Trump's Middle East
Redrawing the map.
Trump has repeatedly said that he would own Gaza and that the Palestinians would be expelled. Most recently, on 11 February, he met with King Abdullah II of Jordan to discuss this. King Abdullah said that the Arab countries, led by Egypt and Saudi Arabia, would present an alternative plan.
The Two State Solution
The two state solution has never been viable. For the Israelis, it was predicated on retaining control through economic and security means of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Gaza. For the Palestinians, it was an interim solution until the conditions in the Muslim Arab world changed enough to permit a war that would destroy Israel. The strongest opponents of the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, which were meant to establish the two state solution, were Benjamin Netanyahu, who has since become - and remains - Israel’s longest serving prime minister, and Hamas, which remains in control of Gaza and is the most popular group in the West Bank. We further explain the non-viability of the two state solution below.
Islam and the Jewish State
The existence of a Jewish state in the Holy Land is a theological insult to Islam. Mohammad’s message is based on the claim that the Christians and Jews had failed to adhere to God’s Covenants with Abraham and his descendants by failing to apply God’s laws. Muslims believe that God calls them to apply His law, including by governing Christians and Jews.
Islam has not gone through the Jewish dispersion, or through the 300 years of persecution that preceded the conversion of Rome to Christianity. It has never been able to separate spiritual and temporal authority. Indeed, from the standpoint of Islamic scripture and tradition, the two are inseparable.
The Temple Mount/Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem is Islam’s third holiest site. Muslims claim that Mohammad ascended from there to heaven, where he was welcomed by the Hebrew prophets and spoke to God.
The holiness of Jerusalem and the deep connection between religious and temporal authority make it impossible for Muslims to accept Jewish sovereignty over Jerusalem, or the legitimacy of a state for Jews, especially in the Holy Land. This is reflected in the deep hostility towards Israel in countries that have signed peace treaties with it: Egypt and Jordan.
As such, for Saudi Arabia, reconciling with Israel would threaten the credibility of the ruling Al Saud family as Custodians of Mecca and Medina, Islam’s two holiest sites. This would shake their legitimacy to the core. Even more so if Saudi receives Palestinians expelled by Israel.
Palestinian refugees
For this reason, Palestinian refugees have never been fully integrated into any Arab country, but retain a separate status (with the exception of Jordan, which, as it was sovereign over the West Bank and Jerusalem from 1948 to 1967, gave many Palestinians citizenship, and Lebanon, which gave citizenship to some Christian Palestinians).
The Arab and Muslim public view accepting Palestinian refugees as full citizens, or receiving new refugees, as authorising Israel to ethnically cleanse Palestinians and as legitimising it. This, to them, is unacceptable morally, religiously, and politically.
Redrawing the map
The re-Islamisation of Turkey under Erdogan, the overthrow of Assad in Syria, and the constant political paralysis in nominally democratic Iraq and Lebanon, have exposed a reality that has long been evident: the nation state project in the Levant has failed, rendering the current Sykes Picot borders irrelevant.
It is now possible to redraw these borders, perhaps along ethnic and religious lines. Seeing this reality, Trump wants to expand the borders of Israel, just as President Erdogan of Turkey is trying to expand Turkey’s borders.
Imperial Power
We believe that Trump’s and the Israelis’ view is that removing the Palestinians from Gaza, and, eventually, the West Bank, is the only way to break the cycle of violence.
Trump knows that, without Western aid and support, Jordan and Egypt would collapse, and that it is American military power that keeps Gulf Arab rulers in place. The surveillance equipment that these countries depend on is reliant on American and Israeli technology. As such, Trump believes that he is in position to exercise American power to compel what he perceives as vassals to accept his plans.
Trump recognises how destabilising expelling the Palestinians would be for the Hashemites of Jordan, for Egypt’s army-led government, and for Mohammad bin Salman in Saudi Arabia. He wants to proceed anyway.
Rival Satraps
Trump knows that Egypt and the UAE would seize, respectively, Saudi Arabia’s Mecca and Medina provinces (Hejaz), and the oil fields of the Eastern Province, if Saudi Arabia was destabilised. He knows that the King of Jordan has ambitions over Saudi territory, given his family’s origins in Saudi Arabia’s Hejaz. And he knows that the Saudis would love to control the UAE and Jordan if they could.
Based on these rivalries, Trump believes himself in a position to redraw the map of the Middle East to favour Israel, and may have a partner in Turkey’s Erdogan, despite his loud public protestations.
Implications
The choices facing Arab rulers are as follows:
US-instigated domestic instability as Trump pressures them to comply, by pressuring their currency, exposing their corruption, shorting their debts, imposing sanctions, and limiting their access to financial markets. Obviously, this can lead to politically destabilising unrest.
Accepting Trump’s plan, receiving aid and construction funds (from Gulf Arab countries), receiving new weapons and surveillance equipment with which they can secure their hold on power. This would imply accepting that they rule only by force, removing what is left of their legitimacy.
In extremis, war, as Israel, with US backing, forces open the border with Jordan and Egypt and attempts to militarily expel the Palestinians. Incidentally, they may believe that this would help stabilise their rule.
Egypt launched the October 1973 War (Yom Kippur War) not with the aim of decisively winning, but with the aim of imposing a political compromise that would be acceptable to Egyptians. The Arabs may find that confronting Trump, and risking war, is less dangerous than accepting Trump’s proposal, and their ensuing delegitimisation in the eyes of their peoples.
Scenarios and Commercial Implications
We envision three scenarios. In the first, the Arabs fully or partially accept Trump’s proposal. In the second, they reject it and Trump, through Israel, forces it on them anyway. In the third, Trump’s plan remains just talk, even though he uses various levers of power to implement it.
Timeframe: We believe that Trump is not in a rush. He will work to impose his view over at least the next two years, knowing full well that he has four, and that his successor will almost certainly implement the same plan.