn, these Ba‘thist officers had allied themselves with Akram al-Hawrani, the charismatic leader of a peasant revolt, which was challenging the great landowners of the central Syrian plain, most of them resident in Hama.

Hama is today remembered as the centre of the Muslim Brothers’ armed uprising against Hafiz al-Asad, which he crushed in blood in February 1982, leaving a bitter legacy of sectarian hostility. Few recall, however, that eighteen years earlier, in April 1964, rioting by Muslim rebels against the Ba‘thist regime had already flared into something like a religious war. Funded by the old land-owning families, enraged at being dispossessed, and egged on by the imam of the Sultan mosque in Hama, the rebels threw up roadblocks, stockpiled food and weapons, ransacked wine shops to spill the offending liquor in the gutters, and beat up any Ba‘th party man they could find.

After two days of street fighting, the regime shelled the Sultan mosque where the rebels had taken cover and from where they had been firing. The minaret collapsed, killing many of them. Many others were wounded but many more disappeared underground. The shelling of the mosque outraged Muslim opinion, igniting a fever of strikes and demonstrations across the country.

Thus, today’s civil war – for that is what it has become — has deep roots in modern Syrian history. The rebellion has increasingly taken on an Islamist colouring, as the Swedish writer Aron Lund explains in an informative 45-page report on Syrian Jihadism, published this month by the Swedish Institute of International Affairs. It is striking, as he points out, that virtually all the members of the various armed insurgent groups are Sunni Arabs; that the fighting has been largely restricted to Sunni Arab areas only, whereas areas inhabited by Alawis, Druze or Christians have remained passive or supportive of the regime; that defections from the regime are nearly 100 per cent Sunni; that money, arms and volunteers are pouring in from Islamic states or from pro-Islamic organisations and individuals; and that religion is the insurgent movement’s most important common denominator.

In the last few months, the Syrian National Council (SNC) — that is to say the Turkey-based civilian ‘political’ opposition — has been largely up-staged by fighters on the ground. Most of these fighters are grouped into nine Military Councils (majalis askariya) of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), each Council divided into a number of brigades (kataib). But, in much the same way as these Councils have marginalised the SNC, so they also seem unwilling to take orders from the Turkey-based FSA commander, Col Riad al-As‘ad.

Aron Lund points out that, with rare exceptions, the FSA is an entirely Sunni Arab phenomenon, and that most FSA brigades use religious rhetoric and are named after heroic figures or events in Sunni Islamic history. It is thought that about 2,000 non-Syrians, some linked to al-Qaida, are now fighting in Syria, about 10 per cent of the total rebel manpower, estimated at about 20,000 (although some sources put the figure twice as high at 40,000.) Most of these fighters would seem to be active only in protecting their home areas.

Three major fighting units, among a score of others — Jabhat al-Nosra, the Ahrar al-Sham Brigades and Suqur al-Sham Division — are among the most extreme salafi groups in the Syrian rebel movement. The first has been linked to suicide and car bomb attacks in Syrian cities and to the assassination of pro-regime figures; the second carries out ambushes and uses remotely-triggered bombings and sniper fire against army patrols; and the third uses suicide bombers and frames its propaganda in jihadi rhetoric. The leaders of the last two have declared that their aim is to establish an Islamic state in Syria. All three seem to have welcomed al-Qaida fighters into their ranks.

These fighting groups have gravely destabilised the Syrian regime but, without a foreign military intervention in their favour, they seem unlikely to topple it. The regime is fighting back with air and ground attacks, evidently determined to crush all pockets of armed rebellion on Syrian territory.

This is the conundrum facing the UN peace envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi. His task is to persuade the world community to impose a ceasefire on both sides, before bringing them to the table. But only when all are persuaded that there can be no decisive win for either side might they heed his call. In the meantime, thousands more will die or be driven from their homes and the country will sink further into blood and chaos, making the divide between the Islamists and President Bashar al-Asad virtually unbridgeable.

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Released: 28 September 2012
Word Count: 1,103
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Patrick Seale, “Why Do Arabs and Muslims Hate America?”

September 19, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

Faced with a dramatic outbreak of anti-American violence by Arabs and Muslims in a score of countries — including the killing of Ambassador Chris Stevens in Benghazi — the American reaction has been one of puzzlement, outrage and a thirst for revenge. Send in the Marines! Few Americans seem to understand that their country is paying for decades of grossly mistaken policies.

Take the Palestine problem. Most Americans have long since dismissed it from their minds and consciences. But Arabs and Muslims have not. Israel’s 45-year-long oppression of the Palestinians — the cruel siege of Gaza, the relentless land-grab on the West Bank — remains a major source of humiliation and rage. The United States bears the prime responsibility because, having sustained Israel in every possible way, it has failed to persuade it to give the Palestinians a fair deal.

Some American presidents have tried to break the Arab-Israeli logjam but were defeated by domestic politics and by obdurate Israeli leaders. Jimmy Carter was defeated by Menachem Begin; George H W Bush by Itzhak Shamir; Bill Clinton almost clinched a deal before he left office but was sabotaged by pro-Israeli officials like Dennis Ross. Barack Obama’s defeat by Binyamin Netanyahu has turned the huge hopes he first aroused into bitter disappointment. The poison of the unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict continues to inflict grave damage on the United States and to threaten Israel’s long-term future. There will be no peace in the region until a fair settlement is reached. But no president has dared exert American power in this cause.

Not only has the United States failed to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, it has also built Israel up into the regional bully, and must therefore be judged complicit in its numerous assaults against its neighbours. The origins of this policy may be traced to Israel’s comprehensive victory in 1967, which caused Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to view it as the guard-dog of America’s regional interests. Kissinger’s idea was to bolster Israel with funds and weapons in order to keep the Arabs down and the Russians out. His plan reached fruition after the 1973 October War, when he plotted to exclude the Palestinians from the post-war settlement and remove Egypt from the Arab military line up, thus laying the foundations for the 1979 Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty. “Remove a wheel, and the car won’t run,” was the triumphant Israeli version.

Indeed, the Treaty guaranteed Israel’s supremacy for the next three decades, while exposing Lebanon, Syria and the Palestinians to the full force of Israeli power. Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982, killing 17,000 people. It expelled the PLO and sought to turn Lebanon into an Israeli protectorate. Syria fought back; the man who was to serve as Israel’s vassal was assassinated; and the American-brokered Israel-Lebanese accord was scrapped. But not before Israel seized Beirut and presided over the horrific massacre by right-wing Christians of 800 Palestinians at the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps. Israel remained in occupation of south Lebanon for the next eighteen years until driven out in 2000 by Hizballah guerrillas — whom the United States still insists on calling ‘terrorists’.

Americans have rarely paused to ask themselves why they were attacked on 11 September 2001. Palestine was certainly a motive. Another was the severe punishment inflicted by the United States on Iraq in expelling it from Kuwait in 1991 and then in starving it over the next thirteen years with punitive sanctions, which are said to have resulted in the death of half a million Iraqi babies. Yet another major motive was the callous way the United States treated the tens of thousands of Arab fighters from across the region — 25,000 from Yemen alone — whom it had recruited and armed to fight the Russians in Afghanistan. Once the Russians withdrew in 1989, Washington dropped the mujaheddin. Large numbers of these ‘Afghan Arabs’, angry, alienated and battle-hardened, were let loose on the region. Some caused mayhem in their own countries; others joined Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaida.

George W Bush’s ‘global war on terror’ after 9/11 was another grotesque misuse of American power. Instead of using police methods to hunt down Al-Qaida, the United States blundered into war in Afghanistan — where, twelve years later, it is still inflicting and taking casualties. It then allowed itself to be tricked by Paul Wolfovitz and other pro-Israeli neo-cons into invading Iraq — a country which the neo-cons, after the Iran-Iraq war, saw as a possible threat to Israel’s eastern front. Some 1.4m Iraqis are estimated to have died as a result of the occupation and destruction of Iraq, together with about 4,500 Americans.

This was the heyday of the militarisation of American foreign policy — brutal wars, extraordinary rendition and routine torture, the expansion of overseas bases (including half a dozen in the Arab Gulf states), a grossly inflated military budget — still around $700bn a year!

The catalogue of blunders continues to this day. Instead of engaging with Iran as he promised to do when he came to office, Obama has waged an undeclared war against the Islamic Republic with ‘crippling sanctions’ and cyber attacks — largely, it would seem, to prevent Israel from dragging America into yet another Middle East war. The chance of a ‘win-win’ deal with Tehran — which would have allowed Iran to produce low-enriched uranium for electricity generation while giving up 20% uranium — has been thrown away because Israel insists that Iran’s nuclear industry be destroyed altogether. The United States is now attempting to bring down not just the Iranian regime but the Syrian regime as well, indeed the whole Tehran-Damascus-Hizballah axis which has dared challenge Israel’s hegemony.

Little Israel has now turned the tables on its mighty patron: Instead of Israel being America’s guard-dog, it is the United States which has become Israel’s guard-dog, harassing, sanctioning, demonising and waging wars on Israel’s enemies on its behalf. Americans may have forgotten these facts, if they ever knew them, but the Arabs and Iranians have not.

If this were not bad enough, Obama has authorised a vast expansion of U.S. drone attacks against alleged Islamic militants in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and elsewhere, inevitably causing large numbers of civilian casualties and inflaming local populations against the United States. On the receiving end of brutal American policies, it is hardly a surprise that Arabs and Muslims hit back when they can.

Has the United States given the Middle East security? Or has it spread calamitous insecurity? Does the Gulf really need the U.S. 5th Fleet, squadrons of warplanes and thousands of infantry and armour? Is the U.S. presence stabilising or destabilising? Might it not be time to disengage? The Islamic revival, which has been such a striking feature of the Arab Spring, should be seen as a rejection of Western meddling and of Western controls, and a reaffirmation of Muslim identity. It is only the latest phase in the Arabs’ long struggle for independence. The vile film about the Prophet Muhammad may have been the spark which set Arab and Muslim anger alight, but it was only able to do so because of the large quantities of highly combustible material around.

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Released: 19 September 2012
Word Count: 1,178
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Patrick Seale, “Israel’s Super-Hawk”

September 14, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

To understand Israel’s security concerns, as well as its ambitions, one needs to look into the head of Uzi Arad, Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu’s National Security Adviser. He is a veteran of Mossad, Israel’s spy agency, where he spent 20 years; he has Netanyahu’s ear; he occupies an office a step away from his and, in terms of influence over the Prime Minister, he seems to have managed to beat off competition from the heads of the armed services and from other security and intelligence chiefs. Dr Arad is Israel’s super-hawk. Some have called him Israel’s Dr Strangelove.

His over-riding goal is to put a permanent end to any ambition Iran may have to build a nuclear bomb, or even simply to acquire the means and ability to do so. He does not believe that “crippling sanctions” will do the job and deplores the lack of resolve of Western leaders in stopping Iran’s race for nuclear weapons. He is convinced, against a good deal of evidence, that Iran is determined to become a nuclear power.

Uzi Arad wants the United States and its Western allies to confront Iran with the certainty of military attack if it does not give up all uranium enrichment and plutonium production. Indeed he believes that a pre-emptive attack on Iran would be perfectly legitimate: Iran, he argues, must be stopped before it is too late. Since Netanyahu never misses an opportunity to demonise Iran as the “greatest threat to world peace” and “the world’s leading sponsor of international terrorism,” one can safely predict that his address to the 67th session of the UN General Assembly this month will be an anti-Iranian rant.

What is the root cause of Israel’s animus against Iran? Certainly, there is an element of paranoia. Having suffered genocide at the hands of Hitler, Jews are utterly determined never to risk another Holocaust. “Never again!” is the slogan. Arad has spoken of the “genocidal attributes of Iranian statements.” But, equally, there is an element of hubris — of overweening pride — in the Israeli approach. Having built up a powerful nuclear arsenal over the past 45 years — estimated at between 100 and 200 warheads, together with an array of delivery vehicles, including a “second strike” capability in the form of submarine-launched missiles — Israel wants no competition in the nuclear field. It wants to be the Middle East’s sole nuclear power — a key element in its determination to remain the region’s dominant military power.

Men like Arad and Netanyahu do not, even for a moment, think that Iran’s leaders are mad or suicidal. They are well aware that if Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, it would never launch them against Israel — and risk immediate national annihilation. Atomic bombs are weapons of defence, not offence. They provide a deterrent capability to the country possessing them — that is to say they serve to deter a hostile nuclear power from launching an attack. No nuclear power, for example, would consider attacking nuclear-armed North Korea.

Israel does not want Iran, or any other state in the Greater Middle East, to acquire a deterrent capability in the form of nuclear weapons, since this would restrict its own ability to attack its neighbours at will. If Iran or an Arab state had a nuclear capability, Israel would not have attacked Lebanon in 2006, Syria in 2007 and Gaza in 2008.

Arad believes that the United States and its allies should address a clear ultimatum to Iran on the following lines: “Dismantle your entire nuclear industry or face attack. Don’t dare retaliate to any attack as more punishment will follow. And don’t dare restart your nuclear programme once it has been destroyed, as it will be destroyed again.”

He has expressed these brutally robust views on many occasions, among them an address last February to Canada’s annual Conference on Defence and Security. What does he recommend? First, that Iran’s oil exports should be “put in jeopardy”; and secondly, that strikes against Iran should be “surgical,” aimed initially only at its nuclear facilities and at the Revolutionary Guard Corps. Such strikes, he argues, would be far easier to conduct than the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and would cause little collateral damage. He dismisses as unfounded the often-cited fear that an attack on Iran would set the whole region on fire.

Like his boss Netanyahu, Arad rejects all compromise with Iran on the nuclear issue, rejecting the widely held view that Iran, as a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, has the right to enrich uranium on its own territory for the purpose of power generation or medical purposes. He wants none of it. His whole argument is that a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities would be far less dangerous than living with a nuclear-armed Iran. If Iran were to get the bomb, he warns, it would “enhance the clout of a militant, extremist Islamic regime,” and drive Arab states to go nuclear as well. Proliferation would make life in the Middle East a nightmare.

U.S. President Barack Obama has so far resisted Israel’s relentless pressure for war and its constant threat — in effect blackmail — that “If you won’t attack Iran, we will, and you will be forced to join in, whether you like it or not.” To counter the accusation that he is ready to “throw Israel under a bus,” Obama has showered the Jewish state with funds, with secret intelligence, with UN vetoes in its favour and with weapons, including the latest warplanes and bunker-busting bombs. He has joined with Israel in acts of state terrorism, such as cyber-warfare against Iran. But all this is still not enough for Israel’s super-hawk. He wants Iran’s nuclear industry destroyed.

So, if one were able to look into Uzi Arad’s head, what other imperatives might one note?

First, the need to maintain at all costs the vital relationship with the American super-power. More than an alliance, it is a marriage, a merger, an inter-penetration of each other’s society, to the extent that it is difficult to tell which of the two is the dominant partner.

Second, the need to ensure Israel’s military dominance over the Greater Middle East by all possible means — wars, sabotage, the dismemberment of threatening states, mobilising the United States for regime change as in Iraq in 2003, and now in Syria and Iran, the assassination of political opponents. (The long list of Israel’s victims includes the former leaders of Hizballah and Hamas as well as Iranian scientists. Palestinians figure prominently on the list, including very probably Yasser Arafat himself.)

Third, the need to prevent the emergence of a Palestinian state, since it would put an end to the dream of a Greater Israel and might even undermine the legitimacy of Israel’s own enterprise, built on the ruins of Arab Palestine.

Uzi Arad is the dangerous advisor of a dangerous prime minister. In the Greek legend, hubris leads to nemesis. Israel’s long-term survival rests on accepting, indeed encouraging, the emergence of a Palestinian state and on peaceful, cooperative relations with the whole region, not on murder, subversion, domination and war.

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Released: 14 September 2012
Word Count: 1,180
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Patrick Seale, “The Collapse of Turkey’s Middle East Policy”

September 4, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

The Arab Spring will undoubtedly go down in history as an important moment in the liberation of the Arab peoples from tyranny. But, like most major political upheavals, it has had a number of unfortunate and largely unforeseen consequences.

The economies of Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen have suffered serious damage; Syria’s on-going civil war has resulted in heavy — and mounting — civilian casualties and material destruction; in the Sahel, violence and chaos have followed the overthrow of Libya’s Muammar al-Qadhafi, especially in Mali where Touareg rebels backed by Islamist groups have seized a great chunk of the country; sectarian tensions have sharpened across the region causing all minorities to feel less secure; the Palestine cause has been consigned to the margins of international attention, while Israel, fully backed by the United States, proceeds undisturbed with its land grab.

Turkey is yet another victim of the unforeseen consequence of the Arab Spring: Its ambitious Middle East policy has collapsed. Two years ago, Turkey could claim to be the most successful country in the region. Its economy was booming. Its charismatic Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in power since 2002, enjoyed popularity at home and respect abroad. The Turkish combination of democracy and Islam was hailed as a model for the region. Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, an academic turned statesman, was credited with devising a peaceful regional order, based on the principle of “zero problems with neighbours.”

A key pivot of Davutoglu’s new regional order was a Turkish-Syrian partnership, both commercial and political, which soon expanded into a free-trade zone embracing Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. Visas with these countries were abolished. Meanwhile, Turkish construction companies were active in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, as well as in Qadhafi’s Libya (where contracts were estimated at some $18bn for roads, bridges, pipelines, ports, airports and much else besides.)

Buoyed by these successes, Turkey set about seeking to solve some of the region’s most obdurate conflicts. It tried hard to bring Syria and Israel to the negotiating table. Together with Brazil, it made what seemed a promising advance towards solving the problem of Iran’s nuclear programme. In Afghanistan, Turkish troops were the only foreign forces welcome, which seemed to presage a role for Ankara in negotiating a settlement with the Taleban. In addition, Prime Minister Erdogan had hopes of reaching an entente with Turkey’s old rival, Greece, and of making peace at last with Armenia (a country still smarting from the harsh treatment of Armenians by the Ottoman Turks.) Above all, the Turkish Prime Minister seemed ready to make major political concessions to the Kurds of eastern Anatolia in a bid to end, once and for all, the long and violent struggle with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has claimed tens of thousands of lives.

Then the whole thing fell apart.

The deal which Turkey and Brazil negotiated with Iran over its nuclear facilities was rejected by Washington. Turkey’s overtures to Armenia got nowhere: The border remains closed. Turkey quarrelled violently with Israel when Israeli commandos boarded a Turkish ship, the Mavi Marmara, in international waters, and killed nine activists, most of them Turks, who were trying to break Israel’s cruel siege of Gaza. Israel has refused to apologise for its brutal behaviour. Turkey’s hopes of better relations with Greece were dashed by Greece’s economic collapse. Moreover, having quarrelled with Turkey, Israel hurried to embrace Greece, as well as the Greek-speaking Republic of Cyprus, joining with it in the exploitation of gas finds in the eastern Mediterranean, to the anger of Turkish-speaking northern Cyprus and of Turkey itself.

On the commercial front, Qadhafi’s overthrow put an end to several big Turkish contracts in Libya, while Turkey’s expanding business with Saudi Arabia and the Arab Gulf states was dealt a harsh blow by the disruption of road traffic across Syria due to the uprising there. Turkey’s once friendly relations with Iran suffered because they now found themselves on opposite sides of the Syrian conflict, while Turkish relations with Iraq suffered because of Turkey’s close ties with the autonomous Kurdish Regional Government in northern Iraq (including providing the KRG with facilities to export oil direct to Turkey, to the fury of Baghdad.)

Instead of “no problems with neighbours,” Turkey is now beset with grave problems on almost every front. Inevitably, Ahmet Davutoglu’s star has waned. No longer the master strategist, he is seen as an amateur politician struggling to survive.

The real turning point was Turkey’s impetuous decision to back the Syrian rebels against President Bashar al-Asad’s regime. At a stroke, Turkey’s partnership with Syria collapsed, bringing down the whole of Turkey’s Arab policy. Instead of attempting to resolve the Syrian conflict by mediation — which it was well placed to do — Turkey took sides. It provided house room in Istanbul for the civilian Syrian opposition and camps for the Free Syrian Army and other fighting groups. Under Turkish protection, the Syrian rebels now control a narrow strip of territory of some 70 kilometres along the Syrian-Turkish border.

Turkey and Syria are virtually at war. In retaliation for Turkey’s role in channelling funds, weapons and intelligence to the rebels, Syria seems to be encouraging the PKK — and its Syrian affiliate, the PYD — to turn up the heat on Turkey. The PYD has occupied five largely Kurdish towns in northern Syria, from which Syrian government forces were deliberately withdrawn. If Syria’s Kurds gain anything like the autonomy already enjoyed by Iraq’s Kurds, then Turkey’s own Kurds are bound to press their claims for political rights and freedoms. In eastern Turkey, the PKK’s 28-year insurgency seems to be springing back to life with deadly ambushes against military targets, such as last Sunday’s attack which killed a dozen Turkish soldiers. The struggle to put a lid on Kurdish militancy could once again become Turkey’s most painful and disruptive domestic problem.

A real headache for Turkey is the massive influx of Syrian refugees. To stem the flood, Turkey has closed its frontier with Syria for the time being. Syrian refugees in Turkey are said to number over 80,000, lodged in nine tented camps. Five more camps are under construction, which could house another 30,000 refugees. Turkey says it cannot realistically take in more than about 100,000, without help from other countries and international organisations. Hosting the refugees has already cost Turkey an estimated 135 million euros — and no doubt will cost a great deal more.

Should Turkey revise its Syria policy? Instead of joining in Washington’s (and Israel’s) war against Tehran and Damascus, Ankara might be well advised to revert back, step by step, to a more neutral stance. Lakhdar Brahimi, the new UN peace envoy, needs Turkey’s help in his difficult task of mediating a peaceful resolution of the Syrian conflict. That would be the way to restore Turkey’s Middle East policy to its former glory. Turkey needs urgently to rethink its relations with all its neighbours — Syria first among them.

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Released: 04 September 2012
Word Count: 1,152
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Patrick Seale, “Regaining Egypt’s Independence”

August 28, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

Although he has been in office only since June 30 — a bare two months — President Muhammad Morsi of Egypt has already embarked on bold foreign policy initiatives which risk bringing him into confrontation with the United States and Israel. It is a risk he is evidently prepared to take. Indeed, his goal appears to be to recover a measure of independence from the tutelage of these powers. If he succeeds, he will win the plaudits of the vast majority of Egyptians.

The immediate area of possible confrontation is over the extreme pressure which the United States, egged on by Israel, is putting on the Iranian and Syrian regimes, with the evident intention of bringing them down. The U.S. is seeking to cripple Iran’s economy with unprecedented sanctions and is backing the armed Syrian rebels in their attempt to topple President Bashar al-Asad.

President Morsi will have none of it. Braving the displeasure of the United States and Israel, he is refusing to isolate or demonise Iran. On the contrary, he has chosen to attend this week’s gathering of Non-Aligned countries in Tehran — the first Egyptian President to visit the Islamic Republic since the overthrow of the Shah in 1979. He broke the ice with Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinjad some weeks ago when they met at an Islamic summit in Mecca. By all accounts, their meeting was extremely cordial.

Again, in direct opposition to Washington, President Morsi evidently prefers to resolve the Syrian crisis by negotiation rather than war. He has proposed that the region’s four main Muslim powers — Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey — form a contact group to oversee a negotiated settlement. In other words, he is telling the United States and NATO to keep out of Syria and leave it to local powers. (Morsi’s move poses a tricky dilemma for Turkish diplomacy: Should Turkey, a NATO power, side with the U.S. in channelling arms, funds and intelligence to the Syrian rebels or would it be wiser for Ankara to join in a regional effort to end the conflict by negotiation?)

U.S. President Barack Obama has invited Dr. Morsi to visit Washington in September — no doubt to give him a diplomatic dressing down. But, in yet another assertion of Egyptian independence, Dr. Morsi plans to visit Beijing and Tehran first. It may be his way of signalling that he will not tolerate being lectured to.

An even more serious subject of contention concerns the military annexes of the1979 Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, which President Morsi, like most Egyptians, would like to revise. When a band of gunmen surged out of Sinai on 5 August and attacked an Egyptian army checkpoint on the Egyptian-Gaza border, killing 16 Egyptian soldiers and wounding several more, Morsi promptly sent a strong force of troops, helicopters and tanks in hot pursuit of them. But, according to the military annexes, Egypt should have sought Israel’s prior agreement before sending tanks into Sinai, even though it is sovereign Egyptian territory. It would seem that Morsi did not feel the need to do so.

When, last September, I interviewed Amr Moussa, former Egyptian foreign minister and veteran Arab League secretary-general — who was then a candidate for the Egyptian presidency — he called for a revision of the military annexes. “The Peace Treaty will continue to exist,” he told me, “but Egypt needs forces in Sinai. The security situation requires it. Israel must understand that the restrictions imposed by the Treaty have to be reviewed.” President Morsi evidently shares this view.

This sort of talk is not to Israel’s liking. The New York Times reported on 22 August that Israel was “troubled” by the lack of advance coordination and had asked Cairo to withdraw its tanks. But Israel finds itself in a cleft stick: It wants Egypt to maintain order in the lawless and turbulent wastes of Sinai, yet it fears that armed Egyptian deployments might one day threaten its security.

Dennis Ross of the Washington Institute (an outgrowth of the Israeli lobby, AIPAC) used strong words in the Washington Post on 19 August to censure Morsi for moving tanks into Sinai without notifying Israel. “If this behavior continues,” he thundered, “U.S. support, which will be essential for gaining international economic aid and fostering investment, will not be forthcoming.” Known as “Israel’s lawyer” for his decades-long defence of Israeli interests when he was in government, Ross clearly thinks that he still speaks for the American administration. Let us hope he is mistaken.

Another of President Morsi’s moves, which alarmed Washington and Tel Aviv, was his sudden sacking of a clutch of very senior officers — the very men with whom Israel and the United States had established close relations over the years. These remnants of the Mubarak regime include defence minister Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, chief of staff General Sami Anan, the heads of the Navy, Air Force and Air Defence, intelligence chief Murad Mowafi, and other commanders. President Morsi has named Lt. Gen Abdelfattah El-Sisi as the new defence minister, and Lt. Gen Sedky Sobhi as the new chief of staff. Both men, it would appear, share Dr. Morsi’s wish to break free from excessive American and Israeli influence.

The immediate and overriding priority of Dr. Morsi and his team will be to revive Egypt’s economy, now in a dire state. Some 85 million people need to be fed. Job creation will be essential. Government services have to be restored. Massive external aid will be required. In the circumstances, there is no danger of the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty being scrapped. No Egyptian can today conceive of war with Israel. Nor will the Egyptian military readily sacrifice the $1.3bn annual subsidy it receives from the United States to keep the peace with Israel.

But President Morsi will undoubtedly seek to forge a new relationship with both the United States and Israel. From now on Egypt is likely to be less tolerant of Israel’s outrageous treatment of the Palestinians, under continued siege and occupation. He has already stressed the need to address the long-neglected Palestine question. He will be less ready than his predecessor to accept Israel’s relentless war-mongering against Iran. Although he will not be able to challenge Israel’s military supremacy — financed, equipped and guaranteed by the United States — he will seek to end the abuse Israel has made of this supremacy, notably its repeated aggressions against its neighbours.

Many Egyptians have a certain feeling of guilt about the 1979 peace treaty with Israel. They know that, by removing Egypt from the Arab military equation, the Treaty gave Israel more than thirty years of unchallenged military dominance — and with it the freedom to strike its neighbours at will, without the risk of being hit back. Lebanon, the Palestinians, Iraq and Syria have all experienced Israel’s assaults.

President Morsi’s evident ambition is to restore some balance to Middle East power relationships. It will be fascinating to see how he goes about this high-risk enterprise, and how the United States and Israel choose to react to Egypt’s new assertiveness.

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Released: 28 August 2012
Word Count: 1,166
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Patrick Seale, “Lakhdar Brahimi: A Man of Peace”

August 21, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

Half a century ago, in 1962, when I was the Middle East correspondent of the British Sunday newspaper, The Observer, I learned that Algeria, following its hard-won independence from France, had sent an ambassador to Cairo and that President Gamal Abd al-Nasser had put at his disposal one of King Farouk’s palaces. The ambassador’s name was Lakhdar Brahimi. As I was in Cairo at the time, I decided to call on him.

The palace seemed deserted. There was no one at the gate. I walked in and made my way through the gardens towards the great house, hoping to find someone there. Then I saw a gardener digging in one of the flower beds. “Where can I find Ambassador Brahimi?” I asked him. “I am Lakhdar Brahimi,” he replied. This was my first — but fortunately not my last — encounter with this remarkable man.

I have had the privilege of many conversations with him over the years — when he was ambassador to London in the 1970s, deputy secretary-general of the Arab League in Cairo in the 1980s, Algerian Foreign Minister in the early 1990s, or between his many assignments in Lebanon, South Africa, Haiti, Afghanistan and Iraq. He was also kind enough to receive me at his home in Paris on a number of occasions.

What is the key to his personality? I would suggest that it is his utter conviction that negotiation rather than war is the best way to resolve conflicts — of which the Middle East has more than its fair share.

My guess is that he reached this conclusion because of the torment his country suffered in its nearly eight-year struggle for independence from France, 1954-1962, the most bitter of modern anti-colonial wars. No savagery was omitted in that terrible war. Its catalogue of horrors included numerous acts of terrorism, cruel massacres, barbarous torture, ferocious counter-insurgency and equally ferocious reprisals. Devilish instincts were released on both sides. About 750,000 Algerians died and another two million were uprooted. France lost about 25,000 men. And after the war another 100,000 pro-French Muslims were murdered by the National Liberation Front. The war brought down France’s Fourth Republic, carried General de Gaulle back to power, and anchored the Algerian army and security services in their country’s political life to this day. It was a trauma from which, one might argue, neither Algeria nor France has yet fully recovered. Certainly it has had profound effects on the subsequent history of both countries.

Lakhdar Brahimi has many qualities which prepare him for his difficult task in Syria. First of all, as a man of the Maghrib, he views the turbulent Mashriq with a certain valuable detachment. In other words, he comes to the conflict with no emotional baggage. Secondly, he is well-known and respected by all the Arab leaders, and also by the leaders of the external powers most directly involved in the conflict — the United States, Russia, Britain, France and Turkey. All have welcomed his appointment as U.N peace envoy. Thirdly, few people on the international political scene today can match his personal experience at mediating conflicts in different parts of the world.

But are the parties to the Syrian conflict ready for a deal? Can the many different fighting groups on the streets agree to put up their guns, even for a short spell, to allow negotiations to start? Can the squabbling exiles in Turkey and elsewhere agree on a common negotiating position? Can the Muslim Brothers be brought to the table with the regime? Is President Bashar al-Asad prepared to make the painful compromises which must eventually set a term to his leadership?

Lakhdar Brahimi is likely to tell all sides that their Syrian nation — its safety, stability, territorial integrity and the welfare of its population — is far more important than their individual ambitions and hates.

This is what he said in his first statement after his appointment as U.N. peace envoy:
“Syrians must come together as a nation in the quest for a new formula. This is the only way to ensure that all Syrians can live together peacefully, in a society not based on fear of reprisal, but on tolerance. In the meantime, the U.N. Security Council and regional states must unite to ensure that a political transition can take place as soon as possible.

“Millions of Syrians are clamouring for peace. World leaders cannot remain divided any longer, over and above their cries.”

Lakhdar Brahimi has some advantages over Kofi Annan, his unfortunate predecessor as peace envoy. The most notable of these advantages is that the various parties to the conflict are beginning to understand that a clear victory by either side is unlikely, and that a prolonged war will destroy the country and will serve no one’s interest — except Israel.

The Syrian regime does not seem about to fall but nor can it easily win what has become a hit-and-run urban guerrilla campaign, funded and armed from outside. The rebels may be getting better armed and organised but, to their bitter disappointment, they are beginning to grasp that they cannot count on an external military intervention. And without such an intervention they are unlikely to defeat the Syrian army. Washington, in turn, is beginning to worry that, if morejihadis join the fighting, Syria could turn into another Afghanistan. The last thing the United States wants is to find itself on the same side in Syria as Al-Qaida! Saudi Arabia and Qatar know that if a regional war were to break out — say between the United States and Israel against Iran — their economic and political interests could suffer. They might even find themselves in the line of fire.

Key regional leaders — King Abdallah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia, President Muhammad Morsi of Egypt, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran — are beginning to assume their joint responsibility to put an end to the conflict. Ahmadinejad attended the recent Islamic summit in Mecca, where he had an apparently cordial exchange of views with the Saudi monarch. Morsi, who was also at the Mecca summit, is to attend the Non-Aligned Movement conference in Tehran later this month, the first visit to Iran by an Egyptian president in decades.

President Morsi is reported to have suggested that Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey and Iran form a contact group to resolve the Syrian crisis through discussion and reconciliation. This is a promising development since it suggests that major regional powers are beginning to take the destinies of their region in hand, free from the ambitions of outsiders. They face no easy task because, overshadowing the Syrian crisis, is the evident ambition of the United States and Israel to affirm their regional supremacy.

Such is the challenging context of Lakhdar Brahimi’s peace mission. He must be given every chance to succeed.

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Released: 21 August 2012
Word Count: 1,127
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Patrick Seale, “The Urgent Need to Prevent a Middle East War”

August 14, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

The Middle East is facing an acute danger of war, with unpredictable and potentially devastating consequences for the states and populations of the region. A ‘shadow war’ is already being waged — by Israel and the United States against Iran; by a coalition of countries against Syria; and by the great powers against each other. A mere spark could set this tinder alight.

The threat of a hot war is coming from three main directions: first, from Israel’s relentless and increasingly hysterical war-mongering against Iran; second, from America’s geopolitical ambitions in the oil-rich Gulf and its complicity in Israel’s anti-Iranian campaign; and third, from the naked hostility of some Sunni Arab States towards Iran — and towards Shi‘is and Alawis in general.

These Arab states are apparently unaware that they are playing into the hands of Israeli and American hawks who dream of re-modelling the region in order to subject it to their will. This same neo-con ambition drove the United States to invade and destroy Iraq in the hope of permanently enfeebling it.

The current Israeli war fever rests on a blatant falsehood: that Iran poses an ‘existential threat’ to the Jewish people. What a joke! The only threat Iran poses is this: Were it to develop the means and skills to build an atomic weapon — without actually doing so — it would thereby acquire a limited deterrent capability. That is to say, Israel might hesitate to attack it. Israel’s freedom to attack its other neighbours would also be restricted — a freedom it has enjoyed for decades, as may be seen from its numerous wars and assaults on the Palestinians, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.

Israel wants unfettered military supremacy. This is what the fuss is all about. It wants the freedom to hit Iran and any other country that dares raise its head, without the risk of being hit back. It does not want any Middle East state or movement to be able to protect itself — hence its bitter animus against resistance movements such as Hizballah and Hamas, which have survived Israeli attempts to destroy them, and refuse to be cowed.

Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defence Minister Ehud Barak are evidently itching to bring down the regime in Tehran — and indeed the whole so-called ‘resistance axis’ of Iran, Syria and Hizballah, which in recent years has been the only credible barrier to Israeli and American ambitions. But the Arabs should reflect that the destruction of this barrier will mean abandoning the Palestinians to their tragic fate and exposing the Gulf States themselves to future Israeli and American pressures and possible assaults.

Israel would, of course, prefer the United States to bring down the Iranian regime by itself — much as it brought down Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. Netanyahu may be tempted to strike first, but only if he is sure that President Barack Obama will join in the attack or be compelled to do so, because of his alleged need to win Jewish votes in November’s presidential elections. Obama desperately wants to avoid being dragged into another war. To head off an Israeli attack, he has, in the words of his spokesman, imposed on Iran “the most stringent sanctions ever imposed on any country.”

A solution to the crisis lies in the hands of the two major regional powers, Saudi Arabia and Iran. Although they are often seen as rivals, they could also be partners, since they share a strong interest in the peace and security of the Gulf. There are small but promising signs that they are reaching out to each other. It is striking that the recent summit in Tehran of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and the gathering in Riyadh of members of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) reached much the same conclusions regarding the civil war in Syria. Members at both meetings stressed the need for a ceasefire to stop the bloodshed, followed by political negotiations and the formation of a national unity government. A hopeful sign was the presence of Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at the OIC summit in Riyadh.

Disastrous as it is, the Syrian civil war is only a sub-plot in a far wider contest. Whether President Bashar al-Asad remains temporarily at the head of the regime in Damascus, or is persuaded to quit the scene, is far from being the main issue. Those pressing for war do not care about who rules in Damascus. They simply want Syria enfeebled, preferably dismembered, and its allies crippled.

Issues of profound importance for the Arabs are at stake in this ferocious test of wills. Will the existing pattern of Arab nation states survive the crisis or will it fracture? Can Sunnis and Shi‘is learn to live together in harmony under the banner of Islam or are they doomed to fight each other for another thousand years? Can the security of ethnic and religious minorities, which have contributed for centuries to the rich diversity of the region, be guaranteed? And what will be the outcome for Arab independence itself?

We are witnessing today the latest phase of the struggle for Arab independence. It began a century ago when the Arabs sought to throw off Ottoman rule. But when the Ottoman Empire collapsed in the First World War, the Arabs fell instead under the control of Britain and France who divided the Arab world between them. And when these colonial powers were finally forced out, the Arabs were confronted by the even deadlier threat of an aggressive and expansionist Israel.

American influence over the region has long been predominant, especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union a generation ago. Today, as the United States wrestles with economic problems and the legacy of catastrophic wars, it is also being challenged by new emergent powers. A further handicap for the United States is that it has allowed Israel to dictate its Middle East policy. The Arabs should reflect that a regional war, driven by Israel, risks robbing them of the little real independence they have so far managed to secure.

Can war be prevented? King Abdallah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia is one of the wisest leaders on the international stage. He alone has the political weight, the resources, and the influence with both the United States and the Muslim rebels in Syria to check the region’s downward rush to disaster. He seems torn between his understandable distaste for some Iranian policies and his instinctive understanding of the need for better Saudi-Iranian relations. Several Gulf officials, in turn, are torn between their fear of a powerful Iran and their understanding that members of the Gulf Cooperation Council share many commercial and strategic interests with the Islamic Republic.

Instead of siding with the United States and Israel in the destruction of Iran and Syria, Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies should join with Iran in building a new security system for the region free from external meddling. If they act together, they can spare the region the devastation of war. But they must act soon because time is running out.

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Released: 14 August 2012
Word Count: 1,171
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Patrick Seale, “The Kurds Stir the Regional Pot”

July 31, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

While the world’s gaze is riveted on President Bashar al-Asad’s life-and-death struggle with his domestic and foreign enemies, the Kurds have seized the opportunity to boost their own political agenda. In a dramatic development, Kurdish forces have in recent days seized five Kurdish-majority towns in northern Syria, which lie in a strip of territory along the Turkish border. The Syrian Government has allowed them to do so by withdrawing its troops.

These events have aroused ancient fears in Turkey and Iraq, as well as quiet jubilation in Israel, which has long had a semi-clandestine relationship with the Kurds, and welcomes any development which might weaken or dismember Syria.
Kurdish politics are fiendishly complicated but, in the present context, several groups deserve special mention:

• The Democratic Union Party (PYD), formed in 2003 and led by Salih Muslim Muhammad, is by far the strongest single Kurdish group in Syria. It is armed and disciplined, and has not hesitated to use force against rivals and opponents.

• The Kurdish National Council (KNC), formed in October 2011, is a loose (largely unarmed) political alliance of eleven Syrian Kurdish parties or factions.

• The Kurdish Workers Party, or PKK, is a militant Kurdish organisation in Turkey, which has waged war against the Turkish state in the interests of Kurdish independence over the past several decades. Ankara considers the PKK a terrorist organisation and has regularly bombed its clandestine bases in the Qandil mountains of northern Iraq. The Syrian PYD is closely affiliated to the PKK, some would even say it is a political front for it.

• The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) rules a semi-independent Kurdish entity in northern Iraq, with a population of about 5 million. Erbil is its capital and its leader is President Massoud Barzani, first elected in 2005 and re-elected in 2009.

This Kurdish autonomous enclave was born out of the long wars which Iraq’s former dictator Saddam Hussein waged against the Kurds. In its present form, the KRG took shape after the first Gulf War of 1991, when the United States protected the Kurds by setting up a no-fly zone in northern Iraq. The KRG was then consolidated when the U.S. and Britain invaded Iraq in 2003, overthrew Saddam Hussein, and prepared the ground for the restructuring of Iraq as a federal state of separate Arab and Kurdish entities.

This is the background to the alliance which President Barzani negotiated at Erbil on 11 July between the PYD and the KNC, giving them joint responsibility for the border strip between Syria and Turkey — with the PYD, the stronger partner, in the driving seat. The withdrawal of Syrian troops made this Kurdish take-over possible.

Needless to say, these events have fired the ambitions of some Kurdish militants who imagine that a Kurdish Regional Government might now come to birth in northern Syria, on the model of the one in northern Iraq. The English-language edition of Rudaw (an Iraqi Kurdish periodical), carried a piece on 23 July by a Kurdish journalist, Hiwa Osman, in which he wrote: “The Kurdish Region of Syria? Yes, it is possible. Now is the time to declare it!” A Turkish journalist, Mehmet Ali Birand, went further still when he wrote that “a mega-Kurdish state is being founded,” potentially linking Kurdish enclaves in Turkey, Iraq and Syria.

Turkey is understandably alarmed by this resurgence of expansionist Kurdish goals. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused Syria of giving the PKK ‘custody’ of northern Syria and has warned that Turkey would “not stand idle” in the face of this hostile development. “Turkey is capable of exercising its right to pursue Kurdish rebels inside Syria, if necessary,” he declared. He clearly finds intolerable the prospect of the PKK establishing a safe haven in northern Syria, from which to infiltrate fighters into Turkey. He has sent Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu to Erbil to ask Massoud Barzani — no doubt in forceful terms — what game he thinks he is playing.

There is fevered speculation in the Turkish press that Erdogan is planning a military attack on northern Syria to create a buffer zone, with the twin objectives of defeating and dispersing Syrian Kurdish forces and of creating a foothold, or safe-zone, for Syrian rebels fighting Bashar al-Asad.

What of Syria’s calculations? There are three possible reasons why President Bashar withdrew his troops from the Kurdish border region: He needs the troops for the defence of Damascus and Aleppo; he wants to punish Erdogan for his support of the Syrian opposition; and, he is anxious to conciliate the Kurds, so as to dissuade them from joining the rebels. In fact, he started wooing them some months ago by issuing a presidential decree granting Syrian citizenship to tens of thousands of Kurds — something they had been seeking for more than half a century.

What does Iraq’s Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki think of these developments? He is clearly watching the Syrian crisis with anxious attention. If Asad were to fall and be replaced by an Islamist regime, this could revive the hopes of Iraq’s minority Sunni community — and its Al-Qaida allies — that Maliki and his Shia alliance could also be toppled. Another of Maliki’s worries must be the possible influx into Iraq from Syria of thousands of militant Kurds who would serve to strengthen Kurdish claims to Kirkuk and its oil.

What are the Kurds own objectives? In spite of the concessions Asad has made to them, they have no love for him. But nor do they like the opposition. The PYD is hostile to the Turkish-based Syrian National Council, which it considers a Turkish puppet. More generally, the Kurdish national movement, which is essentially secular, has long been at odds with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, and dreads its coming to power in Damascus.

The PYD leader Salih Muslim Muhammad is more philosophical. He was quoted as saying: “The ruling powers in Damascus come and go. For us Kurds, this isn’t so important. What is important is that we Kurds assert our existence.” The Syrian Kurds do not expect to win their independence from the Syrian state. They know that it is not a realistic goal: Kurdish enclaves in Syria are too scattered. They do seek, however, a large measure of autonomy, in which they no longer face discrimination, and in which their rights, both political and cultural, are guaranteed.

Erdogan is no doubt watching how the PYD and the KNC run the Kurdish towns they now control on the Syrian border. If they behave, he will not intervene. But if they start infiltrating fighters into Turkey, he is bound to react forcefully. For its part, the PKK has warned that, if the Turks intervene, it will turn “all of Kurdistan into a war zone.”
A major factor of instability has thus been added to an already volatile region. The Kurdish pot is simmering. If it boils over, it risks scalding everyone within reach.

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Released: 31 July 2012
Word Count: 1,141
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Patrick Seale, “The Destruction of Syria”

July 24, 2012 - Jahan Salehi

Once one of the most solid states in the Middle East and a key pivot of the regional power structure, Syria is now facing wholesale destruction. The consequences of the unfolding drama are likely to be disastrous for Syria’s territorial integrity, for the well-being of its population, for regional peace, and for the interests of external powers deeply involved in the crisis.

The most immediate danger is that the fighting in Syria, together with the current severe pressure being put on Syria’s Iranian ally, will provide the spark for a wider conflagration from which no one will be immune.

How did it come to this? Every actor in the crisis bears a share of responsibility. Syria is the victim of the fears and appetites of its enemies but also of its own leaders’ mistakes.

With hindsight, it can be seen that President Bashar al-Asad missed the chance to reform the tight security state he inherited in 2000 from his father. Instead of recognising — and urgently addressing — the thirst for political freedoms, personal dignity and economic opportunity which were the message of the ‘Damascus Spring’ of his first year in power, he screwed the lid down ever more tightly.

Suffocating controls over every aspect of Syrian society were reinforced, and made harder to bear by the blatant corruption and privileges of the few and the hardships suffered by the many. Physical repression became routine. Instead of cleaning up his security apparatus, curbing police brutality and improving prison conditions, he allowed them to remain as gruesome and deplorable as ever.

Above all, over the past decade Bashar al-Asad and his close advisers failed to grasp the revolutionary potential of two key developments — Syria’s population explosion and the long-term drought which the country suffered from 2006 to 2010, the worst in several hundred years. The first produced an army of semi-educated young people unable to find jobs; the second resulted in the forced exodus of hundreds of thousands of farmers from their parched fields to slums around the major cities. Herders in the north-east lost 85% of their livestock. It is estimated that by 2011, some two to three million Syrians had been driven into extreme poverty. No doubt climate change was responsible, but government neglect and incompetence contributed to the disaster.

These two factors — youth unemployment and rural disaffection — were the prime motors of the uprising which spread like wildfire, once it was triggered by a brutal incident at Dar‘a in March 2011. The foot-soldiers of the uprising are unemployed urban youth and impoverished peasants.

Could the regime have done something about it? Yes, it could. As early as 2006-7, it could have alerted the world to the situation, devoted all available resources to urgent job creation, launched a massive relief programme for its stricken population and mobilised its citizens for these tasks. No doubt major international aid agencies and rich Gulf countries would have helped had the plans been in place.

Instead, the regime’s gaze was distracted by external threats: by the Lebanese crisis of 2005 following the assassination of Rafic Hariri; by Israel’s bid to destroy Hizballah by its invasion of Lebanon in 2006; by its attack on Syria’s nuclear facility in 2007; and by its bid to destroy Hamas in its murderous assault on Gaza in 2008-9.

From the start of Bashar al-Asad’s presidency, Syria has faced relentless efforts by Israel and its complicit American ally to bring down the so-called ‘resistance axis’ of Tehran-Damascus-Hizballah, which dared challenge the regional dominance of Israel and the United States.

Syria had a narrow escape in 2003-4. Led by the Pentagon’s Paul Wolfowitz, the pro-Israeli neo-cons embedded in President George W. Bush’s administration were determined to reshape the region in Israel’s and America’s interest. Their first target was Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, seen as a potential threat to Israel. Had the United States been successful in Iraq, Syria would have been next. Neither Iraq nor the United States has yet recovered from the catastrophic Iraqi war, of which Wolfowitz was the chief ‘architect’.

Syria and its Iranian ally are once again under imminent threat. The United States and Israel make no secret of their goal to bring down both the Damascus and Tehran regimes. No doubt some Israeli strategists believe that it would be greatly to their country’s advantage if Syria were dismembered and permanently weakened by the creation of a small Alawi state around the port-city of Latakia in the north-west, in much the same way as Iraq was dismembered and permanently weakened by the creation of the Kurdish Regional Government in the north of the country, with its capital at Irbil. It is not easy to be the neighbour of an expansionist and aggressive Jewish state, which believes that its security is best assured, not by making peace with its neighbours, but by subverting, destabilising and destroying them with the aid of American power.

The United States and Israel are not Syria’s only enemies. The Syrian Muslim Brothers have been dreaming of revenge ever since their attempt 30 years ago to topple Syria’s secular Ba‘thist regime by a campaign of terror was crushed by Hafiz al-Asad, Syria’s President at the time. Today, the Muslim Brothers are repeating the mistake they made then by resorting to terror with the aid of foreign Salafists, including some Al-Qaida fighters flowing into Syria from Iraq, Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan and other countries further afield. The liberal members of the Syrian opposition in exile, including several worthy academics and veteran opponents, are providing political cover for these more violent elements.

Some Arab Gulf States persist in viewing the region through a sectarian prism. They are worried by Iran’s alleged hegemonic ambitions. They are unhappy that Iraq — once a Sunni power able to hold Iran in check — is now under Shia leadership. Talk of an emerging ‘Shia Crescent’ appears to threaten Sunni dominance. For these reasons they are funding and arming the Syrian rebels in the hope that bringing down the Syrian regime will sever Iran’s ties with the Arab world. But this policy will simply prolong Syria’s agony, claim the lives of some of its finest men and cause massive material damage.

America, the dominant external power, has made many grievous policy blunders. Over the past several decades it failed to persuade its stubborn Israeli ally to make peace with the Palestinians, leading to peace with the whole Arab world. It embarked on catastrophic wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It failed to reach a ‘grand bargain’ with Iran which would have dispelled the spectre of war in the Gulf and stabilised the volatile region. And it is now quarrelling with Moscow and reviving the Cold War by sabotaging Kofi Annan’s peace plan for Syria.

There can be no military solution to the Syrian crisis. The only way out of the current nightmare is a ceasefire imposed on both sides, followed by a negotiation and the formation of a national government to oversee a transition. Only thus can Syria avoid wholesale destruction, which could take a generation or two to repair.

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Released: 24 July 2012
Word Count: 1,173
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