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Regional Alliances and the Peace Process
October 22, 1997
This memo canvasses a set of likely (ie., existing) and possible alliances within the Middle East, examining their potential impact on the two drivers of decision-making that we determined: US engagement and domestic political forces in Israel and the Palestinian authority. I will also discuss the potential impact of such alliances on the strategic position of Israel and the Palestinian authority, and thus their disposition toward further peace moves.
In general, I think that the effect of regional alliances and alliance shifts on the peace process is not substantial, as long as we assume no regime changes in the major Arab states. Therefore, Egypt and Jordan will remain committed to their peace treaties with Israel and their international alignment with the United States. Should there be regime change in those states, their alliance choices could have a major effect on the peace process and the strategic picture in the area. If folks want, I could play out those scenarios in a separate memo. But this memo basically assumes domestic regime stability and asks how regional alignments could affect the peace process.
Existing Alignments
1) Israel-Turkey: This is the newest and most robust regional alliance. It has real military consequences, in that it brings together the two most powerful states, militarily, in the region. Serious military cooperation appears to be developing, with joint training missions, arms deals and strategic dialogue at the highest level.
This alliance is aimed against Syria, principally, and Iran secondarily. Therefore, to the extent that it develops, it lessens the Israeli incentives to make a deal with Syria on Golan. An effective Israeli-Turkish alliance makes a Syrian war option even less likely than it is now, and therefore makes a Syrian-Israeli treaty less valuable to any Israeli government.
Its effects on the Israeli-Palestinian front are almost negligible, since the threat posed to Israel by the Palestinians is not a conventional military one. Having or not having the Turks as military alliances will not affect Israeli calculations vis a vis Arafat and the occupied territories.
A strong Israeli-Turkish alliance reduces, somewhat, American motivations for intense involvement in the region. As long as that strategic axis is solid and solidly pro-American, U.S. interests in the region are less likely to be threatened. We are assuming that a strong American push in the peace process would likely lead to progress on all fronts. To the extent that the Turkish-Israeli alliance reduces the risks to American interests in the area, it also reduces the incentives for that strong American push in the peace process.
2) Israeli-Jordanian alliance: This is a very funny alliance, but an important one in Israeli thinking. The recent, clownish episode in Amman nothwithstanding, the fundamentals of the relationship appear solid. What Jordan gets from the relationship is clear: a commitment from the strongest regional power of the security of the Hashemite regime (including from potential threats from Israel itself, of the "Jordan is Palestine" variety) and a guarantee to try to minimize any overflow effects of events in the occupied territories on the East Bank.
The Israelis get some tangible benefits from the alliance, and some important intangible ones that affect Israeli public opinion, and thus Israeli domestic politics. The tangible ones: security cooperation on Palestinian issues, an important regional player who also wants Palestinian power to remain very limited, a buffer between Israel's eastern border and potentially hostile states (Iraq, Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia). The intangibles: Jordan is the only Arab government (not society) to have an open and cordial relationship with Israel. The King is very popular in Israel. The warmth of the Jordanian-Israeli relationship seems to be something that Israelis -- elite and mass -- value beyond its tangible worth. Hence the bizarre, secret parade of high-level Israelis going to Amman to apologize for being such bad boys two weeks ago.
Maintaining the Jordanian tie thus seems to be something that the Israelis are willing to pay some price to do. At least part of that price, in the five-year period we are considering, is tangible movement toward final status. In the end, King Hussein wants some kind of stable final status that will give the Palestinians something in the West Bank and Gaza, so they won't seek anything in the East Bank (we can disagree on whether the Jordanians want to see an independent Palestinian state -- I think that they do -- but it seems hard for me to accept the argument that the Jordanians can happily accept the current status-quo). So, to the extent that the Israelis value their alliance with Jordan, they will be pushed toward negotiating a final settlement with the Palestinians. An Israeli government that does not do that risks a rupture in its relationship with Jordan that could have negative domestic consequences, and negative strategic consequences.
The United States also has a stake in a good Jordanian- Israeli relationship, as evidenced by its mediation in the Mish'al assassination affair. US involvement could become more intense if it seems that the Jordanian-Israeli relationship is deteriorating.
King Hussein therefore has more leverage on the negotiations on the Palestinian track than is perhaps appreciated, but only if he is willing to play brinksmanship. The Israelis will not pay for maintaining the existing relationship; they will pay to prevent its deterioration. Brinksmanship is dangerous, and it is doubtful that the King will try to play it very often (he is no Arafat). But if he does, and plays it credibly, it could have important consequences.
3) Syria-Iran: Syria's close relationship with Iran is not directly exclusively at Israel (Iraq is the area where the two have direct and mutual interests, and they engage in an interesting mixed-motive game in Lebanon), but Iran's support for Damascus makes the Asad regime less willing to rush into any deal with the Israelis. The Syrian-Iranian relationship also makes Israelis, elites and masses, look less favorably upon Asad. His relationship with the Iranians sends the opposite signal of Sadat's Jerusalem visit or King Hussein's various public gestures, and reduces the likelihood of Israeli public opinion pressure on any government to come to terms with Damascus. Conversely, any moves by Asad to distance himself from Teheran would lessen public opinion opposition to an Israeli-Syrian peace deal. Such moves would probably be part of the side-bar agreements between Syria and Israel that would accompany any formal peace.
The Israeli-Turkish v. Syrian-Iranian alliance game promises to be an interesting and potentially destabilizing one in the region, but its dynamics are more regional and less focused on Palestinian issues. Neither Syria nor Iran have much leverage on Arafat (both support opponents of his, but neither seems to be able to exercise much direct influence on the ground in the occupied territories aside from encouraging terrorist actions -- which can be important, but do not increase either Syrian or Iranian influence within the larger Palestinian community). The threats to Israel posed by the Syrian-Iranian alliance have more to do with the strategic balance and with Lebanon. This alliance's net effect on the peace process is negative on the Syrian-Israeli track, but not that significant on the Palestinian-Israeli track.
4) Egypt-PLO: The PLO's strongest supporter among the Arab states has always been Egypt, and remains so to this day. Arafat, of course, looks for friends wherever he can find them. For Egypt, the relationship with the PLO is a lever that keeps it relevant to the United States and to Israel, and a way to keep the relative influence of Jordan and Syria (the main contenders for influence in the Palestinian community) in inter-Arab affairs down.
Egypt's position in the peace process since Oslo is quite interesting, and somewhat contradictory. One the one hand, it supports moves by Arab states and the PLO toward peace with Israel. It blazed the path; the more states that follow, the more Egypt looks "right" and the easier it is for Egypt to reclaim its inter-Arab role. But the more states that move toward Israel, the less important Egypt is as THE Arab interlocutor with Israel and (to a lesser extent) with the U.S. Thus, in the past few years, the Eygptians have thrown a few fits (non-proliferation treaty, for one) just to remind everyone that they are there and that they are important. So Cairo wants to help the PLO to final status with the Israelis, but wants to be seen to be doing it. If things seem to be progressing nicely without it, Cairo might be tempted to throw a few monkey-wrenches in the process.
But it does not seem to me that the Egyptian-PLO alliance does much to affect our decision-drivers, Israeli public opinion and U.S. involvement. Israeli public opinion does not see Egypt in a very favorable light, and therefore using Egypt as a cover does not increase Arafat's or the PLO's acceptability to Israeli public opinion. Any Israeli government will know that the Egyptians will not break the peace treaty over Palestinian issues, so that kind of threat has no credibility at all. Cairo knows this, and does not make it. Israel has done just fine with the cold peace, and will not pay much just to warm it up.
Egyptian sponsorship of the PLO might have a marginal effect on American proclivities to become more actively involved in the process -- heavy Egyptian pressure could be a factor weighing on Washington, because Washington does value stability there. However, my sense is that Washington feels that it does enough for Egypt by maintaining the aid level. It is only if it seemed that a complete collapse of the process could endanger DOMESTIC stability in Egypt would that be an important motivator for greater U.S. involvement.
Possible, but Unlikely Alignments
1) Syria-Iraq: This would be a big surprise to me, given the depth and history of the hostility between the two regimes. But there have been some moves to establish more correct relations recently (I think motivated by Syrian desires to get a part of the Iraqi market, now that there is some money coming into Iraq), and this has led to a spate of speculation in the Arab press about a Syrian-Iraqi-Iranian alignment against Israel and "the West." I buy that even less than the bilateral possibility. But let's say that I am wrong, and the Ba'thists get together.
My guess would be that a Syrian-Iraqi alignment would have a negative impact on our two decisional drivers. Israeli public opinion would react very negatively to dealing with a Syria that was publicly aligned with Saddam Hussein. The strategic weight of these two together would still not pose a significantly greater threat to Israel than Syria does alone, so I do not think it would drive the Israeli government to change its strategic calculations (ie., be willing to give back Golan more cheaply in order to lure Damascus away from Baghdad). I think it would further sour the U.S. on Damascus, making Washington even less likely than it is now to push the Syrian track.
I do not think a Syrian-Iraqi alignment would have much impact on the Palestinian track at all. Arafat is no friend these days of either Asad or Saddam, so he would not look to them in any major way for support, and they would not offer it.
2) Iran-Israel: Do not laugh. It has happened before, and stranger things have happened. It would be a return for both to the old policy of "non-Arabs against Arabs," and has some strategic logic. My guess is that any return to this kind of alignment would marginally lessen incentives for the Israeli government to deal with either Syria or Arafat. But we are talking marginal.
Regime Change and Alliances
The most important potential regime changes, in terms of regional alignments, would be:
If requested, I can play out the alliance consequences of those regime changes for the peace process. But right now, my brain hurts enough.
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