WarSclerotic

WPR Article | World Citizen: Wikileaks Cables Highlight Arab-Iranian Divide.

In a part of the world where ever-present conspiracy theories waft through the air, blending easily with the aroma from water pipes and the sounds of the Muslim call to prayer, the massive document release from Wikileaks was received with familiarity. It’s not easy to shock the people of the Middle East, certainly not with revelations about the conversations and machinations of the rich and the powerful. After all, the region has stood at the crossroads of political intrigue for thousands of years, and people have become almost immune to shock. Still, the absence of real surprises does not equal an absence of impact.

As much as leaders everywhere seem inclined to downplay its impact, the document release has the potential to gradually reshape the Middle East.

The masses may not be exactly startled by what we have learned until now through the Wikileaks revelations: not by trivial accounts, such as Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi’s penchant for traveling with his blonde Ukrainian nurse; nor by the more ominous, headline-grabbing accounts detailing Arab calls for the U.S. to take military action against Iran.

In fact, it has been an open secret that Arab leaders fear Iran and have urged Washington to attack. And it’s common knowledge that Gulf states, particularly Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, have been arming themselves with unrestrained urgency — and with Iran in mind. And yet, there is a reason why for years the truth and the animosity remained thinly hidden behind diplomatic niceties: Open hostility is dangerous. It will now be difficult, probably impossible, to put that particular Wikileaks genie back in its lamp.

Of all the headlines coming out of the classified data dump, the most striking ones have Arab leaders, one after the other, urging Washington to attack Iran. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia prodded the U.S. to “cut off the head of the snake.” Abu Dhabi’s crown prince, the head of the UAE’s armed forces, described Iran as his country’s “primary external threat” and an “existential” threat — a term we have often heard used by Israel to describe the Islamic Republic, but never by an Arab country. The commander of Oman’s armed forces warned of Iran’s “deceptive tactics” and “expansionist ideological desires in the region,” a charge echoed by Kuwait’s interior minister, who called Iran the “beating heart” of Islamic extremism. King Hamad of Bahrain, while speaking of Iran’s nuclear program with Gen. David Petraeus, exclaimed, “That program must be stopped,” arguing, in an analysis repeated by other Arab leaders, that, “The danger of letting it go on is greater than the danger of stopping it.”

Ironically, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at times sounds less belligerent than the Arab leaders who publically accuse Israel of warmongering. According to diplomatic cables, Netanyahu advocates for strong economic sanctions, saying, “President Ahmadinejad could be toppled by economic pressure,” adding that, eventually, through that route, “it might be possible to bring down the entire Iranian regime.”

For many in Israel, the documents are seen as vindication. After all, the country has long argued that Iran is a threat not only to the Jewish state but to the region and the world. That argument is strengthened by the disclosure that many others in the region, in fact, see Iran that way. (One cable reported that Iran had even acquired missiles from North Korea capable of reaching Moscow and other European capitals, although some experts have expressed doubts about the claim.)

And yet, Netanyahu himself has found much to feel embarrassed about in the documents. Revelations that he disparaged former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert before a U.S. congressional delegation will prove awkward, and likely prompt Olmert to be more openly critical of Netanyahu. Already, a member of the opposition Kadima Party has declared that the leaks show Netanyahu’s “empty leadership,” and accused the prime minister of putting “his political interests above those of the nation.”

The documents could help Israel make its case against Iran. But their ultimate impact on Israel will depend on whether this incident seriously weakens American diplomacy — which could prove devastating for Israel — and whether it undermines the Arab regimes that closely align themselves, albeit secretly, with Israeli strategic objectives. Those regimes have until now kept their views secret, in part because they thought disclosing them would be harmful. We will now see if they were right.

It is along the two shores of the Persian Gulf where the impact of the document release will reverberate most dangerously over the weeks and months to come.

It comes as no surprise that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has sought to dismiss the significance of the revelations, calling them “worthless” and saying they will not affect Tehran’s relations with its Arab neighbors.

However, the Iranian public, and some government officials, may be surprised at the extent of the country’s isolation, and the level of mistrust that surrounds the Islamic Republic. The animosity against Iran undercuts claims by the regime that the pressure it faces emanates only from the West. The cables indeed show Western world leaders dripping with disdain for Tehran, with one French official describing Iran’s response to Western overtures as “a farce” and calling the Iranian regime a “fascist state.” But they also show Arab leaders calling Iran “evil” and “dangerous.” And, while it is true that bending the truth is far from unique to the Islamic Republic, it is startling to see how often Tehran is labeled untrustworthy by its neighbors. Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani explains the emirate’s relationship with Tehran as, “They lie to us, and we lie to them.” Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak calls the Iranians “liars” and sponsors of terrorism.

Unlike Ahmadinejad, not all Iranians find the unfolding situation so easy to dismiss. The daily Mellat-e Ma said, “The publication of these documents heralds a worrying situation for Iran in the future.” The concern, said the paper, is that “Iran is facing an undeclared war by its neighbors who want a confrontation between Iran and America.”

There is a reason why Arab regimes kept their hostility toward Tehran quiet. Last summer, when the UAE ambassador to the U.S. told a reporter that his country favored an American attack on Iran, government officials quickly backtracked, saying the comments had been taken out of context. The clarification came as no surprise: Calls for an American attack come perilously close to qualifying as a casus belli between Iran and its neighbors.

Yet, in page after page of the Wikileaks documents, there is evidence that many of Tehran’s Arab neighbors want Washington to take military action against Iran. Ahmadinejad may choose to dismiss that unpleasant information, but it is now public knowledge. Deniability has been destroyed. This makes Iran and many of its neighbors open enemies, and in so doing, it increases the chances for war across that busy Middle Eastern waterway, the Persian Gulf. That may not shock the jaded residents of the region, but it could shake the world to its oil-thirsty foundations.

Frida Ghitis is an independent commentator on world affairs and a World Politics Review contributing editor. Her weekly column, World Citizen, appears every Thursday.

This entry was posted on December 3, 2010 at 8:41 AM and is filed under Uncategorized. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.