The first real Israeli response came after Russian President Putin has invaded the cities of (Lugansk and Donetsk in the Donbass region) in Ukraine, on Monday, February 21, 2022, at an official request from the Israeli government to the Russian side to (protect Jewish citizens in  Ukraine and Israel’s request for Russia’s help to evacuate Jewish and Israeli citizens residing in Ukraine in the event of a war). The features of the Israeli plan to evacuate the Jews of Ukraine in accordance with the principle of the right of return for Jews around the world, as well as the Israelis residing in Ukraine, by evacuating them via land routes, with Israel’s request for a number of legal and security guarantees from the capital “Moscow” to “open humanitarian corridors”. Despite the previous Israeli attempts to “mediate between the Russian and Ukrainian parties, to achieve a balance between them”, but, Israeli officials have failed to achieve any kind of rapprochement with the Kremlin in this matter.

   The most important fears in the Middle East in general are that these developments regarding the Russian recognition of the cities of “Lugansk and Donetsk” in the “Donbas region” of Ukraine, as two independent countries, may lead to the escalation and growth of security threats, which will negatively affect Ukrainian wheat exports to the region, which constitutes “the greatest threat to global food security”, especially since most of the Ukrainian regions producing grains and vegetable oils are in (the eastern side of Ukraine), which is the most threatening and targeted side by Russia more than others, especially after the recognition of “Lugansk and Donetsk” as two independent countries,  Which may pave the way for an escalation of the conflict and the possibility of a possible Russian attack. Expectations indicate that Egypt, as an important country in the Middle East, has sufficient wheat reserves for five months.

  Here, the most prominent repercussions of the Ukraine and Russia crisis in the event of a war between them on Egypt and the countries of the Middle East will be mainly economic, as Ukraine has come to be called the “breadbasket of Europe”, with the heavy dependence of the Middle East countries heavily on Ukraine to a level that some warn from its dangerous height in the event of war. The most important consequences of this Ukrainian-Russian conflict for Egypt and the Middle East are, as follows:

   Note that allies and partners in the Middle East are not important in efforts to deter Russia from invading Ukraine. They may be willing to help out on the sidelines. Here, “Qatar” can divert gas supplies from long-term contracts in Asia to the European market in the event of war between Russia and Ukraine, considering that the “Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates” can work to (reduce pressure on oil prices in the event of war, and Israel can continue to pass messages  to the Kremlin to urge a halt to the escalation between the two sides of the conflict), according to what Israel itself announced.

   But, the public silence of all those countries in this crisis speaks of the need to point and consider the analysis with (the reality of the new geopolitics of the Middle East). Russia has become a player in the region and has partially filled the void left by the USA. According to some US allies, Moscow appears “more confident than Washington”. There is no room to get around this basic trade-off, given the fact that a resurgent China and an aggressive Russia require more from the USA.

  Perhaps US President “Joe Biden” will resort to easing his pressure on the countries of the Middle East, instead of asking his partners and allies in the region to take a clear public stance.  This goes beyond statements and condemnations about Ukraine. Washington may be forced to (compromise with Saudi policies), and with the Saudi Crown Prince, “Mohammed bin Salman”, especially if “Biden” needs to resort to the Saudi side to reduce the price of oil.

  Accordingly, Biden may be forced to adopt a new realistic policy to achieve his interests, through (a policy of abandoning pressure on Saudi Arabia and the UAE to end their war in Yemen, and making room to support their efforts to deter the Iranian-backed Houthi militia). Here, the United States of America may have to continue giving Israel freedom of action in dealing with Iran’s regional subversion even with the Biden’s return to the nuclear agreement with Iran.

  It may also be (American cooperation with Egypt in “Gaza and Libya” is a priority for the United States of America over its demands on President “Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi” with regard to human rights and democracy files), and other internal affairs.

  We will note the extent to which the Ukrainian-Russian crisis revealed (the significant decline in the role of the United States in the Middle East), which was evident in that crisis, despite the official silence from Arab political regimes to comment on this crisis, but my analysis and general vision of the current scene in  The region, perhaps referring to (the bias of a large number of Arab countries to the Russian side and its Chinese ally, which they consider to have provided them with a strong alternative or partners that can be relied upon in the future), especially in light of these international changes taking place.

  My analysis of the Ukrainian crisis and its repercussions on the Middle East after the gradual retreat of the United States of America from the region, has enabled me to note that Washington’s allies and partners in the Middle East, even if they are sympathetic to Ukraine and committed to the United States, but at the same time, we can understand that the (Middle East countries aren’t ready to take any hostile, negative or inflammatory stances against Moscow).

  Here, to understand the extent of change for Washington’s closest ally in the Middle East, which is “Israel”. In mid-January 2022, the United States of America and Israel held a round of strategic consultations. The Israeli focus was on (Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the extent to which Iran and Russia exploited the Ukraine crisis and the world’s preoccupation with it, to threaten Israel’s interests in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, as a punishment for Israel as a trust ally from Washington), at a time when attempts by Washington and its European allies began fiercely salvaging the 2015 agreement with Iran that former President “Trump” canceled.

  Most notably to me, is that while the Biden administration is lobbying to oppose Moscow’s pressure tactics against “Kiev”, the US-Israeli consultation did not mention any consultations regarding the impact of the Ukraine crisis on Israel. In fact, since the start of the reinforcement of Russian forces since 2020, Israel has adhered to a policy of continuous silence, with the exception of an offer by Prime Minister “Naftali Bennett” to mediate between Ukraine and Russia, an idea that Moscow has flatly rejected.

  In my opinion, I see that the situation for the Israelis is that their calculations are not different from before, despite their strong dependence on the United States of America. The existential threat to Israel is still Iran. The only Israeli fear of the Ukrainian crisis is (the policy of Russian and Iranian indirect punishment of Israel, considering “Tel Aviv” a close security and diplomatic partner to Washington), that both Russia and Iran will open several pressure fronts on Israel, with the presence of (numerous enemies on Israel’s borders). According to the analyzes of the Israeli think tanks, the Israeli fear here is that Israel’s enemies will exploit the Ukraine crisis with Russia, to increase their rapprochement with Iran, as Iranian agents in confronting Israel. The most prominent of the Israeli enemies here, are: (Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Iranian militias that control it  Iran in Syria).

  Here, we will notice that the impact of the Ukrainian-Russian crisis on the Israeli side is represented in the Israeli fear of its enemies, “Israel” exploiting the crisis, which Israel calls the “war between wars” theory, in order to prevent the transfer of advanced Iranian missiles and guidance systems through Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon and may thwart the (attempts of the Iranian-backed militias to open another front with Israel in the Golan Heights).

  The Russian military presence in Syria makes Israel more of a player in this conflict than the United States of America, which maintains a limited force in eastern Syria to fight “ISIS”, but has left Israel to fend for itself in the rest of the country.

 The only way that Israel can continue its repeated air attacks on Iranian targets in Syria is if the “Russian Air Force” agrees to Israel’s use of Syrian airspace.

  Therefore, we can explain the reasons for the repeated visits by Israeli former Prime Minister “Benjamin Netanyahu”, which amounted to ten visits to Russia between 2015 and 2020, in order to secure the cooperation of the Russian President and to ensure that the operations of the Russian and Israeli air forces in Syria will not  get in the way of each other. Likewise, once “Naftali Bennett” became prime minister in 2021, he wasted no time in reaffirming those arrangements on a visit to the Kremlin in October 2021.

  But in January 2022, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that (Russian and Syrian planes conducted a joint patrol over the Syrian Golan Heights occupied by Israel, and that these patrols will continue). This was a (symbolic warning shot) by Russia and Syria to “Israel”, that if “Putin” wanted, he could easily end the Israeli military operations in Syria. If Israel is considering openly siding with the United States on Ukraine, Moscow has indicated that there will be a heavy strategic price to pay.

   The United States of America is trying to follow a new global mechanism and spread it around the world regarding the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, especially with the American keenness to issue repeated warnings of an imminent Russian attack on Ukraine. The United States is publishing “secret information” about Russian moves in an unprecedented way.  But, the analyzes indicate that the United States does not care in the first place that its information on this current crisis appears in “transparent and more open”, but the truth is that what Washington is doing is nothing but a “new form of war”.

  All media analyzes refer to all US advertisements and statements to publish detailed information about Russia’s moves and attempts to mislead the media, as part of its preparations to attack Ukraine, despite Moscow’s denial of its intention to attack it.

  It may not be a coincidence that (the Russian intervention in Syria in September 2015, occurred a year after the attack on eastern Ukraine and the occupation of Crimea). The Russian move in Syria was not just a consolidation of its traditional influence there, but rather revealed a new dynamic in the Russian role militarily in the face of Western influence.

 Here, the Russian side, at the height of this global interest in the Ukrainian crisis, announced that it had conducted several (naval exercises in the Mediterranean, and the transfer of bombers and aircraft equipped with hypersonic missiles to the Russian air base in Syria). This is one of the indicators that the (Middle East and North Africa region) represents a piece of a global chessboard around which the roles and the struggle for influence between the major powers are attracting.

  After extending almost complete Russian influence in Syrian territory, whether through its military forces or through (Wagner mercenaries), we note Moscow’s direction after that towards North Africa and the sub-Saharan region, through the deployment of thousands of (Wagner elements), to become a major player in the Libyan crisis and in the conditions of a number of (West and Central African countries).

 The impact of the crisis on the countries of the region will be largely related to the nature of the scenarios according to which the current crisis may develop.  Experts draw different scenarios for the outcome of the open power struggle between the West and Russia, ranging between the (scenarios of a widely or limited war, a scenario of continuation of severe tension, and a scenario of the crisis heading towards détente based on a temporary or long-term settlement).

  If the expansion of Russian influence in the region occurred during a period in which the influence of European countries witnessed a decline, especially (France and Italy), it also coincided with the direction of the United States to (re-arrange its priorities in the world and reduce its role in the region, towards focusing mainly on China as an enemy).

  The most important thing remains for us, (analyzing the potential impact of Russia’s military campaigns and its penetrations into the spheres of influence of the traditional Europe and the United States, all influential Western powers to reconsider their calculations), and even the extent to which this could lead to the restoration of the Middle East region to its place in the American strategy?

   If this happens, it may start from a Western perspective, by closing some of the “strategic gaps” that have appeared in the last few years in the relations of traditional allies of the United States, such as: (Egypt and Saudi Arabia), which have opened large channels of military and economic cooperation with Russia. We can notice that, Russian-Egyptian exchanges recorded a growth of 10% during 2021, and Russia regained its presence as a (main supplier of arms to Egypt).

  In what appears to be a shift in the position of the “Biden’s administration”, due to the fear of the Russian war against Ukraine and the American role to prevent this and defend Ukraine, (Washington raised its reservations about major arms deals to Saudi Arabia and the UAE), after the two Gulf states were under the pressure of the (Yemen war), and the conflict with Iran has opened channels of military cooperation with Russia and China, which do not set preconditions before concluding arms deals.  Which is considered an attractive factor for the tendency of a large number of Arab countries to (request support from “Putin”, in the face of Western pressures or popular and internal security entitlements).

  The North African region, which includes (Tunisia and Morocco), that considered mainly as allies of Washington, has maintained its position within the arrangements established during the administration of former President “Trump”, in particular, after (the strengthening of military cooperation agreements with Morocco and Tunisia as major non-NATO allies), which confirmed that the extent to which the United States can benefit from them is at the heart of the American strategic interest in the African continent as an area of ​​heated competition with China and Russia, which is the same trend that President “Joe Biden” supported.

  Based on the previous analysis, here the Ukrainian crisis could contribute to “strengthening the American alliance and coordination with North African countries during the coming period”, depending on the state of momentum that has been achieved between American and European allies within “NATO” in the face of China and Russia. In addition to continuing to rely on partnership with traditional regional allies, led by (Israel and Turkey).

  We can observe new elements in the conflict, which are (derived from technological and cyber developments and a new type of conflict tools that are not limited to conventional and strategic weapons, including nuclear ones and by virtue of their qualitative impact on the nature of the conflict, they give the cconfrontation of an unconventional character this time).  Strategists are considered that (it’s new generations of wars and conflicts).

  Hence, the repercussions of the Ukrainian crisis on the countries of the regions of North Africa and the Middle East are not only related to the nature of the interests that link the countries of the region to the parties to the conflict, i.e. Russia, Ukraine, then the United States and Europe, but (they are dynamic interests, not only by virtue of interaction and change in relations, but also  due to the emerging and evolving nature of the tools of influence in those relations).

  The great developments in the crisis between the West and Russia have shown once again (the importance of the strategic position occupied by Ukraine as a sensitive area of ​​contact between Russia on the one hand and Europe and the rest of the “NATO” member countries), and many other countries on the other hand.

  Here we can analyze the extent (the competitive role that Ukraine can play as a main source of basic foodstuffs), such as: (grains, oils, and meat), which Ukraine exports to a large number of Arab countries, which depend on wheat imports through the “Black Sea”, which in turn is in the heart of  Military tension.

  It is expected that grain prices will increase by 20%, and the outbreak of war in Ukraine may lead to two things, first: a rise in oil prices in the world, which in turn will affect food prices, and consequently the costs of sea and land transportation within countries will rise, second: this will lead to a rise in wheat and grain prices in general, because Russia and Ukraine control a large amount of grain imports in the world, so grain prices will rise by no less than 20%, unlike the increase in oil prices, which can also reach 20%, so prices will be affected  internally and externally.

  And we will note that the outbreak of war between Russia and Ukraine will affect Egypt’s import of grain from Ukraine, because (in the event of war, all the ports of Ukraine will be closed, so it is expected that transportation costs will rise), especially with ships having to impose a risk allowance in areas where there are wars, and therefore, the end result is higher import costs for wheat.

  The outbreak of war will (negatively affect the Egyptian import of grains such as wheat and maize for fodder and edible oils, which will affect Egypt’s strategic stock), because the strategic stock of Egypt is one third in stores, one third on boats at sea, and one third in contracts, so one third of the contracts will be affected until the problem of contracting contracts with Ukraine is resolved if war breaks out.

 Perhaps, it will become (the alternative plan for Egypt in the event of the outbreak of war, is to move to France, given that it is the closest facilities exporting wheat, and then Australia, then we will resort to distant facilities such as Canada, the United States and Brazil), given that the mother of wheat in these countries is much better in the quality of wheat in Russia and Ukraine, because Russian and Ukrainian wheat is less than international prices by 10%, because its types are lower than American, Australian and French wheat, but this difference will increase wheat prices, in addition to increasing the price of oil if war breaks out.

  Knowing that Ukraine and Russia’s wheat exports represent about 23% of the volume of global exports, and world food prices are currently approaching their highest levels in 10 years, and the two countries’ market share means that (any disturbances in exports may cause a rise in grain prices  in Egypt and the region).

 According to “USDA data”, the Middle East is considered (the third largest buyer of wheat from Ukraine) was between 2020/2021, and more than 40% of Ukraine’s wheat exports were destined for the Middle East or African markets alone.

  It was one of the most important consequences of the rise in the prices of some commodities, especially in Egypt, because (Egypt imports a group of strategic food commodities from the Ukrainian side, especially wheat, as Egypt imports 13 million tons of wheat annually from Russia and Ukraine together), and Egypt also imports from Ukraine also produce corn, barley and soybeans, as well as edible oil, iron and steel and its products.

  Expectations indicate that (the prices of some of these commodities will rise by 20%, due to the outbreak of a war between Russia and Ukraine, in contrast to the increase in global oil prices), with its effects on Egypt and the countries of the region.

  Here, the “International Monetary Fund’s expectations” indicate that (energy costs and commodity prices in many countries, including Egypt) will rise in the event of a conflict.

 There are fears that the impact of the conflict on the Middle East may be much worse, especially as it is a conflict between two of the world’s major suppliers of grain, which will have a (negative impact on prices, while there is already a feeling of shortage of wheat globally and in countries  Middle East and Egypt).

 We note that the countries in the Middle East that consume the most wheat, are: (Lebanon, Libya and Egypt), which are considered among the largest importing countries of wheat from Ukraine in the region, there are some other countries, such as: (Yemen and Syria) are depending on the (World Food Program’s purchases) of Ukrainian wheat as a aid.

  We understand, through the previous analysis, the extent of the impact of the development of the Ukrainian crisis and the Russian-Chinese support in the face of “NATO” and its prominent members in the West and the United States of America.  And perhaps this is what the former US National Security Adviser, “Zbigniew Brzezinski”, expressed about the danger behind the potential alliance and the policies pushing towards it, when he explicitly asserted that: “the worst scenario that the United States could be exposed to, is the formation of a large defense and security alliance between China and Russia”. The US policy against Russia and China, which is now pursued by the current US leadership of President “Joe Biden”, and expresses the current prevailing trend of the US administration, is pushing Russia and China to achieve this scenario, which is considered the (worst case for the United States of America).

Middle Eastern states walk a tightrope that Ukraine spins ever tighter

Russia breathes down Middle Eastern necks over Ukraine

Associate Professor of Political Science, Faculty of Politics and Economics / Beni Suef University- Egypt. An Expert in Chinese Politics, Sino-Israeli relationships, and Asian affairs- Visiting Senior Researcher at the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES)/ Lund University, Sweden- Director of the South and East Asia Studies Unit

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At first glance, there is little that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an Islamist and nationalist, has in common with Dogu Perincek, a maverick socialist, Eurasianist, and militant secularist and Kemalist.

Yet it is Mr. Perincek, a man with a world of contacts in Russia, China, Iran, and Syria whose conspiratorial worldview identifies the United States as the core of all evil, that Mr. Erdogan at times turns to help resolve delicate geopolitical issues.

Seven years ago, Mr. Perincek mediated a reconciliation between Russia and Turkey after relations soured following the Turkish air force’s downing of a Russian fighter.

Now, Mr. Perincek is headed for Damascus to engineer a Russian-backed rapprochement with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whose overthrow Mr. Erdogan had encouraged for the past 11 years ever since the eruption of mass Arab Spring-era anti-government demonstrations that morphed into a bloody civil war.

Chances are that Mr. Perincek’s effort will be more successful than when he last tried in 2016 to patch up differences between Mr. Erdogan and Mr. Al-Assad but ultimately stumbled over the Turkish leader’s refusal to drop his insistence that the Syrian president must go.

Mr. Erdogan has suggested as much in recent days, insisting that Turkey needed to maintain a dialogue with the government of Mr. Al-Assad.

“We don’t have such an issue whether to defeat Assad or not… You have to accept that you cannot cut the political dialogue and diplomacy between the states. There should always be such dialogues,” Mr. Erdogan said.

He went on to say that “we do not eye Syrian territory… The integrity of their territory is important to us. The regime must be aware of this.”

Mr. Erdogan’s willingness to bury the war hatchet follows his failure to garner Russian and Iranian acquiescence in a renewed Turkish military operation in northern Syria. The operation was intended to ensure that US-backed Syrian Kurds, whom Turkey views as terrorists, do not create a self-ruling Kurdish region on Turkey’s border like the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq.

Turkey hoped the operation would allow it to create a 30-kilometre buffer zone controlled by its forces and its Syrian proxies on the Syrian side of the two countries’ border.

Russia and Iran’s refusal to back the scheme, which would have undermined the authority of their ally, Mr. Al-Assad, has forced Turkey to limit its operation to shelling Kurdish and Syrian military positions.

The United States’ seeming unwillingness to offer the Kurds anything more than verbal support, and only that sparsely, has driven the Kurds closer to Damascus and, by extension, Russia and Iran as Syria quietly expands its military presence in the region. The US has long relied on the Kurds to counter the Islamic State in northern Syria.

The rejiggering of relationships and alliances in Syria is occurring on both the diplomatic and military battlefield.

The Turkish attacks and responses by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) with the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) at its core appear to be as much a military as a political drawing of battlelines in anticipation of changing Turkish and Kurdish relations with the Al-Assad government.

By targeting Syrian military forces, Turkey is signalling that it will not stand idly by if Syria supports the Kurds or provides them cover, while unprecedented Kurdish targeting of Turkish forces suggests that the Kurds have adopted new rules of engagement. Turkey is further messaging that it retains the right to target Kurdish forces at will, much like it does in northern Iraq.

Both Mr. Erdogan and the Kurds are placing risky bets.

The Kurds hope against all odds that Mr. Al-Assad will repay the favour of allowing the president to advance his goal of gaining control of parts of Syria held by rebel forces and forcing a withdrawal of US forces from the area by granting the Kurds a measure of autonomy.

With elections in Turkey looming in the next year, Mr. Erdogan hopes that Mr. Al-Assad will help him cater to nationalist anti-Kurdish and anti-migrant sentiment by taking control of Kurdish areas.

Turkey wants to start repatriating some of the four million predominantly Syrian refugees it hosts. In early August, Turkey’s interior ministry announced that it had completed the construction of more than 60,000 homes for returning refugees to northeastern Syria.

Concern about a potential deal with Mr. Al-Assad and a call by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusloglu for reconciliation between opposition groups and Damascus sparked anti-Turkish protests in Turkish-controlled areas of northern Syria as well as rebel-held Idlib.

Turkey also expects Mr. Al-Assad, who is keen to regain not only territorial control but also maintain centralized power, to ultimately crack down on armed Kurdish groups and efforts to sustain autonomously governed Kurdish areas.

As a result, Mr. Perincek, alongside Turkish-Syrian intelligence contacts, has his work cut out for him. The gap between Turkish and Syrian aspirations is wide.

Mr. Al-Assad wants a complete withdrawal of Turkish forces and the return of Syrian control of Kurdish and rebel-held areas. He is unlikely willing or able to provide the kind of security guarantees that Turkey would demand.

Both the Kurds and Mr. Erdogan are caught in Catch-22s of their own that does not bode well for either.

The Kurds may be left with no options if a Turkish-Syrian rapprochement succeeds or face a Turkish onslaught if it fails.

Similarly, reconciliation on terms acceptable to Mr. Erdogan may amount to pulling a rabbit out of a hat.

Whether he agrees with Mr. Al-Assad or violence in northern Syria escalates, Mr. Erdogan risks sparking a new wave of refugees making its way to Turkey at a time that he can economically and politically least afford it.

In the words of analyst Kamal Alam, Mr. Erdogan’s problem is that the Turkish president “is running out of time before the next election to solve the Gordian knot that is Syria. For his part, Assad can wait this out – because after Turkey once again fails to bomb its way out of the northeastern problem, Erdogan will need Assad far more than the reverse.”

At first glance, a potential bid by Saudi Arabia and Egypt, two of the world’s worst human rights violators, together with Greece, to host the 2030 World Cup sounds like an invitation to a perfect public relations fiasco.

That is undoubtedly true if one looks at Qatar three months before its World Cup kicks off in November.

Coverage of the Qatar World Cup in independent media remains harshly critical of the Gulf state’s final preparations for the tournament and migrant worker and human rights record, despite significant legal and material reforms.

Moreover, human rights groups continue to confront Qatar with legitimate demands such as an improved compensation system for workers who suffered serious harm, including death, injury, and wage theft.

Even so, Qatar’s rough public relations ride over the last 12 years since it won in late 2010 its World Cup hosting rights, despite having been responsive to criticism, may prove to have been mild compared to what likely awaits Saudi Arabia and Egypt, if and when they submit a formal bid to FIFA, the world soccer governance body. Greece, too is likely to be taken to task for partnering with the two autocracies.

Saudi Arabia has wanted to host a World Cup for some time as part of a concerted effort to establish itself as a regional sports hub, eclipsing Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

Sports is one pillar of a larger endeavour to position the kingdom as the Middle East’s commercial and political centre of gravity. Moreover, as the custodian of Mecca and Medina, Islam’s two holiest cities, Saudi Arabia is already a major religious point of reference.

The sports effort also aims to boost Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s creation of an entertainment sector that caters to youth aspirations, contributes to the diversification of the country’s oil export-based economy, and helps project the kingdom as forward-looking and cutting-edge rather than secretive and ultra-conservative as it was perceived for much of its existence.

By partnering with Greece and Turkey, Saudi Arabia hopes to enhance its chances of winning the bid in a competition that is likely to be dominated by multi-country proposals. The bid’s strength is that it would be tri-continental, Asia, Africa, and Europe.

Other potential contending partnerships include Spain and Portugal; England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Ireland, and Wales; a North African combination of Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria; and a joint South American effort by Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, and Paraguay. Romania, Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia have also expressed interest in banding together.

Partnering could allow Saudi Arabia to circumvent FIFA’s likely hesitancy to award the tournament to a Middle Eastern country as sole host for the second time in a decade.

The potential alliance with Egypt and Greece follows an earlier apparently failed attempt to team up with Italy for a World Cup bid.

Saudi Arabia’s willingness to risk the kind of scrutiny that Qatar was exposed to is rooted in a degree of hubris on the part of Mr. Bin Salman and an evaluation of the Qatari experience.

Mr. Bin Salman has been encouraged by the willingness of leaders like US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to put behind them the unresolved 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and the arrest of scores on often flimsy charges and welcome the crown prince back into the international fold.

By the same token, Mr. Bin Salman has nothing to fear from non-democratic members of the international community like China and Russia and much of the Global South that either sit in glasshouses, do not want to align themselves with US and European lip service to the defence of human rights, or opportunistically don’t want to get on the wrong side of Saudi Arabia.

Saudi hubris was evident in this month’s sentencing of 34-year-old Leeds University PhD candidate Salma al-Shehab, a mother of two, to 34 years in prison for following and retweeting dissidents and activists on Twitter.

Mr. Bin Salman’s willingness to shoulder the risk is likely to be rooted in an analysis of Qatar’s experience that suggests that, on balance, the Gulf state’s hosting of the World Cup will prove to be a success, despite continued negative press in Western media, provided that it pulls off the tournament without significant glitches.

However, Saudi Arabia and Egypt’s human rights records are far more egregious than Qatar’s, which is hardly commendable by any measure.

Like the kingdom and Egypt, Qatar is an autocracy with a legal infrastructure that fortifies the emir as the country’s absolute ruler. Like the potential 2030 World Cup bidders, Qatar lacks freedom of the press and assembly, outlaws extra-marital sex, and refuses to recognize LGBT rights.

But unlike Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Qatar’s jails are not populated by political prisoners or offenders of anti-LGBT laws. Human rights groups estimate that Egypt keeps 60,000 political prisoners behind bars.

Egypt and Saudi Arabia, which has enhanced the rights and opportunities of at least some women, eased gender segregation, and lifted bans on modern entertainment such as music, dancing, and cinema. have often targeted LGBT communities for domestic political gain.

Human Rights Watch has repeatedly charged that Egyptian authorities “arbitrarily arrest” LGBT people and “detain them in inhuman conditions, systematically subject them to ill-treatment including torture, and often incite fellow inmates to abuse them.

Going to extremes, Saudi Arabia, amid a push to encourage tourism, launched “rainbow raids” in late 2021 on shops selling children’s toys and accessories.

Authorities focused on clothing and toys, including hair clips, pop-its, t-shirts, bows, skirts, hats, and colouring pencils “that contradict the Islamic faith and public morals and promote homosexual colours that target the younger generation,” according to a commerce ministry official.

Earlier, the kingdom banned Lightyear, a Disney and Pixar animated production, because of a same-sex kiss scene, and Disney’s Doctor Strange in the Universe of Madness, in which one character refers to her “two mums.”

The litany of Saudi violations of fundamental rights includes a ban on non-Muslim houses of worship even though the kingdom has recently emphasized inter-faith dialogue and welcomed Jewish visitors, including those with a double nationality of which one is Israeli, as well as Christian religious leaders.

As a result, the headwinds a bid involving Saudi Arabia and Egypt is likely to encounter could make Qatar’s experience look like a cakewalk.

Qatar has demonstrated a degree of dexterity in dealing with its World Cup critics, a quality that the Saudi crown prince and Egyptian general-turned-president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi have yet to exhibit.

Steven Sahiounie is an exceptionally reliable journalist on the Middle East, and is also the Editor-in-Chief of Mideast Discourse. I have never yet found him to have reported even a single false (or inaccurate) statement, and this is remarkable for a journalist on such a heavily propagandized subject-area. He reported on August 17th that:

Maher Ihsan is a journalist and political expert. He exposes the real purpose the US remains in Syria as occupiers. According to Ihsan, the US is stealing resources and imposing its will upon the political future of Syria. “Look at the situation now, the United States is controlling key gas and oil fields in oil-rich areas in Syria, it’s also controlling key agricultural areas … the United States didn’t come here to help, but to take advantage of the situation and impose their own will,” Ihsan said.

Ahmad Al-Ashqar, a journalist and political expert, echoed Ihsan’s views, that the US occupies and plunders the oil-rich regions in Syria.

On August 8, the Syrian oil ministry said in a statement that the average daily output of Syrian oil in the first half of 2022 is 80,300 barrels, while the US occupying forces and their mercenaries are stealing an average of 66,000 barrels a day, accounting for over 83 percent of Syria’s oil output.

According to the ministry, the prolonged crisis in Syria has cost Syria’s oil sector about 105 billion US dollars in direct and indirect losses.

One might say that stealing Syria’s oil is being done in order to impoverish the Syrian people so much so that they will turn against and overthrow Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, whom even Western-sponsored polls, which have been taken for years in Syria, have shown to be overwhelmingly the #1 person whom they want to be Syria’s President. However, whatever the reason might be as to why the U.S. regime is stealing Syria’s oil, the U.S. regime’s theft is equally illegal, and equally a gangster-operation that it is running there.

This operation has been going on for a decade now, under American Presidents Obama, Trump, and, currently, Biden.

Sahiounie’s report asserts that “President Trump ordered the withdrawal of US troops from Syria in December 2018, but the Pentagon would not agree with the order, and the US troops remain in two locations: one in the oil-rich north east region, and the other in the south east at Al-Tanf.” His source on that might have been U.S. news reports on 19 December 2018, such as “Trump orders rapid withdrawal from Syria in apparent reversal”; but, obviously, it turned out to have been false (like most U.S. news reports about international relations are).

On 9 August 2022, U.S. Colonel Douglas Macgregor discussed this matter in depth in a youtube interview. Two excerpts from it will be shown here. The first excerpt will provide background regarding America’s Military Industrial Complex or “MIC,” in order to explain the second excerpt; the second excerpt will be Macgregor’s historical account of how, when Macgregor personally finally drafted a U.S. withdrawal-order for the President to sign, which was limited ONLY to Afghanistan though Macgregor had tried to get Trump to approve U.S. withdrawals from also Iraq and Syria, Trump actually did sign it but refused to follow-through on it, and simply caved to the uniform opposition against his Constitutional command that came from both of the Parties in Congress, and despite the Commander-in-Chief’s having the sole authority to do this and the Congress having no authority against that order — Trump just didn’t care enough about the matter: (youtube)

The truth is, the armed forces, especially the Army, the Marines, really exists in order to provide jobs for generals. So, you have this enormous bureaucracy that has built up over time. Today, we have, in the United States armed forces, 40 four-star generals and admirals. Now, to those who don’t understand what this means, in World War II, when we had 12.2 million men under arms fighting all over the world [and before President Truman created the U.S. ‘Defense’ Department in 1947], at the height of that war until the war was nearly over, we had only seven four-stars. Today, we have 1.1 million under arms, and we have forty. Now, anyone who knows anything about the military knows that this kind of overhead is corrupting, it’s unnecessary, it constipates and slows down decision-making, it makes for bad policy. So, I think, in this sense, we’re banana-republic-like, and we have lots and lots of people running around as generals wearing lots and lots of medals, none of which have anything to do with fighting anybody under fire or killing anybody or being valorous, but having to do with, like, I was in the theater when this happened, and I was here when this happened, and my fellow generals rewarded me with more decorations. It’s embarrassing; this is a terrible mess that needs to be addressed. [That excerpt ends at

[Questioner asks: Let me take you back to just a year or two ago. Did President Trump order the Pentagon to return a substantial number of our troops then in Afghanistan, and did the Pentagon, by hook or by crook, decline to comply with that order?] [ANSWER:] What happened was as follows: The President, as you know, had first made an attempt in 2017 to extricate our forces from Afghanistan. He convened a meeting in the White House in the summer in July. All of the great men of defense were there, Mattis, his National Security Adviser at the time McMaster, other senior military people, advisors, cabinet, and the President said I think we’ve been there long enough, we are not accomplishing anything, and I think we should get out. And the entire group stood up and obstructed his wishes, said no you can’t leave, the world as we know it will end, we will have sacrificed and we will have gained nothing, and he said we’ve already got nothing. What are we getting for it? How do we benefit from doing this? Why are we there? Why aren’t the regional actors involved? Of course, nobody wanted to hear that, so he gave up. He tried again a couple of times, and then finally, I was called to the White House, this would have been the 9th of November, and told that they had removed the Secretary of Defense and they were appointing a new temporary Secretary [This was right after the Biden-Trump election.] He had fired Esper, Esper was always in lockstep with Milley [Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff], who was always running the show anyway. … They wanted no end to the conflict. And you had Mitch McConnell and everyone else on the Hill on the right, and most of the people on the left, who all were 100% onboard with keeping this conflict going and maintaining a presence there in perpetuity. And I was called in and I was asked to arrange a meeting with the new Secretary and John McIntee [Director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office] with a list of tasks for me to perform as the Senior Advisor to the new Secretary of Defense, and I said there’s only one man who can withdraw forces from Afghanistan, and that’s the Secretary of Defense. So I went back and I told the Secretary of Defense the next day, and I said … perhaps [numbers] 1 or 2 on this list [namely] specifically Afghanistan, we could make that happen. We could conceivably also remove forces from Syria and Iraq, that’s relatively easy, you could drive out quickly, but I said beyond that, I don’t think we could do that. And he agreed. And I said, by the way, Mr. Secretary, I don’t think you could do this without a direct order from the President, that’s written. You’re an Acting Secretary. And he said I think you’re right. And I said I’ll get you an order. And so I left, and I called over to the White House, and we had discussed this the night before, and I said we’ve got to have an order. And they said what does the order have to say? And I drafted it, right then and there over the phone, gave them instructions. And I said let me know if you need anything else. A few hours later, about five in the afternoon, I get a frantic call from one of the NSC staffers, asking what are the legal authorities? And I said go and get a Presidential Decision Memorandum out of the file cabinet. His authorities under the Constitution [are there]. And, in addition to that, it will help you with distribution, show you who needs to receive the order. So, he said, okay, got it, thanks so much. I never heard anything again, until Thursday afternoon [12 November 2020] and I was told that … the President had signed the order. I had hoped that we would get a draft, I had asked them to send a draft before it went final but it all took off on its own, [they had] changed some of the dates but essentially it said that everything is going to be out by 15 January. And keep in mind that pulling out of Afghanistan in the winter was always a very good idea because in the winter all of the people who might otherwise interfere with you are up in the mountains, next to stones in their caves. They’re not wandering around in the open. It’s the low ebb in the so-called fighting-season. … Well, unfortunately, what happened was that he wrote this 15 January deadline, somebody [immediately] bootlegged [it] over to the Senate, and I guess Mitch McConnell went berserk, [saying] we can’t just leave, this is impossible, and subsequently Milley gets ahold of this, [and says] this cannot happen!, We are not leaving Afghanistan!! And there was a big pow-wow in the White House and all the principals were there, and the President backed down. [That excerpt ends at

Biden came into the White House on 20 January 2021, and set a 1 May 2021 deadline, which was just about the worst season to do it, but the very worst time to do it was when the U.S. regime actually did it, which was 6 July 2021. The problem with America’s Government isn’t only that it is evil (such as by stealing Syria’s oil) but that it is also incompetent — in every way except serving the desires of America’s billionaires in both of its political Parties.

I think that if Douglas Macgregor won’t become America’s President on 20 January 2025, then either something is wrong with Douglas Macgregor (since no current member of Congress nor state Governor is up to the challenge that he clearly has already met — he therefore must now fulfill his unique duty to his nation (just as Lincoln and FDR did), or something is catastrophically wrong with America (since Americans have been keep getting evil and incompetent Presidents such as Bush, Obama, Trump, and now Biden), or else both will be true, and a WW III, global nuclear annihilation, will therefore be likely. That wouldn’t just be stupidity; it would be unimaginably evil, because totally unnecessary global destruction. That’s where things are heading. It’s why he is needed.

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