Growing complexity of Middle East politics

May 13, 2015, 6:30 pm

Palestinians ride their donkey-carts in the middle of rubble and destroyed buildings, on May 11, 2015, in the Eastern Gaza City Shujaiya neighbourhood, which were destroyed during the 50-day war between Israel and Hamas militants in the summer of 2014. AFP

Accordingly, it could be said that a plethora of security issues are standing in the way of the international community moving in the direction of a less fear-filled world. The UN system could not be expected to work faster towards a resolution of these questions on the basis of equity and fairplay because the principal organs of the UN are dominated by the major Western powers, who usually fight shy of going against the wishes of their allies in the Middle East.

To what degree could the Middle East problem be continued to be referred to as the ‘Arab-Israeli conflict’, as it is very often characterized? This question imposes itself on the political observer in view of the complex ways in which the conflict has developed over the years. The parties opposing Israel could no longer be loosely described as the ‘Arab camp’ because of the decisive role Iran has begun to play in the region. As should be known, Iranians bear no relation to the Arabs, from the viewpoint of ethnicity. Iranians were formerly referred to as Persians and the latter are seen as belonging to a different ‘racial stock’ to that of Arabs.

However, it must be quickly added that like most identities, ‘race’ and ‘community’ are social constructs and to the extent to which they are thus ‘constructed’, they do not stand-up to the rigours of scientific verification. Nevertheless, these identities are strongly championed by the simple-minded among humans. And they have a divisive impact on societies, and no better illustration do we have of this unwelcome tendency than the Middle East itself.

The Middle East has proved a political conundrum of the most extraordinary kind over the years but prior to the launching of the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the conflict was of a lesser complexity mainly on account of the fact that the opponents of Israel in the Middle East constituted a more or less monolithic bloc and came to be known as the ‘Arab Camp’. However, we now have a powerful political actor in the form of Iran, which is opposed to Israel but being seen as a staunch advocate of Shiite Islam. However, a considerable number of Middle East states identify closely with Sunni Islam while being opposed to Israel.

These religious categories could not be dismissed as so much trivia because the Sunni-Shia divide has, in the Middle East and other Islam-majority regions, contributed towards intra-Islamic discord of the bloodiest kind. Cases in point are Syria and Iraq, where the IS, of Sunni origin, is savagely targeting Shiite Muslims and religious minorities.

Accordingly, it is a divided Islamic world that Israel faces currently, particularly subsequent to the 9/11 tragedy. It does not follow from this observation that Israel’s opponents were exemplarily united in times past, for example, in the three decades after the establishment of Israel. This was certainly not the case but the present denominational dimension to much of the turmoil in the Middle East, gives the conflict a complexity that would render it even more difficult to resolve.

If well known western political scientist Samuel Huntingdon’s famous thesis that the post Cold War world presents us with a ‘Clash of Civilizations’ featuring the West Vs Islam is to be looked at more closely, it could be said that he has captured some of the complexities which boggle the minds of the watchers of world political developments. However, the present divisions within the Islamic world tend to confound all positive projections with regard to inter-state politics in the Middle East. The question is: What is the shape of things to come?

While the fluidity of developments ‘on the ground’ does not enable the observer to make any definitive projections on this score, what seems fairly clear is that what we are having on our hands currently in the Middle Eastern theatre, and in some regions outside it, is more an intra-‘civilizational’ military confrontation which could render the main conflict increasingly difficult to resolve. After all, what is essentially at the heart of such conflicts is group identity and the latter is highly explosive in nature given that it relates more to emotion rather than reason.

While the IS backs Sunni-leaning oppositional forces in Syria and Iraq, Shia groups in some parts of the Middle East are rising against their Sunni rulers with powerful international backing, as is now happening in Yemen. Accordingly, bringing peace to the principal conflict zone in the Middle East would not prove easy unless these diverse identity groups are enabled to have a voice in the resolution of the main dispute. Even if they do have such a 'say', resolving the differences among these groups would prove an uphill task.

As a consequence of these complexities, the foremost project of resolving the Palestinian-Israeli dispute could begin to be considered a matter of secondary importance by the international community, including the West. Currently, the US is spearheading a military onslaught, along with the Saudi-dominated Gulf Cooperation Council, against the IS and its supporters in the Middle East. Considering that the West-led coalition is facing stiff military resistance, this confrontation could end in a military stalemate for the US. As a consequence, the main Mid-East conflict would remain unresolved for a further length of time and emotions on both sides of the divide would increasingly harden.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and scores of other Arab states are voicing their disapproval over the nuclear accord the West has shored-up with Iran. While the Arabs were hoping for a drastic scaling down of the Iranian nuclear capability, this has not happened and as a consequence, Arab fears over a perceived nuclear armed Iran have not eased. On the other hand, Israel too is on record as being unhappy over the nuclear deal.

Hopefully, the developing world, under the guidance of the Non-aligned Movement and similar organizations, would get its act together and bring pressure on the world community to work more swiftly and steadily towards bringing a degree of stability to the conflict zones just focused on. But prior to taking on these giant endeavours, NAM and allied forums need to wake-up and prove effective.