Will Lebanon Weather the Moment or Whither?

January 21, 2025

Dr. Dave Wurmser

There is a spurt of great optimism on both sides of the political spectrum in the United States, and even Israel, that the Lebanese government, now that it has installed Joseph Aoun as its president, will finally leverage Israel’s devastating victory over Hizballah to assert Lebanon’s sovereignty. In order to uphold the November ceasefire between Hizballah and Israel, it will execute not only UNSC Resolution 1701 – under which Hizballah was to be removed from south of the Litani River – but also UNSC Resolution 1559 – under which all armed factions are to be disarmed and the monopoly of power be returned to the Lebanese government. Moreover, for the first time in five decades, powerful regional forces seem held at bay; the PLO is gone and Iran and Hizballah are laid to waste. Lebanon is back in Lebanese hands. And indeed, the speech Aoun gave upon assuming office contained language that lends substance to this promise: “The era of Hizballah is over; We will disarm all of them.”

Perhaps with age, one’s more jaded and curmudgeonly essence comes forward, but Lebanon likely is far from out of the woods, far from adequately executing its obligations under the ceasefire, and certainly far from emerging as a calm state at peace with Israel. The problem is because Lebanon’s instability arises not from the external array of forces, but from the very foundations of the Lebanese state that then are leveraged by external forces.

The quote that never was

Let’s start first with the most obvious. President Aoun was reported to have said the above quote. The problem is he did not say it. He actually said:

“My mandate begins today, and I pledge to serve all Lebanese, wherever they are, as the first servant of the country, upholding the national pact and practicing the full powers of the presidency as an impartial mediator between institutions … Interference in the judiciary is forbidden, and there will be no immunity for criminals or corrupt individuals. There is no place for mafias, drug trafficking, or money laundering in Lebanon,”

To note, he raised this in the context of the judiciary, not the military. Regarding the disbanding of the Hizballah militia as a military force, he was careful in his words and suggested it would be subsumed into the state rather than outright eliminated – exactly the greatest fear of Israel (Hizbazllah’s integration into the LAF):

“The Lebanese state – I repeat the Lebanese state – will get rid of the Israeli occupation … My era will include the discussion of our defensive strategy to enable the Lebanese state to get rid of the Israeli occupation and to retaliate against its aggression.”

The structure that cannot reform

Words in the Middle East mean only so much. One can dismiss this episode of the quote that never as essentially inconsequential. The problem is that it reflects something far deeper: the structure of the Lebanese state – the National Pact to which he refers — cannot develop into what we hope it will, because the structure of the Lebanese state is not aligned with the only form of Lebanon that potentially gives reason to its very existence as an independent state, let alone one at peace with its southern neighbor.

The existence of Lebanon is not a result of a colonial gift to a Christian community by the French at the end of World War I. Lebanon actually has an older and more defined reason to exist than almost any other state in the region but Israel, Iran, Turkey and Egypt. The colonial definition of Lebanon established at the end of World War I unwittingly and out of the best intentions to the Lebanese Christians actually undermined that essence.

Lebanon embodies the result of a major event: the Battle of Ayn Dera in 1711, where the powerful Chehab clan both converted from Sunni Islam to Christianity, aligned with the powerful Khazen Maronite clan, and unified the remaining non-Greek Orthodox Christians into a powerful force, all aligned with half of the Druze under the Jumblatt, Talhuq, Imad and Abd al-Malik clans. This Maronite-Druze coalition won against their premier enemy – the Ottoman empire and its governors of Sidon and Damascus — and expelled the Ottoman proxies, the Arslan, Alam al-Din, and Sawaf Druze clans from Mount Lebanon to the east in what today is the area of Jebel Druze/Suweida in Syria. This was the key enemy around which the Lebanese state was formed, thus, in 1711 was the Ottoman threat from Damascus and the area of Sidon and ousting the Turkish nemesis than a Sunni Arab issue, which played a marginal role as proxies, if they played any at all at that time. The Shiites were not even a factor, although they too held as a their nemesis the Ottoman specter, of which the Sunni Arabs was a mere instrument.

The problem with the Lebanese structure is that the military and its government are fundamentally anchored to the National Pact: a concept of a multi-confessional equilibrium among four communities, and not around the core idea of Lebanon as established as a result of the battle of Ayn Dara in 1711 around a Maronite-Druze core. This multi-confessional essence divorced Lebanon from its only reason for existence: to be a homeland for a Christian state aligned with the Druze ally. Lebanon, as constructed embodies the multi-confessionalism, and not the alliance of the 1711 Battle of Ayn Dera and its results.

At first, this was a moot point: the Maronites and the Druze were a strong majority, and thus dominated the State. But the Greek Orthodox were never fully on board with the idea, and over the 20^th century, the Sunni populations grew, largely through immigration, as did the Shiite, to the point at which the Christians were no longer the majority. The multi-confessional equilibrium thus shifted from being a cover for Maronite dominance to being a genuine rickety, artificial coalition of forces that could not manage to overpower each other. Any attempt by any faction to overpower the other at this point inherently then resulted in a breakdown of the equilibrium, a collapse of civic order and violent conflict.

There is really no way to square the structure of the Lebanese government and its premier materialization, the armed forces, which is a manifestation of this equilibrium of forces, to move the nation from the essence of where Lebanon needs to go – a rejection of the National Pact and return to its original and only raison d’être and therein be the only regional Christian nation that at this critical time gathers the various regional Christian communities into a homeland as their last hope for regional survival.

At the end of the day, neither Syria nor Lebanon exist, because they are institutions and institutions don’t really exist in the Middle East the way we understand them in the West. While we believe institutions have a real existence that transcends those that constitute it – even the head of an institution in the West is considered a steward rather than an embodiment of the structure, institutions in the region are merely the embodiment of the people and groups that constitute it at that moment. Indeed, institutions are structures to regulate intercommunal interactions and conflicts, and they do not have an essence, sovereignty, existence of their own. And since the institution of the Lebanese military and state are fundamentally anchored to an equilibrium, they cannot survive any attempt to suppress one element of that equilibrium to the advantage of others without triggering conflict.

Strategic forces at work

That said, neither are the outside forces fully held at bay. Indeed, the looming threats from the outside push the fragile artificial institution of the Lebanese state and army to hedge yet further rather than move decisively to extirpate the remains of Hizballah. And its inherent instability and misalignment with its original purpose invite those external interventions.

Indeed, there is logic in that for the Lebanese government, because it has a neighbor next door – Syria — which essentially has never recognized Lebanon’s existence as a valid state. Syria was also established as an Arab state with large minorities – a multi-ethnic, confessional quilt, and as such is not easily distinguished from a multi-confessional Lebanon. The mix is different; a much larger Sunni Arab community, with large Alawite minorities. And the Christians in Syria were largely Greek Orthodox – who had made their peace with Arab nationalism since it allowed them to transform the irreconcilable and potentially mortal Turkish nemesis into a digestible Arab one. As such, if Lebanon were to remain a multi-confessional state rather than narrowly a Maronite state with a Druze entity, then its digestion by Syria is conceivable.

And again, what is most concerning is that what is emerging in Damascus is not a multi-confessional nation with enough of its own problems to leave Lebanon alone, but a Sunni-Arab state under Turkish influence, if not possible suzerainty. And Turks are flooding the new Syria, as well. As such, the Ottoman nemesis that was defeated in Ayn Dara in 1711 is on the move to reverse that verdict – this time without their Druze allies but with the natural affinity of the sizeable Sunni Arab populations of northern Lebanon.

As such, the Lebanese government right now is more worried about what will threaten them from Damascus, and about the rise of the Sunni Lebanese alliance with the HTS entity emerging in Damascus and led by Ahmad ash-Shara (Abu Muhammad al-Julani) to subvert Lebanese independence on behalf of the neo-Ottoman project led by Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan, than they are with Hizballah — which Israel essentially has reduced to such diminished parameters that they pose a distant, and not acute problem that needs immediate and urgent attention for the central Lebanese government and its multi-confessional military. Indeed, the Lebanese government may even entertain husbanding the remaining forces of Hizballah as an asset to mobilize in a rainy day against the Sunni threat emerging from Ankara and Damascus.

And to deal with such a complex regional context at the same time as injecting a cataclysmic earthquake – namely the erasing of the now-diminished and vulnerable structure of Shiite protection and power — into the domestic tapestry anchored to an equilibrium that no faction can mast and dominate, is likely seen by any current Lebanese government as a prescription for civil war and invasion by the new Syrians and their Turkish overlords. This would be tantamount to willfully inviting the apocalypse.

As such it is unlikely that the Lebanese government will risk its very existence as an artificial institution anchored to a false equilibrium, by trying to rearrange the power structures. It is far more worried about maintaining a sense of stability to not give Syria the immediate ability to interfere and enter through the Sunni question, effectively ending Lebanon as a country.

In the end, Lebanon’s only path to long term survival lies not with this equilibrium, but through returning to the essence of what Lebanon was meant to be, the Spirit of Ayn Dara and 1711, and establish a protective strategic umbrella with other regional forces, such as Israel (whose alliance with Lebanon is the only way for Israel to ever secure its northern border), and the Western world that is still interested in preserving the oldest churches of Christianity in the cradle of Christianity.

But this involves an upheaval which at this moment, the Lebanese people appear unwilling to entertain – and understandably so. Lebanon’s people, being very averse to conflict after decades of civil war, would rather kick the can down the road and maintain even a bad equilibrium, rather than upset the apple cart and descend into intercommunal strife. It is in this context that President Aoun’s call for integration of all militias – essentially a re-manifestation of the national pact and integration of Hizballah into it– needs to be understood rather than the clean call to disarm and erase Hizballah which the EU, US and Israel expect.

And given that insurmountable reality, peace with Israel and a strategic reorganization of the coastal Levant will have to wait – until the Syrian cauldron again comes to visit, as Lebanon’s Sunnis align with it, and as the neo-Ottoman empire threatens – of which will shortly happen. Only in the framework of that will there be a realignment of Lebanon and likely strategic cooperation and even peace with Israel.

Trump can turn Syria opportunity against Iran

January 06, 2025

Last month’s rapid collapse and fall of Syria’s Assad dynasty surprised the world, starting with Bashar Assad himself. Led by the radical Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al Sham and likely galvanized by Israel’s mauling of Hamas and Hezbollah, the rebel victory represents Iran’s third catastrophic defeat in trying to implement its anti-Israel “ring of fire” strategy.

HTS and its leader, Ahmed al Sharaa, are struggling to consolidate power within long-fractured Syria. Their main priority is convincing Arab and Western states that they are no longer terrorists, nor controlled by Turkey, which labels HTS as terrorist but has nonetheless aided it for years. Sharaa has shed his terrorist nom de guerre and even his combat fatigues, now appearing at media events in Western attire. Whether his transformation from radical terrorist is real or merely cosmetic remains to be seen.

Iranian Leader Ali Khamenei attends a program at the Imam Khomeini Hosseini meets with Iran Air Force commanders and Iran Air Defense Force officers at the Imam Khomeini Husayniyya in Tehran, Iran on February 05, 2024. (Iranian Leader Press Office / Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Still, this is no time for the United States to say “hands off.” We have two critical national security interests flowing from Assad’s downfall. First, cooperating with Israel and Arab allies, we must ensure that Syria does not become another terrorist state, threatening our regional allies and possibly Europe and America. Second, Washington and Jerusalem should seize the opportunity of swiftly moving events in the Middle East to increase pressure on Iran, including destroying or substantially weakening its nuclear weapons program.

On the antiterrorism front alone, the U.S. has compelling reasons to prevent another Afghanistan. Nearly 2,000 of our troops remain in northeastern and eastern Syria, supporting primarily Kurdish forces who helped eliminate the Islamic State territorial caliphate in 2019, and who are now guarding thousands of dangerous Islamic State fighters held prisoner. The Kurds are threatened not only by HTS but by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s neo-Ottomanist aspirations, long-standing irredentist objectives in northern Syria, and his vindictive campaign against the Kurdish people. Northeastern Syria is today relatively calm. Any U.S. withdrawal or assent to Turkish demands to “relieve” us would only contribute to longer-term instability.

Inside the remainder of Syria, numerous ethnic and religious minorities, some favored under Assad, some not, worry about their fate under radical Sunni Islamist rule, as possibly dangerous as the Shia Hezbollah terrorists in next-door Lebanon. The disorder in Syria compounds the already widespread fragmentation created during the Arab Spring struggle to overthrow Assad. These anarchic conditions are conducive for existing and newly arriving foreign terrorists to establish a significant presence in Syria, as in Afghanistan, which would pose substantial dangers regionally and globally.

For Washington, the possibility that HTS might push Russia out of its naval and air stations at Tartus and Hmeimim, respectively, is a major upside. HTS has reportedly called for all Russian forces to withdraw. Widespread reporting indicates that some removals of troops and equipment are underway, perhaps slowed by the sinking of a Russian cargo ship in the Mediterranean, which Moscow blames on terrorism. But if HTS did, in fact, expel the Russian military from Syria, that could be promising evidence that HTS wanted to foster stability and reject adventurism by unhelpful foreign assistance.

As to Iran, Assad’s overthrow substantially damaged its hegemonic ambitions, and not just in Syria. By cutting off land supply routes to Hezbollah in Lebanon, HTS severed the most efficient, economical route used by Tehran for years to supply its terrorist proxy. HTS has warned Iran against “spreading chaos in Syria,” which, typically, Iran denied doing.

Israel wasted little time after Assad fled to Moscow, attacking Syrian air, land, and naval military facilities; chemical and biological weapons targets; and temporarily occupying the entire U.N. Golan Heights demilitarized zone and some additional Syrian territory. Although criticized pro forma by Gulf Arab states, Israel’s preventive action was justified by Syria’s instability and the risk of terrorists seizing government control in Damascus. Even the Biden administration acted militarily, bombing significant Islamic State targets to prevent its resurgence, or allowing HTS to absorb Islamic State fighters and assets.

With Syrian air defenses degraded, as Iran’s have been by prior Israeli strikes, the way is now largely open from Israel to Iran should Jerusalem and Washington decide to strike the heart of Tehran’s nuclear program. There may never be a better opportunity.

The Biden administration has consistently and erroneously pressured Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to eliminate Iran’s nuclear menace. However, core U.S. national security interests, notably our long struggles against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and global terrorism, all justify eliminating Tehran’s existing capabilities. Diplomacy has manifestly failed.

History is ready for the making in Syria and the Middle East. The incoming Trump administration should go for it.

This article was first published in the Washington Examiner on January 6, 2025. Click here to read the original article.

The Fall of Assad

December 17, 2024

History is moving fast in the Middle East, raising the possibility, for well or ill, of massive changes throughout the region. The collapse of Syria’s Assad-family dictatorship took everyone by surprise, starting with Bashar al-Assad himself, and certainly including Russia and Iran. Arab and Western intelligence services missed the regime’s vulnerability, particularly the weakness and disloyalty of its military and security services.

The brutal dictatorship is gone, but what comes next? Most importantly, Assad’s removal is yet another massive defeat for Iran’s ruling mullahs. Following Israel’s thrashing of Hezbollah and its near-total dismemberment of Hamas, this is the third major catastrophe for Tehran’s anti-Israel “ring-of-fire” strategy. While Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu agreed to a cease fire with Hezbollah, he has made clear it lasts for only sixty days, ending just after the Joe Biden leaves office. Hezbollah will be in further dire trouble if its overland supply route through Iraq and Syria is permanently blocked. There is no cease fire with Hamas, meaning both terrorist proxies could face further Israeli decimation.

As for Iran itself, the situation could hardly be worse. With three major pillars of its regional power already fallen or on the way, the ayatollahs are now at great risk both internationally and domestically. Recriminations and finger-pointing among top leaders of the Revolutionary Guards and regular Iranian military(https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/12/09/iran-armed-forces-at-war-with-themselves-fall-assad-syria/) has already spread widely in the general population(https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/13/world/middleeast/iran-syria-assad.html).

Disarray and fragmentation in the senior ranks of authoritarian governments are often the first signs of regime collapse. Popular discontent in Iran was already extensive due to long-standing economic decline, the opposition of young people and women generally, ethnic discontent, and more. If the Revolutionary Guard and regular military leaderships begin to come apart, the potential for internal armed conflict grows. Assad’s collapse showed that a façade of strength can mask underlying weakness, with surprisingly swift collapse following.

Externally, Iran’s regime has not been this vulnerable since the 1979 revolution. Jerusalem has already eliminated Tehran’s Russian-supplied S-300 air-defense systems, seriously damaged its ballistic-missile capabilities, and destroyed elements of the nuclear-weapons program(https://www.axios.com/2024/11/15/iran-israel-destroyed-active-nuclear-weapons-research-facility). Netanyahu has never had a better opportunity to obliterate all or vast swathes of the entire nuclear effort. So doing would make Israel, neighboring states, and the entire world safe from the threat of Iran’s decades-long nuclear-proliferation threat, which has long contravened the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Israel, with US assistance if requested, should go for the win on the nuclear issue. Not only would that eliminate Tehran’s threat of a nuclear Holocaust, it would simultaneously strike yet another domestic political blow against the mullahs. In addition to the tens of billions of dollars wasted in supporting Iran’s now-decimated terrorist proxies, but the billions spent on nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles would also be seen as squandered. Iran’s citizens would be perfectly entitled to conclude that the ayatollahs had never had their best interests at heart, and that their removal was now fully justified.

Russia is the next biggest loser. Distracted and overburdened by its unprovoked aggression against Ukraine, now about to enter its third year, the Kremlin lacked the resources to save its puppet in Damascus. Vladimir Putin’s humiliation is reverberating globally, and it will also have corrosive impact inside Russia, perhaps finally stimulating more-effective opposition to the ongoing burdens the Ukraine war imposes on Russia’s citizens and economy.

Even more significant losses may be coming. The Kremlin’s main interests in Syria are its Tartus naval station and its Latakia air base. These are Moscow’s only military facilities outside the territory of the former Soviet Union. They are vital to Russia’s position in the eastern Mediterranean. If forced to evacuate these bases, Moscow’s ability to project power beyond the Black Sea would be dramatically reduced, as would be the threat to NATO across the Mediterranean. Although there were early indications Russia might to retain the bases, recent commercial overhead photography indicates it may be preparing to withdraw some or all of its forces. The situation remains fluid(https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/12/13/world/syria-news).

Without doubt, Turkey, the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) terrorists, and the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army are the big winners so far. However, Syria’s internal situation is far from settled. American troops remain in northeastern Syria assisting the largely Kurdish Syrian Defense Forces in the anti-ISIS campaign, and at al-Tanf. The Kurds should not be abandoned, especially to President Recep Erdogan’s neo-Ottomanist aspirations to expand Ankara’s control and influence in Arab lands It would be a mistake, at this point, to remove HTS from Washington’s list of foreign terrorist organizations, although, unwisely, the Biden administration is reportedly considering doing so(https://www.politico.com/news/2024/12/09/us-debates-lifting-terror-designation-for-main-syrian-rebel-group-00193367).

While eliminating Assad is a critical contribution to reducing the Iranian threat, neither Israel nor neighboring Arab governments nor the United States have any interest in seeing another terrorist state arise, and this one on the Mediterranean. Delicate diplomacy lies ahead. In the meantime, Biden was right to bomb ISIS weapons storage depots in eastern Syria to deny those assets to HTS, and Israel is justified in eliminating the Assad government’s military assets for the same reason.

Importantly for the region and beyond, urgent efforts are required to locate and secure all aspects of Assad’s chemical and biological weapons programs(https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/12/12/syria-chemical-weapons-search-mustard-sarin/). Assaad used chemical weapons against his own people as recently as 2017 and 2018, so there is no question whether these capabilities exist.

Thus, while there is considerable good news surrounding Assad’s ouster and exile to Moscow, circumstances in Syria still pose serious threats to peace and security in the Middle East and globally. This is no time to relax or turn away, especially for the incoming Trump administration.

This article was first published in Independent Arabia on December 17, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

Dark days lie ahead with Trump on the world stage once more

November 30, 2024

Soon to be cast adrift by President-elect Trump, Ukraine’s likely future is bleak. Let’s not make it worse by a feckless peace deal
Donald Trump’s looming inauguration bodes poorly for vital Western security interests, and Ukraine in particular. Trump’s hostility to NATO is palpable, and his feelings about Ukraine follow close behind. After January 20, US military and economic assistance will likely drop significantly, and negotiations with Russia begin quickly. In turn, European financial support for Ukraine will diminish, as EU members rush to revive now-defunct commercial ties with Moscow. Despite contrary press reports, Trump has not yet spoken to Vladimir Putin. When they do, Trump’s desire to put this “Biden war” behind him could, at worst, mean capitulation to maximalist Russian demands. After all, if assisting Ukraine’s defence against unprovoked aggression is unimportant to Washington, why worry about Kyiv’s terms of surrender?

In fact, core America national interests remain. Since 1945, European peace and stability have been vital to advancing US economic and political security. The ripple effects of perceived American and NATO failure in Europe’s centre will embolden Beijing to act aggressively toward Taiwan and the East China Sea; the South China Sea; and along its land borders. These aren’t abstract, diaphanous worries at the periphery of our interests, but hard threats to US physical security, trade, travel and communications globally.

Biden put these interests at risk by bungling implementation of nearly three years of aid to Kyiv. He never developed a winning strategy. His administration helped create the current battlefield gridlock, deterred by constant but idle Kremlin threats of a “wider war.” Parcelling out weapons only after long public debates prevented their most effective use. Biden failed to explain clearly Russia’s threat to key Western interests, thereby fanning the belief there are no such interests, and abetting the Trump-inspired isolationism spreading nationally.

What to do? Aiding Ukraine is in NATO’s vital interest. That interest does not diminish because of persistent Biden administration poor performance. Do we ignore the continuing reality that Russia’s aggression threatens Alliance security? Does Ukraine simply give way to Trumpian capitulationism?

Certainly not. In the coming negotiations, certain points are essential to any potential agreement. The following suggestions, which are hardly my preferred outcome, are the absolute minimum we must obtain. They are only indicative, not exhaustive, and certainly not NATO’s opening position.

Any agreement must be explicitly provisional to keep Ukraine’s future open. Moscow will treat any deal that way regardless. For the Kremlin, nothing is permanent until its empire is fully restored, by their lights. Putin needs time to restore Russia’s military capabilities, and believing any “commitment” to forswear future aggression against Ukraine is dreaming.

A ceasefire along existing military frontlines during negotiations may be inevitable. Nonetheless, we should insist that any ultimate agreement explicitly state that the lines eventually drawn have no political import whatever, but merely reflect existing military dispositions. Russia may later disregard such disclaimers, but such claims must be rendered clearly invalid in advance.

Similarly, the agreement should not create demilitarised zones between Ukrainian and Russian forces inside Ukraine, or along the two countries’ formal border elsewhere. The surest way for a ceasefire line to become a permanent border is to make it half-a-mile wide, extending endlessly through contested territory. A DMZ inures solely to Moscow’s benefit.

Deployments of UN peacekeepers have an unhappy history of freezing the status quo, not helping to resolve the underlying conflict. Consider the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) which has partitioned the island since 1964. The UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) has patrolled the Golan Heights since 1974, and may last forever, but did not prevent Israel from annexing the Golan. The list goes on. In Ukraine, a disengagement force could mean permanent cession of twenty percent of Ukraine to Russia.

The problem is not mitigated if the peacekeepers are under NATO rather than UN auspices. It is not the quality of the military that makes a difference, but the intentions of the parties to the conflict. Does anyone doubt what Russia’s long-term aims are? Or Ukraine’s for that matter? My guess is that the Kremlin won’t agree to NATO peacekeepers anyway, at least not unless augmented by thousands of North Korean troops.

Finally, Ukraine should not be constrained in its future options to join or cooperate with NATO. What’s left of Ukraine will still be a sovereign country, striving for representative government, and free to pick its allies on its own. We should not acquiesce in enforced neutralisation, what in the Cold War was called “Finlandisation”. Even Finland turned out not to like it, finally joining NATO in 2023. And if some hardy nations want to provide security guarantees to Free Ukraine, they should be able to do so, not subject to Russian vetoes.

Soon to be cast adrift by President-elect Trump, Ukraine’s likely future is bleak. Let’s not make it worse by a feckless peace deal.

This article was first published in The Telegraph on November 30, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

Trump and Iran

November 11, 2024

Donald Trump’s election as President guarantees that America’s Middle East policy will change. The real question, though, and a major early test for Trump, is whether it will change enough. Does he understand that the region’s geopolitics differ dramatically from when he left office, and could change even more before Inauguration Day? The early signs are not promising that Trump grasps either the new strategic opportunities or threats Washington and its allies face.

The region’s central crisis on January 20 will be Iran’s ongoing “ring of fire” strategy against Israel. Right now, Israel is systematically dismantling Hamas’s political leadership, military capabilities, and underground Gaza fortress. Israel is similarly dismembering Hezbollah in Lebanon: its leadership annihilated, its enormous missile arsenal steadily decimated, and its hiding places shattered. Israel will continue degrading Hamas, Hezbollah, and West Bank terrorists, ultimately eliminating these pillars of Iranian power. Even President Biden’s team has already urged Qatar to expel Hamas’s leaders(https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/08/politics/qatar-hamas-doha-us-request/index.html).

Unfortunately, Yemen’s Houthis, still blocking the Suez Canal-Red Sea passage, have suffered only limited damage, as have Iran’s Shia militia proxies in Syria and Iraq. Iran itself finally faced measurable retaliation on October 26, as Israel eliminated the Russian-supplied S-300 air defenses and inflicted substantial damage on missile-production facilities. Nonetheless, Iran’s direct losses remain minimal. Due to intense White House pressure and the impending US elections, Jerusalem targeted neither Tehran’s nuclear-weapons program nor its oil infrastructure.

Whether Israel takes further significant action before January 20 is the biggest unknown variable. Israel’s October 26 air strikes have prompted unceasing boasting from Tehran that it will retaliate in turn. These boasts remain unfulfilled. The ayatollahs appear so fearful of Israel’s military capabilities that they hope the world’s attentions drift away as Iran backs down in the face of Israel’s threat. If, however, Iran does summon the will to retaliate, it is nearly certain this time that Israel’s counterstrike will be devastating, especially if during the US presidential transition. Israeli Defense Forces could lay waste to Iran’s nuclear-weapons and ballistic-missile programs so extensively they rock the foundations of the ayatollahs’ regime.

Washington’s conventional wisdom is that Trump will return to “maximum pressure” economically against Iran through more and better-enforced sanctions, and stronger, more consistent support for Israel, as during his first term. If so, Tehran’s mullahs can relax. Trump’s earlier “maximum pressure” policy was nothing of the sort. Even worse, a Trump surrogate has already announced that the incoming administration will have “no interest in regime change in Iran(https://www.timesofisrael.com/ex-envoy-says-trump-aims-to-weaken-iran-deal-of-the-century-likely-back-on-table/),” implying that the fantasy still lives that Trump could reach a comprehensive deal with Tehran in his second term.

Moreover, despite the staged good will in Bibi Netanyahu’s call to Trump last week, their personal relationship is tense. Trump said in 2021, “the first person that congratulated [Biden] was Bibi Netanyahu, the man that I did more for than any other person I dealt with. Bibi could have stayed quiet. He has made a terrible mistake(https://www.axios.com/2021/12/10/trump-netanyahu-disloyalty-fuck-him).” In practice, this means that Israel should not expect the level of Trump support it received previously. And, because Trump is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term, he need not fear negative domestic political reactions if he opposes Israel on important issues.

Much depends on the currently unclear circumstances Trump will face on January 20. In addition to shunning regime change, Trump seems mainly interested in simply ending the conflict promptly, apparently without regard to how(https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trumps-erratic-foreign-policy-meet-a-world-fire-2024-11-06/), which has proven very effective in US politics. This approach is consistent with his position on Ukraine. Asserting that neither conflict would have even occurred had he remained President, which is neither provable nor disprovable, Trump sees these wars as unwanted legacies from Biden.

If Israel does not demolish Iran’s nuclear aspirations before Trump’s inauguration, those aspirations will be the first and most pressing issue he faces. If he simply defaults back to “maximum pressure” through sanctions, he is again merely postponing an ultimate reckoning with Iran. Even restoring the sanctions to the levels prevailing when Trump left the Oval Office will be difficult, because Biden’s flawed and ineffective sanctions-enforcement efforts have weakened compliance globally. Trump will not likely have the attention span or the resolve to toughen sanctions back to meaningful levels. The growing cooperation among Russia, China and Iran means Iran’s partners will do all they can to break the West’s sanctions, as they are breaking the West’s Ukraine-related sanctions against Russia.

As they say in Texas, Trump is typically “all hat and no cattle”: he talks tough but doesn’t follow through on his rhetoric. Since he has never shown any inclination to move decisively against Iran’s nuclear program, that leaves the decision to Israel, which has its own complex domestic political problems to resolve. An alternative is to assist Iran’s people to overthrow Tehran’s hated regime. Here, too, however, Trump has shown little interest, thereby missing rare opportunities that Iran’s citizens could seize with a minimum of outside assistance. If Tehran’s ayatollahs are smart, they will dangle endless opportunities for Trump to negotiate, hoping to distract him from more serious, permanent remedies to the threats the ayatollahs themselves are posing.

Of all the critical early tests Trump will face, the Middle East tops the list. China, Russia, and other American adversaries will be watching just as closely as countries in the Middle East, since the ramifications of Trump’s decisions will be far-reaching.

This article was first published in The Independent Arabie on November 10, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

What Next in the Middle East?

October 07, 2024

One year after Hamas launched Iran’s “Ring of Fire” strategy with a barbaric attack against Israeli civilians, the Middle East has changed significantly. Now, the world awaits Jerusalem’s response to Tehran’s ballistic-missile attack last week, the largest such attack in history. It was the current war’s second military assault directly from Iranian territory against Israel, the first being April’s combined drone and ballistic/cruise missile barrage. We do not know how Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu will respond, but it is nearly certain Israel’s answer will be far stronger than in April.

Meanwhile, Iran’s Ring of Fire is clearly failing. Israel is systematically destroying Hamas and Hezbollah, two critical foundations of Iran’s terrorist power. Whatever now happens between Jerusalem and Tehran, Iran’s efforts to debilitate Israel — and potentially the Gulf Arab states — with terrorist and conventional military assets may well suffer irreversible defeat.

According to Israel, 23 of 24 Hamas combat battalions have been destroyed, and what’s left remains under attack. Numerous Hamas leaders have been killed, not the least being Ismael Haniyeh in a supposedly secure compound in the heart of Tehran. Yahyah Sinwar remains at large; Hamas still holds Israeli civilian hostages; and Gaza’s enormous underground fortress is still partially in Hamas hands, but the ending is increasingly clear.

Hezbollah is still in the process of being destroyed. Israel’s killing of Hassan Nasrullah is already a turning point in Middle East history, so great was the shock in Lebanon and beyond. As effectively as against Hamas, or perhaps more, Jerusalem is relentlessly decapitating Hezbollah’s leadership, eliminating officials even as they are being promoted to the fill vacancies left by dead colleagues. Israel also claims to have destroyed half of Hezbollah’s enormous arsenal of missiles and launchers. That estimate seems high, and in any case leaves significant work remaining against Hezbollah’s estimated inventory of up to 150,000 missiles. Nonetheless, with Nasrullah’s demise and with its leadership decimated, Hezbollah is reeling.

The Gulf Arab states and others should now be considering what the future holds for the people of Lebanon and Gaza without Hezbollah and Hamas. What has been unthinkable for decades may now be within sight. As long as Hezbollah, the world’s largest terrorist group, controlled Lebanon and its government, there was no possibility to achieve political freedom and stability. Given the prospect of Hezbollah’s eradication as both a political and military force, urgent attention is required to the possibility of a society without intimidation and control from Iran. Lebanon with Hezbollah could and should be a very different place.

Gaza, although smaller, is more complicated. Palestinians are the only major refugee population since World War II that has not benefitted from the basic humanitarian principle of either returning to their country of origin or being resettled. Palestinians are, unfortunately for them, the exception, not the norm. The international community needs to confront the reality that Gaza is not and never will be a viable economic entity, even if some distant day combined as a state with “islands” on the West Bank. Far better, once Hamas is on history’s ash heap, to treat Gazans more humanely than simply being shields for their terrorist masters. It makes no sense to rebuild Gaza as a high-rise refugee camp. The most humane future for innocent Gazans is resettlement in functioning economies where their children have the prospect of a normal future.

Although Gaza and Lebanon have something to look forward to, the same cannot yet be said, sadly, for Yemen, Syria and Iraq. Yemen’s Houthi terrorists and Iranian-backed Shia militias in Syria and Iraq remain largely untouched after October 7. That should change.

Although the Houthis have launched missiles and drones against Israel, and Israel has retaliated, the Houthis main contribution to Iran’s Ring of Fire has been effectively closing the Suez Canal-Red Sea maritime passage. This blockade has been extremely harmful to Egypt through lost Suez Canal transit fees, and has hurt the wider world by significantly increasing shipping costs. A clear violation of the principle of freedom of the seas, the major maritime powers would be fully warranted to correct it through force, with or without UN Security Council approval.

For the United States, freedom of the seas has been a major element of national security even before the thirteen colonies became independent. In the last two centuries, America and the United Kingdom led global efforts to defend the freedom of the seas, and should do so now, eliminating the ongoing Houthi anti-shipping aggression. Cutting off Iran’s supply of missiles and drones is a first step, coupled with destroying existing Houthi stockpiles. Washington’s opposition to prior efforts by Saudi Arabia and the UAE to defeat the terrorists was misguided and should be reversed. Destroying Houthi military capabilities would afford Yemen the same opportunities now opening for Lebanon and Gaza, and should be urgently pursued.

In Iraq and Syria, as Iran’s power fades (and may well fade dramatically after Israel’s coming retaliation), action against the Iran-backed Shia militias should be the highest priority. In such circumstances, Baghdad at least may well think twice before demanding that the few remaining US forces still in Iraq and Syria be removed.

For Iran itself, loss of its terrorist proxies, after having invested billions of dollars over decades to build the terrorist infrastructure, will be a dramatic reversal of fortune. If Iran’s nuclear program is similarly devastated, the threat Iran has posed by seeking to achieve hegemony in the Middle East and within the Islamic world will likely be impossible for the foreseeable future. In these circumstances, the people of Iran may finally be able to achieve the downfall of the ayatollahs and the creation of representative government. It is far too early to be confident of such an outcome, but it is not too early to hope for it.

This article was first published in Independent Arabia on October 7, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

Lasting Middle East peace requires regime change in Iran

October 07, 2024

October 7, 2023, is truly “a day which will live in infamy,” to borrow Franklin Roosevelt’s
memorable description of Japan’s December 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor.
But what Hamas did to innocent Israeli civilians on October 7 and thereafter is the more
infamous for its outright barbarity, savagery committed with malice aforethought, the
very definition of terrorism.
Stunningly, however, and sadly, many Westerners, one year later, still fail to grasp the
full implications of the Iran-Hamas attempted holocaust.
October 7 initiated Iran’s “Ring of Fire” strategy against Israel, “the little Satan”. The
immediate response from Iran’s Western media and think-tank apologists was to deny
Iran’s central role.
They pointed to US intelligence that elements of Iran’s leadership were unaware Hamas
was about to blitz Israel. They argued there was no “smoking gun” evidence of Tehran’s
command-and-control over the Hamas terrorists. But even if these assertions are true,
they do not refute the logic and reality of Tehran’s responsibility.
Why should anyone expect that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which takes
orders directly from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, would tell anyone who didn’t have
an urgent “need to know” what was to happen? The Quds Force and its ilk are not
exactly communicative; they are not like US or other Western bureaucracies. Among
those quite likely kept in the dark would be Iran’s foreign ministry and even higher
authorities.
Iran’s October 1, 2024, barrage of 180-plus ballistic missiles against Israel corroborates
the point that civilian Iranian officials are not in the decision-making loop. The New York
Times’s Thomas Friedman reported that day, citing Israeli sources: “The Iranian
president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was not informed of the attack until shortly before it
began, the sources said, indicating that the Iranian regime is divided over the operation,
which will probably add to the fractures in the government.” If the President himself was
blindsided by the enormously significant second missile attack on Israel, it is no stretch
to conclude many were iced out before October 7.
Nor is the failure of Israeli and other intelligence agencies to uncover an Iran-to-Hamas
“execute order” surprising. No Western intelligence agency detected the impending
Hamas attack, a massive failure all around. Missing the “execute order” is simply one
piece of a more profound intelligence debacle.
This history is critical. It helps explain, although certainly does not justify, the larger
Biden administration failure, shared by all European governments, to react strategically
against the real threat: Iran.
The past year has not been a Palestinian war against Israel, nor an Arab war against
Israel. It has been an Iranian war against Israel, fought directly by Tehran’s own military
and through its numerous terrorist proxies, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad,
Hezbollah, Yemen’s Houthis, and Iraqi and Syrian Shia militia groups. And behind the
terrorist storm troopers lies Iran’s nuclear-weapons programme, seeking to produce the
world’s most dangerous weapons. This is the ring of fire now directed against Israel, but
readily convertible to a ring of fire around the Arabian Peninsula’s oil-producing
monarchies.
The Arab governments at risk are acutely aware of the dangers they face from Tehran.
They understand that their strategic assessment is essentially identical to Israel’s,
explaining the basis for the Abraham Accords to establish full diplomatic relations with
Israel.
Further progress on more Abraham Accords is now on hold for the duration of the
conflict, but many believe the possibility of broader recognition of Israel in the Islamic
world was what motivated Iran to implement the “Ring of Fire” in the first place.
One year into the conflict, Israel is doing well. Hamas is nearing complete elimination of
its top leadership and organised military capabilities. Hezbollah is well on the way to the
same fate. The Houthis, for inexplicable reasons, are still largely untouched, despite
their broader threat to the basic principles of freedom of the seas that Britain and
America have sought to defend for centuries.
The blame for failing to destroy the Houthi military capabilities can be laid on US and
UK incompetence rather than on Israel. The same applies to Washington’s failure to
decimate Shia militias in Iraq and Syria that have repeatedly attacked American civilian
and military personnel since October 7.
Israel’s schwerpunkt, however, has been and undoubtedly remains Iran itself. After this
April’s missile-and-drone attack, the Biden administration forced Israel to “take the win”
and respond with only one pin-prick strike. That piece of brilliance has obviously failed.
Now, Israel is deciding whether to retaliate against Iran’s nuclear-weapons programme,
oil infrastructure, top leadership, military facilities, or a creative mix-and-match
combination. We will know shortly what Prime Minister Netanyahu and his Cabinet
decide.
Israel’s next move is on behalf of everyone in the world who rejects terrorism from Iran,
or any other source. We can only wish Jerusalem the best, hoping it encourages the
people of Iran to take their fate into their hands, beginning the overthrow of Tehran’s
mullahs.
Whatever Israel does now, the only durable outcome for Iran is ousting the Islamic
Revolution of 1979.

Effects of the Haniyah Assassination

September 28, 2024

Ayatollah Khamenei should increase his security protections. Whoever assassinated Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a supposedly secure compound in Iran’s supposedly secure capital sent an unmistakable message to Khamenei, Iran’s citizens, its terrorist proxies, and the world at large: No one is safe in Iran.

Not the Supreme Leader, not Qassem Soleimani, and not the lowliest Basiji militiaman. This grim reality should lead all Iranians not lost in religious fanaticism or authoritarian ideology to reconsider their own future under the mullahs. Whether Israel (or whomever did the deed) used a bomb planted two months before detonating during Haniyeh’s visit, or fired a precision-guided weapon, the result was the same. Haniyeh is dead, and Iran stands humiliated.

What now? Almost a month after Haniyeh’s demise, Iran has not retaliated, although Israel’s pre-emptive August 25 strike against Hezbollah may have thwarted part of Iran’s plan. The situation remains fluid. The United States, committed to defend Israel, had acted earlier, deploying the USS Abraham Lincon carrier strike group to the Middle East, overlapping with the USS Theodore Roosevelt group before it returned home. Also now on station is the nuclear-powered USS Georgia, a cruise-missile submarine. Together with already present American military capabilities, this is a force to be reckoned with, offensive and defensive. Its presence alone could be delaying Iran’s response(https://www.wsj.com/opinion/israel-iran-u-s-force-pentagon-biden-administration-gaza-hamas-dcf393a1?mod=opinion_feat1_editorials_pos3).

While no one can ignore a US carrier strike group in their backyard, the main cause for Iran’s hesitation in again attacking Israel, as it did on April 13 with 320 missiles and drones, is the decidedly unpleasant strategic conundrum it faces. Humiliated, presumably by Israel, the mullahs must undertake devastating reprisals to reestablish credibility and deterrence. This time, a pinprick attack on Israel, which is all Hezbollah’s Sunday attack amounted to, will not suffice.

Moreover, some observers are dubious about Iran’s April strike, asserting that it warned Israel in advance, thereby enabling Israel’s defenses to blunt the assault. In turn, in President Biden’s words, Jerusalem could “take the win” and respond minimally. This analysis is speculative, and there are reports Iran suffered massive failures in its ballistic-missiles launches(https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iran-launches-drone-attack-toward-israel-idf-says/). Whichever version is true, Iran caused only minimal casualties and physical damage. That will not be nearly enough this time, whether the response comes from Iran itself, Hezbollah, or another terrorist proxy.

However, a truly punishing attack is what creates Iran’s strategic conundrum. Iran fears that an emboldened Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not bend to Washington’s pressure this time, as he did in April. With Biden now a lame duck, and the US presidential election in doubt, Israel could conclude that this is precisely the moment to launch a debilitating response, not just take out a few missile-launching sites. To start, Jerusalem could level Iran’s air-defense capabilities. Then, Netanyahu could target Iran’s nuclear weapons and ballistic-missile programs; its oil terminals and loading facilities in the Gulf; or major IRGC and regular military facilities countrywide. This time, the Supreme Leader might also be a target.

If Israel caused serious damage, the entire 1979 Islamic Revolution could be in jeopardy, which the ayatollahs will not want to risk. Their hold on power domestically has never been so unsteady, with substantial, long-brewing political, economic, and social discontent. Wrestling with the competing imperatives of striking Israel savagely but not being overthrown is paralyzing the regime’s decision-making. Trying to make a virtue out of necessity, Tehran claims to be withholding revenge to avoid jeopardizing the Qatari-led effort to establish a Hamas-Israel cease-fire in exchange for the release of Israeli hostages. With the negotiations seemingly stalled, the mullahs welcome further delay, not out of altruism for the combatants in Gaza, but because it affords Tehran precious additional time to untangle its strategic dilemma.

If the cease-fire negotiations do collapse, Iran will have no satisfactory way to escape the unpleasant alternatives it faces. That is a problem of its own making, having forged its “ring of fire strategy” against Israel over decades, and for reasons still unclear, launching it with Hamas’s barbaric October 7 attack. Tehran may have miscalculated the effect of Hamas’s blitz, which clearly did not crush Israel’s resolve. Instead, Netanyahu is now close to achieving his stated goal of eliminating Hamas’s political and military capabilities.

Moreover, with chaos in Gaza so extensive, Israel can now reopen the decades-old issue of what to do next with Gazan civilians, and whether resettlement to third countries is now in order. Following World War II, tens of millions of refugees who, for whatever reasons, could not return to their home countries were resettled. Only Palestinian were exempted from this outcome, treated instead as hereditary refugees, weapons against the very existence of Israel. That already-obsolete plan met its demise thanks to the Iran-Hamas October 7 assault.

Iran could choose to do very little, hoping its reputation as a regional power with nuclear capabilities will not suffer greatly. Its terrorist surrogates, however, will then question the basic terms of their dependence on Iran. If the ayatollahs can’t protect terrorist leaders in Tehran, what are their incentive to do Tehran’s bidding in a dangerous and uncertain future? Might not Tehran’s timidity inspire Iran’s domestic opposition? Seeing weakness externally, might not the regime’s domestic enemies conclude that their moment to oppose the legitimacy and very existence of the mullahs’ regime is at hand?

The clock is ticking for the ayatollahs. They do not have forever to decide.

This article was first published in Independent Arabia on September 26, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

Operation Grim Beeper

September 24, 2024

Israel’s stunning attacks on Hezbollah via exploding pagers and walkie-talkies demonstrate both the creativity and cunning of its intelligence and defense forces, and their capacity to strike deep into the heart of its adversaries’ domains. The casualties among Hezbollah’s top leadership (and allies, like Iran’s Ambassador to Lebanon) plus the significant near-term degradation of Hezbollah’s internal command-and-control, make it conspicuously vulnerable.

For Americans, the death of senior Hezbollah leader Ibrahim Aqeel is especially significant. He was responsible for the 1983 bombings of the US embassy in West Beirut, and of barracks for US Marines and French soldiers participating in a multilateral peacekeeping force, at the government of Lebanon’s invitation. At least partial justice has been done.

Together with the recent elimination of Hamas leader Ismael Haniyah in a supposedly secure compound in Tehran, Israel has almost certainly unnerved Iran, its principal enemy, as well as the terrorist proxies directly targeted. While the future is uncertain, now is a perfect opportunity for Israel to take far more significant reprisals against Iran and all its terrorist proxies for the “Ring of Fire” strategy. Iran’s nuclear-weapons program may now finally be at risk.

Where does the Middle East battlefield now stand?

After “Operation Grim Beeper,” as many now call it, Jerusalem launched major strikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon. Whether these strikes have concluded, or whether they are the opening phases of a much larger anti-terrorist efforts, is not clear. These and other recent kinetic strikes have caused further damage to Hezbollah’s leadership and its offensive capacity.

Nonetheless, Hezbollah’s extraordinary arsenal of missiles, largely supplied or financed by Iran, plus their ground forces and tunnels networks in the Bekka Valley and elsewhere in Lebanon, make it a continuing threat, more dangerous near-term to Israel than even Iran. The CIA publicly estimates the terrorists could have “as many as 150,000 missiles and rockets of various types.” Many believe it is a matter of simple self-preservation that Israel must neutralize Hezbollah before any significant military steps are taken against Iran itself.

Since October 8, the day after Hamas’s barbaric attack on Israel, Hezbollah’s constant missile and artillery barrages into northern Israel have forced approximately 60,000 citizens to evacuate their residences, farms and businesses. Because of the extensive economic dislocation, and the continuing danger of further destruction of the abandoned properties, on September 16, Israel declared that returning those forced to flee from the north to be a national war goal. That could well signal further strikes. Israel has maintained near-perfect operational security for nearly a year; no one on the outside can predict with certainty what is coming.

As for Hamas, a less-reported but equally significant development is that the Biden administration seems to have largely given up hope of negotiating a cease-fire in the Gaza conflict, at least before November’s presidential election. In fact, Israel and Hamas had opposing goals that could not be compromised. Israel was prepared to accept a brief cease fire and releasing some Palestinian prisoners, in exchange for its hostages, whereas Hamas wanted a definitive end to hostilities, with all Israeli forces withdrawing from Gaza. Almost certainly, there was never to be a meeting of minds.

Accordingly, Israel’s pursuit of Hamas’s remaining top leadership and the ongoing efforts to degrade and destroy its combat capabilities will continue. Moreover, operations to destroy Hamas’s extraordinarily extensive fortifications under Gaza will also continue, aimed at totally destroying every cubic inch of the tunnel system. Thus, at least for now, Iran’s initial sally in the Ring of Fire strategy is on the way to ignominious defeat. Tehran’s dominance in Gaza has brought only ruin.

By contrast, Yemen’s Houthi terrorists, with Iran’s full material support and political direction, continue to close the Suez Canal-Red Sea passage to most traffic, while also targeting US drones in international airspace. This blockage us causing significant economic hardships. In the region, Egypt is suffering major declines in government revenue from lost Suez Canal transit fees, which can only increase economic hardships for its civilian population. Worldwide, the higher costs of goods that must now be transported around the Horn of Africa are burdening countless countries, all with impunity for the Houthis and Iran.

Allowing Tehran and its terrorist proxies to keep these vital maritime passages closed is flatly unacceptable. Even before the United States was independent, freedom of the seas was a key principle of the colonies’ security. As with many other aspects of Iran’s Ring of Fire strategy, the Biden administration has been wringing its hands, not taking or supporting decisive action to clear these sea lines of communication. Whether the next US President continues the current ineffective approach will obviously not be known until after January 20, 2025.

Similarly, the United States has failed to exact significant retribution against Iran and the Shia militias in Iraq and Syria, also largely armed and equipped by Iran, that have conducted over 170 attacks on American civilian and military personnel since October 7. The Biden administration has effectively left these diplomats, soldiers and contractors at continuing risk, especially as tensions and increased military activity in the Ring of Fire area of operations escalate. An Iranian or Shia militia attack that inflicted serious American casualties, which is unfortunately entirely possible due to the Biden administration’s passivity, could prompt major US retaliation, perhaps directly against Iran.

Tehran’s mullahs remain the central threat to peace and security in the Middle East. As its terrorist surrogates are steadily degraded, and the Ring of Fire Strategy increasingly unravels, the prospects for direct attacks on Iran’s air defenses, its oil-and-gas production facilities, its military installations, and even its nuclear-weapons and ballistic-missile programs steadily increase, Moreover, as Iran’s deeply discontented civilian population sees increasingly that the ayatollahs are more interested in religious extremism than the welfare of their fellow citizens, internal dissent against the regime will increase. The real question, therefore, is whether Iran’s Islamic Revolution will outlast its current Supreme Leader.

This article was first published in Independent Arabia on September 24, 2024. Click here to read the original article.

The Diplomatic Demons of Despair Battle Securing Strategic Victory in Israel

August 22, 2024

By Dr. David Wurmser[1]

In the summer of 2002, I was sent as a US diplomat to assess and correct the damage done by our negotiating team at the end of the 2000 Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference. In 2000, the overarching goal within our diplomatic corps was to reach a deal with the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) to expand NPT membership reach universality. So central had this goal become that it became a fixation to the point where the original mission of the NPT was obscured. The non-Aligned Movement believed self-imposed pressure was so great among Western diplomats to achieve such universality that they could be blackmailed and seduced into shifting the nature of the treaty from its original purpose of controlling nuclear technologies to responsible actors who could use it for peaceful purposes to become instead a disarmament treaty focused on disarming Western nuclear weapons arsenals, undermine Israel, and to establish a goal as well as to eliminate Western structures of missile defense. The vehicle of this attempt was to forward an unrealistic list of demands – which eventually became known as the Thirteen Points under Article VI of the NPT.

The NAM read US and British diplomats correctly. Both the US and UK diplomatic teams had indeed descended into such despair that they had crossed into an obsession. In a final act of surrender, all resistance or rejection by US and British diplomats on the 13-point plan was surrendered by the US negotiator as he physically collapsed from exhaustion and was wheeled away to a hospital in a life-threatening condition. He literally signed the agreement from the stretcher. The US had in effect signed away its (as well as the British and French) nuclear arsenals and any right to missile defense. The French felt betrayed since they had not even been consulted or coordinated, intentionally because the US and British teams knew that France understood more soberly than they that its residual claim to superpower status had just been erased.

It was a lesson that entered historical annals about diplomatic obsession and loss of proportion. Diplomatic goals were detached and prioritized over national interest, and diplomatic décor and sober policymaking were sacrificed at the altar of an agreement at all costs. The noble early intention to expand the NPT had descended into a possessed obsession.

Sadly, we have come to this point once again with the ceasefire/hostage deal negotiations over Gaza. The ceasefire/hostage deal talks began many months ago and are based on assumptions and parameters that originated from the very different reality of early Spring 2024 of pre-Rafiah, pre-Philadelphia Corridor period of Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza. But instead of assessing the tectonic changes, US diplomacy is redoubling its effort to the point of obsession while losing sight of the overall strategic picture, and even its more narrow goal of freeing the hostages.

The current diplomatic effort was born in a different reality. In April 2024, Israelis believed that the only way to get the hostages out— any of them — was a deal that came at a steep price. That difficulty of accepting a dear price, moreover, seemed offset by the difficulty and impasse of the situation. Israel controlled only about a third of Gaza in early May, and the U.S. demanded a ceasefire because of the mounting humanitarian cost and the assessment that any further advance of the IDF would trigger an unfathomable humanitarian catastrophe, as well as escalate to general war with Hizballah.

Iran, Hizballah, Hamas and Gazans themselves read the writing: Israel had stalled. Israel was unprepared to fight a war in the north against Hizballah, especially given how much of its force was still bogged down in Gaza, and was thus eager to end the fighting in Gaza to redirect more of its power northward.

Internally, Israel’s government teetered at the edge of collapse and was expected by most to fall within weeks as the crescendo of voices calling for early elections was deafening. The anti-government demonstrators who over the last two years had gathered at Kaplan street – starting with opposition to legal reform but morphing into essentially a lobby for a hostage deal in hopes that it would weaken the Netanyahu government enough to topple it — was back on the streets with confidence. It rode the tail wind of genuine universal Israeli anguish over the Israeli hostage issue as well as broad-based disappointment in the reigning government, leveraged overt US support, and tapped into the international outcry over the humanitarian “crisis” which had became the focus of all attention.

The majority of the war cabinet and Israel’s flag-rank defense establishment, let alone the world of retired generals for a parade of reasons, echoed the demands and outlook of the U.S. administration. The coalition of air power the US had gathered to parry Iran’s robust missile attack on Israel on April 13 moreover reminded Israel that its entire defense doctrine for decades had drifted into resting dangerously on a US regional strategic umbrella rather than its traditional doctrine of self-reliance and preemptive/preventative defense. And the umbrella came with its price of deference to American demands.

Hamas read all of that and dug in, believing time was taking its toll on Israel, the US was successfully manipulated into furthering its demands, and in the battle of wills, it was winning.

Given those realities, the only deal possible to get hostages back was essentially an Israeli surrender managed under American auspices – end the war and withdraw from Gaza – leaving Israel with the only hope that it will be able to return to fight another day. Some of the most prominent commentors of former generals on TV echoed that point, and insisted that victory was impossible; the only course was to surrender, leverage international support to find a more palatable Palestinian Authority to which it might be possible to turn Gaza over, and bring some – about a quarter at most — of the hostages home.

That is the reality when the fundamental assumptions and framework of the deal began being set. If hostages were to be brought home, which remained one of the two main Israeli goals, that was realistically the only way. And moreover, it was aligned with Israel’s local, regional and geopolitical strategic reality, as unsatisfying as those realities were.

But reality now is vastly different. Israel finally invaded Rafah and took control of the Philadelphia corridor, which severs Gaza from Egypt, with almost no loss of civilian life. Hamas lost its lifeline, its “oxygen supply,” from Egypt as long as the Philadelphia Corridor remains under Israeli control. Indeed, the capture of the Philadelphia corridor revealed a dark truth: Egypt’s government had over recent years failed, or was unwilling, to meaningfully govern the traffic entering and exiting Gaza to the point that Hamas had unfettered access and logistical support from the outside. Now, Hamas is suffocating and seems to be slowly dying.

Internally, the Israeli government is now stable and will survive at least into 2025. Almost all of the strongest voices within the Israeli governmental structure for U.S. administration positions, especially Benjamin Gantz and Gadi Eisenkott – who was among the strongest advocates for yielding and proponents of the view that victory was impossible — have left and the security cabinet is essentially replaced by the coalitional government cabinet. In Gaza itself, there is no genuine humanitarian crisis and the level of civilian deaths is a trace of what it had been.

The ground that shifts tectonically as a result of these dynamics has also shifted how one best can secure the release of the most hostages. Indeed, the best way to bring home the most hostages is no longer through the deal conceived by American diplomats, but through accelerated military pressure to create the realization among Gazans that total Israeli victory is inevitable. At that point, Gazans will despair of Hamas, and even those on the ground holding the hostages will see greater value in their own preservation rather than join Hamas in its collapse and demise. The remaining hostages acquire immense value at that point, since personally for Gazans they become the only asset they have to barter and save their skin under the inevitable Israeli victory. Not only will they keep them alive, but Gazans likely will begin to come forward either to release them to Israel as the IDF draws close, or to leak operational intelligence that can help locate hostages. People will cut their deals with the Israeli victor. In short, the greater the certainty of Hamas’ collapse and loss of control, the greater the chance of getting any or even all hostages back to Israel.

Under those circumstances, the parameters of discussion regarding a ceasefire as construed by US diplomats right now actually undermines the real dynamic that would lead to the release of hostages since it creates the idea that Hamas will be saved, and that there will be no collapse. Gazans thus will not risk their lives to abandon Hamas, given the inevitable resurrection of Hamas that the current parameters of the agreement guarantees. There will also be no intelligence divulged to Israel. There will be no hostage holders who give up their hostages to save themselves. Simply, there will be no Gazans who help the IDF until they are sure that Hamas will not survive.

Moreover, the broader regional strategic context surrounding the Gaza war has changed. And so has Israel’s strategic imagery now that the immediacy of the Gaza war has yielded to reflection on the nature of the overall defense of the nation. Indeed, Israel is slowly turning the geostrategic tide not only in Gaza, but in Lebanon and Iran too — and for the worse for Hamas, Hizballah, Houthis, Iraqi militias and the whole Iran axis. The longer the war goes on, the more Israel weakens, and will eventually defeat, the evil axis.

But Israel’s close-in strategic realities have also changed. In Gaza, dozens of hidden cross-border tunnels have now been exposed, some large enough for constant truck traffic even. The strategic supply of Hamas by Iran had been unrestrained until May – bringing the front line of Iran’s attack into the heart of Israel only 25 miles from the center of Tel Aviv. Israel now, however, controls that border. Nothing passes into Gaza now without traversing Israeli lines. And Gaza itself has been divided, with nothing from the south being able to move into the northern half without also going through an additional, robust Israeli line. Essentially, the Iranian threat had been pushed outside of the Mandatory border – the border established in 1921 by the League of Nations to define what was earmarked to become Israel, but after 1948 was partially controlled by Egypt and Jordan in Gaza and Judea and Samaria, and then captured entirely by Israel in 1967. The closest Iran can get is in the chaos of the Sinai Peninsula on the Egyptian side of the border with Israel.

On the negative side, Judea and Samaria (West Bank) have become an active front, more dangerous now than even Gaza. The reason for this is that Iran has used the Iraqi militias, the collapse of Syria and the weakness of the Jordanian state to penetrate Israel’s border in the Jordan Valley. It is able to smuggle significant material and event agents, and is attempting to trigger a dangerous new front that reaches into areas at the heart of Israel adjacent to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.[2] As a result, Israel is rapidly and urgently building a far more robust defense structure in the Jordan Valley to prevent a similar reality as had been in Gaza until May, when Israel took the Philadelphia Corridor, to separate Judea and Samaria from the Iranian pincer coming in via Jordan.

Essentially, Israel has rediscovered what it had neglected for at least three decades: The territory within Mandatory Palestine is a single strategic theater. Whoever maintains its borders — whether the Jordan Valley or the Philadelphia corridor and the whole Egyptian border to Eilat — strategically dominates all that transpires within the territory.

And the only way to control a border is operational control and presence over it. And such control – not only monitoring but enforcement against what the monitoring uncovers – can only be achieved by robust physical presence. The issue is not detection, but reaction to violation. Even if the IDF detects dangerous cross-border activity, reentry into an evacuated area is prohibitive — even to the point of Israel’s being deterred — and thus relies on cooperation from the Palestinian Authority and Egypt, both of whom are as much part of the problem as its solution. If Israel is present with boots on the ground in operationally capable levels, then reaction is automatic and hardly governs a second thought.

In other words, Gaza and Judea and Samaria all had become entirely part of the larger Iranian effort to penetrate into the heart of Israel using the Palestinian Arab populations. And thus it has become imperative that the IDF holds the Philadelphia corridor and the Jordan Valley corridor with a real, operational force that maintains positive full control as the only way to prevent the drift back to October 6 in Gaza and in Judea and Samaria (West Bank).

As such, the paradigm that informs US establishment thinking and which informs the current content of all American diplomacy, including the ceasefire deal – that Israel can subcontract to the Palestinian Authority and Israel’s neighbors the control of either the Philadelphia Corridor in Gaza or the Jordan Valley in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) — is now collapsing and rejected in Israeli strategic thinking.

So, the entire hostage ceasefire framework has become obsolete and highly counterproductive. Indeed, its terms of reference try to preserve the realities of an Israeli defeat, which had been the only way out before Rafiah and Philadelphia, instead of an Israeli victory, which is what is emerging not only locally but potentially regionally.

And yet, even as the diplomatic effort as currently defined becomes ever more detached from reality, US diplomats redouble their effort to realize the unattainable. And the watershed issue is the Philadelphia corridor. Hamas, desperate to reestablish its lifeline to Iran, demands Israel leave the corridor. Israel, of course, now refuses. The U.S., however, is trying to bridge the gap by trying to reduce IDF presence to a meaningless symbolic level, such as a handful of observers to PA control, in the Philadelphia Corridor. It is an unbridgeable gap since it symbolizes and embodies who will win this war and define the post-war strategic reality: Israel or Hamas and Iran.

In their despair to reach a dead-letter deal, US diplomats are inching ever closer to trying to birth the sort of spectacle I had to help clean up in the 2002 NPT preparatory conference in Geneva by walking back the 13-point surrender plan delivered by a similar obsession and resulting despair possessing our diplomats in the 2000 NPT Review Conference.

[1] David Wurmser is a senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC as well as at both the Misgav Institute and the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs in Jerusalem

[2] https://x.com/wurmserscribit/status/1825094588047986854?s=48

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