The Dome of the Rock mosque at the al-Aqsa mosque

Politics

Le nouveau point d'équilibre du Moyen-Orient

Dec 23, 2017 Joschka Fischer

BERLIN – Nous vivons une époque de transition géopolitique. La tentative de la Chine visant à remplacer les États-Unis comme première puissance mondiale, ou au moins à devenir un partenaire dans le leadership mondial, suscite à juste titre une forte attention. Mais la dynamique au niveau macro qui définit l'évolution à long terme du Moyen-Orient évolue également : sur ce plan aussi, influence américaine risque bien de diminuer.

Il y a un peu plus d'un siècle, l'accord Sykes-Picot divisait le Moyen-Orient entre la France et la Grande-Bretagne et établissait des frontières nationales qui sont restées en place jusqu'à nos jours. Mais à présent, l'ordre régional est en train de changer.

Depuis la fondation d'Israël, le conflit israélo-arabe domine largement la géopolitique de la région. Israël a remporté la première guerre israélo-arabe en 1948 et toutes les guerres qui ont suivi. Mais la question de savoir si les Israéliens et les Palestiniens peuvent parvenir à un règlement acceptable et apporter ainsi la paix au Moyen-Orient reste une préoccupation cruciale pour les affaires internationales.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 10 Comments on this article

Patty ☃ Dec 28, 2017

Israel's positioning should work out fine as long as it can keep all these allies from ever becoming democracies (or the monarchs even slightly populist).
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j. von Hettlingen Dec 26, 2017

Joschka Fischer says the seven-decade-old Israel-Palestinian conflict has been on the front and back burner - depending on geopolitics in the Middle East - and at the mercy of regional players. The only real hope for a peace settlement was between 1993 when the first Oslo Accord was signed and Yitzhak Rabin's assassination in November 1995. The then Israeli prime minister was murdered by a Jewish extremist, who wanted to stop the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. Today his family does not regret the assassination, saying “it needed to be done,”
The author says that "in both the 1993 and 1995 Oslo Accords, the status of Jerusalem was left unresolved. It was widely agreed that such a sensitive and complicated issue would have to be addressed at the end of the peace process." The accords established the Palestinian Authority to run parts of Gaza and the West Bank (but not East Jerusalem). And the Palestinians recognised "the existence of Israel in 1993, that decision alone was seen as a big step forward."
In 1947 under the aegis of the UN Palestine was partitioned into separate Jewish and Arab states after Britain signaled an end to its mandate there and called for an international control over Jerusalem and its surroundings. Israel declared independence in May 1948 and fought the first war, with Arab armies failing to defeat the new Jewish state after Britain's withdrawal. Jordan occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, Egypt occupied Gaza, and Israel held the rest of Palestine including West Jerusalem. Since then the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been dominating politics in the region, and Israel has won all the wars against its adversaries.
During the Six Day war in June 1967, Israel occupied East Jerusalem, all of West Bank, Gaza, Golan Heights and Sinai. The following years saw an expansion of illegal Jewish settlements in occupied areas with government approval. The continuation of settlement building and military checkpoints had been met with Palestinian attacks. Hostility had slowed the progress towards a final agreement, leading many on both sides to dispute the worth of the Accords.
The author says the 2003 US invasion in Iraq and the Arab Spring in 2011 had distracted the world from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The war in Syria and the rise of the Islamic State in 2014 led to a proxy war fought between Iran and Saudi Arabia. With the defeat of ISIS, the two regional powers are now embroiled in a power struggle for regional hegemony, taking a toll on domestic politics in Lebanon and Qatar.
Since Trump appointed his son-in-law, Jared Kushner as Middle East envoy, tensions have risen between the Riyadh and Tehran. Adding fuel to the fire Trump openly demonised Iran and enraged the Muslim world with its recent recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Even if Saudi Arabia is eager to weaken Iran with Israel's help, it is not willing to alienate Muslims around the world. Since Jerusalem’s "status is a fraught political and religious issue," most countries choose not to take side, as it could "damage the prospects for an eventual two-state solution."
If the two-state solution is off the table, Palestinians would certainly demand equal rights within Israel's "binational arrangement," which many fear could usher in an end to both a Jewish and democratic state. The author proposes a "third option" - a Palestinian state "could be created in Gaza, extended into the Northern Sinai, and put under Egypt’s de facto control, while the West Bank could be divided between Israel and Jordan. But the Palestinians would never accept this outcome, and it would not solve the problem of Israel becoming a binational state."
It is unclear whether Saudi Arabia would rather focus on Iran as its "top priority. And because Saudi Arabia is too weak to win that fight on its own....it will continue to strengthen its ties with Iran’s other rivals, especially with the region’s military superpower: Israel." There is no appetite in Israel to launch a war against Iran, which would only further destabilise the region. Besides it fears attacks from the Iran-backed Hezbollah, and perhaps Hamas.
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Jonathan Engel Dec 25, 2017

Clearly Mr. Fischer is right in the sense that Iran is an issue which for Israel and Saudi Arabia is essentially similarly existential. An existential issue shared is what allies are made from, even if allies are not friends. The USSR and the Allies in WW2 had shared existential issues, which they addressed with success.

Both Israel and Saudi Arabia have tried to get the US to solve this issue under Bush AND Obama. The Saudi king used the famous expression "Cut off the head of the snake", Israel was probably more circumspect, at least in the terms employed.

With the US stepping back from the Middle East, having left Iran under a very much looser sanctions regiment, it would seem quite likely that the issue will have to be resolved by "the Hood" (the neighbourhood). This is likely to be considerably costlier in human terms, but existential issues are viewed in a particular manner… Such a clash of arms will certainly change all the local equations.
- Jonathan Engel Dec 25, 2017
  
  The subsequent "Yalta" will determine what will and will not happen with the Sykes Picot frontiers, and, in a minor key, what solution is implemented for the Palestinians...
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Mahedi Akash Dec 24, 2017

Saudi never gonna have its dream come true.
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Cary Fraser Dec 24, 2017

Will Saudi Arabia be able to maintain its claim to being the custodian of the Holy Sites of Islam - if it abrogates the rights of Palestinians to East Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state?
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Gennady Shkliarevsky Dec 24, 2017

Israel is way too smart to have any substantive alliance with Saudi Arabia. Israel's only true ally is the United States, and vice versa since the United States recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Have Saudis granted such recognition? I doubt it.
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Marc Laventurier Dec 24, 2017

Israel will take any advantage, anytime, anywhere, and say or do anything it thinks it can get away with. But what influence do the Saudis hope to gain, without a bulging petrodollar wallet? Posturing towards Qatar looks ridiculous to the West, but rapprochement with Russia appears to involve military technology transfer. What fun, mob control through the national security state. How do you say MIRV in Farsi?
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Mirek Fatyga Dec 24, 2017

https://www.vox.com/2017/12/12/16761540/trump-israel-jerusalem-embassy-evangelical-christians

lets help Mr Fischer in the understanding of motives department.
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