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Day: April 29, 2024
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NPR News: 04-29-2024 12AM EDT
NPR News: 04-29-2024 12AM EDT
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After six months of war in Gaza, whipped into a frenzy by the media, Israeli public opinion is torn by fear. It wonders about the day after in a country where the messianic far right is pushing for ethnic cleansing. The left, for its part, is struggling to find its bearings. Israel’s Palestinians, however, are subject to severe restrictions on their public freedoms.
Ontological essence
On October 7, the most obscure and painful past of Jewish memory was brought into the present. What to make of this new reality? What to do when the ideological foundation on which Israel was built is in ruins? Could it be that the present experience, stripping Israel of its most absolute ontological essence, renders obsolete the very need and justification for this state? Faced with the threat and confronted with these questions, Israel and the Jews today find themselves at an abyss.
Faced with this abyss, and with the ethical impasse of Israel’s military response, which kills fighters and innocent civilians alike, it is to certain teachings of rabbinic tradition that one can turn for comfort and hope in these dark times. For the rabbinic tradition, refusing to allow itself to be trapped by the full meaning of biblical verses, always attentive to new resonances, is above all capable of opening up unsuspected horizons, which one should ingenuously allow to emerge from the text. In so doing, does not the creativity of the masters of the tradition invite, in turn, to tirelessly bring forth from the reality of history unexplored paths which, when all hope seems lost, would come to challenge the darkness of the world and of souls?
One of the great thinkers of contemporary Judaism, Eliezer Berkovits, ventured to define Halakhah – the Jewish law that determines the essence of Judaism – in these terms: “Halakhah is none other than the bridge over which the Torah enters the reality of history“. The strength of this definition lies in its inherent dynamic and plasticity. A dynamic that refuses to imagine the existence of a conflict between two fixed realities, the Torah and the world, since Judaism is precisely the place where the tradition of a people and the complexity of reality meet, always to be constructed and shaped. At a time when the cornerstone of never again has so abruptly disappeared, would it not be desirable to replace it with the idea that Israel is, in its deepest essence, the place where Judaism meets history? The ontological framework of Israel’s adaptation to the reality of history.
To think of Israel in halakhic terms is not to turn it into a theocracy. It means understanding Israel’s foundation, its cornerstone, as the dynamic of a Jewish project that is nothing other than the perpetual adaptation of a people’s tradition to the reality of history. The complexity of history, and first and foremost that of the inescapable reality of the Palestinians and their legitimate aspirations, could then no longer be thought of as the stumbling block on which Israel’s project would tirelessly stumble, but rather as the cornerstone for the realization of its fundamental project: that of Israel’s adaptation to the ever-changing and uncertain realities of the world, but where each adaptation and/or compromise would strengthen the founding essence of the State. Only then, as Isaiah prophesied, “whoever leans on it will not be reduced to fleeing“.
On October 7, the most obscure and painful past of Jewish memory invited itself into the present. What are we to make of this new reality? What to do when the ideological foundation on which Israel was built is in ruins? Could it be that the present experience, stripping Israel of its most absolute ontological essence, renders obsolete the very need and justification for this state? Faced with the threat and confronted with these questions, Israel and the Jews today find themselves at an abyss.
Is the State of Israel today a model of morality, “a light for the nations”? No. Is it an immoral state that oppresses another people with perverse glee and loses its soul in religious, racist ethnocentrism? No, neither is it. Israel is no longer the state of pioneers, of the kibbutz and of socialism with a human face. But the humanist, universalist and ethical dream of the Prophets and the founders of Zionism has not all disappeared.
Principle of proportionality
In Israel’s defensive response to the October 7 attacks on an unprecedented scale by Hamas armed groups, the supposed disproportionality of the response is the accusation most often levelled at the Jewish state. The principle of proportionality prohibits attacks which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.
International humanitarian law seeks to limit the worst effects of armed conflict, in order to protect civilians. Although tragic, the loss of human life remains a reality of armed conflict. But they must be limited to what is strictly necessary – for example, the undesired and, yes, tragic but inevitable loss of civilian life when a highly strategic military target is targeted.
Thus, proportionality does not require that the damage caused to legitimate military targets be the same on both sides. It simply requires that the damage caused to civilians should not be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage expected from an action. Israel’s military objective of eliminating Hamas is a war objective. Any action taken to this end must be measured in terms of casualties and impact.
This reality does not immunize Israel from doing everything in its power to minimize losses; it must continue to do everything in its power to minimize civilian casualties [Gaza’s Ministry of Health – controlled by Hamas – counted over 34,300 casualities].
To deal with any potential threat, Israel has only one doctrine: “strike the enemy as quickly and as hard as possible” to dissuade him from trying again. This is precisely what is seeing at work today in Gaza, in the face of a context that has evolved considerably. A dispassionate analysis of a conflict whose radicalism and inhumanity has reached its climax.
The IDF’s great malaise
Taken by surprise at the start of the war in Gaza, the Israeli army’s general staff is now faced with problems of discipline and growing mistrust of the political leadership. Supposed to be the government’s “great mute”, the Israeli army is showing serious signs of indiscipline at the highest level. Such is the malaise within the IDF that the Chief of Staff, General Herzi Halevi, had to call his troops to order in a solemn declaration. He also defended his prerogatives following personal attacks by Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister. The leader of a far-right party denied him the right to make a series of senior officer appointments, holding him responsible for the “colossal failure” of October 7, when the military was caught off guard by a surprise Hamas attack in southern Israel.
In the space of a week, Herzi Halevi had to issue yellow cards against two generals presented by the media as heroes with a proven track record in the field. The first, Barak Hiram, was reprimanded for taking the initiative, without consulting his superiors, to destroy the Palestinian university in Gaza using explosives. The second, Dan Goldfus, went on the offensive against political leaders, calling on them “to live up to the sacrifices made by the fighters” in a public speech whose content had been approved by the general staff, but to which he added a few last-minute quips impugning the government. He too received a reprimand. “Discipline must be maintained, including by officers who have shown heroism during the war“, proclaimed the Chief of Staff. He added: “We cannot fight when our principles and discipline are neither clear nor followed.” Whether this urgent appeal will be heeded remains to be seen.
The only certainty is that public opinion and editorial writers are divided. On the one hand, those who support the two generals, claiming that they are merely expressing the distrust of the political world that many Israelis also feel. On the other, those who criticize the insubordination of soldiers who are supposed to obey government orders without a second thought. The sense of unease deepened following Bezalel Smotrich’s charge. According to this minister, soldiers have “lost confidence in the General Staff, which can no longer be entrusted with the task of appointing the officers who will make up the next generation of the IDF“. In short, Herzi Halevi should content himself with managing the current war, “because we have no choice“, pending his resignation or dismissal.
The Chief of Staff, supported by some of the more moderate ministers, the media and the opposition, has published a list of promotions for 32 colonels and a brigadier general, stressing that these appointments were within his remit. But the man knows he is on borrowed time. An internal army commission of inquiry is due to make public in June 2024 its preliminary conclusions on the responsibility for the October 7 disaster, in particular the failure of military intelligence to take into account information on Hamas’s preparations for imminent attacks.
Failure of the intelligence community
The list of blunders committed by the various Israeli intelligence services continues to grow. The Shin Beth, in charge of counter-terrorism, had precise information on the planned Hamas infiltration two months before it took place and, aggravatingly, the exact date of the operation. This warning was ignored. The result: some 3,000 Hamas fighters forced their way across the border, killing 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and taking 240 hostages in southern Israel on October 7.
According to these new revelations from Channel 12, the most popular private TV channel, the Shin Beth had recruited a Palestinian agent in the Gaza Strip. The agent warned that the armed wing of Hamas was putting the finishing touches to a major attack on Israeli territory a week after Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, which indeed happened.
But Shin Beth officials deemed the information insufficiently credible. The informant was too new: his reliability had not yet been sufficiently established, and his information was not first-hand. His handlers felt that his warning could only be taken seriously if confirmed by other electronic sources in particular, so the case was shelved and did not make its way up the hierarchical ladder to the highest level with Shin Beth boss Ronen Bar. In a press release, the Shin Beth did nothing to back down. It merely stated that all its attention was currently “focused on the fighting” in the Gaza Strip against Hamas and on security issues in the West Bank. “A thorough investigation will then take place, during which we will examine all the information that was available,” assured the Shin Beth.
On the Israeli side, there were flaws on two levels. On the one hand, an intelligence gap. Until now, Shabak was very well informed about the situation in the Gaza Strip. Obviously, lately, he no longer had any sources within Hamas. His blindness is no less astonishing. For example, journalists had indicated, in recent months, that many Hamas militants went out regularly to train on motorcycles, and even that they learned to pilot microlights; and yet, the Israeli services saw nothing coming. This is a major flaw that they will have to answer for one day.
But this rift did not occur in a vacuum. Very often, intelligence flaws are due to flaws in the country’s political-military design. Take the Yom Kippur War, fifty years ago. Israeli services had ample intelligence indicating that Egypt was about to attack. But the political leaders did not want to believe it because they were caught in a completely erroneous strategic conception, according to which Egypt was far too weak to dare to go on the attack. In the same way, for several years, the political-strategic conception of power has somehow trickled down to the world of intelligence: this conception, defended for years by Benyamin Netanyahu, affirmed that Hamas did not present a major danger to Israel… and that it was necessary to preserve its presence in the Gaza Strip in order to convince Israeli society and the international community that there was no partner for peace since Palestinian society was fractured between, on the one hand , Hamas and, on the other hand, Fatah.
Matanyahu Engelman, the State Controller, Israel’s equivalent of the Court of Auditors, is also determined to get to the bottom of this fiasco. “All aspects of the failures, including personal responsibilities, will be the focus of our activities next year“, he assures. Among the subjects of investigation are, of course, the errors of the Shin Beth, but also of Aman, the military intelligence service prior to October 7, as well as the management of the war by the political leaders. The controller will have his work cut out for him. He has already been caught off guard. Even before he has begun any investigation, the media have drawn up an impressive list of errors.
Here are a few examples. Public television revealed that army intelligence had got their hands on a Hamas manual detailing a planned attack to break through the electronic security fence surrounding the Gaza Strip, attack nearby army posts and invade Israeli settlements to kill and take hostages. Hamas implemented all these plans to the letter, as if the scenario had been written in advance. Simple female soldiers monitoring the fence on their screens had also reported suspicious movements by Hamas members. But their superiors felt that they tended to let their “imaginations run wild“.
An officer from Unit 8.200, which specializes in signals intelligence, had also spotted unusual training exercises by members of Hamas’s military wing near the border, three months before October 7. Her superiors preferred not to listen to her, advising her to “calm down” or face sanctions. In short, all these warnings were ignored by an army trapped in the belief that Hamas, lacking the necessary forces to carry out a large-scale offensive, would not risk challenge the Israeli army.
Unease: The Iranian peril
Sponsor of the “axis of resistance” which constitutes, in the eyes of Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran, the Iranian regime is the sworn enemy of Benjamin Netanyahu, who has made it a central subject for years of his diplomacy, marked in particular by his fierce opposition to the international agreement on the Iranian nuclear program. Geographically separated by Iraq, Syria and Jordan, and a thousand kilometers apart, the Jewish state and Iran hate each other… but are careful not to attack each other head-on. To attack Israel (as well as the Americans), Tehran prefers to go through its “proxies”: Lebanese Hezbollah, the Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria, or the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Likewise, Tel Aviv (like Washington) prefers to strike Iranian interests and officials outside its borders.
Israel believes that Iran poses an existential threat, as evidenced by Tehran’s rhetoric, the buildup of proxy forces that have sworn Israel’s destruction, and the funding and arming of Palestinian groups, including Hamas, the militant group Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah, and what it considers to be Iran’s secret quest for nuclear weapons, although the latter denies seeking to build an atomic bomb.
The spectacular and deadly attack on the consular annex of the Iranian embassy in Damascus on April 1, attributed to Israel which did not claim responsibility, suddenly increased tensions. 16 people were killed, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, including seven members of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, the ideological army of the Islamic Republic. Killed in these strikes in the heart of the Syrian capital, General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, commander of the Iranian Al-Quds force for Syria and Lebanon, and the only foreign member of the highest authority of Hezbollah, was probably the main target.
The day after the attack in Damascus, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, promised to retaliate. “The evil Zionist regime will be punished by our brave men. We will make him regret this crime and the others,” he said. Threats repeated since several times by the supreme guide, by the Iranian chief of staff, by the Revolutionary Guards, as well as by the leader of Lebanese Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, who judged a response “inevitable “. “If Iran carries out an attack from its territory, Israel will respond and attack Iran,” warned – in Persian – Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz. “We are in the middle of a war in Gaza, which continues at full speed […] but we are also preparing to face challenges in other theaters” of operations, Benyamin Netanyahu insisted recently.
The day before, fears of a regional escalation had become more pressing after the publication, by the Bloomberg news site, of an article evoking an imminent “massive attack” against Israel by Iran or its allies. Other American media relayed, all relying on sources “close” to American intelligence. Iran “threatens to launch a major attack against Israel,” Joe Biden declared Wednesday evening, assuring Israel, much criticized by the White House for the conduct of its war in Gaza, of its unfailing support. “As I told Prime Minister Netanyahu, our commitment to the security of Israel, in the face of these threats from Iran and its allies, is unwavering,” insisted the Democratic president.
Launched on the night of April 13 to 14, in retaliation for Israel’s attack on the Iranian consulate in Syria, carried out on April 1, and the death of one of its generals, the Iranian attack was larger than expected, with more than three hundred drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles fired towards Israel and intended to cause significant damage. Most of the projectiles, however, appear to have targeted air bases in the Negev desert, far from population centers, and the majority of them were intercepted in flight by the Jewish state and Western forces.
Indeed, the majority were intercepted over Iraq by American, British and French air forces, which orbited with fighter jets. The Israeli anti-missile shield, the Iron Dome, took care of the ballistic missiles which were launched at altitude to fall towards Israel in an almost vertical manner. Iran is 1000 km from Israel. So, the strikes that are launched from Iran are immediately detected by the entire American system in the Middle East, which has made it possible to destroy a good number of vehicles before they even reach Israeli airspace.
The malaise of genocide
“We have been waiting for this for a long time,” says Ammar Dweik, taking out a file from his leather bag. This Palestinian lawyer, who heads the independent human rights commission based in Ramallah, has just received the complaint for genocide filed by South Africa against Israel before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). A relentless indictment of 84 pages, illustrated by maps and statistical tables. It concludes that there were “genocidal acts and omissions” leading to the “destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnic group“.
“Israel has already killed or injured 4% of the population of Gaza,” says Ammar Dweik. “It’s enormous, but the crime of genocide is not only qualified by the number of victims. It also implies intention. However, Israel demonstrates this intention to bring about genocide in three ways: by massively bombing Gaza without sparing civilians, by creating the conditions for famine and by promoting the spread of disease.“
Examined Thursday, January 11, 2024 by the ICJ in The Hague, the complaint finds no mitigating circumstances in Israel. Neither the attack of October 7, nor the network of offensive tunnels built under Gazans’ homes, nor the thousands of rocket attacks towards Israeli localities. Suffice to say that the South African charge provokes the almost unanimous fury of Israelis, including among the fiercest critics of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Clearly left-wing, Deputy State Attorney Dina Zilber usually does not spare the current Israeli government and its “miserable” attempts to weaken the Supreme Court. But the accusation of genocide launched by South Africa seems scandalous to her:
“Israel is simply exercising its right to defend itself, assures the magistrate. We have been victims of a massacre of incredible cruelty and we are waging a war against a terrorist movement which is hiding among its civilian population. The fact that there. The fact that there are many deaths does not in any way amount to the crime of genocide.“
According to the IDF, Israel intends to demonstrate to The Hague its respect for international conventions and its constant concern to protect populations used as human shields by Hamas militiamen. The Jewish state wishes to counterattack and return the accusations of genocide against Hamas. On Wednesday, the day before the trial opened in The Hague, a website went online. Under the title “October 7, we haven’t seen anything yet”, it presents photos and documents considered damning Hamas. Mass killings, beheadings, desecration of corpses, systematic rapes accompanied by torture… Israel will use the ICJ to call world opinion to witness the cruelty of its enemy.
American universities join the fray and denounce Israel
The war between Israel and Hamas is creating very strong tensions on American campuses. The anger of pro-Palestinian students grew on Wednesday in the United States, with tense face-to-face confrontations with police in Texas, New York, New England and California.
Visiting Columbia University in Manhattan – where this latest wave of student protests began in October – the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, threatened: “if the situation is not brought under control quickly and if the threats and intimidation do not stop, it will then be time to call in the National Guard.”
Mike Johnson, close to Donald Trump, warned that he would demand President Joe Biden to “act” and judged that the pro-Palestinian demonstrations “put a target on the backs of Jewish students in the United States”, who matter the most of Jews in the world (some six million) after Israel.
Since the start of the conflict in Gaza in October, American universities have been shaken by sometimes violent debates on freedom of expression and accusations of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism which cost the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania their jobs this winter. “Enjoy your freedom of expression,” said Mike Johnson provocatively, booed by hundreds of Columbia students.
On Wednesday, the White House reaffirmed that Joe Biden, who hopes to be re-elected in November, “supports free speech, debate and non-discrimination” at universities.
Since the renewed tensions last week at Columbia, the movement has spread to other campuses. Particularly in the New England states, where prestigious universities have asked the police to arrest student demonstrators who denounce the United States’ alliance with Israel and criticize the current conditions of the Palestinians.
The presidency of Columbia University, for its part, welcomed “significant progress” in discussions with students to evacuate this encampment by Friday April 27, 2024.
During the night from Monday to Tuesday, 120 people were briefly arrested in front of New York University (NYU), in the heart of Manhattan. In Yale, Connecticut, around fifty demonstrators were also arrested. Harvard also saw a camp set up on its campus on Wednesday April 25, 2024. On the other side of the country, the University of Texas at Austin was the scene of a confrontation, ultimately good-natured, between hundreds of pro-Palestinian students and the police. And at the University of Southern California, several hundred students demonstrated shouting “liberate Palestine”, “revolution through intifada”.
What to do?
In the face of all the difficulties facing Israel in the current war and mentioned here above, the Jewish state must opt out for realism in its state philosophy to survive:
1-Disengage from Gaza and negotiate the return of the hostages at once;
Six months have passed since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and more than 200 taken hostage.
In response to this attack, Israel promised to “crush and destroy Hamas“ so that it no longer posed a threat, launching a large-scale military operation in Gaza that left more than 34,300 dead, according to the Ministry of Health of Hamas.
Israel claims to have killed thousands of Hamas fighters and destroyed much of the vast network of tunnels that Palestinian militants had built under Gaza and used to carry out their attacks.
But has Israel really achieved its goal of destroying the militant group? And what do Palestinians now think of their leaders and the Hamas leaders in Gaza after one of the bloodiest wars the region has ever known?
The “powerful revenge” promised against Hamas by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not only had a horrible impact on Gaza: 110,000 people killed and injured; infrastructure destroyed, hunger and disease spread and 2 million people displaced. The level of destruction incurred on the Gaza Strip surpasses that on Germany during WW II according to military experts. Many people today, around the world, equate Israel with killing innocents and destroying their environment.
In the other Palestinian territory, the West Bank, Israel has carried out numerous deadly raids against armed groups during which innocent civilians have been killed. Israel has also arrested thousands of people who remain detained without trial. Palestinian farmers have been driven from their land following a violent, sometimes deadly, intimidation campaign by extremist Jewish settlers. Opinion polls, nevertheless, show strong approval among Palestinians for the attacks carried out by Hamas on October 7.
2-Accept the creation of the Palestinian state with international guarantees for both sides
The only alternative to the destructive spiral into which the Middle East is sinking before our eyes, with incalculable international repercussions, lies in the establishment of a Palestinian state which would be Israel’s best guarantee of security. Such a prospect is naturally virulently refused by the warmongers of both camps who prefer to maintain the deadly illusion of the possibility of a defeat of the declared enemy.
This illusion is undoubtedly the main obstacle to peace today, in that it fuels a cycle of ever more atrocious violence, with each side claiming to only act in “retaliation” for the violence of the other. Historical experience demonstrates on the contrary that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, far from being a zero-sum game where the gains of one are staked on the losses of the other, can only be resolved through the reconciliation of aspirations of the two peoples.
3-Israel – Palestine: restoring a political horizon to the peace process by starting earnest negotiations with the Palestinian authority
Recent developments in the political and military landscape in the Middle East and the escalation of violence between Israel and Palestine since October 7, 2023 seem to dash any hope of lasting peace in this region. The foundations of peace, however, seemed to have been laid in the early 2000s, notably with the Geneva Accord, signed in Jordan on October 23, 2003: an alternative peace plan drawn up by former political and military leaders of both parties which proves that a realistic compromise is possible. Should we then put the Geneva Initiative back on the table? What possible paths towards peace in this region? How can we renew dialogue between the two warring parties? And what role should be given to the international community and international humanitarian law in the negotiations. What was the ambition of the Geneva Accords in 2003 and what progress has this initiative made?
The basic idea was very simple: the road map and the Oslo process were based on the idea that we had to start by defining a process that would allow to gradually get closer to the final status, without giving the slightest detail on this final status. This method has never worked. This is why, in the discussions that led to the Geneva Initiative, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators chose the opposite method. They started at the end, that is to say, negotiating a final agreement first. Next, they discussed the process that implements this final agreement.
This peace initiative therefore had two objectives: to implement the Clinton parameters and to adopt another method of negotiation. This is why the signed agreement is very detailed. It tackles all the problems – Jerusalem, security, borders, refugees – unresolved concerns at Camp David (2000) and Taba (2001). This agreement is based on four principles:
1) The official recognition of two independent States, the State of Palestine being demilitarized.
2) The renunciation of the “right of return” of Palestinians to the State of Israel, accompanied by financial compensation for each refugee family. A “right of return” is possible, but in the newly created State of Palestine.
3) An Israeli withdrawal of approximately 90% occupied territories, with an exchange of territories for the missing 10%. This allows Israel to maintain several settlements considered important in terms of security.
4) “Shared” sovereignty over Jerusalem, based on the Clinton parameters.
The Geneva Accords present a historic opportunity for both Israelis and Palestinians. They offer Israelis the opportunity to fully integrate into the Middle East. For Palestinians, these agreements offer the possibility of building their own state.
4-Reactivate peace treaties with Arab nations, basically the “Abraham Accords” to achieve desired economic development that will strengthen peace, understanding and tolerance among the peoples of the region
The Gaza war has relegated the normalization agreements (Abraham Accords) reached in 2020 between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco to the background. Beyond its geopolitical dimension, one aspect of this alliance has been passed over in silence: despite their theological differences, the fundamentalists of the three great monotheisms took advantage of it to form a common front against moral liberalism and secular values – even if Israeli repression in East Jerusalem and violations of holy sites also threaten this aspect of the pact.
Normalization between Israel and Arab countries should be done in conjunction with the Middle East peace process, since the Abraham Accords alone have failed to fundamentally change the situation for the Palestinians.
Is peace still possible in the Mideast?
The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, which began after Israel’s founding in 1948, has now lasted nearly seven decades. Most people agree that the two sides must find a way to coexist peacefully as neighbors, but their leaders remain far apart on many issues, including Israel’s security, the borders of a possible state Palestinian and the status of Jerusalem, which Israelis and Palestinians claim as their capital and the “right of return” for the refugees.
For more than a century, world leaders have appealed for peace in the Middle East, but generally without success. The region has already experienced twenty-three conflicts in the first years of the 21st century. This is due to five persistent tensions fuelling conflict in the region, each consisting of major social, economic, or political change that clashes with an important and relatively constant feature of the region: Population growth vs. geographical and economic limits, young countries vs. ancient societies, modern radical Islamism versus traditional Abrahamic religions, the “Arab Spring” against traditional authoritarianism, and great power competition versus inattention.
If 2023 was the year when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict shook the Middle East, 2024 will be the year when we will know if peace is still possible there. As terrible as it is to write this after so many deaths, never in twenty years has the possibility of a peaceful outcome been so close. Unfortunately, it has been just as long since the conflict came this close to spiralling out of control. What will happen next, only time will tell?
You can follow Professor Mohamed Chtatou on X: @Ayurinu
By Mohammed Torki Bani Salameh
This study aims to reveal the impact of Saudi–Iranian competition on the countries’ relationship with the State of Kuwait. The study showed that the events, crises, and conflicts in the region from 1971 to 2023 formed a field of competition between the two countries for hegemony and influence over the countries of the region.
In its hegemony strategy, Iran has relied on penetrating fragile and weak countries politically, economically, and militarily, in addition to supporting Shiite minorities in Arabian Gulf countries. This has created conflict with Saudi Arabia for the leadership of the region, and Saudi Arabia has tried to lead a unified Arab and Islamic alliance against Iran. Over time, the dispute between them has turned into an ideological, religious, political, and military battle. As for this competition over their relations with the State of Kuwait, the Kuwaiti strategy has been based on sheltering from the conflicts of the major powers in the region and looking for an influential regional role to relieve the pressures of those countries and limit their expansionist attempts. But the geographical dilemma of Kuwait has made it adopt foreign policies that tend to be cautious, and Kuwait has sought to pursue a hedging policy toward Iran and Saudi Arabia. While Kuwaiti diplomacy is always keen to activate cooperation and support rapprochement with Saudi Arabia at all levels, it is trying to hold the stick from the middle in its relations with Iran between the hardening of collective Gulf decisions and flexibility in bilateral relations.
Introduction
Political theory finds that states resort to multiple security strategies to pursue their national interests and to implement the objectives of their foreign policies. Some of these are cooperative, some are conflictual, some employ neutrality. Some depend on balancing, which can be hard and soft. Some are based on an alliance with great powers or rising powers, which is known as bandwagoning.[1]
Practice shows that yet another option exists, beyond those noted above, and one that has not received adequate attention in academic studies: strategic hedging, or a compromise between conflictual and cooperative mechanisms. A small state can hedge when it seeks middle ground. Some call that a smart way to compensate for smallness.[2]
Hedging offsets potential losses or gains. It permits small states to prepare for confrontation, uncertainty, and risk by protecting their security position in case their relationship with the leader of the unipolar system worsens. It is a useful strategy for states that that are unable to settle on other strategies such as balancing, or bandwagoning.[3]
In the Arabian Gulf region, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Oman deal with Iran via strategic hedging. Since their security environment is characterized by dynamism and uncertainty, it is perfect for strategic hedging, which enables them to maintain different strategic options and provides an ability to maneuver. As Yoel Guzansky points out, strategic hedging reduces the danger of conflict with Iran in the short term while preserving contingency plans in the long term.
Arabian Gulf states seek to cooperate with Iran while preserving the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) framework, one established shortly after the Iranian revolution largely due to the threat coming from Tehran. Differing threat perceptions within the GCC made it difficult to establish a joint institutionalized security strategy and cracks in their unity weaken their ability to act in unison vis-à-vis Iran. Even when perceptions of the Iranian threat–the military buildup, nuclear ambitions, political subversion, terrorism–are similar, each state chooses to hedge.[4]
Following the Arab Spring revolutions, the Arabian Gulf states had to adapt to the new political conjuncture in the region. These policy revisions were also responding to the changing policies of great powers like the United States. As I written before, the perception of a US pullback from its commitments in the Middle East, small states of the Arabian Gulf must develop a new vision of how to protect themselves. The Arabian Gulf States, which relied on the US for decades, to strengthen and maintain their internal security began to lose their confidence in the US.[5]
The Arab Gulf region has attracted the interests of researchers and specialists in international relations due to its geopolitical importance, as it is a link between East and West and contains the most important international straits, the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf of Oman, Bab al-Mandab, and the Red Sea. The Strait of Hormuz controls the trade routes to and from the Gulf, which means that controlling it means controlling navigation in the Gulf, and hence oil supplies, the backbone of development in the developed countries.
Saudi–Iranian relations are based on competition to control the countries of the region, and this competition has passed through several stages, the first of which was the public confrontation in the 1980s, followed by a short-term expansion in the 1990s, then a struggle for influence in the Middle East. This has been reflected in the countries of the region, including the State of Kuwait, which since 2011 has witnessed many transformations and strategic changes that have made its relations with Saudi Arabia and Iran characterized by actions, reactions, and attraction. Therefore, this article will discuss the Saudi–Iranian rivalry and its impact on relations with Kuwait.
This paper contends that Kuwait uses a hedging strategy to minimize the risks and uncertainties left by US policy of repositioning in the Middle East. Kuwait uses hedging to prevent Iran and Saudi Arabia from dominating the regional order.
Competition for Leadership by the Regional Forces in the Region and Geopolitical Competition
After the victory of the Iranian revolution in 1979 and the formation of the wilayat-e faqih system centered around the religious rule of the Iranian leader,[6] Iran adopted the slogans of the global Islamic state, exporting the revolution, and protecting the weak on Earth.[7] With a commitment to employ all its capabilities to achieve this,[8] the Iranian project to penetrate the countries of the region depends on the formation of political groups and entities that it associates with, and then creating a state of instability in the countries of the region to become politically and militarily failed states.[9] The Arab revolutions and crises in the region from 2003 to 2011 led to the weakening of the central authority of the state in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. In such countries, Iran enjoys a huge presence of sympathizers, supporters, and even fighters, who are whole-heartedly devoted to the Iranian project of expansionism in the Middle East, which gave Iran the opportunity to implement its hegemony over those countries via sub-state actors (Shiite minorities in Iraq, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait) and political entities loyal to Iran (Lebanese Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad in Gaza, Houthis in Yemen, military intervention in Syria). Iran appeared euphoric over the disintegration of the pro-Western Arab order and saw an “Islamic awakening” on the move with a broader role for its Shiite network. In view of this, Saudi Arabia attempted to lead a unified Arab and Islamic alliance against Iran and tried to support those countries and strengthen their military authorities to be able to restrict the presence of groups and non-state actors such as the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Iraqi militias backed by Iran.[10], [11]
The Impact of Saudi–Iranian Rivalry on Kuwaiti–Iranian Relations
The State of Kuwait is a small country surrounded by three major countries in the region. It is located within the so-called pressure triangle between Iraq, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, which has always been a major concern in Kuwait’s foreign policy. This is because historical experience has shown that each of these major players in this regional system seeks to impose its influence and control over the rest of the parties, especially the small Gulf states, among which is Kuwait.[12]
The Kuwaiti strategy has been based on sheltering from the conflicts of these major powers in the region, seeking primarily to preserve its existence. Therefore, Kuwait has been keen to seek for itself an influential regional role that will relieve it of the pressures of the “pressure triangle” and limit the expansionist attempts of any of its parties. In the face of this geographical dilemma, the State of Kuwait has tried to adopt inexpensive foreign policies that tend to be cautious and avoid provoking crises with Iran and Saudi Arabia. In implementing its foreign policy, it has largely relied on multilateral diplomatic tools, international conferences, and regional organizations, as well as economic relations, so its external decisions are more related to maximizing economic gains and benefits.[13]
Historically, bilateral relations between Iran and Kuwait have been affected by Iran’s external behavior, which since the Iranian revolution in 1979 has depended on interfering in the internal affairs of neighboring countries by adopting, under the ideology of ‘Vilayet al Faqih’, (Rule of the Jurisprudent) the principle of exporting the revolution, reviving the role of Shiites in the region (strengthening Shiites in Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain), and playing a role on the regional and international stages. Kuwait’s indigenous Shiite communities responded to the Iranian revolution of 1979 by organizing a series of mass meetings and demonstrations. The authorities countered by deporting a prominent Shia cleric with close ties to Iran and expelling a large number of politically suspect expatriates. In the early 1980s, Shiite militants launched a wave of bombings and hijackings in an attempt to undermine the authority of the Al-Sabah. The ruling family turned to nationalists and Bedouins as a way of rallying support for the political system among Kuwaiti citizens.[14] There has come to be a mutually beneficial relationship between the rise of Iran’s political position and the roles of its allies in the Middle East, which has strengthened the position of Shiite identity in the regional and international political arena.[15] This has been accomplished through a number of different means and methods, including the recruitment of agents in these countries, in addition to carrying out operations of violence and terrorism in order to destabilize internal stability and influence the positions of Kuwait.
During the period from 1983 to 1987, seven Iranian terrorist operations were launched against the State of Kuwait. The most dangerous of these was in 1985, when Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, Emir of the State of Kuwait, was subjected to an assassination attempt. The rate of terrorist operations increased during the period of tense Iranian–Kuwaiti relations due to Kuwait’s support of Iraq in its war against Iran, which coincided with the height of the internal Iranian effort to export the revolution to neighboring countries and its adoption of the principle of intervention as a basic orientation of Iranian foreign policy. Some terrorist operations have also targeted Saudi interests in Kuwait, reflecting the tense relationship and hostility that Iran has toward Saudi Arabia and its allies in the Arab Gulf states. Following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and Iran’s support for Kuwait, relations between the two countries improved, and Iranian-backed terrorist operations disappeared during the period 1990-2011. But after 2011, Iranian interference in Kuwaiti internal affairs began to return to the fore once again. Iran began planting agents, recruiting spies, supporting, and infiltrating Shia in Kuwait, seeking to gain their loyalty, and supporting the internal movement against the political system. In 2011, the Kuwaiti security forces discovered a spy network providing intelligence to Iran, which strained relations between the two countries, especially since the discovery of this cell was linked to the movement that Kuwait witnessed within the wave of protests that swept the countries of the Arab world. Investigations revealed that this cell was directly linked to Iran, specifically to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). Death sentences were issued to the members of this network, three Iranian diplomats were expelled, and the Kuwaiti ambassador to Iran was summoned for consultations.[16]
In 2012, the dispute over the continental shelf area on the maritime borders between the two countries returned, involving the “Al-Durra field” (Iran calls it the Arash field), which is the water triangle located in the north of the Arabian Gulf. The bulk of it is located on the common border between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, but part is located on the Iranian side, which is estimated at only 5 percent of the total field.[17] The roots of the dispute go back to Iran granting the right of exploration and exploitation to British Petroleum, while Kuwait granted the concession to Royal Dutch Shell, and the two concessions intersected in part of the field. Kuwait protested Iran’s search for gas in the field, in which no agreement was reached regarding the demarcation of the borders, summoned the chargé d’affaires of the Iranian embassy in Kuwait and handed him a protest note. Although this dispute relates to a sovereign right, it did not lead to a direct clash or military intervention. Rather, the two countries have space for diplomatic movement to avoid the impact of this file on the course of relations in a way that amounts to confrontation or estrangement.[18]
In December 2019, a memorandum of understanding was signed between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to work together to develop and exploit the Al-Durra field. The Iranian foreign ministry expressed its denunciation and opposition to this step, which it described as illegal, given that Iran shares this field with the two parties, and stressed that “there are parts of it within the unspecified waters between Iran and Kuwait. The Islamic Republic reserves the right to exploit the gas field,” as it puts it. On the other hand, Kuwait, through its foreign minister, Ahmed Al-Sabah, expressed its rejection of Iranian statements regarding the field, stating that “Iran is not a party to the Durra field, as it is a purely Kuwaiti–Saudi field,” and indicating that Kuwait and Saudi Arabia alone have rights to exploit this field, in accordance with the agreements concluded between the two countries, and in accordance with international law and the rules for demarcating maritime borders.[19]
In 2015, the Kuwaiti ministry of interior announced the arrest of about 26 members of a terrorist cell (one Iranian and the rest Kuwaitis) and the confiscation of large quantities of weapons in the Abdali area, north of the capital of Kuwait, near the Iraqi border. With Iran and Hezbollah committing acts that would prejudice the unity and territorial integrity of the State of Kuwait, implicit reference was made to Iran’s involvement in the formation of a spy cell in Kuwait and the training of its members in Lebanon and at the Iranian embassy in Kuwait.[20] Later, the defendants took advantage of their release after an appeals court found them innocent, pending the issuance of the verdict of discrimination, and fled to Iran, whereupon Kuwait announced the reduction of the level of Iranian diplomatic representation in Kuwait from nineteen diplomats to four.[21] The Iranian reaction came with a partial escalation against Kuwait, accusing Kuwait of having submitted to Saudi pressure to take this step. On July 22, 2017, Kuwait reduced Iranian diplomatic representation to its lowest limits due to Iran’s threat to Kuwait’s internal security and the regional security system and its role in spreading chaos and instability in the region.[22]
The attitudes of the two countries toward the revolutions of the Arab Spring in 2011 varied greatly: while Kuwait considered the Arab Spring revolutions a large wave aimed at striking the stability of the Arab countries, including Kuwait, and bringing about fundamental changes in the structure of its powers, Iran considered the Arab Spring revolutions, with an exception of Syria, as a continuation of the Iranian revolution of 1979 and a response from the Arab peoples to the message of the Iranian revolution. The protests that swept Bahrain in February 2011 represented an important test for Kuwaiti–Iranian relations, as the Iranian side intervened forcefully in the crisis and encouraged the Bahraini opposition to bring about a political change in favor of the Shiite bloc in the Bahraini interior, but the entry of the Peninsula Shield forces into Bahrain, in which Kuwait participated, put an end to the deterioration of the situation in Bahrain.[23] Some Iranian leaders have expressed their opinion on the Kuwaiti role in the Peninsula Shield forces, where the Iranian leader Karim Abedi, a member of the Parliamentary Committee for National Security Affairs and Iranian Foreign Policy in 2012, stated:
What happened with the entry of armies from the Gulf states into Bahrain will not be repeated, and we will not allow it. By repeating it in Kuwait, the circumstances and location of Bahrain geographically and militarily are completely different from Kuwait, and the Islamic Republic of Iran has the right to enter Kuwait to protect the Shiites there, just as Gulf countries justified their entry to Bahrain by protecting the Sunnis there.[24]
In sum, for many years, the relationship between Iran and Kuwait has fluctuated between belligerence and cooperation. It has been characterized by entrenched distrust and hasty decision-making. Factors contributing to this relationship are various, and include Iran’s expansionist policies, its continuous attempts at interference in the internal affairs of Kuwait, and the regional leadership battle with Kuwait’s regional closest ally, Saudi Arabia.
The Impact of Saudi–Iranian Rivalry on Kuwaiti–Saudi Relations
The roots of Saudi–Kuwaiti relations began at the start of the twentieth century, when Kuwait hosted the founder of the modern Saudi state, King Abdul Aziz Al Saud, after the fall of Riyadh to the Al Rashid state in northern Saudi Arabia, followed by its recapture from the authority of Al Rashid. King Abdul Aziz, after the matter was settled in Riyadh, decided to expand his rule to an extent that prompted conflict with the Kuwaiti government at the time, during the era of Sheikh Salem Al-Mubarak Al-Sabah.[25] The conflict ended with the Uqair Protocol of 1922, which defined the borders between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and the establishment of a neutral zone between the two countries.[26] Economic differences between the two countries began to emerge after the Uqair agreement, and ended in 1940 after a peaceful settlement was reached under British auspices. On April 20, 1942, the two countries signed several agreements aimed at regulating political, economic, and security relations, and one of the main results of these agreements was the establishment of the divided zone between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia in what was known as the neutral zone in 1965, which resulted in the delineation of borderlands between the two countries reflecting the balance of power at the time in the region.[27] In 2000, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia also concluded a maritime boundary agreement that settled the issue of the final boundary between the two countries. During the period between 2009 and 2019, a dispute between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia over the divided zone led to a halt in hydrocarbon production, starting in 2014, until the final border arrangements were reached, but the different interpretations of the Kuwaiti–Saudi border problems led to a fifth agreement in 2019. Its aim was to achieve greater clarity and settle the question of boundaries.[28]
The area of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia represents 83.45 percent of the total area of the Gulf states, while the State of Kuwait represents 0.4 percent of this area. Geography has linked the fate of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, as has the depth of religious, cultural, and family ties between its citizens, and they are characterized by homogeneity of identity and values. In educational, cultural, and social affairs, there is a kind of contact and overlap between the borders of the two countries, as the Saudi borders expand to extend over the area of the State of Kuwait so that it constitutes a strategic depth for it, and the geographical reality also makes any threat to Kuwait a direct source of threat to the security of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, making Kuwait almost the first line of defense for Saudi lands.
The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 was one of the most important political milestones for Kuwait. Kuwait entered the arena of military confrontation by closing the Iraqi oil pipeline extending through its territory to the Red Sea and decided to compensate for the shortfall in oil production by increasing its production by two million barrels per day to maintain the stability of its market in the world. Then the kingdom opened its lands and bases to receive the Arab, Islamic, and friendly forces that had been summoned. To remove and repel the aggression, these forces were placed under a joint Saudi command. In the beginning, Kuwait became closer to the Saudi state, as its leaders sought to draw closer to the kingdom in the wake of that invasion. That experience showed the fragility of the Kuwaiti political presence in a turbulent region characterized by conflicts over sovereignty and influence between major regional and international states. Despite the apparent consensus between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia on the necessity of confronting the invasion and its causes, there was a fundamental difference between them: the Kuwaitis saw the necessity of uprooting the Iraqi regime from its roots, as they considered it fundamentally hostile to them, while the Saudi desire was limited to overthrowing Saddam Hussein while maintaining the political system so as not to bring about a deep fundamental change in Iraq.[29]
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia comes at the top of Kuwait’s foreign policy priorities, as Kuwaiti diplomacy is always keen to activate cooperation and support rapprochement with Saudi Arabia at all levels. At the bilateral and Gulf level, Saudi–Kuwaiti talks take place regularly in the wake of the crises facing the Arab Gulf states and the Arab world, and the position of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia often leads to consensus in visions about those crises, and with regard to Iran, the position of the two countries coincides in rejecting Iranian threats to Gulf countries. At the Gulf level, the two sides seek to crystallize a unified Gulf position in dealing with Iran, through coordinating efforts within the framework of the GCC. As for the Palestinian issue, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait agree on how to deal with it. Perhaps the most prominent manifestation of this consensus is evident in the rejection of normalization with Israel by each of them and their keenness to provide material and moral support to the Palestinian people at all levels. However, this does not prevent the existence of some differences between them, such as their unilateral positions on Iran, where Kuwait and Iran reach levels of friendly relations.[30]
Regarding the position of the two countries on the Gulf crisis and the boycott of the Emirate of Qatar in 2017, throughout that crisis, Kuwait showed a position of neutrality regarding the boycott of Qatar. Nonetheless, Kuwait continued to play the role of mediator between the Gulf states. During the Gulf summit held in Riyadh in December 2018, which the Emir of Qatar did not attend, and the minister of state for foreign affairs attended on his behalf, the Emir of Kuwait delivered a speech in which he criticized the sharp media exchange between the conflicting parties, urged the use of a calm media tone, and looked forward to resolving the dispute as soon as possible.[31]
In the aftermath of the Arab Spring revolutions, Saudi Arabia abandoned its traditional foreign policy track in favor of a more dominant one. Saudi Arabia has traditionally attempted to influence the other Gulf countries to align with Riyadh, but it has redoubled this effort in the post-2011 period. Saudi Arabia took a counterrevolutionary position against the Arab uprisings and revolutions and expected other countries in the Gulf to follow suit. Saudi Arabia attempted to pressure countries like Kuwait and Bahrain to provide financial support to the Egyptian government. Saudi Arabia foreign policy became more assertive in the early period of King Salman’s rule.[32]
Conclusion
The Saudi-Iranian rivalry is considered to be one of the most prolonged rivalries in the Middle East’s modern history, and the enmity between both countries is a persistent feature of Middle East geopolitics. The events, crises, and conflicts in the region from 1971 to 2015 marked the beginning of the conflict and competition for hegemony in the Arab Gulf region between Saudi Arabia and Iran, as each country tried to exploit these crises and conflicts to its advantage. The success of the Iranian revolution and the fall of the Shah’s regime in 1979 marked the beginning of Iran’s transition from seeking hegemony in conjunction with Saudi Arabia and the United States to trying to dominate the region unilaterally. Iran became the most destabilizing actor in the Gulf region. This created a conflict with Saudi Arabia to lead the region. Over time, the dispute between them turned into an ideological, religious, political, and military battle. The Iranian regime uses all mechanisms and means to dominate the countries of the region, and Iran has directly sought to change the ruling regimes in the Arab Gulf states through Shiite Islamic political movements in these countries or by seeking to monopolize the representation of Shiites in those countries with Shiite presence under the pretext of protecting them. The occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the Arab Spring revolutions (2001–2011) turned Iran into a major regional player in four Arab countries: Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Bahrain. Since then, tension has escalated between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and the differences between them have sharpened in all regional issues.
Under this atmosphere of Saudi–Iranian competition, the Kuwaiti strategy has been based on sheltering from the conflicts of the major powers in the region by seeking, in the first place, to preserve its existence. Kuwait has been keen to look for an influential regional role to relieve the pressures of those countries and to prevent expansionist attempts.
As a result of the geographical dilemma of the State of Kuwait, it has tried to adopt inexpensive foreign policies, which tend to be cautious, and to avoid provoking crises with Iran and Saudi Arabia. In implementing its foreign policy, it has relied heavily on multilateral diplomatic tools, international conferences, and regional organizations, as well as economic relations, so its external decisions are more related to maximizing economic gains and benefits.
About the author: Mohammed Torki Bani Salameh is a Professor of Political Science at the National Defence College of the United Arab Emirates. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the views of the National Defence College, or the United Arab Emirates government.
Source: This article was published by the Middle East Forum’s Middle East Quarterly Spring 2024
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[3] Telci, İ. N. & Rakipoglu, M. (2021). Hedging as a Survival Strategy for Small States: The Case of Kuwait. All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace, Vol. 10, Issue 2, pp. 213-229.
[4] Yoel Guzansky, “The Foreign? Policy Tools of Small Powers: Strategic Hedging in the Persian Gulf,” Middle East Policy, Vol. 22, No. 1 (Spring 2015).
[5] Mohammed Tork Bani Salameh. Bahrain’s Vision in the Gulf’s Security Order. Middle East Policy. Vol.30., No.1 (Spring 2023).
[6] Muhammad Al-Salami, “The Future of Saudi–Iranian Relations” (In Arabic), Al-Faisal Magazine 477–78 (Shawwal and Dhul-Qa’dah 1437 AH, 2016), p. 108.
[7] Amjad Kishk, “Tensions in Iranian-Gulf Relations, Causes – Repercussions – Confrontation Mechanisms,” Journal of Strategic Studies (February 2016), pp. 8–9.
[8] Massad Nevin, Decision-Making in Iran and Arab-Iranian Relations (In Arabic) (Beirut: Center for Arab Unity Studies, 2, 2002), p. 211.
[9] Fathi Boularas, “Iranian Foreign Policy in the Middle East: Between Doctrinal Considerations and Geopolitical Factors” (In Arabic), Humanitarianism (Mohamed Khider University, Algeria), Vol. 16, No. 2 (2016), pp. 275–78.
[10]Azhar al-Rubaie, Protest in Iraq: Against Domestic Corruption and Iranian Influence, The Washington Institute, Oct. 29, 2019.
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[12] Faisal Abu Salib, “Kuwaiti Mediation: Historical Experiences in Facing a Unique Crisis” (In Arabic), Al Jazeera Center for Studies, June 22, 2017.
[13] Jill Crystal, Oil and Politics in the Gulf: Rulers and Merchants in Kuwait and Qatar, Cambridge, U.K. 1990.
[14] Suad Bardi Al-Saeedi, “Kuwaiti Foreign Policy from Political Survival to Renewal,” Journal of Financial and Commercial Research, Vol. 22, No. 2 (April 2021), p. 432.
[15] Muhammad Jawad Larijani, Statements in the National Strategy “Explanation of the Shiite Umm Al-Qura Theory,” Nabil Ali Al-Atoum (London: Al-Asr Center for Strategic and Future Studies, 2013), pp. 108–109.
[16] Abdul Hafeez Mahboub, The Solid Refuge: Saudi Arabia in the Face of Iranian Impulses (London: Dar any Books, 2017), p. 27.
[17] Issam Abdel Shafi, “The Kuwaiti-Iranian Continental Shelf: Political Dimensions Driven by Economic Interests” (In Arabic), Al-Watan Kuwaiti Newspaper, March 4, 2012.
[18] The roots of the crisis go back to 2001, when Iran began drilling operations in the field, which prompted Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to agree to demarcate their maritime borders and plan for the development of joint oil reservoirs.
[19] Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, “Facts about the Disputed Al-Durra Gas Field between Iran, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia” (In Arabic), March 29, 2022.
[20] Abdul Hafeez Mahboub, The Solid Refuge: Saudi Arabia in the Face of Iranian Impulses (London: Dar any Books, 2017), p. 27.
[21] Al-Qabas Kuwaiti Newspaper, “Stop Disregarding Our Sovereignty, Iran,” July 19, 2017.
[22] Muhammad Abdullah Bani Hamim, Iranian-Kuwaiti Relations between Continuity and Change, International Institute for Iranian Studies, Aug. 3, 2017.
[23] Fatima Al-Smadi, Reports: Iran and the Arab Revolutions: Narratives of Building the Iranian Central, Al Jazeera Center for Studies, November 8, 2016, p. 8.
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[25] Hadi Hamad, “Najdi-Kuwaiti Relations until 1932” (In Arabic), Journal of Human Sciences (College of Education, Majdal) Vol. 33, No. 1 (March 2016), pp. 244–47.
[26] The Algerian Encyclopedia of Political and Strategic Studies, “The Historical Roots of the Dispute (Saudi–Kuwaiti) on Fire under Embers in the Divided Region.”
[27] Arabi Post, “The Silent Dispute. The story of the Neutral Zone between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, in Which Oil Production Has Been Disrupted for Years,” (In Arabic) July 25, 2019.
[28] Bader Al-Seif, The Kuwaiti–Saudi Border: Resilience is a Pillar of Stability, Malcolm Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center, July 19, 2021.
[29] Nayef bin Hathlin, The Allied Struggle: Saudi Arabia and the United States since 1962, trans. Ahmed Maghribi (Beirut: Dar Al-Saqi, 2013), p. 48.
[30] Moataz Salameh, Gulf Cooperation Council States and Iranian Nuclear Commissioners (In Arabic), Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, Sept. 8, 2021.
[31] Policies Unit, The Siege of Qatar: Contexts for Continuing the Crisis and Prospects for Resolving It (In Arabic), Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, June 3, 2020, pp. 1–6.
[32] Telci, İ. N. , Rakipoglu, M. “Hedging as a Survival Strategy for Small States: The Case of Kuwait”. All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace 10 (2021 ): 213-229.
By Antara Ghosal Singh
On 11 April, the first trilateral summit between the United States (US), Japan, and the Philippines was held in Washington. This was preceded by the first-ever military exercise between the US, Japan, the Philippines, and Australia in the South China Sea on 7 April.
Not very long ago, in September 2022, the US, Japan, and the Philippines held the first “Trilateral Defense Policy Dialogue” and decided to deepen cooperation in areas such as maritime security, humanitarian relief, and disaster response. Again, in December 2022, the US Army and Marine Corps in the Pacific, the Armed Forces and Marine Corps of the Philippines, and the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force held their first trilateral meeting in Tokyo, laying the foundation for regular high-level talks between the ground forces of the three countries. In June 2023, the heads of the national security agencies of the US, Japan and the Philippines held the first Trilateral Security Dialogue, marking a new level for the security cooperation mechanism between the three.
In July and September 2023, the foreign ministers of the three countries met for the first time to advance cooperation on “economic security, development, humanitarian assistance, maritime security, and defence”. In September 2023, Japanese Prime Minister Kishida, Philippines President Marcos, and US Vice President Harris again met to further deepen trilateral cooperation.
Now, the buzz on the Chinese internet is that, in less than a year of holding the first Defense Ministerial Dialogue, the four countries—the US, the Philippines, Japan, and Australia—may now get integrated into a new “quadrilateral security mechanism”. The rapid development of the trilateral ties between the US, Japan, the Philippines and “the linking of the South China Sea–East China Sea dispute and the Taiwan issue” has set the alarm bells ringing in Beijing.
The Chinese assessment is that a centralised and integrated regional security architecture is increasingly taking shape in the Indo-Pacific region, with the US as the core, the quadrilateral security mechanism as the focus, and multiple sets of “mini-multilateral” mechanisms as the supplement.
Hu Xin, Assistant Researcher at China South China Sea Research Institute, in an article in the Guancha.com, argued that in recent years, the US alliance system in the Indo-Pacific region has undergone important changes
1. It has achieved substantial internal integration, in terms of goals, structure, and members.
- In terms of goals, the alliance system formed by the US after World War II had a relatively loose structure and lacked a unified strategic goal. But now, a common strategic threat perception from China has become a common goal binding together the US alliance system.
- In terms of structure, the original bilateral alliance system (between the US and regional states, including Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand) format has been transformed into a “latticework of mini-lateral arrangements” between the US and its various alliance and security partners in the region. This is playing an important role in legitimising the geographical scope of its alliance system in the Indo-Pacific.
- The US is promoting military and security dialogue and cooperation among the member nations (allies/partners) to facilitate better integration, communication and management within its alliance system. For example, countries such as Japan and the Philippines, Japan and Australia, Japan and India, India and Australia, India and South Korea have all established a “2+2” dialogue mechanism between each other’s foreign and defence ministers.
Japan and India have established a “Special Strategic and Global Partnership”; Japan and Australia have formed a “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership” with Vietnam; Australia and India have upgraded their bilateral relations to a Comprehensive Security Partnership in 2020; in 2022, Japan and Australia have signed the “Joint Declaration on Security Cooperation”. Now Japan and the Philippines are negotiating the signing of a reciprocal troops access agreement.
2. The US alliance system is also undergoing an outward expansion, in terms of involving non-resident nations in regional affairs and incorporating issues beyond the traditional security and defence domain. For example, it is noted with concern in Beijing how the United Kingdom, France, and Germany have been made a party to the Indo-Pacific politics, by encouraging them to establish 2+2 dialogues with the countries in the region, deploying warships or taking part in high-level military exercises, etc.
Apart from that, further adding to China’s challenges, the US alliance system is no longer focused on high-political single issues such as security and defence but is being extended to low-political and diverse functional issues such as economy and trade, infrastructure, supply chains, and new energy. This “cross-disciplinary” nature of the mini-laterals, Hu Xin highlighted, has been further enhancing the intensity and expanse of the US’s “de-Sinicization/de-coupling from China” strategy.
Meanwhile, to counter the perceived strengthening of the US alliance system in Asia, China has intensified its ASEAN outreach. In a symbolic move, Beijing managed to host Indonesia’s President-elect Prabowo Subianto within 10 days of being elected and sought his assurance for the continuation of predecessor Joko Widodo’s friendly policy towards China. Soon after that, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi held back-to-back talks with foreign ministers from Lao and Timor-Leste. Wang Yi will soon start a six-day visit to Indonesia, Cambodia, and Papua New Guinea. The hope is to use China’s significant influence on certain AEAN members to restrain the Philippines.
On the other hand, some Chinese scholars are of the opinion that despite the strong posturing on Taiwan as well as the South and East China Sea issue, the US may find it difficult to deliver in actual terms. The reasons are that, domestically, internal political divisions constrain the Congress and internationally, the turmoil in Ukraine, Israel, and the Korean Peninsula is holding it back from directly challenging China. Instead, the US, they argue, will be forced to send Treasury Secretary Yellen or Secretary of State Blinken to keep the talks going and eventually accommodate China’s aspirations to a certain extent. Thirdly, the Chinese side is also hopeful that the uncertainty associated with a possible Trump 2.0 administration may eventually reverse the Biden administration’s gains so far, in terms of strengthening the US alliance system and thereby indirectly benefit China.
For India, as the Line of Actual Control (LAC) situation remains stuck in a stalemate, we must keep a close eye on the developments on China’s other fronts—namely, the South and East China Sea and the Taiwan Strait, so as to leverage them for our interest.
- About the author: Antara Ghosal Singh is a Fellow of the Strategic Studies Programme at the Observer Research Foundation.
- Source: This article was published by the Observer Research Foundation.