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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan | ||||
| The Kid's Table - A Personal View | ||||
| 2012-11-19 | ||||
| by Pappy Mr. Obama's administration has placed itself between a rock and a hard place. The administration's reopolitik foreign policy has decided that the Turks are needed for dealing with Syria and possibly Iran; Mr. Erdogan's ego is being stroked by the White House by involving his government with Gaza. That's going to feed the Turks' desire to become the de facto Islamic power in the Islamic region.
Egypt is a borderline failed state, one step away from starvation. Syria is in a civil war, as are Yemen and Sudan (still). Iraq is coyly cuddling up to Iran. Jordan is facing its own Muslim Brotherhood-instigated riots as a result of trying to fix its own economic issues. Lebanon's various warlords are gearing up for another alleyway fight. North Africa, which has been ignored by both the White House and the diplomatic set at Foggy Bottom, has both Salafists and Al Qaeda's Maghreb franchise trying to set up caliphates. That will drag most of the continent (already dealing with Somalia) into another long and costly war. Libya could go either way, but most likely it'll end up looking like the rest of North Africa minus Algeria, albeit with more weapons. The Saudis are watching everyone else. Qatar has its own agenda, which doesn't involve chatty night-time talks with the Oval Office. We won't mention Afghanistan and Pakistan. It's best to avert one's eyes from an air crash into a daycare center at a refinery. To make matters worse, all sides will likely end up being hanged by their strings of words. If Hamas continues to insist that the politics of the souk don't apply to it, then they will get what they want: a ground operation by Israel. This is going to put everyone else in a hell of a bind. Morsi is going to have to accede to the thugs of the Muslim Brotherhood and back his own words. That is something Egypt cannot really afford to do either militarily and economically. Media like the NYT, and the Western Left, are going to have to double-down on their rhetoric, since they nailed one (rhetorical) foot to the floor with this last round of bash-Israel rhetoric. They have no other place to go now, except to cover Gaza. I won't speak for Israel, but it's almost certain that, unlike their Palestinian enemy, they've learned from their earlier operations (against Hesb'allah in Lebanon and Hamas.) And both are now much more heavily armed. And Mr. Obama will have to - surprise - face a decision: Bring Israel to heel and risk both a domestic and Israeli backlash, or find a way to placate the Islamic world by other means. Either decision will be hard. If he brings Israel to heel without stopping Hamas' gambit cold, he will alienate both the Republicans and the pro-Israel faction. He needs the former at this point because he faces a potential economic storm. He will need the latter, to a lesser extent, for support during his next administration. It will also be another wedge issue for a divided electorate. He can't bribe the citizenry or Congress, nor can he bribe Israel, nor the Islamic world. He can't cajole any of them. He can't even use his Presidential influence. The "call from the President of the United States" doesn't have the same power, especially since Mr. Obama has quietly euthanized it. President Obama is going to have to choose between Turkey (and Egypt) or Israel, and do so publicly. It's going to be interesting watching the media spin that decision.
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| Posted by:Pappy |