While it's certainly important for Arab regimes to publicly pay lip service to the Arab-Israeli conflict, the true concern for many Arab states has always been the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Thomas Ricks writes:
'I wonder if something fundamental is going on in the Middle East. That is, Iran is getting more powerful, and that scares the Arab states. So they seem to be turning away from worrying about Israel and focusing more on Iran as it moves toward becoming a nuclear power. The Bush administration actually helped strengthen Iran a lot by knocking down Iraq as the great bulwark against the expansion of Persian power westward. Also, by occupying Iraq, it effectively gave Iran tens of thousands of potential hostages, lessening Western leverage and so the West's ability to curtail Iran's nuclear ambitions. And so on.Bottom line: Will AQ Khan and the Bush administration together inadvertently have brought Arab-Israeli peace to the Middle East?
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Is this really a new trend? While it's certainly important for Arab regimes to publicly pay lip service to the Arab-Israeli conflict, I thought it was rather common knowledge that the true concern for many Arab states was the Islamic Republic. There's a reason, after all, that the GCC exists today. There's a reason these regimes backed Saddam Huessin's quasi-secular Baathist regime during the Iran-Iraq War. There's a reason Iran has at times been put in the middle of the Yemen conflict.
Iran conspired to topple several of these regimes throughout the 1980's, and a few - such as Bahrain - have their own Shia majorities to worry about. The nuclear debate is simply the latest chapter in a long geo-political tug of war in the Middle East. Some have argued that the regional power structure has already shifted, as Ricks suggests. I believe the "Shia Crescent" stuff is often exaggerated, however Ricks is right to peg the Iraq invasion as a strategic victory for Tehran.
As to whether or not this regional realignment could accelerate Mideast peace, I'm not so sure. Despite their missteps in the region, even the Bush administration understood that Palestine offered Iran a kind of public relations coup in the region - this was a driving force behind the 2007 Annapolis Conference. Iran, for its own part, always gets fidgety whenever the Arab capitals are brought together on the issue.
But these entrenched positions can only go so far. Ultimately, it's up to Israel - an Iranian enemy - and Hamas - an Iranian ally - to reach a settlement before we'll see a peace agreement of any kind. Arab input may not account for much in the end.
(h/t Andrew Sullivan)