MBS, the Arab world and Israel

Muhammad Bin Salman (MBS), the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia for last so many years, seems a man on a mission. Given his young age he is considered as the future 50 years King of Saudi Arabia. Leading a country of 36 million people, 65% of which are under 30, he is determined to set his country on the biggest transformation project ever. His success can easily be attributed to his reliance on the sentiments of the young Saudi generation which considers him a reform-minded ruler that they have been waiting for, a ruler who could give them the opportunity to live real lives rather than living them virtually by watching videos on Netflix and following other cultures through Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. MBS’s message to his countrymen and the world so far was simple — he was not trying to modernise Islam but all he was doing was restoring it to its more modest roots. Through the American corridor he was reaching out to the Israelis and was committed to joining the other Arab nations in signing the Abraham Accord with them. But that was not to be, as Hamas’s attack on Israel happened. MBS’s modernisation dreams and his Vision 2030 have come crashing down almost with the same speed as the physical infrastructure and buildings in Gaza are crashing down under the Israeli airstrikes.

The problem with the MBS solution for Saudi Arabia is that he can modernise the physical infrastructure of the country but how he will modernise it politically and socially as it remains a deeply conservative country. Even outlawing slavery in Saudi Arabia took a while and was only done in 1962, and some say under pressure from then American President JF Kennedy. It is the same conservatism and the old Bedouin from the nomadic Arab tribes that now stand in total disbelief as the Israelis execute their shock and awe military campaign against the Palestinians. The big question that all of them are asking is: were we being friends with this country?

The American President and the British Prime Minister visited Israel. For these major powers it was not enough to demonstrate that they were standing with Israel but standing in Israel; and demonstrating that they were with the people of Israel was more important. The civilised world that these powers represent had already caged the uncivilised people but now the civilised world was bombing them to death. The Israeli PM while holding a joint press conference with the British PM mentioned who all wanted Israel to win this war and together with the entire civilised world which includes the US and the UK, he also named the ‘modern Arab countries’. I was just wondering what would be going through the minds of the people of Saudi Arabia. If the cost of being modern is being on the Israeli side, what would they think about it?

I am reminded of MBS’s modernisation plans. He is building a new city in Saudi Arabia named Neom; in fact he doesn’t call it a city he calls it a new kingdom. He considers it a pioneer which will lead all sectors in future. One of them is the commercial air travel that the Crown Prince wants to bring to the city. This is a project on which the Crown Prince wants to spend $500 billion and the exuberant cost is reflective of ideas such as NASA partnering Saudi Arabia in developing there an artificial moon that would be the biggest in the world. Neom has a vision statement that reads, “the land of future where the greatest minds and the best talents are empowered to embody pioneering ideas that exceed boundaries in a world inspired by imagination.” But unfortunately, the world of the Middle East is inspired by ideological hatred and conflict and in the troubling politics of the Middle East hardly any state is anymore sovereign. The UAE, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman are already Muslim states that have embraced modernism but for almost all of them the US acts as the arbiter and none of them can do anything without America’s nod or approval.

MBS is the leader of the Arab world and his Vision 2030 should have been more Arab than his country centred. Geoeconomics guided his Vision 2030 but there was so much wrong with the geopolitics and the Arab politics that warranted Saudi Arabia’s and the Muslim world’s attention and there is so much wrong that had happened in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen. So many people in these countries that suffered and there is this unending suffering of the Palestinian people. The lesson for MBS is that no economic vision alone can create an environment of security and stability. The very powers that guarantee Saudi security stand unhinged with Israel today. How can Saudi Arabia, the leader of the Arab world, stand up against them when it is dependent upon these big powers for its own security?

The Crown Prince says he read The Prince and that Machiavelli is his model. What MBS was doing through his Vision 2030 was creating a Saudi fortress in an Arab island where many other countries and their people suffered. Machiavelli says, “the best fortress is to be found in the love of the people, for although you may have fortresses, they will not save you if you are hated by the people.” Hamas and the people of Palestine had nothing to lose except their lives. Those were already being lost under the state terrorism being executed by the Israelis for the past so many years. So, the death ground strategy of Hamas had one big achievable objective — bring the plight of the Palestinian back on the global stage.

Under the current circumstances, life is not easy for both the US and its strategic partner Saudi Arabia. The US was pivoting Asia-Pacific and was moving away from the Middle East. But now it faces not two but three front problems in three different theatres. In Eastern Europe there is the problem of Ukraine. In Western Pacific there is the problem of China with Taiwan and now it is being pulled back in the Middle East. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia was blindsided by the suffering of its brotherly Arab countries and was running away with its Saudi-centred modernisation plans. What has happened to the big plans of both these countries is best described by a dialogue in the famous movie Godfather: “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!” Both the global and the regional hegemons have some very difficult decisions to make as the world sits and waits.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 22^nd, 2023.

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