FORGET NORTH KOREA, THE NEXT WAR COULD WELL BE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
In 2017, the war of words between President Donald J. Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jung Un kept investors awake at night as missile tests and nuclear tests showed that North Korea had the ability to reach American soil with long range missiles equipped with nuclear warheads.
We argued several times that the episode was nothing more than China asserting its geo-political leadership over Western Asia and that the US had no choice but to pass the leadership baton on to the Empire of the Middle.
The opening of talks between the two Koreas during the current PyeongChang Olympic games confirm that China has taken the lead and that the Korean crisis will be solved in a peaceful manner through direct talks between the two Koreas.
The agreement of China to the deployment of US THAAD missile defense system in South Korea was nothing more than China giving South Korea the guarantees that its sovereignty and political system would not be harmed, in exchange for a more cooperative handling of the North Korean needed evolution.
The Korean crisis is probably a thing of the past, despite the lip service of the US towards more economic sanctions, and the most likely outcome is a gradual evolution of the North Korean regime and economy in cooperation with South Korea.
But the real issue at hand, and one that could make 2018 a significant milestone in history, is the increasing likelihood of an all-out war in the Middle East.
As our readers know, we are based in Beirut, Lebanon and have been monitoring the dynamics at play in the Middle East for several years now.
The events that have unfolded since last summer, the eradication of DAESH, the probable end to the Syrian conflict, the resignation of Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad AL HARIRI from Saudi Arabia in November 2017, the intervention of Turkey’s military in Syria and the direct military confrontation between Syrian-Iranian forces in Syria and Israel’s Air Force only last week paint a picture that reveals very strong dynamics at play, the outcome of which are alarming, to say the least.
But before delving into the analysis of the multiple dynamics at play, we must highlight the heightened state of tension reached in the past few days between Iran and Israel by reproducing extracts of articles published by REUTERS following Sunday’s Munich Security Conference where Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu threatened to act not only against Iran’s allies in the Middle East but against Iran itself.
“Israel will not allow the regime to put a noose of terror around our neck,” he said. “We will act if necessary not just against Iran’s proxies but against Iran itself.”
Netanyahu said that Iran and its allies were surging into Syria, “trying to establish this continuous empire surrounding the Middle East from the south in Yemen but also trying to create a land bridge from Iran to Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Gaza.”
Netanyahu described Iran’s aggression as “the greatest threat to our world” and warned that Israel would resist it.
One thing is for sure though, even if no one knows what were the motives behind the Iranian-Syrian forces decision to send drones flying 35 km into Israeli territory; if one of the pilots of the Israeli F-16 that was shot down by Syria’s air defense system has landed in Syria or Lebanon, the war would have already begun.
As a retaliation, Israel’s Air Force destroyed 50 % of Syria’s air defense systems according to military sources.
But Iran and Syria tout the shooting down of an Israeli F-16 as a major victory and the “crumbling” of Israel supposed military invincibility.
“What has happened in the past several days is the so-called invincibility (of Israel) has crumbled,” Iran’s Foreign Affairs minister Zarif, who addressed the conference hours after Netanyahu, said, referring to the downing of the Israeli F-16, which crashed in northern Israel after a strike on Syrian air defenses on February 10th 2018.
What transpires from the various discourses of the Iranian, Syrian, and Hezbollah parts is that the Iranian- Syrian-Hezbollah axis’ claim to have restored an efficient resistance to Zionism is starting to be demonstrated militarily.
Israel was not the only country to denounce Iran’s expansionary views at the Munich conference. Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al Jubeir, addressing the event later Sunday, said Iran needs to pay a price for its “aggressive behavior.” Without mentioning Israel, Al Jubeir accused Iran of regional expansionism and a long history of supporting terrorism. “There has to be a fundamental change in the Iranian regime for Iran to be treated as a normal country.” he said.
It would be foolish and childish to assume that these are only wars of words.
Military action has started and public opinions are being prepared for further confrontation.
But What Are the True Dynamics at Play?
Geopolitics, like physics, are about dynamics, and multi-layered dynamics are always at the heart of confrontations.
Wars are never the result of one event in particular but the consequences of particular events happening within the context of powerful dynamics leaving no choices but to resort to war.
No one wants war, but wars do happen because for both sides there is no other solution….
Dynamic # 1: The End of Radical Islam
It may sound far-fetched to link the current heightened tensions in the Middle East to Radical Islam, but the fact of the matter is that it is truly at the heart of the other dynamics currently at play.
Radical Islam is a relatively recent phenomenon in the Arab world.
In the 1940’s and the 1950’s, the Arab revolutions that dethroned the traditional royalties of Egypt, Syria and Iraq were all about secularism, socialism and pan-arabism, following the foot steps of Turkey’s Mustafa Kemal who brought down the Ottoman empire in 1920.
The Iraqi and Syrian Ba’ath regimes were secular at the outset and Gamal Abdel Nasser’s Pan-Arab Nationalist Republic was secular by definition.
Indeed, The Muslim Brotherhood movement was founded in Egypt in 1928, but Radical Islam only took off in 1979, after the second oil shock and Khomeini’s Iranian Revolution. 1979 saw the birth of the Iranian Islamic Republic, a political system ruled by clerics aiming at demonstrating that the rule of God was more efficient than the rule of Men. Even if the executive leaders are elected by the people, the concept at the heart of the system is “Wilayat Al Faqih”, i.e. the Guidance of the supreme religious leader, meaning that no strategic option can be taken without his approval. This is what distinguish Iran from Pakistan’s Islamic Republic.
The 1970s oil shocks yielded massive financial surpluses in the hands of Saudi Arabia’s Sunni regime backed by clerics and of Iran’s Shi’a Islamic Republic ruled by clerics. Both regimes spent the next decades promoting Radical Islam across the entire Muslim World, financing Islamic schools, mosques, radical teachings and radical political movements.
For over 40 years, Radical Islam grew and developed as an alternative model of society, based on religious purity and strict following of the religious teachings, appealing to the youth and the impoverished, in the Arab World as well as in the large Muslim immigrant communities of the West.
Over those 40 years, the interferences of the West in the Muslim World, such as the US support to radical groups in Afghanistan to fight the Russian Soviet presence during the cold war, the ill-conceived and ill-motivated toppling of Iraq’s Saddam Hussein and of Libya’s Moammar Ghaddafi, the subsequent laissez-faire and balancing act of US President Barack Obama and the constant expansion of the State of Israel through illegal settlements at the expense of the Palestinian populations fueled the anti-western sentiment in the Arab and Muslim populations of the world, paving the way to the spreading of Radical Islam.
Inevitably, the development of Sunni and Shiite Radical Islam in parallel led to two consequences that we all know.
It created a wedge between the Muslim world and the rest of the World at a time where the latter, following the end of the cold war and the fall of communism, really integrated politically and economically through globalization.
And the competing theological ideologies of Sunni and Shia Islam created a wedge within the Muslim World itself, as both sides’ leaderships competed with each other for the dominance of the Muslim world, or at least of their Muslim worlds, on theological grounds.
The emergence of DAESH — the Sunni ISLAMIC STATE — in Syria and Iraq in 2014, 13 years after 911, was the ultimate straw that made the Muslim World a Pariah in the eyes of the world population, from Alaska to Kamchatka.
In less than five years, DAESH did everything it takes to give Sunni Islam the image of a devilish religion, broadcasting cruel and arbitrary executions, taking women to slavery and selling them publicly, abducting children, drowning Arab pilots in cages, beheading innocent NGO workers and applying a dictatorial and arbitrary rule to the populations they controlled in the name of Islam.
Without speculating on who created Daesh and why it was created, it is nevertheless factually established that the ranks and officers of what was to become Daesh were all suddenly and unilaterally freed from Syrian and Iraqi prisons at the beginning of 2014 by Syria’s Bashar El Assad and by Iraq’s Nouri El Maliki, both allies of Iran in the region.
It is also factually established that Daesh took control of the city of Mosul in June 2014 without a fight. The Iraqi army — again under the control of Nouri Al Maliki — left the town without fighting, and left behind their armament, vehicles and in excess of US Dollar 1 Billion in cash at the local central bank. It is from the stronghold of Mosul that Daesh initially spread its wings over devastated Iraq and Syria.
It is probably not by accident that the very first armed coalition to attack Daesh’s positions included Saudi Arabia and Jordan’s air forces, the military of two Sunni nations.
All over a sudden, Syria’s Bashar El Assad was no longer the main enemy of the West, but the Sunni Radical Islam impersonated by Daesh became the devil of the world.
And Daesh’s actions left profound scars in the world at large.
With less than 500 casualties of terrorist actions in Europe over a three-year period, Daesh restored the Christian identity of Europe, a 500-million strong population that had built a culture of secularism and religious tolerance, and fueled the emergence of anti-muslim populist movements across the entire continent.
The first Presidential decrees taken by Donald J. Trump when he was sworn in on January 20, 2017 were to ban Arab and Muslim citizens from 7 Nations to enter the soil of the United States of America. It was the first time in the 200-years old history of the USA, a country of tolerance and assimilation by Law, that a US President enacted Laws discriminating people on the basis of their origin or religion.
In 2017, Arabs and Muslims had become Pariahs in the eyes of the populations of the entire world from the American continent to the Asian continent, and Islam was psychologically assimilated to terror.
Because it was based on religion and dogmatism, the wedge between the two sides of Islam, Sunni and Shia, evolved into a full-fledged religious war. The 1.8 billion Muslims of the world are 80 % Sunni and 20 % Shia and their theological differences are as deep as were the Catholic — Protestant differences that subjected Europe to the same kind of religious wars up till the 20th century in Ireland.
Iran’s Islamic Republic is Shia and its stated objectives from the outset in 1979 were to offer a model of society rejecting the values of the rest of the world, where State and Religion are separated, and to unite the Shiite populations under one banner and one leadership, the establishment of a Shia Crescent unifying Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon under “Wilayet Al Faqih” or the guidance of the supreme Iranian religious guide.
The problem is that Iran is Persian and the Arabs have been in an ethnic opposition with Persians for thousands of years, the latest episode being the devastating Iran — Iraq war of the1980s.
Iran’s ambitions to control Arab Counties through their Shia populations could certainly not go down well with the oil-rich Arab countries of the GCC which have sizable Shia populations themselves.
The experiment of Lebanon where Saudi Arabia and the GCC countries invested massively only to see their Sunni champion Prime Minister Rafic Al-Hariri assassinated and Iran-backed Hezbollah’s growing influence on the country rang alarm bells across the Arab world.
The eruption of the Syrian civil war in 2011 must be put back into the context of this religious rivalry and of the ambition of Iran to control the Levant and establish the Shia Crescent around and even the middle of the Sunni world, separating Turkey from the rest of the Sunni Arab World.
Contrary to Iraq where 63 % of the population is Shia, Syria’s population is largely Sunni, even if the ruling Assad family is from the Alawi minority, a component of Shia Islam.
Confronted with the ambitions of Iran in the region, Saudi Arabia and Qatar started financing and arming the Syrian opposition movements, and particularly the Sunni opposition movements, with the objective of toppling Bashar El Assad’s regime and establishing a Sunni-Government in Syria, with the added benefit of cutting the lines of communication and flow of armament between Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
Barak Obama’s decision not to strike Syria in September 2013 and the subsequent Russian military intervention completely changed the rapport de force. Bashar El Assad re-asserted its control over Syria, with the help of Lebanon Hezbollah’s fighters, while the West was busy fighting Daesh.
Far from having contained the wedge between the two sides of Islam, the “victory” of the Iranian-Syrian axis in Syria deepened the conflict and heightened the sense of urgency of the Arab world to contain Iran’s expansion in the region.
Faced with the above two realities, Arabs and Muslims becoming pariahs in an integrated global world and the growing threats coming from Iran everywhere from Yemen to Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, the leaders of the Oil rich Arab countries realized that they had to change and stop sponsoring Sunni Radical Islam.
They realized that their own survival was at stake and that they would not be able to contain Iran if they did not become part of the world again, and for that, the logic of spreading Sunni Radical Islam had to end.
2017 WILL PROBABLY BE REMEMBERED AS THE YEAR WHERE SUNNI RADICAL ISLAM ENDED.
In June 2017, Mohammad Bin Salman, the third son of King Salman, only 32 years of age, was appointed Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.
He immediately embarked on an extremely ambitious plan to reform the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, allowing women to drive, reducing the powers and the presence of the religious police, fighting the corruption of the elite.
It even launched a new 500 Billion Dollar economic area at the Northern tip of the Kingdom, close to Egypt, Jordan, the Gaza strip and Israel. In exactly the same way the Chinese first created a Special economic zone in Shenzhen, close to Hong Kong, when they wanted to change the Chinese society, Saudi Arabia is now creating its own Shenzhen; the 26'000 Km2 NEOM economic area, where new rules and new Saudi ways of life would develop according to the principles laid out in the Saudi Vision 2030 blue print.
These developments are extremely significant.
It is not by accident if King Salman chose his 32 years-old son to rule the country. Mohammad Bin Salman is destined to rule the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for decades and his mission is to change the Sunni Arab World.
The diplomatic crisis that erupted with Qatar in June 2017, right after his nomination, must also be seen in this context.
Saudi Arabia and its GCC fellow countries, as well as Egypt, suddenly blockaded Qatar, closed its borders, its airspace and prevented its citizen from travelling to the rest of the GCC countries to the surprise of the rest of the world.
This harsh embargo, still in force today, is geared to bring the Qataris to stop funding radical Islam and to cut the ties they have cultivated for years with Iran’s Islamic Republic, including since the outbreak of the war in Yemen.
Since he took power in 1995, Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar challenged Saudi Arabia’s supremacy over the Muslim world and the 100 Billion US Dollars of gas revenues for a population of 320'000 Qataris enabled him to fund numerous Arab radical movements including the Egyptian Muslim brotherhood, extremist factions in Syria and, according to some sources, several terrorist organizations. Qatar has also been instrumental in financing Mosques and Radical Preaching in the West.
As can be seen from the above, fundamental changes are happening in the Arab World.
The defeat of Daesh and the drastic changes happening in Saudi Arabia mark the end of the Arab Sunni radical Islam.
But Iran’s Islamic Republic is ruled by Clerics….
Contrary to Saudi Arabia where a ruling family governed for decades with the support of Clerics and are now phasing them out, Iran’s leaders will never question the principles and the philosophy of their Islamic Revolution and Islamic Republic.
Far from it, their stated objectives are to expand its rule and to export it to neighboring Shia Arab countries. And even if the Shia religious practice is usually less stringent and more tolerant than its Sunni counterpart, day-to-day life in Iran has not really improved since the 1979 revolution, as testified by the 2009 uprising and the recent street movements.
Over forty years of the Islamic Republic rule, Iran fought an 8-years wars with Iraq with millions of casualties, its economic development was feable, it came under international sanctions, and the final outcome has not been a resounding success, despite its oil riches and a highly educated entrepreneurial population.
Probably because of the above, Iran’s clerics decided to position themselves as the champions of the liberation of Palestine and the entire construction and justification to the presence of Hezbollah in Lebanon is based on the same claim.
But beyond all the above,
IRAN IS TODAY THE ONLY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD TO BE RULED BY CLERICS.
OUR 21ST CENTURY WORLD HAS ADOPTED THE RULE OF MEN AS A GLOBAL STANDARD OVER THE RULE OF GOD. Nowhere in the world today, Religion and Religious Leaders run a country apart from the City of Vatican. Even the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a parliamentary democracy.
The fundamental values of the separation of Government from Religion are prevalent everywhere and democratic principles have been adopted by almost all nations in a form or another, with only very few exceptions such as North Korea. In the past forty years, Democratic rule has been making significant headways with the gradual disappearance of Latin American and African dictators, the latest one being Mugabe in Zimbabwe.
The end of Sunni Radical Islam leaves Iran as the SOLE country on the planet to reject the rule of Men and impose the rule of God, through the rule of Clerics that think with a different set of values, reasoning and objectives than the rest of the world.
WHAT IS AT STAKE HERE IS A CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS and the integration of the Islamic Republic of Iran into the concert of nations has always been and will continue to be a problem as long as it ambitions to export its governance model to other countries
INTERESTINGLY ENOUGH, THERE ARE NO MORE WARS IN THE WORLD APART FROM THE RELIGIOUS WARS OF THE MIDDLE EAST…
Our 21st century world is about economic dominance, not military dominance. It is about globalization, G-X meetings, International Organizations, the rule of Peace and the peaceful resolution of conflicts. Armies, Soldiers, Missiles and Air forces are here to maintain peace, and supposed not to conquer territories or to destroy other countries, unless they are perceived as a threat.
Once the Shia-Sunni conflict is over and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is solved through the creation of a proper Palestinian State, there should be NO MORE WARS IN OUR 21st Century WORLD.
Iran’s positioning on the International scene is now perceived by many in the world as THE problem, and by some, such as Donald J. Trump, Mohammad Bin Salman and Benjamin Netanyahu as “THE MAIN THREAT TO OUR WORLD”.
THE WORDS PRONOUNCED BY THE LEADERS OF NATIONS WITH POWERFUL ARMIES AND DEEP POCKETS SHOULD NEVER BE OVERLOOKED…
Dynamic # 2 : The End of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
The election of Donald J. Trump at the helm of the United States of America in November 2016 and the unfolding of the drastic changes described above in Saudi Arabia have created a completely new environment in the Middle East.
FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE THE CREATION OF THE STATE OF ISRAEL IN 1948, ISRAEL, THE ARAB WORLD AND THE USA HAVE THEIR INTERESTS ALIGNED.
THERE IS A COMMON DESIRE TO PUT A FINAL END TO THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT.
The tough words on both sides at the international event in Munich yesterday come as Israel is increasingly seeking to cooperate with Sunni Arab states that share its worries about Shi‘ite Iran. For months, Netanyahu has touted what he describes as unprecedented levels of behind-the-scenes cooperation.
“The fact that we have this newfound relationship with the Arab countries — something that … I would not have imagined in my lifetime — this is not what they call a spin,” Netanyahu said, during a question and answer session after his speech. “This is real, it’s deep, it’s broad: it doesn’t necessarily cross the threshold of a formal peace, and I doubt that would happen until we get some formal progress with the Palestinians — so the two are linked,” he added.
Israel has formal peace agreements with two of its Arab neighbors, Egypt and Jordan, and it just signed a US$ 15 billion deal with Egypt to provide it with gas from the Leviathan and Temer offshore gas fields.
Other Arab nations have said a pre-condition of any peace treaty is an Israeli deal with the Palestinians.
Since his election, Donald J. Trump has made it a priority of his mandate to close a peace deal between Israel and The Palestinians and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner spent the best part of his time brokering this peace agreement between the Arab gulf nations, the Palestinian Authority and Israel.
Donald J. Trump views this peace agreement in the Middle East as the greatest achievement of his tenure as President of the United States, the one success that will make one of the greatest President in the history of the United States.
Things seem to have changed also in the Palestinian territories.
Hamas, the Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist organization that has been the de facto governing authority of the Gaza Strip since its takeover of that area in 2007 began security co-ordination with Egypt to crack down on Islamic terrorist organizations in Sinai in 2016, in return for economic aid.
In May 2017, Hamas unveiled its new charter, in an attempt to moderate its image. The charter no longer calls for Israel’s destruction, but still calls for liberation of Palestine and to ‘confront the Zionist project’. It also confirms acceptance of the 1967 borders as the basis for establishing a Palestinian state.
In October 2017, Fatah and Hamas signed yet another reconciliation agreement. The partial agreement addressed civil and administrative matters involving Gaza and the West Bank and handed official control of the Gaza strip to Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah.
Both organizations have accepted the logic of a new peace process with the state of Israel and abandoned the concept of the destruction of the State of Israel.
There is no doubt that the Saudi-Egyptian efforts to clamp down on the Muslim Brotherhood and the promises to fund extensively the creation of a viable and prosperous Palestinian state contributed to the changes in the Palestinian positions.
On Dec 6th 2017, Donald J. Trump announced the transfer of the US embassy to Israel to Jerusalem while keeping open the status of East-Jerusalem. Subsequently, Rex Tillerson the US Secretary of state in charge of foreign affairs and Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the United Nations confirmed that the move did not prevent east Jerusalem from becoming one day the capital of a Palestinian state.
Contrary to the way most commentators analyzed the move, Donald Trump’s decision was the first step in a much larger process that would open the door to negotiations on the creation of a Palestinian state.
The Americans, the Israelis and the Arabs know full well that there will never be peace in the Middle East without a viable Palestinian State and without Jerusalem as its capital.
The status of East Jerusalem is the trump card in the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiation process, the ultimate concession against concessions from the Palestinians on the occupied territories and the Israeli settlements.
Netanyahu has a difficult battle to wage against his own extreme right and the rules have been set for a framework of direct bi-lateral negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
Since the announcement, discussions have been frozen and the Palestinian authority refuses to deal with the American administration. However, contrary to expectations, the decision did not lead to a new Intifada, testifying of the fact that Palestinian extremists no longer benefit from the support and the financing of the Arab countries.
The process is probably going to take time and Donald Trump has another three years to complete it before the end of his mandate.
Between 2000 and 2017, the position of Israel has dramatically changed in its rapport de force with the Palestinians.
In 2000, Israel had to face the hostility of Iraq, Syria, Libya and the Arab world willing to finance and support the Palestinian resistance movements. Today, these three hostile regimes have disappeared and the Arab countries favor a peace plan and the creation of a viable — even if reduced — Palestinian state.
The Palestinians have really no choice but to accept the reality of the existence of the state of Israel and to finally work peacefully towards the bettering of the conditions of their People, with the financial and political support of the Arab world and Egypt.
THE ONLY REMAINING OBSTACLES TO A GLOBAL PEACE PROCESS TODAY ARE IRAN AND ITS SATELLITE IN LEBANON, HEZBOLLAH.
Iran and Hezbollah know full well that they won’t destroy the state of Israel, but their presence and armament is there to influence any negotiations in the Peace Process. This probably also explains the support of Russia who wants to be part of the process.
BUT ISRAEL IS PROBABLY NOT GOING TO ENGAGE INTO A PEACE PROCESS AND THE CREATION OF A PALESTINIAN STATE AS LONG AS ITS NORTHERN BORDER IS THREATENED BY HEZBOLLAH’S MISSILES OR BY IRAN’S BALLISTIC OR NUCLEAR CAPABILITIES.
Dynamic # 3 : Hezbollah and the Lebanese Republic
Over the past 50 years, and because of its weak and divisive model of “Sectarian Democracy”, Lebanon allowed on two occasions the development of armed militias fighting Israel from its territory and competing with its own Sovereignty.
In 1969, the Lebanese Government signed the Cairo Agreement giving the Palestinian Liberation Organization the right to arm itself and fight Israel from its land.
Lebanon was not the only country to deal with massive inflows of Palestinian refugees, Jordan and Syria did too. But being the weakest and most divided Arab nation, it was the only one to let them fight from its soil.
Inevitably, the PLO became a state in the state and occupied vast areas of south Lebanon, imposing its rule and preventing the Lebanese state and the Lebanese Army to exert their sovereignty. The end result was a devastating 18-years civil war, an Israeli invasion in 1982 that kicked the PLO out of Lebanon and left Lebanon occupied by the Syrian army for 30 years.
In 1989, under Syrian pressure, the Lebanese factions agreed to the Taef agreement and disarmed all the militias apart from Hezbollah, a Shiite Iran-backed militia claiming to continue the resistance to Israel.
Over the years, and particularly after the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic AL-HARIRI and the departure of the Syrian Army in 2005, Hezbollah extended its hold on the country, blocking the institutions, preventing elections and deploying offensive missiles on the Lebanese territory with the technical and financial help of Iran.
Hezbollah’s fighters were also instrumental in maintaining Bashar El Assad in power in Syria fighting alongside Iranian instructors.
Today, the Israeli military and several independent military experts estimate the number of offensive missiles deployed by Hezbollah in Lebanon to 100'000 and Hezbollah stands a great chance to win the majority in the upcoming Lebanese parliamentary elections in May 2018, something that would make it the legitimate ruler of Lebanon, by Law.
It nevertheless refuses to integrate its armament and its militia into the Lebanese institutions and continues to claim its obedience to Iran’s supreme Guide Ali Khamenei and his stated objective to destroy Israel.
Contrary to the 2006 war that caught the Israeli military unprepared, as it did Hezbollah itself, the Israeli Army is today fully prepared to the eventuality of an all-out war with Hezbollah.
Israel’s position until now was that it would not intervene if they it was not provoked and it has limited its military interventions to preventing more armaments and more military capabilities to reach Hezbollah, but the recent escalation in Syria testify of a state of nervousness that does not bode well.
THE KEY QUESTION, HOWEVER, IS WHETHER ISRAEL WILL REALLY TOLERATE A HOSTILE AND HEAVILY ARMED STATE OBEDIENT TO IRAN AT ITS NORTHER BORDER FOR LONG?
Several members of the Israeli Government including Netanyahu himself warned that the next war would not be a war against Hezbollah but a war against Lebanon itself as in their eyes there is no more differentiation between Hezbollah and the Lebanese government.
But there is more….
The resignation of Lebanon’s PM Saad Hariri from Saudi Arabia on November 4th, 2017 must be put in this very peculiar context of a pseudo democracy relinquishing its military sovereignty to another state, Iran, via an armed militia aiming at taking control of the country.
At the time, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia declared to the New York Times that “Lebanon’s prime minister would not continue to give political cover for a government that is controlled by Iranian proxy Hezbollah”
Saudi Arabia and the GCC nations invested heavily in Lebanon and its Sunni-led Government since the Taef agreement. It has been the main source of funds for the Lebanese army and the reconstruction of Lebanon after the Civil War. GCC individuals have invested massively in Lebanese real estate as they enjoy visiting the country.
Finally, Lebanon is part of the Arab League and Saudi Arabia considers that it is an Arab nation that is naturally within its sphere of influence.
NO ONE SHOULD MAKE THE MISTAKE TO ASSUME THAT SAUDI ARABIA WILL HAPPILY ACCEPT THAT LEBANON BECOMES A SHIA DOMINATED COUNTRY UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF IRAN.
And unfortunately, history is there to prove that Saudi Arabia and Mohammad Bin Salman do not hesitate to use military force.
On March 21st, 2015, the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels took control of Yemen’s capital Sana’a, forcing the Saudi –backed regime to flee. On March 24th, Mohammad Bin Slaman put together a coalition of Arab states and launched massive air attacks on the country, bombing civilian areas as well as military targets. The war is still going on and the country is experiencing famine and devastation.
In 2011, Saudi Arabia and Qatar armed the Syrian opposition forces to topple the Syrian regime. The end-result is a devastated country, 300’000 casualties and more than 5 million Syrian refugees around the world.
TENSIONS ARE BUILDING IN LEBANON AHEAD OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS OF MAY 2018.
THE KEY QUESTION IS WHETHER ISRAEL OR SAUDI ARABIA CAN REALLY LIVE WITH A LEBANON UNDER HEZBOLLAH-IRANIAN RULE.
Conclusion
Political Dynamics like Physics Dynamics have a life of their own and every war in history was the result of multi-layered dynamics and unforeseen catalysts.
NO ONE WANTS WAR, BUT WARS DO HAPPEN.
The dynamics currently at play in the Middle East and the stakes are such that it is very difficult to find a peaceful exit to the heightening of tensions.
Iran and Hezbollah are closing in on the success of a strategy that has been patiently built over decades. They won in Syria with the help of Russia and are about to succeed in Lebanon. Far from toning down their discourse and appeasing tensions, they are pushing forward with their strategy, escalating the anxiety of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
The difference between Lebanon and Yemen is that Lebanon is on the Northern border of Israel.
The difference between Lebanon and Syria is that Israel had all to benefit from the destruction of Syria.
Will Lebanon follow the same path? We really hope not !
Unfortunately, the probability of a major conflict in the Middle East in the coming months is the highest we have seen for many years.
It does not mean it will happen and hopefully the international community will find ways to contain the escalation and maintain Peace.
One thing is for sure though; if it happens, it will not be limited to Lebanon and Syria but will probably reach Iran directly. Benjamin Netanyahu could not make it clearer…
The only, but excruciating, ray of hope is that if it happens, it will probably be the last conflict of the Middle East…
Originally published at Mechelany Advisors.
