US’ diminishing influence in the Middle East
The United States, previously dubbed a key player in shaping events in the region, is displaying weakness and indifference at a time when the Middle East has found itself in turmoil not witnessed in decades, which threatens to alter the Sykes-Picot borders.
Despite efforts by Secretary of State John Kerry to revitalize dormant peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians or engage more positively in the Syrian crisis, it is becoming clear that he lacks the presidential sway to make things happen.
Unlike the conventional belief that second-term presidents are able to take bold decisions in domestic and foreign affairs after conquering re-election pressure, the second Obama term seems far from taking such a stance.
For one thing, the administration is reeling under mounting domestic crises from his first term, from fiscal issues and how to deal with the growing budget deficit, to whether to retain the existing health care program or embark on new initiatives.
In addition, foreign crises, such as the explosion that killed an American ambassador at the US Consulate in Libya, forced the administration to release e-mail correspondence, while the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) began targeting conservative groups, going as far as monitoring AP correspondence.
All these factors contributed to pushing the administration on the defensive and more importantly, led to questions being raised within Obama’s liberal electorate base on his increasingly reserved demeanor.
Some argue that Obama’s background as a professor in constitutional law dominates his approach at the expense of decision-making and execution.
Means of tackling the budget deficit is a good example. Former President Bill Clinton was said to have faced a similar predicament. He would have invoked a constitutional amendment that allows for raising the debt ceiling and forces the Republicans, who refused a deal, to challenge him in courts.
After eight years of Republican rule, Obama is clearly trying to mend the mess created by Bush. The president is trying to extricate the United States from the costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also handling the economy in a more bipartisan way than the solo approach adopted by Bush and his neo-conservative entourage domestically and in foreign affairs.
It has also become crystal clear that the United States is no longer the sole super power and as such not the only player who can call the shots. Though China is moving to compete with the US in the economic domain, it is Russia that wants to reassert itself as the neck-to-neck game player with Washington. A new Cold War-style race seems to be in the offing.
With the domestic oil production boom in the United States thanks to the new technology of fracturing, Washington now hopes even to take over Moscow as a top producer in just five years, where it hopes to pump 11.9 million barrels of oil per day by 2018.
With less interest in the Middle East’s hydrocarbon resources and weaker commitment toward its fellow Western allies as far as securing their energy needs are concerned, Washington looks more inclined to leave the complicated affairs of the region to Israel, who after all, has a bigger interest and knowledge of what is going on than far away Washington.
That could culminate a long trend of America moving gradually from the position of being a neutral or honest broker to a hands-off approach. From the peak of 1956, where Eisenhower forced Israel to withdraw from occupied Egyptian lands, successive American administrations adopted policies of giving in to Tel Aviv, even going against international law, most notably in the legal stance adopted on the 1967 occupation of Arab lands including Jerusalem.
But it is not fair to only blame the Americans. They are, after all, pragmatic people who know very well that international law is just legalization of what power creates on the ground. It is the “Arab Order” that came into being after World War II and is crumbling now under its own failures that has given Israel a golden opportunity to play the role of the Big Brother in the region, leaving the US and the Arabs watching as new chapters in history are being written.
Email: [email protected]
