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Bronner writes: "President Donald Trump is facing a credibility crisis."

Saudi Arabia's king Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud walks with U.S. president Donald Trump during a reception ceremony in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 20, 2017. (photo: Bandar Algloud/Saudi Royal Court/Reuters)
Saudi Arabia's king Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud walks with U.S. president Donald Trump during a reception ceremony in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 20, 2017. (photo: Bandar Algloud/Saudi Royal Court/Reuters)


Trump of Arabia

By Stephen Eric Bronner, Reader Supported News

26 May 17

 

resident Donald Trump is facing a credibility crisis. He admitted to disclosing classified information to Russian officials; his top staff has allegedly had illicit dealings with foreign governments; he fired former FBI Director James Comey; he has also opposed the appointment of a special prosecutor and Congressional investigations into his former NSA director, Michael Flynn. The media is justifiably concerned about the intimidation of journalists, the references to “fake news,” the constant lying, and the president’s lack of credibility. Authoritarian austerity is growing with White House attacks on the welfare state and healthcare, women’s organizations, immigration, and democratic governance. Under the circumstances, taking a trip to the Middle East was not such a bad idea. The mainstream media certainly breathed a sigh of relief. Its commentators could now switch from reporting on depressing topics to the red-carpet treatment that Trump received in Saudi Arabia, the traditional sword dance in which he participated, and Melania Trump’s decision not to wear a headscarf (a supposed breach of etiquette for which Candidate Trump had excoriated Michelle Obama while she was First Lady). Commentators could now laugh at new jokes concerning the president’s sudden interest in Islam, his plans while in Israel to visit Masada by helicopter, and his intention to spend fifteen minutes at Yad Vashem in order to learn something about the Holocaust.

As these stories saturated the airwaves, however, serious matters were pushed off-stage. Little meaningful coverage has been given to Trump’s misguided and dangerous reversal of policy for the Middle East. Discrete aspects might have been discussed, but not how the whole threatens to become more than the sum of its parts. Doubts exist whether an overriding strategy even exists or whether instead the president is haphazardly and emotionally reacting to events (as with his recent decision to bomb Syria after seeing some of Assad’s atrocities on the evening news).

Undoubtedly, the $110 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia is the centerpiece of Trump’s Middle Eastern policy. Apparently, he has decided to distinguish between the “good” Arabs (aligned with the United States) and the “evil” Islamic fringe elements (such as al-Qaeda and ISIS). And that is okay. Or sort of okay. There remain a few minor (!) problems worth considering. The most obvious is that, whereas Trump’s run to the presidency championed the fight against Islamic terrorism, powerful sects like the Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia sponsored Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, its off-shoot the al-Nusra front in Syria, and ISIS in Iraq. Like Saudi Arabia itself, these terrorist organizations are exclusively Sunni and, though extremists often target more moderate co-religionists, their primary enemies remain the Shia militias in Iraq, the Shia rebels in Yemen, the Shia state of Iran, and the Alawite-Shia government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Especially since Trump explicitly stated that his arms deal would help Saudi Arabia counter “the malign influence of Iran,” it seems safe to assume that deposing Assad has become the strategic priority over combatting ISIS.

More than that: Saudi Arabia will undoubtedly use the $110 billion in arms purchases to support an ongoing transnational offensive against Shia forces that have, for better or worse, played the leading role in fighting terrorism. That white is black and black is white requires explanation. So, it’s a sure bet that right-wing media in the United States will demonize Iran and turn it into the source of Islamic extremism. Just a reminder: the same tactic was employed when the secular regime of Saddam Hussein was portrayed as allied with al-Qaeda (and look at how well that turned out). In any event, Trump’s strategy calls upon the United States to act as an arms peddler (not so different from a drug dealer) and the close ally of a particularly detested reactionary regime.

But it is a powerful regime. Saudi Arabia is preeminent among the Gulf States. Its “Arab Peace Plan” of 2002, which Trump is now seeking to resurrect, proposed recognition of Israel by all states in the Arab Union in exchange for withdrawal from the occupied territories. The “right of return” would be dealt with in terms of financial compensation for refugees (probably funded by Saudi Arabia) and Jerusalem would basically become an open city. The Saudi proposal is the only comprehensive plan on the table. Trump is right in endorsing it, and perhaps even putting Saudi Arabia in charge of negotiations. But the plan seems dated. The world has changed since 2002. Israeli settlements have multiplied drastically, thereby fragmenting the occupied territories and making land swaps far more difficult; Israeli public opinion has also shifted dramatically to the right and Binyamin Netanyahu’s ruling coalition rests on the ultra-orthodox and the ultra-nationalists. Israel has been the beneficiary of internecine fighting between the corrupt, incompetent, and increasingly illegitimate Palestinian Authority of the West Bank and a stubborn and authoritarian Hamas in Gaza. As their low-level civil war continues, the settlements expand, and right-wing parties grow stronger, Israel has no incentive to negotiate seriously let alone accept a Palestinian state.

Nothing ventured nothing gained: Trump of Arabia, like T.E. Lawrence, can now present himself as the blond-haired European intent upon resolving a seemingly irresolvable conflict. Such a role would surely suit the president’s narcissistic and megalomaniacal self-image. Of course, the bar doesn’t need to be set quite so high. It would be enough if the Saudi trade agreement simply made some cash for firms like Lockheed Martin and thereby created jobs (though this economic sector is not now experiencing labor shortages). But then there is Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and trusted advisor, who allegedly intervened with Lockheed’s CEO, Marilyn Hewson, to lower the price of arms for Saudi Arabia. No need to mention Kushner’s shady real estate dealings outside the United States. It is undoubtedly a welcome sign that the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates have (innocently!) agreed to provide $100 million for Ivanka Trump’s very new fund to help women starting small businesses (New York Times 5/22/2017).

There is also the Russian angle. President Trump has depicted Vladimir Putin as a friend and ally in order to justify passing classified intelligence information to the Russian foreign minister and the Russian Ambassador to the United States. With the new arms deal, however, the enemies of Saudi Arabia become our enemies; Russia’s alliance with Iran and the Syrian government makes the president’s indiscretions appear even more reckless. Trump is surely counting on his personal relationship with Putin to break his alliance with Rouhani and Assad. But this would not be in the Russian national interest. Even the economic benefit of lifting US sanctions is far outweighed by the political threat Islamic extremism poses in Russia’s southern and eastern territories as well as the certainty of Russia losing influence in the Middle East.

Advocating a new détente with Putin is a sensible idea – but only if similar overtures are made to Iran. It is either both or neither. Yet Trump doesn’t see it that way – at least not now. While embracing Russia, he has threatened to jettison the nuclear deal with Iran, re-impose sanctions, and perhaps even launch a military strike. This can only leave American foreign policy at cross-purposes. The timing for his new ideological campaign against Iran is also particularly inauspicious. President Hassan Rouhani was just re-elected against his far-right opponent by 57% to 31% with 70% of citizens voting. Trump’s incitements strengthen Iran’s most reactionary elements and anti-Western sentiments. They leave Rouhani stranded and, what’s more, undermine the opportunity of further cooperation. That is all the more unfortunate since Iran is crucial for resolving the ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, and Yemen.

Syria is a case in point. Russia and Iran are on one side and the United States is on the other in its seemingly endless civil war. Prospects for peace will improve if these three nations sit down with one another. With the Saudi agreement, however, American policy will become even more partisan in its support for rebel forces that are fractured, incompetent, and vulnerable to Islamic extremists. The trade deal raises the stakes, thereby heightening the likelihood of greater American involvement in yet another conflict for which it is clearly unprepared. The United States once again will appear as an imperialist interloper, especially since it lacks an exit strategy and “mission creep” is looming. Is the strategic goal occasional military intervention to level the playing field, regime change, or nation-building? Worst case scenario: heightened tensions and possible war between the United States and Russia, Syrian disintegration into cantons and hamlets run by religious and ethnic warlords, and yet more genocidal conflicts between Sunnis and Shia. No less than the costs others must bear, the president might want to consider the American national interest a bit more carefully the next time he engages in “the art of the deal.”



Stephen Eric Bronner is Board of Governors Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University. His latest books include The Bigot: Why Prejudice Persists and The Bitter Taste of Hope: Ideals, Ideologies, and Interests in the Age of Obama.

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