Who killed the “Arab Spring”?

Ghassan Charbel, editor-in-chief of pan-Arab al-Hayat, penned this think piece in Arabic

Where are the young men and women who nearly three years ago crammed the plazas and public squares calling for the downfall of who they called the tyrant or the dictator or the despot?

Do they remember the victory signs they raised when they heard news of his escape or his standing down or his killing?

Do they recall the dreams they dared reflect upon in those days and their talk of democracy, state institutions, transparency, the transfer of power and the respect of human rights?

Was their behavior actually motivated by their fervor, their innocence or their naïveté?

Were they alien to their communities and ignorant of the degree of injustice permeating their depths and the wells of hatred waiting for an opportunity to explode?

Did it escape them that the problem is basically cultural rather than political and that it is not enough to open the ballot boxes to turn over the page of the past?

Did it escape them as well that centuries of darkness contributed to the incarceration of the Arab intellect and its disablement, rendering the Arab individual incapable of handling the keys to the future?

I have been obsessed for weeks by an irritating question: “Who killed the ‘Arab Spring’?”

That’s why I seize the opportunity of coming across anyone of the major players in the said “Spring” to ask for his assessment – especially now that some of the said ‘Spring’s’ theaters shut out the advocates of democracy and of modern state-building.

I will not name my respondents because our discussions were not to be published.

The man played an important role in his country’s “Arab Spring” when he dealt a painful blow to the despot under whose portrait he served for several years.

I asked him the question, “Who killed the ‘Arab Spring’?”

“I don’t know,” he replied.

“What you call the ‘Spring’ may have come early, before our societies became ready to embrace a transformation of this magnitude.

“It turned out we still live in the depths of history.

“With the tyrants’ fall, our societies began spewing all the blood, pus, hatreds, coercions and reprisals that accumulated in their guts.

“I think the transitional phase will be daunting and extended. In any case the French Revolution took eight decades before settling down.”

He added:

“We are in a terrible state of underdevelopment. Watch the screens. A university professor talks as if he has yet to enter the era of reading and writing.

“Look at nation-states, like for example Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Bahrain that are now paying the price of what took place between Ali and Muawiyah.

“We discuss globalization and technology and then go to sleep in the caves of history.

“Our capitals are closer to abattoirs overflowing with suicide bombers and assassins.

“Our countries fail to provide regular power supplies to their citizens.

“Our societies participated in killing the ‘Arab Spring’ by letting the prisoners of history take the lead.”

Another player put forward a different reading.

He said the most prominent killers of the “Arab Spring” are those who rushed to mold it, casting an image of their own interests.

He said the West acted as a crook, especially Obama’s America. Washington wanted the phenomenon to serve the policy she adopted years earlier – in essence the policy of promoting to power what she calls moderate Islam, thinking that the latter could contain terror.

He added: The Muslim Brothers, who were the better organized and widespread movement in the community, took this as an historic opportunity to devour it all.

He also said Turkey played a role in killing the “Arab Spring” when she considered a “Brotherhood Spring” victory gives her a trump card in her strategic wrestling with Iran.

He said Qatar used her financial might and international relations to prop up the “Brotherhood Spring” alongside Turkey.

Russia, he remarked was focusing on stifling the “Muslim Spring” lest it turned into a card in the hands of the West or spread to her vicinity.

He said Russia found in Syria’s events a chance to kill the “Arab Spring.” Iran was of the same opinion but for different purposes.

The two men’s words helped me understand what is now going on in more than one Arab country.

I got convinced the “Arab Spring” killers were more than one.

Most probably a stormy season is just about to kick off – a long and painful transition season.

The first condition for moving into the future is to exit the caves of history and bury the illusions of ready-made solutions.

Why should Saudi Arabia feel anxious and lonely?

This is my paraphrasing of the weekly think piece penned in Arabic by Saudi mass media celebrity Jamal Khashoggi for pan-Arab daily al-Hayat

Saeed al-Wahhabi is a young Saudi writer with a blunt and concise style of expressing himself in writing.

After the Saudis were crammed all day long with news analyses of the nuclear deal between the 5+1 world powers and Iran, he encapsulated the general Saudi mood last Sunday night with a tweet saying, “No doubt, Saudi Arabia feels lonely tonight.”

Yes, it was a tough night.

Until an official (Saudi) statement cautiously welcoming the agreement was released, the ghosts and illusions of threats and isolation made the rounds.

At the same time, analysts were piling up the jitters: “Iran is the region’s policeman” and “As customary, the United States double-crosses her allies and lets them down.”

In context, I personally told Agence France-Presse (AFP) Iran softened her nuclear ambitions in order to win hegemony over the region.

But the public’s anxiety and dejected feeling were unwarranted. The agreement reached in Geneva last Sunday is natural and a commonplace occurrence in history, which should rid the region from the specter of war that has been hovering in its skies for over a decade.

When serving as Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince Turki al-Faisal coined a brief answer explaining Saudi Arabia’s position on Iran’s nuclear program. This was because he would be asked about the subject each time he held a stateside press conference or met with U.S. officials.

Prince Turki’s cliché answer went like this: “We live today between two nightmares. The first is Iran making a nuclear bomb. The other is Israel blitzing Iran’s nuclear facilities and dragging the region into a war of unknown scope and outcome.”

The new Iran deal dispels our bad dreams – at least during its six-month timeframe when Tehran will freeze its progress towards a possible nuclear bomb and Israel won’t launch a preventive strike against Iran to prevent it from obtaining nuclear weapons.

There is also a chance of the November 24 interim agreement making a permanent check on Iran’s nuclear ambitions and bringing permanent peace to the region.

What should be a matter of concern for us Saudis are the state of “anxiety and apprehension” and the case of “going to bed (if at all) feeling lonely” as Wahhabi suggested in his tweet.

Abdullah al-Askar, who heads the foreign relations committee in the Shura (Consultative) Council, said, “Denizens of the region won’t be getting much shut-eye.”

Such negative reactions are a source of concern for the express and endemic lack of confidence in our ability to cope with overdue change in the region.

I put forward that this is because:

• We got “used” to being dependent on the U.S. as a strategic ally that will invariably lend us a hand in times of crises.
• We realized the region started to wobble and lose its balance after the fall of Iraq and Saddam Hussein (and this is not to bemoan the loss of the man or his regime)
• Then came Turkey’s rise as a regional power, Egypt’s eclipse for internal reasons associated with the Arab Spring, and Pakistan’s hibernation after the wounds it sustained post 9/11 and its mini civil war with the Taliban.

It can be argued that Saudi Arabia stand alone in facing up to Iran and her regional ambitions. That’s despite the kingdom having common interests with Turkey and Qatar for instance in the Syria war, and with the UAE, Kuwait and Qatar in Bahrain’s turmoil.

Nonetheless, there is no united front or agreement to confront Iran. All the countries I mentioned now and earlier have links and interests with Iran. But they all lack a common strategic agenda for action on the Syria front. This has allowed the Syrian regime and its Iranian backer to score victories over opposition forces.

The November 24 agreement did not give Iran a free hand in the region. But her hands were not exactly tied behind her back before the agreement.

Proof is Tehran’s unchallenged military intervention in Syria.

Iran is thus aware the West is not particularly interested in what she is doing in Yemen or in Bahrain so long as the IAEA inspectors are going about their jobs freely and the enrichment of uranium is not exceeding the agreed level.

Iran will thus enhance its activities in places like Yemen and Bahrain in order to test her new relations with the West.

Saudi Arabia would have to face this alone, but not necessarily. She still has common interests with regional heavyweights.

But a restructuring of Saudi Arabia’s defense policy is imperative – starting with an acknowledgement that reliance on the United States is unhealthy.

The fact America turned her back on us was not a whimsical Obama move. It was a well thought out U.S. policy resulting from ongoing changes in America’s priorities.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia would thus have to redraw the map of her regional alliances. Turkey is key. Her leaders want special relations with the kingdom.

But Egypt is yet to come back from the wilderness. The most that can be heard from Cairo is, “We support all what you do” – except that Cairo did nothing for Syria.

Pakistan too needs a friend’s help to make up with the Taliban, allowing the Pakistani army to resume its national duties.

It will also be necessary to open channels of communication with Iran, even while the confrontation persists. Tehran repeats every five minutes that it wants good relations with the kingdom. Let’s take after the Iranians’ diligence and hear what they have to say.

The region’s problems are many. They multiply when neglected but they can be solved. The region also harbors allies and friends of ours. We don’t have to feel lonely after that dreary Sunday.

The state of play in Syria today

Iran Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the Grand Imam of al-Azhar Ahmad al-Tayyib

“Syria was not drowning in her blood yet. She was being swept by peaceful protests suggesting an Arab Spring wind was blowing in her direction,” Ghassan Charbel, editor-in-chief of pan-Arab al-Hayat, comments today.

He carries on:

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei received an Arab guest. The conversation centered on Syria.

A conclusive sentence by the host summarized the position: “The choice is obvious in Syria. She can be like she used to be or she won’t be anyone’s at all.”

I met Khamenei’s Arab visitor in Cairo. He was trying to explain to me why Lebanese Hezbollah crossed the border to join the fighting in Syria.

He said, “All sides have laid their cards on the table. From hereon, makeup and facelifts are good-for-nothing. We are in the throes a Sunni-Shiite conflict. The struggle taking place in and over Syria will determine future balances in the region.”

A few hours earlier, I had called on Sheikh Ahmad al-Tayyib, the Grand Imam of al-Azhar. I saw him worrying lest the conflict in Syria turns sectarian. He felt bitter about Hezbollah hurling itself into the Syria war and tarnishing its image as a party solely devoted to standing up to Israel.

The Grand Imam of al-Azhar does not reproach Hezbollah only.

He did not get convincing answers from one of his visitors named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The dialogue last February was frank and transparent. The Grand Imam of al-Azhar quizzed his visitor about Iran’s position vis-à-vis Bahrain and the three UAE islands.

He also asked him about Iran’s role in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen. And he did not hesitate to ask Ahmadinejad about the Sunnis’ circumstances in Iran itself.

Ahmadinejad answered the tough questions by encapsulating the Iranian stance in one sentence: “Resistance to the usurper Zionist entity.”

The tiff did not go unnoticed.

The gravity of the conflict in Syria has forced all countries concerned to outpace diplomatic phraseology and lay bare their true positions.

President Mohamed Morsi, who at one point fancied courting Iran and Russia to carve out a Syria peace role for Egypt, buried the idea after Hezbollah’s plunge. He also hardened his position against the regime and went overboard.

The ongoing bloodbath in Syria changed the images of countries and their roles. It unmasked the depth of their contradictory feelings, their conflicting policies and their old and new fears.

The perception of Iran forging ahead under the banner of bravado and resistance hit a brick wall of Sunni resentment across the region. Tehran’s immersion in the Syria crisis lost Iran her aura and image.

At the same time, the axis of resistance lost its sole Sunni interface, Hamas. The Hamas movement in turn repositioned itself in its natural camp.

Overt interference in Syria dramatically changed Hezbollah’s footing. Having said it was joining a life-or-death battle in Syria, the party is now on the first line of engagement with the Sunnis of Syria, Lebanon and the region.

Hezbollah’s venture accelerated the cracks in Lebanon’s state institutions, coupled the “Lebanese arena” with the “Syrian arena” and added new injuries to historic wounds.

There are those who believe Lebanon will suffer from the logic “it is either ours or no one else’s.” This means bringing the temple down if you can’t make it solely yours.

The battle for Qusayr thrust the region into a situation where governments have to be in sync with inflamed passions on their street.

Decisions taken at the Doha meeting show the conflict has reached the point of no return.

Measures by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) partners targeting Hezbollah loyalists and financiers sent an unmistakable signal. The battle in Syria has turned regional and international.

Russia’s behavior is in step with “Syria can be like she used to be or she won’t be anyone’s at all.”

Still dithering and fearful of Jabhat al-Nusra and its sisters, America has been whitewashed to accept arming the opposition.

The Syrian regime opted too soon for “Syria can be like she used to be or she won’t be anyone’s at all.”

For hardliners in the opposition, “Syria can be like we wish her to be or she won’t be anyone’s at all.”

A battle as vitriolic internally, regionally and internationally threatens to pulverize Syria and ravage the weak neighboring milieus.

No one country can endure this level of risks and this number of risk-takers.

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. 

"The Dangerous Price of Ignoring Syria"

A must read op-ed contributed by Vali Nasr to The New York Times. I missed the piece when published by the paper earlier this week. Here goes:

By Vali Nasr

President Obama has doggedly resisted American involvement in Syria. The killing of over 70,000 people and the plight of over a million refugees have elicited sympathy from the White House but not much more. That is because Syria challenges a central aim of Obama’s foreign policy: shrinking the U.S. footprint in the Middle East and downplaying the region’s importance to global politics. Doing more on Syria would reverse the U.S. retreat from the region.

Since the beginning of Obama’s first term, the administration’s stance as events unfolded in the Middle East has been wholly reactive. This “lean back and wait” approach has squandered precious opportunity to influence the course of events in the Middle East. There has been no strategy for capitalizing on the opportunity that the Arab Spring presented, or for containing its fallout — the Syrian crisis being the worst case to date. The president rewarded Burmese generals with a six-hour visit for their willingness to embrace reform, but he has not visited a single Arab country that went through the Arab Spring.

Obama sees Syria as a tragic humanitarian crisis without obvious strategic implications for the United States. “How do I weigh tens of thousands who’ve been killed in Syria versus the tens of thousands who are currently being killed in the Congo?” he asked in a New Republic interview in January. When the president visited the region last month he chose to focus on the Arab-Israeli peace process rather than Syria. The peace process is now at the top of Secretary of State John Kerry’s agenda.

The plight of Palestinians is a perennial concern, but it is in Syria that the future of the region hangs in the balance. Choosing the peace process over Syria underscores not the administration’s interest in the Middle East but its determination to look past it.

Washington has wasted precious time in using diplomatic, economic and military levers to influence the course of events in Syria. That neglect has allowed the conflagration to rage at great human cost, radicalizing the opposition and putting at risk U.S. allies across the region.

America cannot and should not decide the fate of the Middle East, but it should be clear about its stakes there, and not shy away from efforts to at least nudge events in more favorable directions as this critical region faces momentous choices. A “lean back and wait” posture toward unfolding events is dangerous.

The paroxysm of violence in Syria is expected to kill tens of thousands more and produce as many as three million refugees by the year’s end. That is a humanitarian tragedy to be sure, but one with immediate strategic consequences. American insouciance in the face of that devastation is fomenting anti-Americanism. The waves of refugees will constitute an unstable population that will be a breeding ground for extremism and in turn destabilize the countries where they take refuge. Syria’s neighbors are not equipped to deal with a humanitarian disaster on this scale.

The longer the devastation goes on the more difficult it will be to put Syria back together, and failing to do so will leave a dangerous morass in the heart of the Middle East, a failed state at war with itself where extremism and instability will fester and all manner of terrorists and Al Qaeda affiliates will find ample space, resources and recruits to menace the region and world.

Worse yet, the conflict in Syria could spill over its borders. Syria has become ground zero in a broader conflict that pits Shiites against Sunnis and shapes the larger regional competition for power between Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Syria’s paroxysms if allowed to drag on could potentially spread far and wide and even change the map of the region. America may think it does not have any interests in Syria, but it has interests everywhere the Syrian conflict touches.

Lebanon and Iraq are each deeply divided along sectarian lines, and both countries teeter on a knife’s edge as tensions rise between their ascendant Shiite populations who fear a setback if Bashar al-Assad falls, and the minority Sunnis in their own countries who support Syria’s Sunni-led opposition. Sectarian tensions stretch from Lebanon and Iraq through the Gulf countries of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain and on to Pakistan where sectarian violence has exploded into the open.

It is time America takes the lead in organizing international assistance to refugees. America should not hide behind the Russian veto. It should pursue a concerted diplomatic strategy in support of arming the rebels and imposing a no-flight zone over Syria. That would not only hamper Assad’s ability to fight, it would allow refugees to remain within Syria’s borders, thus reducing pressure on neighboring countries.

It is time the U.S. took over from Qatar and Saudi Arabia in organizing the Syrian opposition into a credible political force — failure to do that accounts for the chaos that has paralyzed the group. There are powerful economic sanctions that the U.S. could use to cripple the Assad regime.

Finally, America should build ties with the Free Syrian Army with the goal of denying extremist groups the ability to dominate the armed resistance and gaining influence with groups that will dominate Syria’s future. It was failing to build those ties in Afghanistan that allowed the resistance groups who opposed the Soviet Union to disintegrate into the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

The Syrian crisis has become a Gordian knot that cannot be easily disentangled. As daunting as the crisis looks, there is a cost to inaction — in human suffering, regional instability and damage to America’s global standing. And as the Syrian crisis escalates, America and the world will only rediscover their stakes in the Middle East. If Obama truly wants to pivot away from the Middle East then he has to help end the bloodletting in Syria.

Vali Nasr, dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, is the author of the forthcoming book “The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat.”

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.

A propos Iran, the U.S. and Saudi foreign policy

U.S. and Iran footballers: A lesson for politicians?

Saudi foreign policy has to grapple with two key problems à propos change in the region and the world order.

One is Iran, which is not exactly a new problem. The other is the Obama Administration forging ahead with its strategic pivot from the Middle East to East Asia.

Saudi academician and writer Khalid al-Dakheel, in his weekly column today for the Saudi-owned pan-Arab daily al-Hayat, believes the two problems have taken new dimensions.

He explains:

After gaining a foothold in Bilad al-Sham through its alliance with the Syrian regime, Iran proceeded to plant Hezbollah as its military arm in Lebanon.

Ironically, this was done under the smokescreen of “resistance” (to Israel) and a Saudi-Syrian “understanding” on Lebanon.

Having then bagged Iraq from U.S. occupation forces and enthroned its surrogates in Baghdad, Iran is now out defending the Syrian regime and striving to be the paramount power in the Gulf as a step to expand its influence throughout the Arab Mashreq.

Iran’s aim is to be the nation-state of the region’s Shiites and to be recognized as such by Washington.

To realize this dream, after ensnaring Syria and Iraq, Iran has to face the bigger challenge posed by Saudi Arabia and Egypt – more so Saudi Arabia because it is the Gulf’s richest country, sits on Iraq’s doorstep and is home to Islam’s two holiest mosques (al-Masjid al-Haram in Mecca and al-Masjid al-Nabawi in Medina).

Iran is aware that undermining Saudi Arabia is a tall order: the ethnic, sectarian and historical impediments are simply formidable and countless. That’s why Tehran chose instead to surround the kingdom with Iranian clients and hotbeds of unrest – northward in Iraq, southward in Yemen and eastward in Bahrain and Kuwait.

Egypt is as impregnable as Saudi Arabia, except that Egypt lies further away geographically and is currently beset with political and economic problems. This explains why Iran is trying to lure Egypt away from the Gulf with promises of financial aid and a collaborative solution for Syria.

With the Syrian regime now on its last legs, Iran can recognize the expiry of its sell by date, cut its losses and facilitate the transfer of power in Damascus. Or, it can continue backing the regime at the price of walking away with no more than a piece of a fragmented Syria.

Iran’s predicament is also the region’s. Therein lies the future significance of Saudi foreign policy and Washington’s pivoting from the Middle East to the Asia-Pacific region.

President Barack Obama’s pivot toward the Asia-Pacific region is all about China.

While the U.S. was off fighting its wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, China’s amazing growth and the promise of its huge and expanding market turned the Asia-Pacific region into the global economy’s center of gravity.

A report last November by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) expects the United States to cede its place as the world’s largest economy to China as early as 2016.

Washington is equally concerned by China more than doubling its declared military spending from 2006 to 2012, roughly in keeping with economic growth.

There are two unmistakable signs Obama is forging ahead with steps to pivot U.S. foreign policy from the Middle East to Asia.

One is his perseverance in “leading from behind” on Syria. The other is keeping his “extended hand” to Iran.

Zbigniew Brzezinski, who served as U.S. National Security Advisor under President Jimmy Carter, says the U.S. can deter and contain a nuclear Iran, such as it is still deterring North Korea from using its nuclear weapons against South Korea and Japan.

Also, confirmation of Chuck Hagel, Obama’s pick for defense secretary, remains blocked because he is soft on Iran and previously called for talks between Washington and Tehran without preconditions.

It seems America’s strategic shift to Southeast Asia, the accumulation of Arab crises and the Arab’s impotence in solving albeit one of them are pushing many Americans to support a political deal with Iran.

Strangely, all U.S. talk of such an understanding with Tehran makes no mention of Saudi Arabia.

So how would Saudi Arabia react? Could it face such an eventuality with its same old foreign policy tools and premises?

Saudi foreign policy needs to update its perceptions and tools to match up with America’s strategic rebalancing, Iran’s agenda and the current winds thrashing the Arab world, not to mention the sea changes in Saudi society, the region and the world order.

Can the foreign policy adopted at the height of the Cold War by King Saud and King Faisal, God bless their souls, remain unchanged after 50 years?

Clearly, the policy that failed in Iraq and Syria, was half-successful in Yemen and Bahrain and missed setting up stable and enduring alliances in the region needs reappraisal and revision.

Time for a rethink of Saudi foreign policy

“Saudi foreign policy requires large-scale reform. The policy’s premises and political instruments call for renewal as well.”

Dr. Khalid al-Dakheel

In a two-part series published February 3 and February 10 in the Saudi-owned pan-Arab daily al-Hayat, authoritative Saudi analyst and professor of political sociology at King Saud University Khalid al-Dakheel penned a sober, in-depth analysis of the reasons for the required overhaul.

Here is the essence of his argument:

Changed times open the way to changed societies. Nation-states have to adapt and react accordingly.

Likewise at the regional level, where a nation-state is expected to respond and react to changed surroundings, revamping the rationale of its regional and international policies and alliances correspondingly.

Aftereffects of the changes sweeping the Arab World – all the way from the Arab Mashreq to the Arab Maghreb – for the past two years have been monumental. Because their socio-popular causes targeted the ruling establishment and the nature of the State, the Arab World we knew in the 20^th Century is fading away before our eyes.

Problem is, no one knows when or how or where the changes in the regional states’ political cultures, values, interests and alliances would lead.

What is certain is that the Arab World won’t be the same again.

The era of the two Assads’ rule in Syria, for example, is clearly fizzling out.

But what kind of Syria will emerge from the ruins, rivers of blood and social fabric distortions that the two Assads’ rule caused over 40 years?

In Egypt, the First Republic has cracked. But the Second Republic is yet to see the light because of a destructive struggle in free fall. The struggle pits two major components of a shabby political class. The Muslim Brotherhood leads one component while its detractors lead the other.

The same, or almost, can be said in the cases of Yemen, Libya and Tunisia.

Then comes Iraq, where years of suffering culminated in the U.S. invasion.

After the end of the U.S. occupation, came sectarian governance in Iraq under Iran’s thumb.

And now, there is a new uprising in Iraq’s west, seeking a redress.

Where would all this lead? What would happen to political power checks and balances in Jordan and Morocco? How would the situation in Bahrain end?

The questions are endless. But they are legitimate, pressing and on everyone’s mind. They also need to be addressed audaciously, transparently and realistically.

Saudi Arabia falls in the middle of these troubled waters and sits in the eye of their storm.

She is a vast, rich and politically stable country. But she is lashed by wild winds from all sides.

Paradoxically, Saudi Arabia’s influence on the stormy events’ course is far from being commensurate with her breadth, her potentials, her stability and her vast network of regional and international relations.

Her clout in Iraq, for instance, is now little. Saudi Arabia invested massively in this neighboring Arab country since 1973, essentially throughout the era of the late Saddam Hussein.

The investment ended with the disastrous invasion of Kuwait and its aftermath.

Among the consequences was Saudi Arabia exiting, and Iran entering, Iraq from the early days of the U.S. occupation.

Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal said as much at a Council on Foreign Relations meeting in New York in September 2005. He told a questioner then that the United States was handing Iraq over to Iran on a silver platter.

This was stated publicly. But did Washington hand Iraq over to Iran on a silver platter by Saudi default? Why did the United States overlook the interests of Saudi Arabia and her Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) partners as well as Jordan and Egypt when it was occupying Iraq and running its internal affairs?

All the said states were Washington’s allies. So why did the administration of George W. Bush hand over the reins of power in Iraq to Iran’s Iraqi proxies?

How come the U.S. and Iran went fifty-fifty in Iraq since 2003?

What made Washington ignore the scope and depth of social and longstanding relations between Iraq and Saudi Arabia and their mutual interests, given that the two countries share a 900-kilometer-long common border?

Where Washington was concerned, its alliance with Riyadh in this case counted for little.

Why did this happen and how? Can the outcome be blamed on the conservative nature of Saudi foreign policy and its tendency to react instead of taking the initiative?

Turning to Syria, the payback was not any better.

Saudi Arabia invested much -- politically and financially -- in the Assad regimes for decades. It is fair to say the investment in Hafez paid off to a degree.

The investment secured a modicum of stability in intra-Arab and Arab-Iranian relations, in forging a Saudi-Syrian-Egyptian axis that played a key role in the October War and in realigning Arab positions generally.

But the axis failed to lay the foundations for equitable and solid Saudi-Syrian bilateral relations. Proof is that it failed to prevent Syria falling gradually into Iran’s lap. Under Bashar, a solid Damascus-Tehran alliance was cemented.

Saudi-Syrian relations started going downhill and reached breaking point after Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri’s assassination in 2005. All accusing fingers pointed at the Syrian regime and Hezbollah.

Saudi Arabia tried to overcome this in the three years leading to the May 2008 Doha Agreement, which gave Hezbollah – Iran and the Syrian regime’s cat’s paw in Lebanon – a one-third blocking majority in a planned government.

Hezbollah has since become the kingmaker in Lebanese politics. Armed to the teeth by Iranian weapons it receives via Syria, the party now decides the head, lineup and manifesto of every new Lebanese government.

Awkwardly, the Saudi-sponsored 1989 Taef Agreement provided for the disarmament of all national and non-national militias. All have disarmed apart from Hezbollah.

In other words, as part of her investment in the Syrian regime, Saudi Arabia provided Arab cover for the flow of Iranian arms to Hezbollah via Syria.

This does not mean Saudi Arabia approved all that was happening. But all this happened nevertheless.

Ultimately, Saudi-Syrian relations collapsed with the outbreak of the Syrian Revolution in March 2011, after which Assad described Saudi and Gulf Arab leaders as heads of Bedouin states that have “no tradition, no history.”

Doesn’t this warrant root changes in Saudi foreign policy and its cornerstones?

Over and above the foreign policy debacles of the highest order in Iraq and Syria, you can hardly point at any Saudi foreign policy success or breakthrough elsewhere since 1990 – one that would match the investment put in it.  

Of late, however, Saudi foreign policy succeeded partially in two instances.

Before the Arab Spring, it did well in cooperating with the Sana’a government to keep the political situation in Yemen under control.

After the Arab Spring, it succeeded through the “Gulf Initiative” in having Ali Abdullah Saleh transfer power to Vice-President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to lead the transition and spare Yemen a slide into civil war.

But the success is still unfulfilled. Southern separatism has reignited, the country remains in political transition under UN supervision, and Saleh is still lying in wait.

So why is Saudi foreign policy’s track record a blend of unfulfilled successes and utter disappointments?

To be fair, Saudi Arabia is not to blame for the Yemen initiative staying unfulfilled. The blame falls on the complexities of Yemeni politics and the meddling by Iran, which is bent on smuggling arms into the country to destabilize it and gain a foothold in the Arabian Peninsula’s south.

In March 2011, Saudi Arabia and her GCC partners decided to deploy Peninsula Shield forces in Bahrain to protect vital installations after the escalation of clashes there between security forces and protesters.

It was the right decision to make in terms of objective and timing, except that the decision lacked a political initiative to heal sectarian and political divisions that gripped Bahrain in the wake of the Arab Spring.

Again, Iran has been exploiting the Bahrain crisis to gain a foothold at Saudi Arabia’s doorstep.

In other words, Saudi Arabia and her GCC partners succeeded in helping Bahrain cope with the situation, but failed to bring it to a close.

It seems the anchors of Saudi foreign policy no longer suit this period.

The anchors were based on making the most of the balances of powers and interests in the region without direct involvement.

The geographic, economic, demographic and Islamic credentials of Saudi Arabia allowed her to carve herself a strategic position in a strategic part of the world. Until recently, she was one of the four legs of the Arab regional order table.

The irony is that Saudi Arabia had no military muscle to match either her geographic and economic weight or her political and regional role.

Today, she can no more be the region’s powerbroker, especially in the Arab Gulf.

Iraq and Iran were at one point the Gulf’s powerbrokers. Since the occupation of Iraq, Iran shares the role with the United States while seeking to become the region’s hegemon.

With foreign policies requiring teeth and power sources, Saudi Arabia is still relying on (1) diplomacy and financial giveaways and (2) regional and international power balances. She has control over the first two elements and controls nothing of the rest. The result is what we saw and are seeing in Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.

Clearly, the policy of relying on the balances of power game without military muscle requires revision.