Arabs & Israel feel shortchanged by ‘Great Satan’

America's Obama Obama and Iran's Rouhani (from algemeiner.com)

Led by Saudi Arabia, Arab governments are dumbstruck by Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers and the Islamic Republic’s acceptance on the global stage.

Not so Israel, which calls the deal a “mistake,” and not so the overwhelming majority of political analysts and commentators in the Arab media.

Fahmi Howeidi, dean of these Arab public opinion-shapers, concludes his think piece today for Aljazeera TV news portal with a sentence saying: “The long and short of the new balance of power in the Arab world is this: Iran tops the list of winners but there is no mention of the Arabs anywhere.”

Tariq Alhomayed, writing today for Asharq Alawsat, the Saudi newspaper of records of which he was editor-in-chief, believes “the deal with Iran is more treacherous than 9/11.”

U.S. President Barack Obama overnight defended the deal between Iran and world powers on Tehran's nuclear program.

The six-month interim deal struck in Geneva on Sunday saw Iran agree to curb some of its nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief.

The accord has been generally welcomed but Israel's prime minister called it "a historic mistake".

The West has long suspected Iran's uranium enrichment program is geared towards making a weapon, but Tehran insists it only wants nuclear energy.

The UN, U.S. and European Union had imposed a raft of sanctions on Tehran.

"Huge challenges remain, but we cannot close the door on diplomacy, and we cannot rule out peaceful solutions to the world's problems," the BBC quoted Obama as saying during an event in San Francisco.

"We cannot commit ourselves to an endless cycle of violence, and tough talk and bluster may be the easy thing to do politically, but it's not the right thing for our security."

Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced an Israeli team led by national security adviser Yossi Cohen would travel to Washington for talks on the deal.

"This accord must bring about one outcome: the dismantling of Iran's military nuclear capability," he said.

Israel has not ruled out taking military action to stop Iran developing the capability of a nuclear bomb.

Saudi Arabia -- Iran's regional counterweight -- cautiously welcomed the deal yesterday.

Under the deal which will last six months, Iran would receive some $7bn in "limited, temporary, targeted, and reversible [sanctions] relief" while a permanent agreement is sought.

Key points of the deal include:

• Iran will stop enriching uranium beyond 5% and "neutralize" its stockpile of uranium enriched beyond this point
• Iran will give greater access to inspectors including daily access at Natanz and Fordo -- two of Iran’s key nuclear sites
• There will be no further development of the Arak plant, which it is believed could produce plutonium
• In return, there will be no new nuclear-related sanctions for six months if Iran sticks by the accord
• Some sanctions will be suspended on trading in gold and precious metals, on Iran's car-making sector and its petrochemical exports
• Frozen oil sale assets will be transferred in installments, bringing in some $4.2bn of extra revenue.

Howeidi, in his piece today for Aljazeera quotes unnamed Iranian experts as telling him:

• The deal recognizes Iran as a regional nuclear power with the right to continue its uranium enrichment program for peaceful purposes
• The Iranians and Americans rushed the deal through to sidestep adverse pressure by Israel, France and some Gulf Arab lobbyists
• The Iranian-American understandings go beyond the nuclear program and the easing of economic sanctions. “The most important understanding is over Iran’s participation in the fight against terrorism in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Afghanistan”
• The deal allows Iran to receive some $7 billion in sanctions relief; about $1.5 billion of the frozen assets were promptly released to Tehran “by Asian banks in South Korea, Malaysia and Indonesia as early as last Sunday morning”
• Shell, which was complying with the sanctions, was the first oil major to resume work in Iran.

Howeidi sums up the most important features of the agreement between the 5+1 world powers and Iran as follows:

1. It seems a new axis is taking shape in the region comprising Iran and Russia, the two countries that played a key role in aborting an American military strike against Syria.
2. The U.S. will henceforth “rely on Iran and Turkey to keep the peace in the region now that Egypt has lost its standing in the Arab world.” Iran is on the ground in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon and to some degree in Yemen, where it is supporting the Houthis. Turkey on the other hand has its role in Syria, Iraq and the Caucasus in Central Asia. Ankara also has its strong economic ties with many Arab countries.
3. There are still question marks over a sectarian war between the Sunnis and Shiites in the Arab world, over Iran’s support of the Islamic movements in Palestine and Lebanon and over future links between Cairo and Tehran.
4. Israel is in a win-win situation. Syria’s chemical weapons are being buried and checks on Iran’s nuclear ambitions are being put in place.
5. Iran’s clout in the Gulf, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon is on the ascendancy. The Gulf, which usually banks on the U.S. is now less prone to challenge Iran. That’s particularly true of Saudi Arabia, which lost its gamble on America’s air strike on Syrian regime forces and on mobilizing Sunni forces against Tehran.
6. “The long and short of the new balance of power in the Arab world is this: Iran tops the list of winners but there is no mention of the Arabs anywhere.”

In the view of Saudi journalist Tariq Alhomayed, “fallouts of the deal on the region – specifically on Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab partners – will prove more treacherous than the consequences of the 9/11 terrorist outrage that pummeled the United States in 2001.

“I am not dramatizing. It is not so because the Obama Administration sold the region down the river or that the administration turned its back on its historic partnership with Gulfite Arabs.

Many forget that America betrayed Israel, her sacred cow in the region.

Alhomayed says Iran’s chief objective since the days of the late Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlevi was to become the “region’s policeman.”

The Islamic Republic will eventually rid itself of all economic sanctions and achieve its primary objective of creating nuclear weapons “much as India and Pakistan did under Bill Clinton, another Democratic Party president.” 

No longer a Shiite Crescent

Press clipping dated Monday, 13 June 1949

By Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabia’s authoritative political analyst, author and kingpin of the impending Al Arab TV news channel, writing in Arabic today for the mass circulation newspaper al-Hayat

When the term “Shiite Crescent” was coined a few years back, it was meant to warn of Iranian expansionism across the Levant.

Nowadays, after the Big Powers’ defeat in the Qusayr battle, Shiite fundamentalism is basking in all the glory of triumph.

With the resulting enlistment of hundreds of Iraqi Shiite volunteers in the war overtly championed by Iran, the Crescent is liable to evolve into a political axis stretching from Tehran to Beirut via Baghdad and Damascus.

The Iranian Oil Ministry will pull out old maps from its drawers to build the pipeline to pump Iranian oil and gas from Abadan (across Iraq) to Tartus.

The Iranian Ministry of Roads and Transportation will dust off the national railways authority’s blueprints for a new branch line from Tehran to Damascus, and possibly Beirut,

Why not? The wind is blowing in their favor and I am not making a mountain out of a molehill.

Tehran has been mulling and airing such projects for years without actually starting them.

But she will, once she settles the Syria war in her favor. It is only natural for her to consolidate victory on the ground by blending her triumphant axis in a singular political, economic and military network.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader or Guardian Jurist of Iran, will realize his dream of delivering his sermon from the pulpit of Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, announcing the attainment of Islamic unity he has long promised.

He will then pompously step down from the pulpit to stroke the forehead of a wheelchair-bound Damascene boy, signaling that forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

He will then stand next to a group of Syrian Sunni ulema wearing white turbans. There are lots of them, in the mould of Mufti Ahmad Hassoun, ready to oblige.

He will shake and raise their hands as camera clicks and flashlights capture the historic moment.

The Guardian Jurist will promise that his next prayer – or his successor’s. if he is sufficiently humble – will be in Jerusalem.

But he won’t mention the Golan. He knows the Russians are now the key component of the UN monitoring force separating Israeli and Syrian forces on the Heights.

Because Takfiris are still mounting desperate operations here and there, he realizes that Syrian troops and Hezbollah fighters are busy keeping the peace in predominantly Sunni cities, towns and townships.

In that afternoon, a huge reception will be held in a newly rehabilitated Damascus palace still showing the scars of war to mark the signing of a mutual defense pact by the presidents of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

The Guardian Jurist will stand wreathed in smiles in the background, perhaps in awe at the likely appearance of the Hidden Imam to bless the agreement.

We turn southward to Riyadh and find the capital calm and dusty but concerned the battle was settled in favor of Bashar al-Assad and his partners.

Riyadh is conscious the clean sweep is not Bashar’s but that of Iran and the old Khomeini scheme.

Bashar becomes the representative of Vali e-faqih in Damascus.

Riyadh is also alarmed by Iranian activity in its surrounding area.

It fears for Bahrain. The Houthis have won uncontested control of more than half the old North Yemen. South Yemen, Saudi Arabia’s traditional ally, is being gradually eaten away by Iran.

Gulf unity plans have dissipated. Some Gulf countries are keen to flatter Iran so as to preserve a modicum of their national sovereignty.

The Arab common market and Fertile Crescent idea evaporated and with it the dream of resurrecting the Hejaz Railway that ran from Istanbul to Holy Mecca across Syria and Jordan.

Even the Europeans are buying the Iranian oil flowing through the Abadan-Tartus pipeline. They are also thinking of linking the European Gas Network with its Iranian counterpart. They have forgotten all about sanctions because the world always prefers to deal with winners.

On the Arab Gulf home front, young men are seething. They feel their governments let them down by failing to face up to the Iranian stratagem. The young men are in a sectarian tinderbox and buckling under economic stress. Extremism is rampant and the security services are busy hunting down extremist groups.

A nightmare, don’t you think?

That’s why I believe Saudi Arabia expressly will not allow Iran to win in Syria.

Iranian presence there proved a burden from the day Hafez al-Assad sealed his alliance with Iran’s Islamic Revolution as soon as it took over power 40 years ago.

Whereas the Syrian regime’s muscle under Hafez left a margin of balance and independence in the partnership, his son submitted totally to the Iranians and Hezbollah.

It is thanks to them Bashar is still alive and ruling a country in ruin. Instead of being their partner, he has become their subordinate.

The implication is that Iran’s presence in Lebanon and Syria now constitutes a clear threat to Saudi Arabia’s national security, and Turkey’s as well.

Consequently, Saudi Arabia must do something now, albeit alone. The kingdom’s security is at stake.

It will be good if the United States joined an alliance led by Saudi Arabia to bring down Bashar and return Syria to the Arab fold. But this should not be a precondition to proceed.

Let Saudi Arabia head those on board.

Let us put aside any misgivings about sequels of the Arab Spring, the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood and Turkey’s ambitions.

Let the objective be to bring down Assad fast.

The objective is bound to draw together multiple forces ranging from the Anbar tribes to Hamas to Egypt’s Brothers to Tunisia to the Gulf Countries.

That would entice Turkey to partake in the alliance. France could follow. And whether the United States does or does not breeze in is inconsequential. After all, it’s our battle and our security. U.S. security is not on the line. 

Syria: Hezbollah defending “Iran’s 35th province”

File photos of Hojjatoleslam Mehdi Taeb (top) and parading Hezbollah fighters 

The Syrian opposition’s break with the Islamic Republic of Iran and its Lebanese cat’s-paw Hezbollah is total and has come into the open.

The Syrian National Coalition of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces posted a statement on its Facebook page overnight accusing Iran and Hezbollah of waging open war on the Syrian people.

The statement said in part, “The direct involvement of Iran-backed Hezbollah forces in the killings, crimes and attacks on Syrians—under the pretext of defending the Assad regime – has been well documented since the beginning of the Syrian revolution.

“On top of that came fresh declarations by Iranian leaders, which can only be described as insolent meddling in the Syrian people’s affairs. The patronizing pronouncements amount to a declaration of open war on the Syrian people, such as the call for a rapid deployment force specialized in urban warfare to support the Assad regime.

“Iran and its lackey Hezbollah’s involvement in Syrian affairs, and their flagrant aggression against Syria’s people and national sovereignty are inadmissible and violate international law.

“The Syrian National Coalition strongly condemns repeated attacks on Syrian territory by Hezbollah fighters. The attacks are driven by Iranian declarations that smack of hateful colonial undertones. They expose the Iranians’ loss of political rationale and their advocacy of ideological rubbish.”

According to the Syrian opposition, fighting began on Saturday as Hezbollah fighters, in control of eight Syrian border villages, tried to move into three adjacent ones -- Burhanieh, Abu Houri and Safarja -- in the Qusayr region of Homs held by Syrian Free Army (FSA) forces.

Regime helicopters fired rockets at rebel positions to support the advancing Hezbollah unit, which included pro-Assad militiamen recruited from the villages it controls, residents said.

"The Hezbollah force moved on foot and was supported by multiple rocket launchers. The FSA had to call in two tanks that had been captured from Assad’s army to repel the attack," Hadi al-Abdallah of the Syrian Revolution General Commission told Reuters by phone.

FSA spokesman Louay al-Miqdad called the Hezbollah operation an "unprecedented invasion", according to Beirut’s independent daily an-Nahar.

"Hezbollah's invasion is the first of its kind in terms of organization, planning and coordination with the Syrian regime's air force," Miqdad was quoted as saying.

An unnamed Hezbollah spokesman confirmed three Shiite deaths, but without saying whether they belong to the group.

AFP news agency quoted the spokesman as saying the dead fighters had been acting "in self-defense.”

Several Syrian rebels were also killed in the clashes, which came days after a senior commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards was killed travelling from Syria to Lebanon.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Revolutionary Guards commanding officer Hassan Shateri was ambushed and killed by rebels while heading to Beirut from Damascus (see my February 14 post, “Iran point man killed heading from Syria to Lebanon).

Shateri was a veteran of the 1980s Iran-Iraq war, and served in Afghanistan before going to Lebanon, where he posed as “Hessam Khoshnevis,” head of an Iranian agency set up to help rebuild Hezbollah-controlled areas devastated by the 2006 war with Israel.

On the eve of Shateri’s burial last Friday in his hometown of Semnan, some 150 kilometers east of Tehran, Hojjatoleslam Mehdi Taeb, a senior cleric from supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s inner circle, said Syria is so strategic to the Islamic Republic that it is considered as Iran's 35th province, and that losing Syria would result in losing Tehran.

He told university student members of the Basij militia: “Syria is the 35th province [of Iran] and a strategic province for us. If the enemy attacks us and wants to appropriate either Syria or Khuzestan [in western Iran], the priority is that we keep Syria.... If we keep Syria, we can get Khuzestan back too. But if we lose Syria, we cannot keep Tehran."

Taeb – head of the Ammar strategic base, which is focused on cyber war and soft war -- also pointed to the Islamic Republic's support of Syrian militias through Iranian advisors inside the country.

He explained, “Syria had an army, but did not have the ability to manage a war inside Syria’s cities. It is for this reason the Iranian government suggested that, to manage an urban war you must form a Basij…The Syrian Basij was formed with 60,000  [members] of the Party of God (Hezbollah), who took over the war on the streets from the army."

Two Lebanese columnists, writing today for an-Nahar, slam both Hojjatoleslam Taeb and Hezbollah.

Rajeh el-Khoury says, “Blatant Iranian interference in Syria comes after a series of complicities in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, the UAE and at the side of Yemen’s Houthis. They also come after a long history of threats and claims to the right of being the region’s éminence grise at the price of poisoning intra-Muslim relations and mobilizing Sunnis to confront Shiites in the 35^th province.”

Ali Hamadeh believes the “inevitable consequence” of Hezbollah’s “diabolic” and “criminal” involvement in the killing of Syrians will be to bring the conflict to the “heart of Lebanon” at the cost of innocent Lebanese lives.