Middle Eastern Affairs Research Articles

China and the Belt and Road Initiative’s Role in Middle Eastern Affairs: A Consideration of Network Effects and Lock-In Dynamics

This paper explores the question of whether China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and China’s growing global interconnectivity more generally, are generating network effects and lock-in dynamics. It considers evidence that the BRI as well as the increase in China’s international interconnectivity has indeed created network effects and lock-in dynamics in several different ways, including transport infrastructure and the different components associated with the transportation of cargo such as railway gauges and types of railways. However, it also examines the ways that the BRI has not achieved network effects, due to the BRI harming relations with countries such as Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Our Palestine: Insights into Middle Eastern Affairs from the Archives of Szlomo Nachum Perla

Our Palestine: Insights into Middle Eastern Affairs from the Archives of Szlomo Nachum Perla

Recent Communication Between the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Iran, and Saudi Arabia: A Commentary

Recent diplomatic dialogues between the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs and counterparts in Iran and Saudi Arabia underscore mutual consensus and China's emerging role in the Middle East. China vehemently condemned the attack on Iran's embassy in Syria, extending support to Iran. Saudi Arabia, in alignment with China, emphasized trust in China's capacity to positively influence Middle Eastern affairs. The Middle East's convergence of viewpoints, particularly with Saudi Arabia, places substantial pressure on Israel. Israel is urged to halt air defense and foster coexistence with Iran to avoid further instability. China's peace overtures await substantive action from the United States, with potential repercussions for Israel's stability. Ultimately, Israel's acceptance of China's peace initiative is crucial for regional stability.

Whipsawed by Woori and Washington: South Korea's growing challenges in handling Middle Eastern affairs

AbstractThe history of the past two decades has proved that top Korean leaders can make a real difference in terms of their previous experiences and personal engagement in securing the Republic of Korea's (ROK) vested interests in the Middle East. For decades, South Korea had handed over its day‐to‐day interactions with Middle Eastern countries to the Korean bureaucracy led by the relevant departments and subaltern officials at the foreign ministry and other state institutions. This approach, however, seems rather dysfunctional today, requiring key Korean officials, especially the president, to get involved personally in the ROK's increasingly multifaceted relationships with Middle Eastern nations. This article reappraises the new Korean orientation by highlighting some of the major developments involving both sides during the past several years. The main argument is that the ROK is facing increasingly serious difficulties in sorting out its policy behaviors toward Middle Eastern countries as Korea is striving to strike a delicate balance between its own expanding commercial interests in the region and what the United States expects from South Korea with regard to the topsy‐turvy world of politics in the Middle East.

CHINA’S MARGINAL INVOLVEMENT IN THE 2023 IRAN-SAUDI ARABIA RECONCILIATION

The restoration of diplomatic relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia in March 2023 has been described as a landmark in China’s advancing engagement in Middle Eastern affairs. This article argues, however, that China’s role in the deal was minimal and that the main drivers of the agreement were Iran and Saudi Arabia’s own objectives and concerns and, in particular, Saudi Arabia’s growing economic and military power. China’s greatest influence resulted from its intervention on the side of Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf Arab states and the Tehran leadership’s perceptions that Beijing’s commercial interests were leading it to side with Riyadh. The Iranian government’s fears were exacerbated by concerns about mass protests in Iran in 2022 and the outcomes of the China-GCC Summit in December of that year. At the same time, Saudi Arabia chose to de-escalate its confrontation with Iran to strengthen its regional and global power underpinned by the huge Vision 2030 development programme.

Hollywood’s Peerless Advocate for Israel: Max Nussbaum, ‘Rabbi to the Stars’

Abstract A neglected figure in the histories of Zionism, American Jewry and US-Israel relations, Max Nussbaum carved out an unusual place for himself in Hollywood after the Second World War. Known affectionately as the ‘Rabbi to the Stars’, as spiritual leader of Temple Israel of Hollywood Nussbaum stood at the centre of entertainment’s Jewish community for thirty years, where he played a key role in advocating for Israel during the state’s formative decades. The rabbi raised millions of ‘publicity dollars’ for Israel with the help of Hollywood moguls and show-business friends, converted the actress Elizabeth Taylor into a Zionist champion, and conversed with America’s political leaders about Middle Eastern affairs. Using American and Israeli archives, this article explores the extensive range of Nussbaum’s pro-Zionist endeavours, demonstrating the importance of Temple Israel of Hollywood’s on- and off-screen support for Israel. It factors in the role of American Jewish organisations and the particular importance of Zionist advocacy and celebrity culture to the changing attitudes of American Jews and the US government towards Israel from the 1940s to the 1970s. At the same time, it reveals the limits of Nussbaum’s pro-Israel political lobbying activities in Washington and assesses why, despite his devotion to Israel, Nussbaum clashed with its leaders over the goals of the Zionist movement. The article highlights the need to integrate religious figures such as Max Nussbaum and cultural players like Hollywood more fully into the history of the US-Israel alliance.

Book Review: The Unspoken Discourse on the Will to Understand Middle Eastern Affairs Through a Political Science Lens

Book Review: The Unspoken Discourse on the Will to Understand Middle Eastern Affairs Through a Political Science Lens

Armies of Arabia: Military Politics and Effectiveness in the Gulf

Armies of Arabia: Military Politics and Effectiveness in the Gulf

The Aftermath of the Suez Crisis: The Reopening of the Canal and Anglo–American Relations

ABSTRACT There have been a great number of works on the Suez Crisis, but scarce academic attention has been paid to the process whereby its settlement was achieved. This paper argues that Britain succeeded in securing fairly sufficient Egyptian concessions with support from the US and the UN. The Americans, who had been hostile to the British prior to their agreement to withdraw troops from the Canal Zone, led the effort to make the Egyptians concede during negotiations on the Canal’s reopening. Contrary to the prevailing argument that Britain suffered a political defeat because of international pressure, this paper argues that Britain persuaded the US to acquiesce to the de facto arrangement because of the Canal’s economic value. The deployment of the UNEF brought a certain level of humiliation to Egyptian sovereignty. As Nasser’s influence in Middle Eastern affairs was contained, Britain chose a pragmatic deal with Egypt over the Canal.

Leaders, politics, and media policy: Benjamin Netanyahu in the Russian press

ABSTRACT The Russian media frequently wrote about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (1996–99, 2009–21), analysing his role in Middle Eastern affairs, especially with regard to Palestinian-Israeli relations, the Syrian civil war, and the Iranian nuclear programme. Examining Netanyahu’s image in the Russian press is crucial not only for understanding the political priorities of twenty-first-century Russian media but also for investigating Moscow’s role in international politics given its keen interest in the Middle East.

China in the Middle East: an Analysis from a Theoretical Perspective of “Path Dependence”

There is an ongoing debate about whether China’s growing economic presence in the Middle East will eventually make it more politically assertive on the Middle Eastern affairs. This paper demonstrates, from a theoretical perspective of “path dependence,” that China’s promotion of the “Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence” since the 1950s as the guiding doctrine of its foreign relations has forged a “path” for China to follow, along which it has made and repeated promises against interventionism and imperialism to other countries including the Middle Eastern ones. It, in turn, has created a situation where moving away from that “path against interventionism and imperialism” will cause huge damage to China’s reputation as a reliable non-interventionist partner to the Middle Eastern countries, and the “Global South” in general. As a result, China has refrained, and will arguably continue to refrain, from being too politically assertive on the Middle Eastern affairs.

Democracy, Pluralism and Political Ethics in Middle East; in an Interview With Prof. Abdulaziz Sachedina

Abdulaziz Abdulhussein Sachedina hails from Tanzania (originally is from India) and he was educated in Tanzania, India, Iran, Iraq, and Canada. After completing the school in Tanzania, he traveled to India and did his B.A. General in Philosophy, Political Science, and Islamic Studies at Aligarh Muslim University. Then, he did another bachelor’s degree in Persian language and literature in Ferdowsi University of Mashhad and he simultaneously received seminary (religious) education in Iran. During his stay in Iran, he was strongly influenced by Dr. Ali Shariati as one of his students. Afterwards, he traveled to Canada, started his education at the University of Toronto in 1971, and got his MA and PhD in Middle East and Islamic Studies. After graduating in 1976, at the same year he joined the University of Virginia, the Department of Religious Studies, and remained there until 2011. Now, he is Chair, Religious Studies and Professor of Islamic Studies in International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT) at George Mason University, Virginia. He has also taught at other Universities and institutes in US, Canada, Iran, Iraq, Jordan and so on. He has been teaching courses on Classical Islam, Islam in the Modern Age, Islam, Democracy and Human Rights, Islamic Bioethics and Muslim Theology. Because of his pluralist view on religions, Ayatollah Sistani issued a statement (fatwa) against him in 1998 that advised Muslims not to listen to his talks or to ask him questions about religious matters. In addition to his work at the university, he has been a consultant to the United States Department of State and Department of Defense, regarding the spiritual and moral dimensions, Middle Eastern affairs, and the question of the freedom of religion in Islam and related topics. In this relation, he was also an adviser to those drafting the Constitution of Iraq that was put into effect in 2005. His doctoral dissertation was published under Islamic Messianism in 1980. Some of his other works are The Just Ruler in Shi’ite Islam (al-sultan al-‘adil), 1988, Human Rights and the Conflict of Cultures, 1988, The Islamic Roots of Democratic Pluralism, 2002, The Islamic World: Past and Present, 2004, Islamic Biomedical Ethics, 2009, Islam and the Challenge of Human Rights, 2009.

“Trust, but Verify” – The Framing of the Nuclear Conflict between Iran and the West in UK and US media

Historicity is an important concept in people’s self-conceptualization as well as in their conceptualization of the world around them. By knowing what was, we can interpret some of what is as a consequence of past actions and events and thus understand how it came to be and how to react appropriately. For our interpretation of current events in the world, we therefore frequently rely on history “as a source of meaning” (Leudar and Nekvapil 2011, 68). Since we relate to events in the world through mediation, i.e. the media, we accordingly understand world history through the historical context that is provided for us by journalists. In many cases, however, such contextualizations of events appear to foreground proximal – or synchronous (Blommaert 2005, 130) – factors over distal ones, thus restricting interpretation to immediate factors rather than describing them as a consequence of other actions or events in history. Due to global reach of today’s corporate media, such synchronous framing of the news can lead to a certain bias of attitudes (Philo 2004, 201–202), e.g., regarding the nature of conflicts between ‘us’ and ‘them’ to the effect that ‘we’ always appear as acting on logical, justifiable and altruistic grounds, while ‘their’ actions are irrational, unwarranted and self-serving. In this paper, I analyze the framing of the political conflict between Western countries and Iran regarding its nuclear program. I investigate opinion columns from various British and U.S. newspapers in order to explore the nature of the news framing of the issue and whether any distal factors such as Western interventions in Iran and Middle Eastern affairs are taken into account. The analysis will be conducted following the Thematic Analysis approach developed by the Glasgow University Media Group (Philo and Berry 2004/2011), but including also other conceptual categories such as Blommaert’s (2005) notion of synchronicity.

Bitter ends: Some notes on the BBC presentation of the Libya conflict, 2011

Abstract On 26 October 2011, it was announced that the BBC coverage of the so-called Arab Spring would come under an internal BBC Trust review. The review was led by Edward Mortimer, former UN Director of Communications and an expert in Middle Eastern affairs. Its chief aim was to determine the level of impartiality to which the BBC rose during what Mortimer described as an apparently ‘exciting’ time for journalists. The report was described as ‘remarkable, given the challenges involved, and was generally impartial’. This article will present some notes which contradict the BBC Trust’s self-review while acting as advice for practitioners on misrepresentation and things to avoid while reporting abroad.

The United States and Saudi Arabia through the Arab Uprisings

The Arab Uprisings continue to re-shape the political environment of the Middle East. As the epicentres of Egypt, Iraq and Syria draw the bulk of international attention, the impact of the last four years has been felt in more subtle ways, with a reconfiguring of alliances and relationships throughout the region. This article reviews the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States. There is a special focus on the challenges faced in the period of the Arab Uprisings from 2010 to 2014, with reference to the role of an ascendant Iran and the emergence of the Islamic State. Through an exploration of the three traditional pillars of the Saudi–US relationship; oil, geostrategic considerations and security, the article charts the current state of the alliance and explores the likely future trajectory of this lynchpin relationship in modern Middle Eastern affairs.

The Open Door and U.S. Policy in Iraq between the World Wars

This article challenges the standard narrative of interwar U.S. involvement in the Middle East by arguing that the United States did have both interests in and a policy concerning Iraq during that time. Despite being non-belligerents with the Ottoman Empire during the First World War and non-members of the League of Nations thereafter, the U.S. government consistently advanced the claim that the American contribution to the Allied victory entitled it to equal political and economic opportunities in the Middle East and to a voice in postwar Middle Eastern affairs. U.S. officials vigilantly intervened in the region throughout the period to ensure not only American access to petroleum resources, but also, as is shown in Iraq, to insist on political relations unmediated by Great Britain. British acceptance of this implies that the foundations had thereby been laid for an independent American role in the Middle East, preceding the later thresholds usually cited by historians. The open door policy the U.S. government set out in the correspondence with Britain in 1920–21 represents a full and cogent policy on Iraq that was advanced throughout the interwar period to protect American interests and standing in that country.

An atlas of Middle Eastern affairs

An atlas of Middle Eastern affairs

‘Two & three air raids daily. What a bother’: an American diplomat in Israel during the War of Independence

In the summer of 1948, Charles F. Knox, Jr., a career American Foreign Service officer with no prior experience in Middle Eastern affairs, was assigned by the State Department to serve as Counsellor to the initial United States Mission in Israel. White House officials who had overcome State Department opposition to the recognition of Israel in May regarded Knox with suspicion. However, in the course of his service in Israel Knox transcended a Foreign Service milieu that was traditionally hostile to Zionist aspirations as well as his own negative stereotypes about the character of American Jews. The letters Knox sent to family and friends at home, as well as his official dispatches to his superiors in Washington, provide a vivid record of daily life in wartime Tel Aviv as well as a notably sympathetic portrayal of the Israeli people at war.

Chasing the Rising Red Crescent: Sino-Shi’i Relations in Post-Cold War Era China

This article adopts a unique angle to analyze China’s Middle East policy in “Chasing the Rising Red Crescent: Sino-Shi’i Relations in the Post-Cold War Era.” With the end of the Cold War and the political renaissance of Islam, the author argues that China’s strategic approaches towards the Middle East have changed fundamentally. The rise of China on the Middle East coupled with the strategic ascendancy of Shi’i Islam in the Middle East invites a strategic window for the emerging architecture of global geopolitics and world economy. The aim of Lee’s study is to make clear the historical trajectories and evolving strategic calculations in China’s Middle East policy and its global implications by reviewing Sino-Shi’i relations in general and introducing Chinese strategic interactions with Iran, Iraq, Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas in particular. Since the establishment of zhongguo zhongdong wenti teshi [Chinese Special Envoy for Middle Eastern Affairs] in 2002, China’s economic presence and political clout in the Middle East including the Shi’i region have been advanced obviously. Sino-Shi’i relations in the post-Cold War era, thus, should be seriously examined not only for understanding China’s strategic perceptions of the Middle East but also for explaining the pattern of Chinese foreign behaviours, as well as for expecting the impact of China’s rising in the region and its geopolitical implications for the future of China-U.S. relations

To Keep the Peace with Iran, Threaten to Strike

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. Dominique Guillaume, Roman Zytek, and Mohammad Reza Farzin, “Iran–The Chronicles of the Subsidy Reform,” The International Monetary Fund, July 2011, http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2011/wp11167.pdf. 2. David Nakamura, “Obama signs defense bill, pledges to maintain legal rights of U.S. citizens,” The Washington Post, December 31, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obama-signs-defense-bill-pledges-to-maintain-legal-rights-of-terror-suspects/2011/12/31/gIQATzbkSP_story.html. 3. Helene Fouquet, “Sarkozy Calls for Freeze of Iran's Central Assets, New Sanctions,” Bloomberg, November 21, 2011, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-21/sarkozy-calls-for-freeze-of-iran-s-central-assets-new-sanctions.html. 4. Karim Sadjadpour, “Reading Khamenei: The World View of Iran's Most Powerful Leader,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2009, http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/sadjadpour_iran_final2.pdf. 5. Karim Sadjadpour, “Reading Khamenei: The World View of Iran's Most Powerful Leader,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2009, http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/sadjadpour_iran_final2.pdf. 6. Barack Obama, “Statement by the President on H.R. 1540,” The White House, December 31, 2011, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/12/31/statement-president-hr-1540. 7. “India not seeking Iran oil waiver from U.S.: official,” Reuters, January 17, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/17/us-india-iran-idUSTRE80G0VE20120117. 8. Wayne Ma, “China's Oil Imports from Iran Jump,” The Wall Street Journal, January 23, 2012, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577174133880790046.html. 9. Barack Obama, “Remarks by the President in State of the Union Address,” The White House, January 24, 2012, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/01/24/remarks-president-state-union-address. 10. Martin Dempsey, “‘Face the Nation’ transcript: January 8, 2012,” CBS News, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57354647/face-the-nation-transcript-january-8-2012. 11. Martin Dempsey, “‘Face the Nation’ transcript: January 8, 2012,” CBS News, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460_162-57354647/face-the-nation-transcript-january-8-2012. 12. Leon E. Panetta, “Remarks by Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta at the Saban Center,” U.S. Department of Defense, December 2, 2011, http://www.defense.gov/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=4937. 13. Elisabeth Bumiller, Eric Schmitt, and Thom Shanker, “U.S. Sends Top Iranian Leader a Warning on Strait Threat,” The New York Times, January 12, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/13/world/middleeast/us-warns-top-iran-leader-not-to-shut-strait-of-hormuz.html. 14. “Mossad chief held talks on Iran in US visit: CIA,” Agence France-Presse, January 31, 2012, http://news.yahoo.com/mossad-chief-washington-iran-talks-media-201731919.html. 15. U.S. Energy Information Administration, “China,” http://www.eia.gov/countries/country-data.cfm?fips=CH. 16. “China's Dec Saudi crude imports 4th highest on record,” Reuters, January 21, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/21/china-crude-imports-idUSL3E8CL02520120121. 17. Michael Singh and Jacqueline Newmyer Deal, “China's Iranian Gambit,” ForeignPolicy.com, October 31, 2011, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/10/31/china_iran_nuclear_relationship?page=full. 18. Leon E. Panetta, “‘Face the Nation’ transcript: January 8, 2012,” CBS News, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-3460-162-57354647/face-the-nation-transcript-january-8-2012. 19. Dempsey, “‘Face the Nation’ transcript: January 8, 2012.” 20. Eric S. Edelman, Andrew F. Krepinevich Jr., and Evan Braden Montgomery, “Why Obama Should Take Out Iran's Nuclear Program,” Foreign Affairs, November 9, 2011, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136655/eric-s-edelman-andrew-f-krepinevich-jr-and-evan-braden-montgomer/why-obama-should-take-out-irans-nuclear-program. 21. “Restarting the Bosnian Peace Talks,” The New York Times, August 29, 1995, http://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/29/opinion/restarting-the-bosnian-peace-talks.html. Additional informationNotes on contributorsMichael SinghMichael Singh is managing director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and served as senior director for Middle Eastern affairs on the National Security Council staff from 2007–2008. He was also director for Iran at the NSC from 2006–2007 and special assistant to secretaries of state Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice from 2004–2005