The Middle East: A Chance For Europe?

Abstract

T S HE Palestinian economists Bisharah and Na'im Khadir wrote in 1975 that 'American and European interests in the Arab world are contradictory. Every step forward by Europe means a step back by the United States, whether it is on the economic or the political plane. 1 It could be argued, however, that exactly the opposite is the case: commercial rivalries and political disagreements belie important interests in the Middie East shared by Western Europe and North America. Both Europe and the United States maintain long-standing political, cultural, and economic ties with Israel as well as with the major Arab states. Although in different degrees, they share a dependence on Middle Easter energy resources, and thus have a vital interest in the security and internal stability of the region. The geopolitical position of the West as a whole would be gravely endangered by Soviet expansion beyond Afghanistan toward the oil-rich area of the Persian Gulf. Both for its bearing on these issues, and because of its own intrinsic importance, progress toward a settlement of the seemingly intractable Arab-Israeli conflict is of crucial concern to Western Europe as well as to the United States. If European and American interests in the Middle East ultimately converge, it must also be admitted that they differ both in nature and degree. Until the 1960s, America's geographical distance permitted a degree of detachment from Middle Eastern affairs which contrasted with the physical proximity and direct involvement of the European states-and particularly of the former colonial powers, Britain and France. To be sure America pursued important and sometimes conflicting strategic, political, and economic interests in the region. In the 1950s it avoided overly close ties with Israel in order to enlist Arab assistance in the containment of Soviet expansion. Only after the Six Day War in 1967 did the United States become Israel's leading supplier of weapons, and only in the early 1970s did America's growing dependence on foreign energy supplies render it vulnerable to OPEC disruptions. The West Europeans, on the other hand, had previously controlled much of the Arab world; in particular, Britain's administration of the Palestine Mandate laid the groundwork for the creation of the Zionist state. Continental Europeans, tortured by memories of the Nazi holocaust, tended in the early postwar period to grant Israel unquestioning diplomatic and in some cases military support.