Israel Matzav

It's not just Israel

It's not just Israel that's fearful of the United States' falling for Iran's charm offensive. The United States' Arab allies are also unhappy with the American response to Rohani.

Iran’s jingoistic and expansionist revolutionary Islamic ideology is not only an existential threat to Israel but a potential danger for the entire Middle East, particularly U.S. allies in the Gulf region. An overview of the media in the Gulf monarchies reveals serious worries about Obama’s rapprochement with Iran. After all, it is worth recalling the Saudi king’s recommendation to the U.S. on how to confront Iran’s illicit nuclear program: ”Cut off the head of the snake” by launching military strikes to knock out Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Why does Iran, a country drowning in oil and gas reserves, need a nuclear program? The bogus explanation for civilian energy usage does not carry water. The U.S. allies in the Middle East – and in the wider international community – surely feel like they are trapped in the Groucho Marx school of foreign policy. The prominent Middle East historian Bernard Lewis applied Groucho’s famous line (“I wouldn’t want to be a member of any club that would have me as a member”) to misguided foreign policy, saying, “A principle of Western foreign policies is that we do not worry about the friendship of any government that would seek our friendship. It’s only our enemies in whom we are interested.”

The Wall Street Journal has more details on the Saudi reaction, and how it's likely to affect US interests.

Saudis now feel that the Obama administration is disregarding Saudi concerns over Iran and Syria, and will respond accordingly in ignoring "U.S. interests, U.S. wishes, U.S. issues" in Syria, said Mustafa Alani, a veteran Saudi security analyst with the Geneva-based Gulf Research Center.

"They are going to be upset—we can live with that," Mr. Alani said Sunday of the Obama administration. "We are learning from our enemies now how to treat the United States."

But Evelyn Gordon reports that all this hostility to Obama could ultimately play well for Israel.

Last month, a senior United Arab Emirates official said in a media interview that “If Israel were to strike Iran to stop it from getting a nuclear bomb, we wouldn’t object at all.” For a senior Arab official to publicly invite the hated Zionist enemy to launch a military strike on fellow Muslims is unprecedented. While Arab states have been urging America to attack Iran for years, they have hitherto opposed an Israeli strike. Moreover, even their pleas to America were strictly behind the scenes; they became public knowledge only due to WikiLeaks. Thus for Arab officials to be willing to publicly support an Israeli strike attests to a desperate fear that the American defense umbrella they have relied on for decades may no longer exist.

Nor is this the only indication. At the UN General Assembly last week, a Saudi diplomat consulted with his counterpart from Israel–a country Riyadh doesn’t officially recognize–over the Iranian charm offensive. A few days earlier, at an International Peace Institute dinner whose guests included officials from both Israel and several Arab states that don’t recognize its existence, “No Arab minister attacked Israel, and not one stood up and left the room when he found out that a high-ranking representative of the Israeli government was sitting beside him,” Haaretz reported: They were too busy discussing their main mutual concern, Iran.

This isn’t the start of an Arab-Israeli romance; most of these countries still hate Israel, and many are deeply anti-Semitic. Rather, it reflects the fear engendered by America’s gradual withdrawal from the Middle East. Despite years of purchasing top-quality American arms, many Arab states have no real military capabilities, especially against a much larger, more technologically sophisticated country that happens to be located right next door, in easy invasion distance (in contrast, several Arab countries lie between Iran and Israel). Thus they have always counted on America being there to defend them–and now, suddenly, they’re no longer sure they can. In that situation, even Israel is better than nobody.

Of course, Israel isn't going to protect the Arab countries like America would. And ultimately that could leave the Arab countries in Russia's or Iran's orbit.

What could go wrong?

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Hassan Rohani, Iranian nuclear threat, Israeli attack on Iran, our friends the Saudis

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:20 AM