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It is useful to note yesterday from the League of Arab States that the Arab world is under attack from three neighbors: Turkey, Iran and Ethiopia. Undoubtedly, there is a lot of truth in this speech, although for reasons I do not know, it overlooked a neighboring quarter, Israel, which recently achieved the annexation of East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights … and now it is in the process of annexing more to the West Bank.
What we have. The reason may be that Israeli aggression is chronic and, therefore, no longer need to be remembered, like the persistence of official Arab statements that have been repeated over the decades.
Indeed, after we were suffering from a fear of aggression and expansion … Here we are, now we are suffering wholesale from “aggression” and “expansion” and what is to come …
Let’s forget, even for a while – like our Arab League – the historical roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and turn to Iranian and Turkish expansion, before our concerns take us south, towards the new wound of the African Indigo .
Indeed, someone with a good memory or a reasonable political culture cannot afford to lose some components of states’ political approaches, in particular: economic interests. The second is internal policies that move outward, guided by economic, religious or sectarian “justifications”, or “legacies” (with all its correct and mythical narratives). And the third is the regional and international circumstances, including the filling of the gaps and the exploitation of the disparity in the balance of power … etc.
In the case of Iran and Turkey, all the above elements meet without exception.
This is because economic interests are a vital component of Iran’s geopolitical project, both in terms of extending control over Iraq and the Gulf region with their enormous oil wealth, and over control of international waterways (Hormuz and Bab al -Mandab), and on access to the Mediterranean through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. The same is true of the religious / sectarian and “hereditary” justifications and narratives (considering Baghdad / Al-Mada’in as a historical capital), and the regional and international conditions … as the Iranian leadership feels that thanks to its unity politics and sectarian fanaticism, he is able to fill the Arab voids as he wishes.
Indeed, Iran’s implementation of its project – at least for its history – is proceeding at full speed amid unjustified Arab confusion even though Tehran’s Khomeinist intentions have been clear since 1979. Indeed, until at the moment, there are some who are still debating whether it is in the interest of the Arabs – all or some of them: the existence of the mullahs’ regime, or the return to Iran’s government of the secular and nationalist liberal current. Ideas are still confused about which Arab Iran in the Gulf and non-Gulf countries can coexist with and with its ambitions, and under what conditions.
Also in the case of Turkey, and of its project, whose dimensions are unfolding more and more, all the components mentioned above are present. The economic dimension was reflected at first with the construction of a large number of dams on the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, then appeared in the oil and gas accounts in the eastern Mediterranean, and its scope was further expanded with the military presence. Turkish … and the political and economic agreements that follow in Libya.
Similarly, we have parallel justifications and narratives, starting with the legacy of the “Ottoman Caliphate” which covered more than two-thirds of the Arab world, and ending with the pretense of defending Sunni political Islam in the face of the Iranian political assault of the Arab world. Shiism. Here, it must be said that the Syrian “scenario”, especially the agreements between Ankara, Tehran and Moscow, confirmed that what unites the Iranian and Turkish projects – at least temporarily – is more than what divides them … as well as the role of “Iran the Shah” and “Turkey Bayar and Menderes” The days of the “Baghdad Pact”. Of course, one of the most important factors encouraging both sides to put aside their historical differences and coordinate “understanding” is the presence of two common victims – the Arabs and the Kurds – whom the “neighbors” find easy to share, taking advantage of divisions that destroy their immunity.
Furthermore, just as there is no vision of a single strategic interest when evaluating the Arab relationship with Khomeinist Iran, history repeats itself with Erdogan’s Turkey. There is no single Arabic reading of the future of good neighborly and mutual respect relations with Turkey that we wish or hope for. There may be agreement on the extent of the risk, but there is no serious and practical reflection on what can be done to counter this risk.
And we arrive in Ethiopia.
I claim that from ancient history, when the Abyssinian army reached the Hijaz, and the Persians and Ethiopians fought in Yemen, the influence of Ethiopia in the heart of the Arab world has become weaker than that of Turkey first and Iran second.
However, I also remember that Ethiopia has been a reliable friend of Israel since 1948, and Emperor Haile Selassie, “The Lion of Judah”, considered himself a descendant of the common Ethiopian Jewish heritage. However, Arab politicians during that time dealt realistically and wisely with Haile Selassie during his rule (1930-1974), and no positions emerged from Addis Ababa that could be described as “dangerous” to regional security for the Arabs.
Similarly, although the left-wing army took power in Addis Ababa, and the Arab powers sided with the Eritrean revolution against the central Ethiopian government, and thus the development of Ethiopian-Israeli (and also Eritrean-Israeli) relations , there was no hostility – in the correct sense of the word – between Arabs and Ethiopia.
The issue was recently at odds with the “Renaissance Dam” project, which Addis Ababa is carrying out based on its own electricity and water needs. And here we are now faced with a situation mainly caused by the crisis of Arab weakness … which today allows Ethiopia to take what it deems right in an “international river”, just as it has allowed Turkey to weaken Syria and Iraq as much as it concerns the Euphrates and Tigris dams.
The absence of a collective Arab awareness of common challenges, whether in Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen – or any other disputed place in the Arab world – foreshadows more intractable crises.
The delay in formulating a single strategy in the face of these challenges will not only increase their number, but will also increase the ambitions of “neighbors” who are impossible to blame for filling the existing gaps … These gaps provide them with a way to escape from their internal crises, from the failures of their economic adventures and from the dilemmas of the legitimacy of their political systems.
Frankly, the time has come to stop others from correcting their mistakes at our expense … and throwing the consequences on us.
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