The Houthis – Iran’s reserve

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 31 December 2024

            Four of Iran’s main anti-Israel instruments are effectively out of action.  Hamas is a shadow of the fighting force it once was; Hezbollah has been neutered and is currently in a two-month ceasefire deal; Iran’s two efforts at a direct attack on Israel were humiliatingly ineffective; and control of the militias in Syria has been wrested from Iran’s grasp.  As a result Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, has been forced to fall back on the one resource still effective – the Houthis.

            Distant from Israel though they are, the Houthis represent the most powerful of the cards remaining in Iran’s hands.

Following the Hamas pogrom of October 7, 2023, Iran determined that the Houthis would be one of the seven ​fronts from which a united attack would be launched on Israel, to exploit the assault and Israel’s inevitable military response.  Under instruction from Iran, the Houthis began launching drones and ballistic missiles the 2000-plus kilometers from Yemen into Israel.  They have so far dispatched approximately 200, most of which have been intercepted before reaching their target. More than 20 have, however, evaded Israel’s air defenses, including one that exploded in a playground in the middle of Jaffa on December 21.  Fortunately only minor casualties resulted.

In response Israel Air Force fighters have undertaken a number of  punitive strikes against Houthi facilities in Sana’a, Yemen’s capital, targeting those used to smuggle Iranian weaponry into the country.  Most recently the Houthis’ three ports have been struck together with the region’s energy infrastructure, and media outlets in Yemen have reported that many places in Sana’a and the port city of Hodeidah lost their electricity supply and were blacked out. 

          Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi has not been deterred and, supplied by Iran, has continued his missile launchings. One of two that crossed into Israeli airspace on December 25 caused Ben Gurion airport to suspend all flights temporarily.

"The Houthis have been carrying out attacks against Israel in violation of international law," said IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, “and the Houthi regime is a threat to peace and security in the region.” 

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea, conflating the Houthis with Yemen as a whole, as the group has taken to do, said they would not be deterred by the Israeli strikes.  "The Israeli aggression will not deter Yemen and the Yemenis from performing their religious and moral duty in responding to its massacres in the Gaza Strip,” he said.

            The Houthis are the only players on the world stage that are openly antisemitic.  Others that are, vehemently deny the charge, and shelter under the convenient anti-Zionist cloak.  The Houthis, however, emblazon across their flag “A curse on the Jews”.  Even the Iranian regime does not go this far.  Anti-Israel they certainly proclaim themselves, but Judaism is tolerated in Iran as a minority religion, and synagogues continue to serve various Jewish communities across the country.

Much more in line with the ayatollahs’ philosophy are two other exhortations on the Houthi flag – “Death to America” and “Death to Israel”.  It was these that made the Houthis, in their bid to overthrow Yemen’s internationally recognized government, a natural target for Iranian support.  Incidentally a working alliance with the Houthis gave Iran the chance to extend their “Shia Crescent” to the Arabian peninsula.

The Houthis are Zaydi Shi’ites, a minority group on the Shia side of the great Islamic Sunni-Shia divide.  Following the collapse of the Ottoman empire in 1918, separate regimes were established in north and south Yemen, and the country was plagued for nearly fifty years with active or passive civil strife.  It was only in 1990 that the two regimes agreed to unite as the Unified Republic of Yemen under the presidency of the former president of the northern state, Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Saleh was far from universally popular, and it was not long before the Houthis, accusing him of corruption and being backed by Sunni Saudi Arabia and the US, emerged as an opposition movement under the leadership of Zaydi religious leader Hussain al-Houthi, from whom they took their name.

In 2011 Saleh fell victim to the so-called Arab Spring. He gave up the presidency reluctantly. The Yemeni military, including its air force, remained largely loyal to him.  In an attempt to maneuver his way back to power, he allied himself with his erstwhile enemies, the Houthis.  As a result, supported by Yemen’s military and with weaponry from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, in September 2014 Houthi troops overcame government forces and took control of large areas of west Yemen, finally capturing the capital, Sana’a.  When Saudi Arabia, alarmed at Iran’s expansion into the Arabian peninsula, intervened in March 2015 to beat back the Houthis, Iran increased its financial and military support. 

As a result the Houthi-Iran relationship soon changed.  From it being a case of Iran assisting the Houthis in their domestic struggle for power, it quickly turned into the Houthis becoming a proxy for Iran in its regional bid for dominance.

With the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza conflict, Iran boosted the Houthis’ role.  On October 31 they effectively declared war on Israel, nominally in support of Hamas in its conflict with Israel in Gaza.  Subsequently the Houthis have attacked Israel by both air and sea.

The Bab el-Mandeb Strait is a strategic sea passage at the very foot of the Red Sea, connecting it to the Gulf of Aden. It is flanked to the east by the Houthi-occupied coastline.  Claiming to target vessels directly connected to Israel, the Houthis began attacking shipping passing through the Strait.

Through faulty intelligence, shipping whose connection to Israel was peripheral, or even non-existent, was also attacked.  As a result the whole campaign has proved something of an own-goal.  It has attracted air strikes by the US and UK, as well as by Israel’s Air Force, and it has also angered  the international shipping world. The attacks have disrupted maritime trade routes, causing significant revenue losses for the Suez Canal and adversely affecting Egypt's economy.

While international anger is largely directed at the Houthis, there is also broader criticism of Iran's role in supporting them, and thus contributing to the disruption of global maritime security and trade.

UN Security Council Resolution 2722, passed in January 2024, condemned the Houthi attacks on shipping, and ordered them to desist. The resolution was supported by the US, UK, and France, but Russia and China abstained, presumably unwilling to condemn an obviously Iranian-backed initiative.

While deprived of other means of attacking Israel, Iran is unlikely to curb the Houthi naval-air campaign, and for the moment the Houthis are content to act as Iran’s proxy, since it accords with their own intense anti-Israel ideology.  But they have their own agenda – namely to take over the rest of government-held Yemen, and then to conquer the area of southern Yemen currently ruled by the Southern Transitional Council that has split away and declared independence. 

An extended intra-Yemen struggle lies ahead – a struggle which has nothing to do with the Palestinian cause, and in which anti-Israel military action is irrelevant. At some point Iran might find that its staunch Houthi reserve has become just as unreliable as its other proxies.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Islamic Republic of Iran now look to their reserve army against Israel:  The Houthis", 31 December 2024:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-835438

 

 

The Oxford Union debased

 Published in the Jerusalem Report, cover date 6 January 2025

   The Oxford Union is arguably the most prestigious student debating society in the world.  Founded in 1823, it has hosted some of the world’s greatest figures such as US Presidents Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon, countless British prime ministers and their Cabinet colleagues, and many of the world’s leading actors, musicians, authors and scientists.  Few are they, even among the most eminent, who refuse an invitation to participate in a debate in the Oxford Union, while to become President of the Union is the highest political achievement open to an Oxford undergraduate.  Most go on to enjoy noteworthy careers in politics and the professions.

            The current President is Ebrahim Osman Mowafy, an Egyptian Arab.  He decided to mount a debate on the evening of November 28 on the contentious proposition: “This House believes Israel is an apartheid state responsible for genocide."  Invited to lead the team opposing the motion was 44-year-old Jonathan Sacerdoti, a British journalist and TV producer, the son of a Holocaust survivor.  Sacerdoti is known as a campaigner against antisemitism. 

            Within minutes of the end of the debate an audio of what had occurred in the chamber when Sacerdoti stood up to speak was posted online.  The impression on the listener was of utter chaos.  Sacerdoti published his own account a few days later.

   “What unfolded on Thursday night,” he wrote, “was not a debate at all. It was an assault on the very principles the Union once claimed to uphold, presided over by organizers who behaved more like a mafia than custodians of an august society dedicated to free speech.”

He describes the motion chosen for debate as “a gross provocation” which in itself caused some people to decline an invitation to speak.  A worse charge was that the evening had been organized in a deceitful and dishonest way.  The chamber had been packed with pro-Palestinian supporters while, writes Sacerdoti, “Jews who might have attended were clearly too afraid to show up.  Many had written to me privately to tell me of their fears.”

Traditionally the President of the Union chairs debates, remaining neutral in order to uphold the perception of impartiality.  They do not normally participate in support of one side.  Exceptions have occurred during the Union’s long history, and the debate of November 28 was one such.  It appears that at some point prior to the debate one of the speakers booked to speak for the motion withdrew – perhaps, Sacerdoti speculates, intimidated by the strength of the team he had managed to assemble.  Mowafy informed Sacerdoti that a student would take his place to support the motion.  Only as the teams were preparing for the debate did he learn, as he puts it, “that Osman Mowafy himself would forgo the traditional impartiality of the chair’s role and speak against us.”

          Sacerdoti describes the audience as a “baying mob, openly hostile and emboldened by the president’s refusal to enforce the most basic rules of decorum.”  One of his team, Yoseph Haddad, an activist pro-Israeli Arab, was ejected from the chamber after dismissing audience members as “terrorist supporters”.

At one point Miko Peled, a relentless anti-Israel activist, described the atrocities of 7 October as acts of “heroism.”

It was this, on top of the clearly disgraceful proceedings generally, that led 300 senior academics to write an open letter to Oxford’s newly elected chancellor, Lord Hague, on December 4 condemning the “inflammatory rhetoric, aggressive behavior and intimidation” witnessed during the event.  Referring to Peled’s “heroism” comment, the signatories said: “We unequivocally condemn the incendiary remarks made by some speakers in support of Hamas and terrorist violence. Such statements are not only morally reprehensible but also in clear violation of the law.”

They should have been pushing at an open door.  There has recently been a series of attempts by Oxford students to bar figures with right-wing and gender-critical views from speaking.  Hague was elected Oxford University’s new chancellor on November 27.  Within a day he declared that he would end so-called “no-platforming.”

In a radio interview he was asked how he would deal with concerns about a “tendency among students not to accept points of view with which they disagree.”  He said: “Cancellation culture towards speakers that we disagree with is absolutely wrong.  I would encourage the Government to bring forward into law the Act that was passed under the previous government reinforcing freedom of speech in higher education, or if they think it is deficient, to come up with proposals of their own.”

   What, if anything, he proposes to do about the Oxford Union debate, which occurred after he had won the election for the Chancellorship, remains to be seen.  As for the debate itself, it is likely to be counted among the more notorious episodes in the records of the Oxford Union – not quite on a par, perhaps, with the debate held on February 9, 1933 on the motion “That this House will in no circumstances fight for its King and Country.” That debate, which was won by 428 against 275, polarized opinion across the country.  Next day the Daily Telegraph ran an article headlined "Disloyalty At Oxford.”  The debased debate on November 28, 2024 attracted, from the audience present in the chamber, 278 ayes as against 59 noes.  Sacerdoti described the evening as “the fall of the Oxford Union.”

Hope of a democratic future?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 23 December 2024

            Abu Mohammed al-Julani surely never envisaged the rapidity with which the Assad regime would crumble under the assault he master-minded on November 27.

It must, however, have been clear to him that if he was ever to make a bid to overthrow Bashar al-Assad, this was the moment.  It was a golden opportunity.  The two powers that had come to his aid time and again in the past were both preoccupied with their own problems.  Russia was bogged down in the quagmire of the Ukrainian war;  Iran was shaken to the core by Israel’s success in neutering Hezbollah.  Assad could expect little comfort from either.  Moreover his own armed forces were weakened by years of war, and the regime’s economy was struggling under the burden of international sanctions.  

So, seizing the moment, Julani ordered his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militia to break out of its stronghold in the Idlib area and storm Syria's second-largest city, Aleppo. The assault was unexpected, and government troops and security forces put up little resistance.

The next city south on the way to Damascus was Hama.  Here, alerted to what was clearly a determined offensive operation, the government managed to muster some token support from Russian planes and Iranian troops, but they were no match for the resolute HTS attack.  Hama fell to the rebels on December 5.  The regime was visibly disintegrating under the HTS assault. 

Two days later they captured the city of Homs after only a day of fighting, and early on Sunday, December 8,  HTS-led rebels entered Damascus and began releasing detainees at the country’s most notorious military prison, Sednaya.

Later that day they announced: "The tyrant Bashar al-Assad has fled."

At the end of the week Julani declared that he was intent on restoring some form of stable governance in Syria, and that he was communicating with Western embassies for assistance..

On December 14 he issued a statement claiming that his plans for the reconstruction and development of Syria were ready.  In preparing them up he had drawn on his seven years’ experience of administering Idlib province. Since 2017 HTS had been operating what it called the Salvation Government, a civilian administrative body which, on the lines of ISIS in its heyday, set up and ran education, healthcare, and public services, funded by taxes, tolls, and fees.  “Based on our administrative experience in Idlib,” said Julani, “we will advance in the rest of the country’s governorates.”

He used the same statement to assure world opinion that he was not to be thought of as extremist.  On the contrary he was  moderate, peace-loving and even-handed. “We are not going to get into a conflict with Israel,” he announced, adding – choosing his words with the utmost care – that he and his organization had “no hostility toward Iranian society.” 

He is at one with Israel on that.  It is the Iranian regime that is the rogue presence in the Middle East, dedicated to its declared objective of converting the whole world to Shia Islam, and of destroying both the US and Israel, to say nothing of Sunni Islamic states, in the process.  Now the ayatollahs are writing off the billions of dollars they have wasted in supporting Assad.  Moreover Syria’s ever-open door has been slammed shut, and a major conduit for supplying arms to their main proxy – Hezbollah in Lebanon – has been removed.  One of the pillars of their foreign policy has been kicked from beneath them.  The Iranian regime has been severely, if not fatally, weakened.

   Meanwhile Julani is turning into something of an enigma.  As part of an attempt to show that he has moved from heading a militant organization to a possible future as a political leader, he has quietly dropped his nom-de-guerre, Abu Mohammed al-Julani, and has asked to be referred to by his real name, Ahmed al-Shara.  Some media outlets. including the BBC, are complying.  

In a radio interview with the BBC on December 18, he was the epitome of quietly spoken moderation, discussing his plans to involve the whole of Syrian society in establishing its future governance.  He had earlier reassured the minorities and non-Muslim sects in Syria that they would live in peace and security under his rule: “No one has the right to erase another sect or religion,” he said.  “[They] have coexisted in the region for hundreds of years.”

He has also positively rejected the idea of autocratic rule, stressing that Syria deserves a system of government based on institutions.

How much of this represents his true intentions is hard to assess, given that he and his HTS are rooted in a jihadist past.   Moreover the extremist groups allied to his organization have little sympathy with the softly-softly methods he is adopting to consolidate his position.

Julani’s honeyed words seem to have given new motivation to the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces.  Formed in 2012, at the very start of Syria’s civil war, the body represented all the political opposition factions that came together with the goal of overthrowing the Assad regime and establishing a free and democratic country.

As HTS forces proclaimed the capture of Damascus, the Coalition, although more or less moribund for years and much fractured, announced that it was committed to "completing the transfer of power to a transitional governing body with full executive powers, paving the way for a free, democratic and pluralistic Syria."  Its statement made no mention of Julani or the HTS, but its vice-president, Dima Moussa, told the BBC that the "transition requires coming together of all Syrian people, including those who are carrying arms."

The Coalition then proceeded to draw up and issue its own proposals for Syria’s future.  On December 12  Anas Abdah, a member of the Coalition’s political committee, unveiled a comprehensive plan for managing the transitional phase in Syria. 

Abdah explained that Julani’s government “is a caretaker administration until early March. During this period, preparations will be made to establish an inclusive transitional government to manage the transitional phase.” 

          Abdah stressed that maintaining the continuity of institutions is a key guarantee of stability and preventing the collapse of the state.  He suggested that the post-March 2025 transitional governing body should prepare for a national, inclusive conference aimed at building a national consensus.  This conference, he proposed, would pave the way for a constituent assembly tasked with drafting a new constitution that reflects the aspirations of the Syrian people. Based on the principle of equal citizenship without discrimination, this draft constitution would be the subject of a nationwide referendum. 

Nothing of these ambitious, possibly illusory, proposals has so far been referred to by Julani. Whether they ever see the light of day depends on whether he sees himself as a more moderate version of Assad, or as the political head of a democratically elected, representative government.  His real intentions, for now, are shrouded in mystery.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Is there hope for a democratic future for Syria?" 23 December 2024:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-834492

Published in the Eurasia Review, 27 December 2024:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/27122024-syria-what-hope-of-a-democratic-future-oped/

Published in the MPC Journal, 31 December 2024:

https://mpc-journal.org/wp-admin/post.php?post=14598&action=edit

 

Syria’s lost democrats

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 16 December 2024:

Well before the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militia found itself victorious in its struggle against the Assad regime, Abu Mohammed al-Julani, its head, told CNN:  “The goal of the revolution remains the overthrow of this regime.”

But Julani omitted to say what he wished to replace it with. Despite all his softly spoken reassurances about his liberal intentions, all the evidence points to a political takeover ​of the country by the leader of the military coup – in fact a Sunni jihadist replacement of Assad.  ​Despite talk of inclusivity, there is little sign of the political presence of the many other Syrian groups and organizations scattered across the country. 

The interim prime minister that Julani has appointed, Mohammed al-Bashir, was plucked from administering an HTS-held area in northwest Syria​.

In recent years, HTS has attempted to gain local legitimacy by governing in a less extreme manner than, say, the Taliban in Afghanistan.  Through the Salvation Government, an HTS-influenced  civilian administrative body, it has – on the lines of ISIS in its heyday – established bureaucratic institutions for education, healthcare, and public services, funded by taxes, tolls, and fees.​  

HTS is rooted in a Salafi-jihadist ideology, and although Julani has renounced his former connection with al-Qaeda and attempts to present himself in a more moderate light, his organization is essentially Islamist.​  What is likely to emerge ​in Syria is a Sunni Islamist state, governed according to its own interpretation of Islamic Sharia law.   

With HTS in the ascendant, it is salutary to remember that the Syrian armed conflict began in 2011 as a popular uprising against the dictatorial government of President Bashar al-Assad​, with the establishment of democracy as its key demand.  

In March 2011 a few teenagers – fired no doubt by the revolutionary fervor sweeping the Middle East at the time – daubed some inflammatory slogans on a school wall in the southern Syrian city of Daraa.  Unfortunately for them, the Syria that President Bashar al-Assad had inherited in 2000 from his autocratic father was a tightly controlled police state, in which a powerful and all-encompassing security machine ensured that the slightest hint of opposition to the régime was ruthlessly crushed.

The youngsters were hunted down, arrested​, tortured​ in unspeakable ways, and killed. When details of their ordeal became known, protesters took to the streets. The security forces, unable to break up the demonstration, eventually fired into the crowd. That was enough to spark widespread rebellion. Groups antagonistic to Assad’s government began nationwide protests. Gradually, popular dissent developed into an armed revolt.

After months of crackdown by the government's security forces, various armed groups such as the Free Syrian Army (FSA) began forming across the country, marking the beginning of the Syrian insurgency.  By mid-2012, the uprising had escalated into a full-blown civil war with the aim of overthrowing the despotic Assad régime and substituting a democratic form of government.

Had assistance of any sort been forthcoming from the US or other Western governments at that early stage, Assad could have been defeated.  But US President Obama hesitated, and then continued vacillating even after it was clear in August 2013 that Assad had used chemical weapons against his opponents, utterly indifferent to the extensive civilian casualties that ensued.  Obama hesitated because he was intent on forging links with Iran leading to a nuclear deal, and Iran regarded Syria as a vital component in what was known at the time as its “Shia Crescent.”

Meanwhile the shining sword of democracy, the weapon the rebels in 2011 hoped would bring down Assad’s dictatorial regime, had become heavily tarnished. Those who are now labelled “Syrian rebels” are not fighting for democracy. The original FSA, once dedicated simply to establishing democracy in Syria, has over the nine years of civil conflict lost its cohesion and been transformed into an amalgamation of different groups for many of whom establishing an open democratic form of government is far from their aim.

Will a second democratic casualty of the civil war be Kurdish hopes of autonomy in the region they have established in north-eastern Syria?  The Kurd-occupied ​territory, which is about 25-30 percent of the old Syria, is currently a semi-autonomous region formally designated the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria or, more simply, Rojava.  It is, however, in the sights of Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has said he will never accept a Kurdish quasi-state ruled by the PYD party, which he considers a terrorist organization, along the Turkish border.

Speaking to reporters on December 6, Erdogan endorsed and supported the HTS advance into Syria.  “Our wish,” he said, “is that this march in Syria continues without accidents or disasters”– another voice with little or no interest in ensuring a democratic future for Syria. 

Erdogan is wedded to the Muslim Brotherhood, and has every sympathy with the HTS’s objectives.

Even as Assad was fleeing the country, the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army (SNA) began offensive operations against the American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who are mostly ethnic Kurds.  The SDF had stormed Deir Ezzor city, situated on the river Euphrates​ and part of Iran’s supply corridor connecting to Lebanon – a facility the regime has now lost.​   ​They were ousted by the HTS on December 10​, and a mini civil war was only prevented when​, on December 11, the US ​intervened to mediate a deal between the​ SNA and the SDF.

So what has happened to the original democratic Syrian opposition of 2011, made up of activists, intellectuals, and defectors pressing for a transition to democracy and an end to Assad’s authoritarian rule?  It consisted of the Syrian National Council, which later became part of the Syrian National Coalition,  Local Coordination Committees, which organized protests and civil resistance, and the Free Syrian Army (FSA), an informal group of defected soldiers and armed civilians.

It was a loosely allied group, and its component parts struggled with ideological, political, and ethnic divisions, resulting in a lack of unified leadership and goals.  Elements like ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra (now HTS) capitalized on the chaos and perverted their cause. As a result the original democratic opposition has largely been sidelined, while efforts to achieve a political resolution through UN-mediated peace talks, such as the Geneva process, made little progress and have now been overtaken by events.

In short the original Syrian democratic opposition has been overshadowed by the militarization of the conflict, the rise of extremist groups, and the intervention of foreign powers. It still exists in a fragmented form, but can it reorganize itself into some sort of cohesive entity in time to claim a seat at the table, ​should an opportunity actually arise to negotiate Syria’s future?  ​Is it realistic to hope for a democratic state of Syria emerging from ​the military coup?  ​The more probable outcome is that Syria’s future will be some sort of autocracy headed by HTS leader Julani.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and in the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Syria's lost democrats were overshadowed by the rise of extremist groups", December 16, 2024:

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-833561

Iran and the ceasefire

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 9 December, 2024

Did Iran oppose or approve of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire, agreed on November 26 and implemented in the early hours of the following day?  ​Opinion is divided, views differing according to the holder's perception of Iran’s complex geopolitical interests in the region.

  ​Some ​of the media speculate that Iran saw the ​proposed ceasefire as conflicting with its strategic interests by undermining its leverage against Israel,​ and opposed it.​  Some argue that that an enfeebled and disheartened Hezbollah​, ​desperate for a respite from Israel's onslaught, proceeded to negotiate the deal without a green light from Tehran.  ​

Most opinion takes a contrary view.  The defense editor of the UK’s Daily Telegraph  believes Iran has been so weakened ​through the defeats inflicted on its proxies that it was forced into the ceasefire, and that it represents a major setback​ for the ayatollahs.  Given the destruction that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have wreaked on the infrastructures of both Hezbollah and Hamas, he writes, “the Iranian regime, which finds itself increasingly under pressure from a disaffected populace, had little option but to bring hostilities to an end. All the indications are that Iran, not Hezbollah, was the driving force behind diplomatic efforts to end the fighting in Lebanon, as it feared that its standing in the region would be further eroded the longer the conflict carried on.”

Some commentators have perceived a split developing between Iran and its two main proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah.   They believe that a much weakened Hezbollah and the rump of Hamas are both more than willing to prolong the conflict with Israel, believing that the longer it lasts, the more pressure Israel will come under from world leaders to make concessions. This, they think, is what is behind the Hamas leadership’s constant refusal to accept ceasefire terms brokered by the Biden administration. 

There are, in fact, reports that dissatisfaction with Iran’s agreement to a ceasefire is morphing into talk of betrayal. It has certainly resulted in numerous breaches of the ceasefire terms by Hezbollah, requiring an appropriate military response by the IDF.  If Hezbollah is indeed determined to resume hostilities against Israel, the chance of extending the 60-day truce will eventually turn on a struggle of will​s with Iran.    

  Hamas’s savage assault on Israel on October 7, 2023, was probably intended to mark the start of a new era of Iranian strength.  If so, subsequent events seem to demonstrate that it was the exact opposite – namely, that October 7 marked ​the  highwater mark​ of Iran's power, and it was all downhill from then on. From the moment that Israel chased Hamas back into Gaza, Iran’s power base began to decline. 

Over the past year the ayatollahs have had to watch their Hamas allies suffer huge losses of manpower and facilities, culminating in the elimination of its leader, Yahya Sinwar.  I​n a long, hard struggle​ Hamas as a military entity has been all but destroyed.  It has also been ousted from the governance of Gaza, which can no longer be regarded by Iran’s ayatollahs as a launching pad for the invasion and destruction of Israel.  Israel’s determined and effective self-defensive action in response to October 7​ has clearly reduced Iran's strength and influence.  The regime has also proved powerless to prevent the decimation of Hezbollah’s senior command structure, including the assassination of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

Some commentators are linking the military successes ​in Syria by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), referred to by the media as the “Syrian rebels”, to Iran’s evidently weakened state and Russia’s preoccupation with its struggles in Ukraine.  Neither could offer Bashar al-Assad much support as HTS forces advanced into the streets of Damascus, greeted by jubilant crowds. Assad’s dictatorial regime has collapsed, while Iran’s “ring of fire” has blown back on itself.  Syria, Lebanon, Hamas and Hezbollah now represent not an unassailable Iranian  regional powerhouse, but a diminished and flagging regime..  

Iran​ appears to have made a serous, perhaps fatal, strategic miscalculation in April, 2024, when it decided to escalate its conflict with the West by launching its first-ever aerial onslaught on Israel.  That first attack was a humiliating failure since some 99% of the missiles and drones were destroyed in flight and failed to reach Israel.

The ayatollahs compounded their failure by essaying a second bombardment on October 1.  Although more powerful missiles were deployed, the results were only minimally more effective.  The ultimate humiliation, perhaps, was that Iran’s direct assaults on Israel triggered retaliatory airstrikes which prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has indicated struck Iran’s nuclear program.

While the regime has managed to win some victories in the propaganda war – successfully persuading many young, Left-wing people in the West that Israel is the aggressor in this conflict – it has been discomfited on the battlefield. and diminished geopolitically.  The strategic goals it has worked toward for years have become pipe dreams in a matter of months. Iran’s aim of regional domination seems less attainable than ever. 

The disintegration of Iran’s carefully-constructed terrorist network in the Middle East could even have profound implications for the survival prospects of the regime itself and its ruling ayatollahs.

         Openly calling for the overthrow of the Islamic Republic are Iranian opposition figures such as Reza Pahlavi, the son and heir of the last Shah of Iran, who heads a body called the National Council of Iran for Free Elections, and his rival, Maryam Rajavi, the head of the National Council of Resistance of Iran. Both claim to be acting as a government-in-exile.  In November Pahlavi called on Iranians to take the country back, adding that he was ready to lead any interim rule.

Having expended billions of dollars supporting terrorist proxies throughout the region, the ayatollahs are likely to find themselves under increasing pressure from disaffected voters.  Inflation is currently running at 35 percent, and more than 20 percent of young people are unemployed.   Apart from the failing economy, the regime is holding the lid on a seething cauldron of discontent about the restrictions imposed on women by the religious police.  Every so often the people’s frustration explodes in the form of public protests which are invariably put down ruthlessly by the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps).

With the Trump administration, which is likely to take a hard line on Iran, soon to assume power in Washington, the ceasefire deal in Lebanon could be the first indication that the ayatollahs’ days are numbered.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 8 December 2024, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Did Iran oppose or approve of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire?":

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-832571

Published in Eurasia Review, 17 December 2024:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/13122024-iran-and-the-ceasefire-oped/#google_vignette

Published in the MPC Journal, 18 December 2024

https://mpc-journal.org/iran-and-the-ceasefire/

Reviving the 'Deal of the Century'?

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 2 December 2024

            On his first time around the presidential election circuit, Donald J Trump placed such emphasis on his desire to broker a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians, that once he was elected I decided to follow his progress on this matter with especial care.  The result was my book “Trump and the Holy Land: 2016-2020” (see right), which I brought to a conclusion with a summary of the Israel-Palestinian peace plan that had been assiduously put together over the preceding four years by Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

With prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu by his side, Trump presented the plan to the world on January 28, 2020.  It was greeted with howls of derision from Palestinian​s and their supporters around the Middle East and beyond, all vowing to thwart it if any attempt was made to put it into effect.  

Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, appeared on television a few minutes after the Trump presentation, rejecting it root and branch:

“I say to Trump and Netanyahu​," he declared, "Jerusalem is not for sale, all our rights are not for sale and are not for bargain…We say a thousand no’s to this deal.”​  He was referring to the extraordinarily generous economic element of the plan, which aimed to create a vibrant, flourishing Palestinian state over ten years. 

Abbas’s reaction was far from the view of some influential figures in the Middle East and across the world. Bahrain and Oman signaled their approval by actually sending representatives to the White House ceremony.  Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, and the UAE all issued statements welcoming the plan.

For example, the statement issued by the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs ran: "The kingdom appreciates the efforts of President Trump's administration to develop a comprehensive peace plan between the Palestinian and the Israeli sides, and encourages the start of direct peace negotiations between the Palestinian and Israeli sides, under the auspices of the United States."

The Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a similar statement: "Egypt recognizes the importance of considering the US administration's initiative from the perspective of the importance of achieving the resolution of the Palestinian issue, thus restoring to the Palestinian people their full legitimate rights through the establishment of a sovereign independent state in the Palestinian occupied territories in accordance with international legitimacy and resolutions."

The UK offered typically restrained approval.  Trump said that then-UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, had called him earlier to offer support.  Dominic Raab, Britain’s then-foreign secretary, welcomed the plan as “a serious proposal” and urged the Palestinians not to reject it out of hand.  The Australian government also welcomed the peace proposal, calling it a positive move and encouraging both parties to consider it as a basis for dialogue.

So the plan certainly had a degree of regional and international approval in 2020.  Much water has flowed under the bridge since then.  In 2024’s changed circumstances. with the Hamas organization decapitated and Gaza on the verge of reconstitution, Trump’s "Peace to Prosperity: A Vision to Improve the Lives of the Palestinian and Israeli People" would certainly need amendment, but could it provide the basis for a renewed peace process? 

The  plan is divided into two parts: economic and political.  The economic portion was the first to be released, in June 2019.  Subtitled “A New Vision for the Palestinian People,” the 40-page document set out in considerable detail a scenario under which, with a huge input of funding, prospects for the Palestinians would be immeasurably transformed for the better.  In present circumstances what would additionally be required is a fully-funded program – to which, no doubt, Israel would contribute in full measure – designed to reconstruct Gaza’s cities in as short a timeframe as feasible.

As for the original program, in the document’s words: “with the potential to facilitate more than $50 billion in new investment over 10 years, Peace to Prosperity represents the most ambitious and comprehensive effort for the Palestinian people to date.  It has the ability to fundamentally transform the West Bank and Gaza, and to open a new chapter in Palestinian history – one defined not by adversity and loss, but by freedom and dignity.”

            A main goal  was to connect Palestinian-occupied areas to regional and global markets, included integrating Gaza and the West Bank “through an efficient, modern transportation network, including a transportation corridor directly connecting” the two areas.  “Billions of dollars of new investment will flow into various sectors of the Palestinian economy,” said the document, which also detailed how “hospitals, schools, homes and businesses will secure access to affordable electricity, clean water and digital services.”

Additionally the plan envisaged improving the well-being of the Palestinian people through educational programs, vocational and technical training, expanding the female labor force, reducing Infant mortality  and increasing average life expectancy.

            The details were no sooner released than they were rejected out of hand by Palestinian spokespeople.  Abbas declared: “there can be no economic solution before there’s a political solution.”  Demonstrations opposing the plan were held in the West Bank and Gaza.

The political component of the plan, unveiled in 2020, while asserting that “any workable peace agreement must address the Palestinians’ legitimate desire for self-determination,” sweeps aside the issue of the “occupied territories” – namely the areas conquered from the Jordanian, Egyptian and Syrian armies in the Six-Day War of 1967.  Maintaining that the succession of UN Resolutions claiming these areas as Palestinian are self-contradictory and demonstrably ineffective, the plan proposes its own path to a peaceful compromise. Israel would be allowed to incorporate West Bank settlements into Israel proper, and in compensation would yield an equivalent amount of territory adjacent to, and south of, the Gaza Strip.

So the plan envisages the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank on the areas outside the settlements, plus a greatly expanded Gaza.  All the Palestinian territories would be made contiguous by way of a network of highways, bridges and a road tunnel linking the West Bank to Gaza.  Additionally the Palestinians would have a capital in eastern Jerusalem based on northern and eastern neighborhoods that are outside the Israeli security barrier.

This prospect is made dependent on the Palestinian leadership renouncing terrorism and recognizing Israel as the Jewish state.  The plan allows four years for these conditions to be met.

Back in 2016 Trump said: “I would love to be the one who made peace with Israel and the Palestinians.  That would be such a great achievement.”  If he remains as wedded to the idea in his second term, he would surely base his renewed effort on the painstaking work already undertaken by Jared Kushner.  With the bones of a plan already devised, and the political landscape much changed, he might find the Palestinian leadership more amenable to negotiation than in 2020.  Trump may yet act as honest broker in bringing a “Deal of the Century” to fruition.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Can Trump's  'deal of the century' be revived and bring Middle East peace?", 2 December 2024:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-831551

Published in Eurasia Review, 7 December 2024:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/06122024-will-trump-revive-the-deal-of-the-century-oped/

Published in the MPC Journal, 8 December 2024

https://mpc-journal.org/will-trump-revive-the-deal-of-the-century/