Syrian Open – advantage Israel!

Has Israel officially entered the Syrian revolution when striking a military and research facility near Damascus last week? Not so fast.

Firstly, the Syrian revolution as it started out two years ago has become the proxy war in Syria. Syrian interests, and the aspirations of the Syrian people for legitimate governance that respects free speech and human rights, have become a sideshow in a greater war, the war for geopolitical supremacy in the Middle East.

Secondly, Israel will never officially enter a conflict in its neighborhood unless there is no way of denying its involvement. Israel's game is the game of ambiguous military actions, of intelligence operations and psychological warfare. The tacit cooperation that Arab countries have had with Israel over the years is one of the best kept secrets in the Middle East. The Great Satan is the great collaborator? A fact that is too outrageous to admit.

Israel was quick to make clear that its cross border foray was not aimed at the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. And indeed: Israel's goals are different than one might think. Israel has nothing to gain from a regime change in Syria. They love Assad in Jerusalem! For almost 40 years, not a single bullet had been fired from Syria direction Israel. And this despite the fact that the Assad regime, father and son, had positioned itself as the last government of a neighboring country that held up the flag of resistance.

Egypt and Jordan were induced to sign peace treaties with Israel. And from the chaotic political situation in Beirut could never emerge a real threat to Israel. As Robert D. Kaplan recently wrote for Stratfor: “because the Arabs never really believed in their dysfunctional states, they didn't always fight very well in state-organized formations. But sub-state militaries like Hezbollah and Hamas have been more of a challenge (to Israel).”

In fact, it was Hezbollah that was on Israel's mind when striking in Damascus. Acting on intelligence – true or false – that weapons were en route to South Lebanon, Israel drew a red line. A red line that other stakeholders in the Syrian quagmire had drawn as well, for various reasons, but then shied away from actually enforcing it.

Israel knows that it can get away with almost anything in the Middle East. If matters should become too tricky there is always the big brother in Washington that will serve as the ultimate goal keeper.

Life is good in Israel. The unemployment rate is lower than in the United States and in Europe, despite high housing costs and the need for reform in health care and education. It seems that only outside observers are bothered by the fact that a few dozen kilometers away from the posh neighborhoods of Tel Aviv, there are people living in third world conditions. The Palestinians are passing their days under enormous stress, with only random access to water and electricity and a feeling of injustice that will never go away.

Israel is a colonizer, not a liberator. It would be foolish to think that Israel would enter the Syrian war zone on the side of Assad's opponents. It must have been sheer desperation that got the much followed @THE47_th tweeting from Homs: “Syrians undergoing their biggest debate ever: to cheer or not to cheer Israeli attack on Assad. ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? HELL YEAH”.

My friend from Homs, one is inclined to say, don't waste your tweets on Israel coming to your rescue. Israel never does anything for the sake of others. Your neighbor is the purest political realist, the most ardent disciple of Machiavelli there is. Israel only acts for the sake of its very own security environment.

The latest round in the perennial conflict that is the Middle East clearly goes to Israel. The amount of dilemma Israel's actions are able to create in the minds of others is almost funny to watch, if it were not that tragic. Should one praise Israel for bombing Assad's weapons' warehouse? Or should one condemn them, out of principle? Israel knows the psychological keyboard well and it plays it with competence.

Israel's raid on Damascus hit three targets with one strike. It showed that Syria cannot fully control its airspace (and that establishing a no fly zone over Syria would actually be possible); it cut off weapons' supply from Iran to Hezbollah, Israel's most feared enemy; and it discredited the Syrian opposition as collaborators of Israel in the Arab Street, when Assad's foes cheered Israel's military actions.

Israel deliberately added fuel to the fire in Syria. Netanyahu and his government don't care if the whole Middle East goes up in flames. In chaos, strong and focused actors thrive best.

At the end of the day, Israel prefers Assad to be in charge in Damascus, but it doesn't really mind who is sitting in the presidential palace – as long as the ruler of Syria is open for Israeli air strikes on his territory!

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Lebanon, the impossible state

After the resignation of Najib Mikati on March 22, 2013, Lebanon is without a government, again. In an attempt to avoid a descent into instability and potential conflict, Lebanon's political factions agreed to nominate Tamman Salam to succeed Mikati as prime minister. Since his nomination at the beginning of April, Salam is struggling to form a new government.

The questions have been asked before: what exactly is Lebanon and can Lebanon be governed? Reading John Agnew's "geopolitics: re-visioning world politics", and particularly the chapter dealing with different aspects of territorial states, one comes to an astonishing conclusion: Lebanon is not a state! This finding alone defines and affects every political struggle that Lebanon, and in fact many “states” in the Middle East, is facing.

What is a territorial state? According to Agnew's geopolitical theory, a territorial state has exclusive power within its territory as represented by the concept of sovereignty; it is a political entity where domestic and foreign affairs are essentially separated realms in which different rules obtain; and finally: the boundaries of a territorial state define the boundaries of society such that the latter is totally contained by the former.

Looking at Lebanon, one can discard all three of these assumptions. The exclusive power within its territory is a mere wish for Lebanon. Israeli airplanes violate the Lebanese airspace almost daily; Israel still occupies parts of Lebanon such as the Shebaa Farms and Ghajar. Out in the Mediterranean Sea, the sea boundaries urgently need demarcation amid the discovery of gas fields and claims by Israel that these resources are on their side of an unmarked border. Already Israel has begun to exploit these gas fields, while Lebanon is still discussing how to go about this project.

In addition, the whole of Lebanon is actually claimed by Syria, which only in the last years seemed to accept the idea of an independent Lebanon. Meanwhile, Syria is forced to mind its own business, having sunk into a civil war, with increasing violations of the Lebanese border by all sides of the conflict.

disputed: oil and gas from the Mediterranean

Domestic and foreign policy are clearly one and the same in Lebanon, at least at the level of the political class pretending to govern Lebanon. With a central power not existing and thus failing to protect the different sub-national communities in Lebanon, these communities look to foreign supporters to give them protection in the domestic ring. That is why Lebanese politicians are constantly on the road, to consult with their mentors and to secure their support. These politicians know the 5-star hotels in Paris or their own private mansions in Jeddah much better than the road from Beirut to Tripoli or the Roman ruins of Baalbek.

So is the containment of the Lebanese society within the boundaries of the Lebanese state? There are approximately four million people living in Lebanon, but more Lebanese are living outside the country, with estimates ranging from five millions to fifteen millions (but the latter number seems inflated and includes probably everybody who quotes Kibbeh as favorite dish). In addition to the Lebanese citizens, there is a big number of Palestinians living inside Lebanon, in camps that have become the end solution of what was thought to be a transitional stage. With Syrian refugees fleeing the war in their country, there are new arrivals to Lebanon every day. The territory called Lebanon is not the society and the society is not Lebanon.

Lebanon's non-existing sovereignty of its state culminates in all matters related to Lebanese citizens working abroad. Lebanon is reliant on exporting labor, in order to keep the unemployment rate in Lebanon as low as possible. At the same time, the money these workers are sending back to Lebanon is an important economical factor. However, these dependencies make Lebanon – again – vulnerable to outside pressure. During the Syria crisis, Qatar and other Gulf countries threatened, on many occasions, to expel Lebanese foreign workers should Lebanon not come more in line with their policies in Syria. Clearly, Lebanon is not the keeper of its own fate.

Is there a Lebanese society at all? Or is it rather a collection of countless religious communities, with a layer of clan structures on top of it, which together form the entity known as Lebanon? As Michael Young argues in his book "the Ghosts of Martyr Square", it is precisely this net of communities that make Lebanon the most liberal state in the Middle East, because all together these communities are more powerful than the state - the main barrier to personal freedom in the Middle East. But this personal freedom comes with a price: the power of the communities has deadlocked the state system on so many levels and occasions that it is in dire need of reform.

The idea of a powerful central state has always been a hard sell in Lebanon. For Michel Chiha, the liberal thinker and journalist, and one of the fathers of the Lebanese constitution, the mission of the state was to preserve the diversity of the society. The state should refrain from interfering with the communities and certainly not intervene in economical matters. A popular slogan, used by the Phalange party during the Lebanese civil war, was: “the strength of Lebanon lies in its weakness.” One might deplore that Lebanon is part of the Middle East: in a less perilous environment, Michel Chiha's theories could have been a guarantee for peace and stability.

A core feature of state power is its ability to grant civil rights to its citizens. As all issues of life and death in Lebanon, affairs like marriage, divorce and inheritance have been outsourced to the religious communities (or actually, they have never been insourced by a Lebanese state). You are born, you marry, you divorce, you die and you inherit under Shia, Sunni or Christian law - different rules for people with the same nationality. Everywhere you go, your religion goes with you, whether you like it or not.

The movement for a civil marriage in Lebanon has not gained much momentum until now. This is somewhat surprising since, according to a 2005 survey, a remarkable 34% of Lebanese privilege their national identity over their confessional identity (in Jordan: 23%, in Morocco: 7%). In 2013, these numbers tend to be more in favor of the confessional identity. Events in the Middle East in the last two years have led to a relapse into religious factionalism instead of giving way to an overarching understanding of a civil society and a democratic state.

Recently, a brave Lebanese couple put up with all the paperwork and the political pressure to actually push through with the first ever civil marriage in Lebanon. Only a cynic is now waiting for the first civil divorce.

The legitimacy of modern states largely rests on "infrastructural power": the state's provision of public goods and services to the people living within the boundaries of the territorial state. With the ability to provide centrally and territorially organized services, the state delivers something other organizations cannot. In return for the infrastructure provided by the state authorities, the people grant power to these authorities and allow them to govern. It is a typicaldo ut des situation. The territorial state is no longer entirely the creation and in the service of state élites, but acts in the name of the people and for the people.

windmill project: infrastructural power

What Lebanon desperately needs is indeed infrastructure. It needs infrastructure for handling the ever growing mobility and traffic. It needs telecommunication infrastructure; and it needs electricity, uncut. Everyday Lebanon is losing millions of dollars because of the lacking or wanting infrastructure! People in the Beirut area spend hours in nerve wrecking traffic jams instead of being productively at work. A working high speed Internet would further enhance and exploit the creativity and the business-minded attitude of the Lebanese. And the perennial power cuts slow down every effort to get things done and are a daily reminder of the failures of the Lebanese system.

Therefore, Lebanon: forget about forming a new government that balances the various political and religious groups. Cut the never ending hours of useless political discussions down to zero. Stop leading the wrong discussions. Lebanon doesn't need politicians who see Lebanon as a self-service shop, for them and for their constituency. Lebanon needs independent, yet determined leading figures who go to church on Friday or on Sunday, and then mean business for Lebanon for the rest of the week. Lebanon needs people sitting on the board of LEB Corp. because of their vision and their deeds, not because of their religion or their foreign backers.

Only when there is infrastructural power coming out of Beirut - and when it is flowing to all places in Lebanon - will people understand that paying taxes is not a waste of money but a good investment. Lebanon doesn't need a shaky Democracy, it needs a stable Technocracy!

Hezbollah is undisputed in South Lebanon not only because it succeeded in resisting Israel. The party also provides the people of Southern Lebanon and the Bekaa with roads, bridges, schools, hospitals and public housing - which are destroyed by Israel in every new war which only increases the infrastructural power of Hezbollah when they rebuild it. This type of power is needed for all of Lebanon and it should be easy to realize.

Or does Lebanon need a nod from Saudi Arabia to build a subway from the Casino du Liban to Downtown Beirut? Does it need a Syrian OK, or a Russian OK for that matter, to build a plant of wind turbines in the ever windy Tripoli area? Do you have to ask the mullahs in Tehran when you want to boost the speed of the Internet in Tyre to 20MB/sec? Or does a Lebanese leader have to go to Washington, Paris or London to get the green light for enforcing emission reduced cars on Lebanese roads? If you need to do all of this, we might better call the idea of a Lebanon a day. We might sell parts of it to Iran, some to Syria and some to Saudi Arabia and leave Beirut for the Americans, to have them make a Disneyland Middle East out of it, shopping malls and fancy clubs included. But then, Lebanon is history.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Lebanon: Host and Hostage to Syria's War

Two years of war in Syria and there is no end in sight. Announced dead on many occasions, the regime of Bashar al-Assad has demonstrated more staying power than expected. The swift regime changes that had taken place in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya led some to the wrong assumption that Assad would soon be history as well.

The forces opposed to Assad keep displaying an almost unbelievable disunity, considering the enormous task at their hands. Uncoordinated and fragmented into many fighting groups, the opposition can win battles, but cannot win the war. To win against a regime that fights with its back to the wall, Assad's foes would need an overarching strategy, both on the military and on the political front. Instead, they keep bombing here and striking there, while a political opposition body speaking with one voice has yet to be constituted.

The longer the war in Syria goes on, the more Lebanon is drawn into this war. Basically, Lebanon is a patchwork of different fabrics, stitched and held together by a vague notion of being superior to its Middle Eastern neighbors. However in the spring of 2013, the patchwork of Lebanon is under severe stress, and the seams begin to burst.

On the one hand, the Lebanese anti and pro Assad camps emulate the events in Syria on a local stage, most visible in Lebanon's northern city Tripoli. Last week's clashes between the various factions have again caused victims on both sides of the front line. In Beirut and in Southern Lebanon, Syria is on everybody's mind as well: Hezbollah sends their fighters to Syria in order to support Assad on the battle field; Lebanese President Sleiman orders the army to stop all armed men en route to Syria; and Prime Minister Mikati resigns after disputes related to Syria within his government, leaving Lebanon heels over head once again.

a vague notion of superiority: Lebanon's patchwork

On the other hand, Syrian opposition forces use Lebanon as their retreat area, where they train, regroup and collect their breath. The Syrian presence in Lebanon today reminds him of the situation in Lebanon some 40 years ago, says Daoud, a reporter and media expert from Beirut, to whom I talk via Twitter and email. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) used Lebanon as their base of operations to fight Israel. The Lebanese state was too weak and too divided to keep the actions of the Palestinians and the Israelis on Lebanese soil under control.

The consequences were disastrous: Lebanon blew up in a civil war in 1975, Israel occupied parts of Lebanon until the year 2000, and Syria was invited to come to the rescue of some parties of the Lebanese civil war. Syrian troops would only leave Lebanon in 2005, after the assassination of Lebanon's Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and the ensuing so called Cedar Revolution.

Could the same scenario play out today? Could Lebanon again be host and hostage to foreign forces? With a powerful Lebanese state still being an illusion, the conditions for a strong foreign influence in Lebanon remain in place. Marie-Joëlle Zahar argues in “Lebanon – after the Cedar Revolution” that “when the state fails to credibly protect sub-national communities, these communities have two options to acquire the means to defend themselves against perceived threats: build up their military strength or enter into alliance with stronger powers that can protect them”. With Hezbollah heavily armed and aligned with Iran; with Sunni movements supported and guided by Saudi Arabia and Qatar – and with many other groups having similar arrangements – both options are a fact and a factor in Lebanon: yesterday, today and tomorrow.

However herein lies one of the problems of Lebanon: when potent protectors of Lebanese factions come under pressure on their home turf, as it is the case with Syria and Iran, the consequences are felt within the Lebanese system.

With the perennial clashes between the Alawite neighborhood of Jabal Mohsen and the Sunni neighborhood of Bab al-Tabbeneh, the bad news from Tripoli keep coming. “Tripoli today is not the same Tripoli that it was one month ago, and certainly not the Tripoli that it was three years ago.” Hanna, who hails from Tripoli, but now spends his week working in Beirut, is straight forward in his assessment. “Huge ideological changes have turned Tripoli into a more Islamic city. It quite feels like Tripoli is not in Lebanon anymore”, Hanna goes on. “Fighters belonging to the Free Syrian Army keep coming in and youngsters from Tripoli are leaving the city to fight against the regime in Syria.”

Is anyone trying the stop the downfall of Tripoli? No, says Hanna, and blames the Tripolitan society for remaining silent on everything that happens to their city. Gunman wandering the streets, Salafists becoming decision makers in Tripoli: the city breaks down violently, the population suffers silently.

Hezbollah was undoubtedly the strongest party in Lebanon in the past decade, having thick ties to Assad in Syria and the Mullahs in Iran. In its modus operandi, Hezbollah behaves like a heavy weight boxing champion on an off day. Hezbollah doesn't hit first, but is ready to react decisively to any provocation coming their way.

But more and more, the Hezbollah monopoly on weapons is challenged. Groups from the Sunni side of the Lebanese spectrum have also started to arm themselves, explains Daoud, in anticipation of things to happen. This mutual arming may lead to mutual deterrence. However, it may also lead to violent skirmishes, even to a destructive war. Events in Syria can spark many matches in Lebanon.

Is there a battle between Hezbollah and Jabhat al-Nusra (the Jihadist group very active in Syria) looming on the horizon? “Not so fast”, tells me Amani, “this will only happen with the Nusra Front starting the fight”. Amani is from South Lebanon; “resistance is my religion” is her Twitter account's motto. “And maybe”, Amani carries on, “Hezbollah wouldn't even take up the fight against the Nusra Front, but rather would have the Lebanese army facing them”. However to some people in Lebanon, the distinction between Hezbollah and the Lebanese army is only a theory.

a heavyweight boxer on an off day: Hezbollah

Syria's future is not in Syrian hands anymore. For Ziad, who is a regular contributor for Your Middle East from Beirut, the geopolitical dimension of the Syrian conflict is obvious. “Think of the situation in Syria as a tug of war between many different blocs, with many different goals, performed in the Syrian theater”, Ziad says. “This is called the international game of geopolitical chess, and Syria and Lebanon are only pawns in this game.”

Indeed! “Syria” has a multitude of dimensions. And many of them are circling around Iran. It is the USA vs. Iran and the proxy war to stop Tehran's nuclear program; it is Saudi Arabia vs. Iran and the war for supremacy in the Muslim world; and it is a revenge for Iraq which the USA had occupied ten years ago but Iran has won in the meantime. Now, it is time to stop Iran in Syria. The struggle of the Syrian people for democracy and a life without an oppressive regime has been reduced to a mere side note in a country pushed and shoved by foreign interests.

Lebanese sometimes tell the following story: When God created the mountains, the plains and the rivers of Lebanon, the desert countries became envious. God then said that he would allocate two neighbors to Lebanon which will make the life of the Lebanese miserable. And so it happened: Lebanon became the stage of conflicts of third parties.

Lebanese like to portray their country in this way. Lebanese like to see themselves as victims of evil forces envious of their beautiful country. They like to fade out their part in the story. In Lebanon, the central state, the main barrier to personal freedom in the Middle East, is deliberately kept weak. But this freedom comes with a price. “Before the 1975 civil war”, writes Marie-Joëlle Zahar, “the Lebanese state was perceived as unable to deter and now is increasingly perceived as unable or unwilling to assure. The difference is significant in that the state is now seen as a direct threat to some of its citizens.” This does not bode well for stability in Lebanon. With or without Syria.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here

IRAN AND USA: LOGICAL ALLIES IN A WRESTLING MATCH

1989 was a year full of historical events. The fall of the Berlin wall; the massacre on Beijing's Tianamen square; the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan: these milestones all highlighted the end of an era and the dawning of a new world order.

However for Iran, a different event was more important in 1989. When Iranian heavy weight wrestler Ali Reza Soleimani beat the American wrestling icon Bruce Baumgartner for the title of world champion, it was a much needed lift for the Iranian collective soul. Iran was heavily reeling from eight years of war with Iraq that had ended in 1988. Saddam Hussein's war machine, fueled and serviced by the Reagan administration, had brought devastation and the loss of innumerable lives upon Iran.

Soleimani's victory made him an instant hero in a country where wrestling is more than a sport. Iran's cultural heritage, its politics and its religion are all bound up in this sport, writes Dominic Byrne, who describes the meaning of wrestling for Iran in an article published in the New Statesman. Varzesh-e Bastani, as the original form of wrestling is called in Persian language, combines elements of the pre-Islamic Iranian culture with the spirituality of Sufism. An ideal wrestler is expected to be pure and truthful, promoting inner strength through outer strength, emanating from a strong body. An Iranian fighter literally embodies “Jihad”, the Islamic concept so often misunderstood in Western readings.

Throughout its history, wrestling was used in Iran for political goals. Both the Shahs of the Pahlavi dynasty and the Mullahs of the Islamic revolution capitalized on the sport's popularity, emphasizing either the pre-Islamic tradition or the Sufi mindset of the sport.

when Iran beat the USA: Soleimani - Baumgartner, 1989

In international sports, Iran has had much success in the past when competing in wrestling tournaments. Up to the London games of 2012, Iranian wrestlers have won 38 Olympic medals, eight of which in gold. Only a few nations have done better. Among them the United States, winning a total of 129 medals over the years. Clearly, successes on the wrestling mat have done a lot for the Iranian and American people to feel good about themselves.

But then a shock announcement was made in February 2013: the International Olympic committee (IOC) plans to delete wrestling from the Olympic program, starting in 2020. A final decision will be taken in September of this year in Buenos Aries where the IOC will hold its next congress.

Away from the sport stadiums, the USA and Iran are entangled in a political wrestling match since the 1950s - in a match that seems to have no end. In 1953, a coup d'état, orchestrated by the United Kingdom and the United States, removed the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohamed Mossadegh. He was replaced with Shah Reza Pahlavi who was deemed more submissive to Western interests in Iran.

In 1979, and after the Shah had to cede power to the revolutionary Ayatollah Khomenei, Iranian activists stormed the American embassy in Tehran. They took 52 diplomats hostage, holding them for 444 days. Since the Tehran hostage crisis the relationship between the USA and Iran has gone only downhill. It culminated with Argo winning the Oscar for best movie in 2013, announced right out of the White House by First Lady Michelle Obama.

In the last 34 years, the USA have tried to control and subdue, to clinch and joint lock an unruly Iranian regime. Consecutive governments in Washington have piled up a mountain of sanctions, from the Iran-Iraq Arms Nonproliferation Act in 1992 to the Iran Freedom and Counter-Proliferation Act of 2012. And yet, Iran has still not surrendered.

Do the United States know with whom they are dealing? For geopolitical analyst Robert D. Kaplan, Iran is a natural nation, with a greater degree of institutionalization than almost everywhere in the Middle East. Iran possesses the key geography of the Middle East – situated between the Indian Ocean and the Caspian Sea, with abundant energy resources – making it fundamental to global geopolitics. The Mullahs of Iran, as suffocating and repressive their rule may be, have read Hegel and Marx and understand the purpose of history. Unlike Syria, Libya and Algeria, Iran is not a colonial product, with borderlines drawn in Paris and London. The Iranians know this and they show it.

Like wrestling, the nuclear program is a cornerstone of Iran's national pride. And just like the sanctions that try to stop it, the program has become an end in itself. The Iranians have fought for too long, and against all obstacles, to develop their own nuclear technology. They can't just walk away and give it up. Why should they? All the more since the program keeps not only the Iranians happy. Intelligence services and armies worldwide have used the argument of the Iranian nuclear program possibly morphing into a nuclear bomb to justify billions of dollars spent on analytical teams, intelligence operations and procurement drives. The defense industry has concluded thousands of contracts to arm Iran's opponents to the teeth, in anticipation of an Iran having the nuclear option in its arsenal.

No one is more afraid of a nuclear Iran than Saudi Arabia. In a recent study by Shibley Telhami from the University of Maryland, the Saudis expressed concern opposite an even peaceful use of Iranian nuclear technology. This would likely enhance Iran's economic power and provide further opportunities to expand Tehran's influence.

nuclear right, national pride: manifestation in Iran

Israel on the other hand could live with a deal allowing Iran the peaceful development of nuclear technology. The Israelis can even understand an Iran seeking nuclear armament – unless Netanyahu and foes are in an election battle. On the Charlie Rose Show of November 2011, defense minister Ehud Barak explained this surprising confession rather convincingly. With the Americans sitting in Afghanistan, so Barak, in Iraq (at the time of the interview) and in Bahrain; with the Russians in the north and the Pakistani in the east, both nuclear powers; and with the experience of having seen Muammar Gaddafi go down only a few years after he had renounced nuclear weapons, the Iranians would actually act quite rationally should they acquire the best defense they can get. Ehud Barak, Israel's former Chief of General Staff, certainly knows a great deal about a rough security environment.

For now, both Saudi Arabia and Israel are relying on Washington to protect them from a future Iranian aggression. Thus, the United States have their hands full with tightening the sanctions on Iran, sending money to Israel and arms to Saudi Arabia, while at the same time trying to alleviate the effects of the sequester on their defense budget. Within the 5+1 formula, the Americans have just met Iran in Almaty for nuclear talks, and will meet them again in Istanbul the coming weekend and in Almaty in April 2013.

And in the middle of this, the USA talk wrestling with Iran. Thanks to the IOC's announcement, the two countries have finally found a common ground and a common goal. “Arm in arm”, as Press TV and Fox News have reported in a rare unisono, Iran and the USA want to combat the IOC's decision. Wrestling must remain on the Olympic menu. To discuss their joint strategies, delegations of both countries have held talks in Tehran last month and are scheduled to convene again in May, in New York City.

Should the Iranian - American wrestling initiative transcend into a deal on the political front, ending the standoff in the nuclear issue, the International Olympic Committee has to be the frontrunner candidate for this year's Peace Nobel Prize. After all, the United States and Iran, with their deeply rooted sense of being morally superior nations, are logical allies for controlling the Middle East. They just don't behave this way. For now.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Marching in Marrakech

The flight from Europe is short on this February afternoon in 2013 and yet, when I leave the airport in Marrakech, the scenery has completely changed. Instead of snow and temperatures below zero, I find a desert town bathing in light. The colors of Africa are mixed with the laid back bustle of an Arab city.

Jemaa al Fna, a big square in the middle of the old city, is the center of Marrakech. After sunset, it feels like the center of the universe. The square is filled with musicians, snake charmers and tattoo artists, entertaining tourists and locals alike. A thin layer of smoke lingers over Jemaa al Fna, coming from the many food stalls that offer grilled meat and the traditional Harira soup to an ever hungry audience.

However, Jemaa al Fna is in mourning. On April 28, 2011, the Argana café on the upper left corner of the square was the site of a terrorist attack that killed 17 people, 15 of them foreigners. The café has not opened again and is still under construction. It is an ugly wound in Marrakech's flesh, a reminder of a world where destiny can turn to tragedy in a fraction of a second.

The Marrakech bombing came at a time when the popular uprisings in the Arab world were in their infant stages. Tunisia's Ben Ali had left the country, Mubarak was in jail and Gaddafi was fighting for his survival. “Syria” had just begun. It came at a time when the Moroccan King, Mohammed VI, must have been very worried about the future of his country and his dynasty. Till today, some people claim that the bombing was a government plot to demonstrate to the Moroccan people how ugly things can be when all order is lost. However, this rumor seems quite far fetched.

Marrakech Souk: "Prix Démocratique"

Marrakech is famous for its crafts, for furniture, pottery and copper lamps. I take a taxi to the industrial area of Sidi Ghanem where many shops cater to mostly European customers. The shop owners I talk to while I march the streets of Sidi Ghanem are mostly happy with the way business is running in 2013. Business owners like it calm, and that is the situation in Morocco today, at least to the outside observer. Thus, tourism is thriving.

In 2011, the King had no choice but to introduce political reforms in order to contain revolutionary unrest that was present in Morocco as well. A new constitution was quickly drafted and general elections were held, bringing the Islamist Party of Justice and Development (PJD) into the government. But since the elections in November of 2011, the drive towards reforms has considerably slowed down. Some observers call the relationship between the PJD and the King a cohabitation: the PJD enjoys being in some sort of power, and the King's intention is only to relinquish as much power as absolutely necessary.

Many of the shop owners in Sidi Ghanem are French, selling Moroccan handicraft to visitors from Europe. The local market is rather small. Moroccans prefer more “shiny” interior design, not the colors of the desert – red, brown and dark yellow in different shades - one shop owner tells me. That said, this trend has been slightly reversed in recent years. Moroccans have encountered Moroccan design in Europe and now ask for it back home.

One of the native shop owners in Sidi Ghanem is Mohamed. He is a master potter and holds King Mohammed VI in highest esteem. Besides his shop, Mohamed heads a project that already has enabled 600 unemployed youths to leave the streets and start a training as a potter, with a diploma in two years. The project is funded by the King and Mohamed is proud to display a photo with him and the King in his shop.

Under the late Hassan II, the King's father, having his portrait in every public place was mandatory. Under Mohammed VI, this law has been eased. Nevertheless, most shop owners prefer to have a portrait of the King in their shops, in different styles and settings: the King as a fashion model, posing by the pool; the King with his family; and the King depicted as an object of art, in a black and white portrait Banksy-style.

Object of Art: King Mohammed VI

“I am doing fine”, admits Mohamed, “I have my shop and the pottery project, I hardly pay taxes and the gas is cheap.” Other Moroccans are less optimistic about their future. A recent survey I read about in Morocco's French language newspaper “Le Matin” shows that 70% of the Moroccan people fear an increased rate of unemployment for 2013. And more than 80% of the Moroccan households think that they won't be able to save any money this year. Overall, the level of confidence of the Moroccan households was lower at the end of 2012 than in 2011. With announcing his reforms, the King had raised the expectations for an improvement of the economic situation. Expectations that haven't been fulfilled until now. The high level of unemployed people keeps being a social and political time bomb in Morocco.

Maybe women can do a better job in moving Morocco forward. Since 2009, Marrakech has a female mayor, Fatima Zahra Mansouri, and she is getting great reviews. “Her predecessor was a thief”, says Mohamed, the master potter, “and we are happy to have Fatima now”. She is from the neighborhood of Sidi Ghanem and still is very visible there, even as a mayor who also holds a seat in the Moroccan national parliament in Rabat. With Mansouri, corruption has disappeared from the city hall of Marrakech. Mansouri, who is 37, is also perfect for business. Hamid Bentahar, the chairman of the Marrakech Tourism Council, is glad to have her at the top of Marrakech's political ladder. “To have a young woman who is mayor has been very attractive for tourism”, he is quoted in a article recently published in Time.

Where is Morocco heading from here? So far, the King has mastered the course of his country with carefully crafted reforms, enough to calm the masses and to secure the ongoing love of most of his people. Without revenues from an oil and gas sector, which in some Arab countries are used to ward off any democratic ambitions, Mohammed VI must slowly but surely move towards a more accountable system. This will eventually end up in a parliamentary monarchy where his function is reduced to a mere representative position.

However, the king may not be safe just yet. Particularly young Moroccans have already well integrated the vocabulary of the winds of change blowing through Tunisia and Egypt. One young rug seller calls the price he offers me a “prix démocratique”, meaning a price that leaves everybody satisfied. A Moroccan citizen I ask about the inertia that has beset Morocco's political system in 2012, tells me that this might be the strategy of the Islamist party. The PJD deliberately does nothing while publicly deploring that their hands are tied because of the King's still existing all encompassing grip on decisions. That way, they aim to increase the pressure on the King to give up more of his rights. The PJD's strategy might work, but only if the King goes along with it. The future of Morocco, and the peaceful transition into a new political system, depends very much on a monarch being able to do what is best for his country.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

"Le Pouvoir" is not for Sale

Algeria hates being in the news. Lying on the northern shores of the African continent, bordering post-revolutionary Tunisia and Libya, the largest country in Africa seems opaque to outsiders and almost paranoid in its behavior.

It may come as a surprise, but the first signs of an Arab Spring had been spotted in Algeria, some 25 years ago. In reaction to public unrest, the government of Algeria in 1988 instituted a multi-party system. However, when the elections of 1991 were heading towards a victory of the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), the Algerian army intervened and brought the democratic carousel to a screeching halt. The subsequent crackdown on the FIS and the ensuing civil war resulted in 200'000 deaths. At the end of this dark decade, the generals had regained control over Algeria. Abdelaziz Bouteflika was installed as president; a presidency managed by an entity commonly known by the French word “le pouvoir” - the power – a consortium of senior officials who meets behind closed doors.

Algeria's parliamentary elections in 2012 ended in disbelief, to quote a headline from the New York Times. An alliance of moderate Islamist parties did poorly in the voting, and so did the Socialist Forces Front, another opposition group. Analysts were stunned. Once again, the system had found ways to consolidate its power.

Clearly though, the “pouvoir” was nervous. Frightened by events in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, where public movements and – in the case of Libya – NATO bombs had swept away long standing strong men, the Algerian government had started to distribute money to calm the masses. Money that was taken from the revenues of oil and gas sales, the lifeline of the Algerian economy.

not going anywhere: Le Pouvoir, Algiers

On January 16, 2013, a terrorist attack on the gas facilities in In Amenas, a desert town in southeastern Algeria, close to the Libyan border, challenged the calm the generals in Algiers usually prefer. Jihadists coming from Mali had taken hundreds of facility workers hostage. The Algerian army decisively moved in, ending the siege in a blood bath. A big number of both hostage takers and hostages were left dead when the dust over In Amenas had cleared. Observers were reminded of similar large scale hostage situations in Russia, most notably the attack on a school in Beslan in 2004 that ended with nearly 200 children killed after Russian security forces had intervened.

Algeria and Russia go back a long time. The Soviet Union was the first country to recognize the provisional Government of the Algerian Republic in 1960, two years before the country's independence from France. Later, Algerian intelligence officers were trained by the KGB and the army was equipped with military hardware made in Russia. Since 2006, Russia and Algeria have increased their military cooperation, with Algeria acquiring submarines, fighter jets and S-300 air defense systems from Russia. Over the years, Algeria has become Russia's top trade partner for arms in the Middle East, even outspending Syria.

Russia has a very robust approach to counterterrorism, according to a 2009 analysis by Mariya Y. Omlicheva, assistant professor at the University of Kansas. The scope of Russia's counterterrorism measures has been traditionally confined to military operations and security services efforts. This follows from Russia's understanding of terrorism as an attack on the state rather than an assault on individual rights. The unrestricted expansion of the state's repressive powers for protection and preservation of state interests, Omlicheva notes, has rarely yielded good results. Instead of resolving security problems, the imperial tradition calls for their suppression. And, inevitably, they re-emerge.

Eradication, not negotiation, is the basic principle of Algeria's counterterrorism policy. Soft approaches have been tried as well, mostly focusing on stopping the spread of extremist forms of Islam, but hard approaches have proven to be more effective. During the 1990s, the Algerian security services fought Islamists with the utmost brutality. They would do “anything to wipe out the devil”, as Robert Fisk denounced the government's tactics in his excellent reporting on the Algerian civil war. It is widely believed that the GIA, the Islamists' combat organization, was actually a creation of the Algerian security services. Army officers and undercover agents who had infiltrated the ranks of the GIA committed atrocities on a horrendous scale, thus discrediting the GIA, and the Islamists in general, in the eyes of the Algerian people.

The DRS, the Algerian military intelligence service, is arguably the world's most effective intelligence service when it comes to fighting Al Qaeda, writes John R. Schindler, a former US counterintelligence officer with the National Security Agency. It is probably also the most cold-blooded intelligence service. The attack on In Amenas was executed by jihadists belonging to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). However, some people in the region refer to AQIM as AQIM/DRS. “At the heart of AQIM is the DRS”, Mali's head of state security told the media in 2009. Shortly thereafter, he was assassinated at his home by “unknown gunmen”.

wiping out the devil: Algerian army, In Amenas

The siege in In Amenas only lasted for four days before order was restored. From the outset, the Algerian army was determined to finish the job quickly, placing a swift end over the safety of the hostages. There were at least three reasons for this: to draw a strong line in the sand to deter terrorists from future attacks. To deal with the crisis on its own terms, while special forces from the UK, the US and France were already waiting in the wings. And, considering the importance of the natural resources sector for the Algerian economy and thus for the regime, to smother any possible bad press about the safety of Algerian oil and gas facilities before it could hit the commodities markets worldwide.

The events in the aftermath of the first round of Arab Spring have not particularly raised the appetite for revolution of the Algerian people. In Tunisia, the country is in shock after the murder of secular opposition politician Chokri Belaïd. In Libya, militias have emerged as the real centers of force in a multi-divided country. And in Egypt, President Mursi must resort to “Mubarak-style tactics” to keep him and the Muslim Brotherhood in power.

Political realists value order above freedom; for them the latter becomes important only after the former has been established. The Algerian regime doesn't waste an opportunity to hammer this point home. In 1992 and in the years that followed, the violence by the Islamists, often instigated by the regime itself, was used to a posteriori justify the abortion of the democratic process and the cancellation of the elections in 1991. In 2013, and following a logic of an AQIM deeply penetrated by the Algerian intelligence apparatus, the attack on In Amenas can serve to justify a non-response to Arab Spring ideas the Algerian people may have. Because this was the message of In Amenas: “le pouvoir” in Algiers is not for sale. Quod erat demonstrandum. 

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.

Yemen after Saleh - Drones kill Morality

The US intelligence community likes to do simulations such as Project Looking Glass. In a three-day run, experts from outside the intelligence community – the red team – are pitted against a team of intelligence professionals – the blue team. The red team's task: to use everything members know or can find out to develop the best possible plan to mount a terrorist attack against a target specified by the organizers of the simulation. In many runs, these are US coastal cities hosting a naval base or a similar installation.

Most of the time, the red team wins. The reasons for this are manifold, however, one reason sticks out particularly: offense is more motivating and easier to execute than defense. You do act, they must react. Therefore, one lesson learned from these simulations is: don't think defense, think “attack defense”. Your chances for success will greatly enhance.

In recent years, the United States' strategy to avoid surprise attacks from terrorists has been to play attack defense in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Instead of waiting for another 9/11, the US, and more precisely the CIA, have sent drones to these countries to kill potential perpetrators before the devise devious plans to attack American soil. Instead of being deported globally – to Guantanamo – America's enemies were being killed locally.

While the main focus of these drone attacks has initially been on Pakistan, it is now shared between Pakistan and Yemen. In 2011, according to the Long War Journal, 64 strikes were executed in Pakistan, compared to 10 in Yemen. In 2012, these numbers were 46 for Pakistan and 42 for Yemen, a near tie. In 2013, 7 attacks in Pakistan and 4 in Yemen killed a total of 59 people so far.

the dusk of morality: CIA drones in Yemen

What is going on in Yemen? In February of 2012, long time president Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced to leave his post, as a result of efforts by Yemeni protesters and international politics. With a fresh government in place, Yemen has become an even more unstable country. Many regions are dangerous, and for foreigners it is not safe to travel. Just before Christmas of last year, an Austrian citizen and a Finnish couple were abducted in the capital, adding them to the group of people already held hostage in Yemen. Most hostages are kidnapped by members of tribes. They later sell their booty to AQAP (al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) who seems to have free roaming ground in many parts of Yemen.

Does the US strategy of attack defense work in Yemen? The answer is yes and no. It works for the US – there hasn't been a second 9/11. And, as the statistics show, the new president in Sanaa is more “open minded” about accepting US drones in Yemen's airspace. However, the strategy doesn't work for the Yemeni people. Drone strikes have killed many people, and among them there were certainly terrorists. But they have also killed a great number of innocent civilians, as “collateral damage”. This dire fact has only led to an increased popularity of AQAP among the Yemeni population. Instead of being diminished, the ranks of active and passive supporters of al Qaeda have swollen.

Besides the operational and political dubiousness of this military strategy, a great deal of unanswered legal and ethical questions remain. Questions like: who is a terrorist, and who is a civilian? (The United States design every male adult present in a certain region as a terrorist and therefore as a legitimate target: is this legally tenable?) Questions like: does the easy availability of force make it too tempting to use it and war more likely because of that? The more precise the weaponry, the more ambiguous the definition of the target has become. Or, as philosophers John Kaag and Sarah Kreps point out in an article for the New York Times: “the use of impressive technology does not grant one impressive moral insight.” Indeed, the opposite can be the case.

Now, as last week's events in Mali and Algeria have proven, there are bad guys in Africa as well. So why does the US hit Yemen with drones strikes, but spares Mali from the same measure? In fact: why does the US fight jihadists in Yemen, but leaves them alone in Mali and even supports them in Syria? It's Iran and Saudi Arabia, stupid! Both countries have replaced Israel as the focal point of the US involvement in the Middle East. Both countries combined are the (new) reason why the United States have a Middle East policy at all.

say no to drones!

The US are very afraid that their good friends in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will fall victim to terrorists operating out of Yemen, thus destabilizing the region. According to press reports, the first US drone strike in Yemen in 2013 was assisted by Saudi fighter jets deployed to the scene. In another press report, coming from Yemen's al-Shari newspaper on January 13, a Yemeni source was quoted as saying that the US government is planning to build three bases for US troops in Yemen, in the Al-Anad Airbase and on the two islands of Socotra and Miyun.

Clearly, there is a build-up of foreign forces over and in Yemen. What is bad for Yemen is good for the Saudis, but again bad for Iran, since the US want to establish the Wahhabi rulers in Riyadh as a firewall against Iran in the Middle East. If Iran decided to become more active in Africa – in an Africa heavily reeling from the blowback of the fall of Libya's Gaddafi – we would soon see the sky over the Sahara filled with unmanned flying objects, courtesy of Washington.

On Monday, January 21, 2013, US president Obama started his second term in office. America's light footprint in the Middle East, meaning drones instead of troops, will likely continue. More so since Obama's new CIA director is set to be John Brennan, the actual architect of the United States drone warfare program. On top of that, Brennan has an excellent relationship with Saudi Arabia, having served in the country twice. Brennan worked as a political officer at the US embassy in Jeddah from 1982 to 1984, shortly after joining the CIA, and again as the Riyadh head of station from 1996 to 1999. Obama and Brennan will be the team to watch when trying to predict the US' impact in the Middle East in the four years to come.

The US had to know by now, and the massacre in Newtown should have brought the message even more home: guns don't solve problems. A type of warfare that is light footed, but heavy handed, that avoids own casualties at any costs, but is indiscriminate towards the casualties “on the other side” doesn't bring a sustainable peace. The blue team must do, the blue team must be better than that. To promote a positive perspective for the Middle East, for its people and their ambitions, a more comprehensive approach is paramount. An approach that isn't solely based on the interests of some, but denies the rights of others. When you fight without morality, the red team always wins.

This post was first published at Your Middle East online media: here.