Pax Americana in the Middle East

Nearly lost in the furore over the Israeli attack on the Turkish civilian aid flotilla is an incredible assessment delivered by Mossad Chief Meir Dagan on June 1: “Israel is turning from an asset to the US to a burden.”

As Eqbal Ahmad first argued in the 1970s, American support for Israel stems from a fundamental alignment of interests. This alignment existed since the 1960s till the end of the Cold War. It does not any longer.

American support for Israel began wholeheartedly after the 1967 Arab-Israeli War when Israel defeated Egypt, Syria and Jordan, assisted by Iraq — the Soviet Union’s primary Arab allies. The “dagger in the heart of the Middle East” proved itself capable of being the tip of a Spartan spear. The US fashioned Israel into a bulwark against socialism and as its long arm in the region. In return, it provided Israel with diplomatic and strategic cover.

The end of the Cold War guaranteed US dominance and devalued Israel. Thus the US sponsored the so called “peace process,” elevating its status in the region.

Israel resuscitated its worth as a Global War on Terrorism ally, a bulwark this time against radical Islamic groups and regimes. But this threat proved over-inflated. Instead the US faces fresh challenges to its hegemony in the Middle East. As the neocon vision of Iraq as an imperial outpost explodes on the streets of Baghdad, Basra and Fallujah, the US must come to terms with a simple reality: it cannot keep Iranian influence out of Iraq, and that Iran has called its bluffs on war and “crippling sanctions.”

Meanwhile Israel, at the peak of its power, is aggressively absorbing Palestinian territories, and threatening war against Iran, Syria and Hezbollah. Its attack on the Turkish flotilla is a show of strength even against allies.

This threatens US interests. America does not desire a contiguous new warfront from Iraq to Afghanistan — even less from Lebanon to Pakistan — as it conducts its complex withdrawals and balancing acts in the region. Nor does it wish for Israel’s emergence as a regional hegemon, acting outside its imperial framework.

This leaves few options for the maintenance of US dominance. One is a détente with Iran: recognition and guarantees for its ruling establishment in return for delimiting its sphere of influence in Iraq and slowing down its nuclear program. There are indications that backchannel talks are already underway. Another is balancing Iran with Turkey in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Repudiating its alliance with Israel to gain legitimacy in the Arab world is part of Turkey’s gambit to reclaim leadership of the Arab world after a century’s hiatus. Thus, the flotilla incident is not the trigger but the climax of Turkey’s shifting policy. Turkey’s pro-Palestinian position will also sap the rising popularity of Iran and Syria as the leaders of the “resistance” against Israel. The US strategic planners will appreciate the irony that a major Nato ally may now spearhead the Palestinian resistance.

Turkey has become more instrumental to American hegemony in the Middle East than Israel. Thus Israel, while remaining an ally, will gradually lose its carte blanche under an American umbrella. But this will not translate into peace in the region or justice for the Palestinians, a prospect opposed not just by Israel but equally by most Arab despots. An American sponsored Palestinian state will not go beyond a moth-eaten vassal entirely dependent on Israel and the US.

Under this strategic architecture the US will have to negotiate a more diffused balance of power held by Turkey, Iran, Israel and the Arabs. But with Turkey’s entry into the region, a turn away from Israel, a détente with Iran, and a symbolic “peace process,” American hegemony in the region will grow more stable.

The whole region may soon enter a new era of Pax Americana.

Published in the Express Tribune, June 18^th, 2010.