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Friday, July 31, 2026
[Salon] One year after Suwayda massacres, trust in short supply - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
One year after Suwayda massacres, trust in short supply
Summary: a year on from the massacres in Suwayda, the fighting has largely subsided, but the political crisis has deepened. Without accountability and a negotiated settlement over local security, the Druze governorate has become a test of whether post-Assad Syria can build an inclusive state.
We thank Robert Bociaga for today’s newsletter. Robert is a journalist and photographer specialising in international relations, conflict and human rights. He has worked for CNN and the German Press Agency (DPA.) This is his first contribution for Arab Digest.
One year after the massacres that devastated Syria's southern Druze heartland, Suwayda paused to mourn. In Saraya Square, renamed in memory of five members of the Saraya family killed during the July 2025 violence, the grassroots Self-Determination Movement organised one of several commemorations across the governorate. Elsewhere, volunteer groups whose members helped evacuate civilians, distribute aid and restore essential services gathered to honour the victims.
Yet the anniversary was less about remembrance than about an uncomfortable reality: almost every demand voiced last July remains unanswered.
The July 2025 violence, which erupted after clashes between Druze armed groups and Bedouin tribes spiralled into a wider conflict involving Syrian transitional government forces and affiliated militias, left more than 1,000 people dead and displaced well over 150,000. Investigations by the U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch documented widespread allegations of extrajudicial executions, torture, looting, village burnings and sexual violence. While abuses were committed by multiple parties—including retaliatory attacks by Druze factions—the alleged involvement of government-affiliated forces fundamentally altered relations between Damascus and the Druze community.
Former Assad regime officers have been identified fighting alongside Israeli-backed Druze militia in Suwayda, Syria.
One year later, Suwayda is no longer simply a Druze issue. It has become the clearest measure of whether Syria's post-Assad leadership can transform military control into political legitimacy.
The governorate encapsulates many of the dilemmas confronting the country's transition. "The transitional government has lost Druze trust to a large extent," says Syrian political scientist Haian Dukhan. "A path toward political reintegration still exists, but it is now narrow and difficult. It requires accountability for the massacres, the return of displaced families and guarantees against further violence. It also requires genuine Druze representation and a negotiated settlement over local security."
Suwayda also mirrors a broader challenge facing post-war Syria: integrating armed groups into a unified national framework. Across the country, local factions have formally joined state institutions while continuing to answer to separate commanders and local constituencies. Similar tensions remain evident in negotiations with Kurdish-led authorities in northeastern Syria: following January 2026 clashes and US-mediated deals, the SDF has ceded territory and resources while integrating forces into the national army, yet progress is slow amid Kurdish fears of full disarmament without stronger constitutional guarantees on rights and representation.
"Communities retain weapons because they do not trust one another," Dukhan says. "Many armed groups appear integrated into the state but retain separate commanders, loyalties and agendas. A unified state requires political agreements that build trust, not only formal military integration."
That dilemma has produced a fragile equilibrium in Suwayda.
Although a U.S.- and Jordan-backed roadmap for confidence-building and reintegration was agreed in September 2025, U.N. officials reported as recently as June that implementation has made little meaningful progress. Damascus blames Druze armed groups for obstructing the process. Local leaders counter that genuine reintegration cannot occur without accountability and credible guarantees that state abuses will not be repeated.
Meanwhile, local security remains fragmented. Armed groups continue to dominate parts of the governorate, while reports of internal rivalries, extortion, smuggling and sporadic violence have persisted throughout 2026. Demonstrations calling for justice and self-determination have underscored continuing frustration with both the pace of reform and the absence of trust between Suwayda and Damascus.
At the heart of the stalemate lies accountability—or the lack of it.
"The lack of accountability is the greatest threat to stability in Suwayda," Dukhan argues. "It deepens distrust and encourages local factions to retain their weapons. Factional competition and foreign intervention are serious, but both grow in this environment. Without justice, Suwayda will remain vulnerable to renewed violence and outside interference."
For many Druze residents, reconciliation without justice risks legitimising impunity. But the consequences extend beyond southern Syria.
The crisis has complicated Damascus' efforts to project itself as the uncontested authority over the country. It has reinforced scepticism among minority communities, weakened confidence in national reconciliation and complicated negotiations with other autonomous regions. At the same time, it has drawn neighbouring states deeper into southern Syria's security landscape.
Israel, citing the protection of Druze communities, intervened militarily during the crisis and has continued to frame southern Syria as a strategic buffer zone. Jordan, facing persistent concerns over cross-border instability and a burgeoning Captagon production and trafficking industry in Suwayda has supported diplomatic initiatives while maintaining a strong security posture along its northern frontier that has included air strikes on alleged Captagon factories. For both countries, Suwayda has become more than a local conflict; it is now part of a wider regional security equation.
The coming year could unfold along several paths. The most optimistic scenario remains a negotiated settlement combining credible accountability, genuine Druze representation and locally agreed security arrangements. A second possibility is the continuation of today's uneasy status quo, with limited violence but a de facto autonomous governorate where distrust prevents meaningful reintegration. The most dangerous outcome would be renewed confrontation, triggered by another security incident or political miscalculation that is amplified by regional intervention.
The Arab Digest newsletter returns on 17 August. We continue our Arab Digest Top Five podcast countdown every Wednesday through August.
Thursday, July 30, 2026
[Salon] How Sheikh Hamad Transformed Qatar into a Geopolitical Juggernaut - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
How Sheikh Hamad Transformed Qatar into a Geopolitical Juggernaut
Summary: Qatar’s former "Father Emir," Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, has died aged 74. During his life he oversaw the transformation of his nation from a regional backwater into a global economic and geopolitical power through natural gas development, bold foreign policy, and soft-power milestones like Al Jazeera and the 2022 World Cup.
We thank Arab Digest assistant editor Hugh Miles for today's newsletter which was originally published in the Guardian.
In June 1995 the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad Al Thani, was holidaying at a luxury lakefront resort in Geneva, Switzerland. His son, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, having effectively run the daily affairs of the country for more than a decade during Khalifa’s prolonged absences abroad, resolved to depose him. In a swift and bloodless operation, the 43-year-old crown prince proclaimed himself the new emir, a move that would permanently alter the trajectory of his nation and reshape the modern Middle East.
Following his audacious takeover, Hamad, who has died aged 74, became a completely different kind of leader from his regional contemporaries. Eschewing the ritualistic, baroque finery and aloofness traditional to Gulf monarchs, he governed Qatar more like the managing director of a global corporation.
He was famously down-to-earth, frequently driving his own vehicle around the streets of Doha and dining in local restaurants with minimal security. A “big picture” thinker, he focused on long-term strategy while delegating the minutiae of daily governance to trusted technocrats. This singular determination was widely recognised by foreign observers; a leaked July 2008 US embassy cable published by WikiLeaks quoted a source who said that: “The Amir seems to be the only one in the Government who has a vision for this country. The details of that vision, however, are not entirely clear to anyone, except perhaps the Amir himself and his closest associates.”
The late Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, former Emir of Qatar
His achievements as emir were monumental. Hamad successfully bypassed the “oil curse” that plagued his neighbours by aggressively developing Qatar’s massive offshore natural gas reserves, transforming the state into an economic juggernaut with one of the highest per capita incomes in the world. His domestic legacy included delivering Qatar’s first implemented written constitution, introducing democratic municipal elections, and elevating the status of women in public life.
Crucially, he established Qatar as a global media hub in 1996 by founding Al Jazeera, initially an Arabic news satellite TV station, later expanding its reach in English and Spanish. In 1998 he abolished the ministry of information, thereby ending official state censorship.
His death marks the conclusion of a transformative era for the small Gulf peninsula, which he single-handedly dragged from regional obscurity into the centre of global geopolitics. While maintaining defence and security links with the US, he maintained a deep-seated commitment to the Palestinian cause, an outlook inherited from his father. He gave the leaders of Hamas a base in Doha, an engagement aimed at pulling the militant group away from the Iranian and Syrian “axis of resistance” and getting them to face reality and negotiate.
During the Arab spring of 2011, Sheikh Hamad rode the whirlwind, proactively championing his policy of “Arabs sorting out Arab problems”, backing revolutionary movements in Libya and Syria, amplifying popular revolts through Al Jazeera, and positioning Qatar to shape political Islam across the region, all while selectively contributing troops to Bahrain to preserve Sunni supremacy.
Born in the capital city of Doha, Hamad was a member of the Al Thani ruling family, members of the Bani Tamim, an ancient Arabian tribe that supported the prophet Muhammad in the earliest days of Islam and carried the movement to AndalucÃa, in southern Spain. His mother, Sheikha Aisha bint Hamad Al Attiyah, died shortly after his birth. Growing up within this powerful tribal lineage, his early life was shaped by traditional custom alongside a rapidly modernising world.
As a youth, Hamad experienced formative encounters that would influence his future philosophy of governance. He had his first exposure to democracy as a boy during a trip to London. The concept seemed so ridiculous to him that he had to be led from the House of Commons balcony in hysterical laughter after witnessing his first parliamentary debate.
Back home, his early formal education was dominated by émigré Egyptian teachers, under whose influence he became a virulent Nasserist. This anti-colonial fervour culminated around 1967, when he participated in political protests, throwing stones at the British embassy and denting its metal shutters. He later realised that these radical pan-Arab movements had misled his generation, an epiphany that sparked his lifelong commitment to replacing foreign educational influences with indigenous, world-class Qatari institutions through the later creation of the Qatar Foundation, promoting education, scientific research and community development.
To prepare for his state duties, he attended the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in the UK, graduating in 1971. On his return, he held several military posts, and in 1977 was appointed minister of defence.
Over the next two decades, as his father spent increasing amounts of time on the French Riviera, Hamad assumed the day-to-day administration of the state. He became immensely popular among his peers and successfully buried centuries-old rivalries between competing branches of the Al Thani family, establishing a unified political front that paved the way for his eventual accession.
In his personal life, Hamad balanced tribal alliances and personal compatibility across his three spouses, by whom he had 24 children. His second wife, Sheikha Moza bint Nasser al-Misned, emerged as his primary strategic partner, collaborating deeply on national education and social reforms. Hamad carefully managed the upbringing of his large family, deliberately fostering a competitive yet disciplined environment to select the most capable successor to maintain the country’s stability.
In a highly unusual move for a Gulf ruler, Hamad chose to step down voluntarily from the throne in 2013, passing the mantle to the next generation. He retired to a life of quiet diplomacy, historical research and cultural advocacy, split between Doha and his properties in Europe. He was succeeded as emir by his son Sheikh Tamim, who continued to guide the nation along the strategic path forged by his father’s singular vision. Their most spectacular deployment of soft power came with the announcement in 2010 that Qatar would be hosting the 2022 men’s football World Cup.
The “father emir” is survived by his three wives, 11 sons and 13 daughters.
Wednesday, July 29, 2026
The Prophecies Fulfilled in the Loaves and the Fish – Ascension Guest Post
The Prophecies Fulfilled in the Loaves and the Fish – Ascension
The Prophecies Fulfilled in the Loaves and the Fish
The feeding of the 5,000 is far more than an incredible miracle—it is one of the clearest revelations of who Jesus truly is. Dr. Sri uncovers the rich biblical symbolism behind the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, explaining how this miracle fulfills the hopes of Israel, points directly to the Eucharist, and reveals Jesus as the New Moses, the New Elijah, and the long-awaited Messiah who comes to nourish his people.
LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE
SHOWNOTES
You can catch up on previous episodes' shownotes
HERE!
Jesus withdraws with purpose
Following the death of John the Baptist, Jesus withdraws to a quiet place—not out of fear, but because his public ministry is not yet complete. His mission of forming the apostles and proclaiming the Kingdom must continue before his Passion.
The greatest public miracle of Jesus' ministry
The feeding of the 5,000 is the largest public miracle recorded before the Passion, demonstrating both Jesus' divine compassion and his power to provide abundantly for God's people.
Jesus as the New Elijah
Just as Elijah miraculously multiplied loaves to feed one hundred people, Jesus performs an even greater miracle by feeding five thousand with only five loaves. The miracle reveals that Jesus is greater than Israel's greatest prophet.
Jesus as the New Moses
The multiplication of the loaves recalls God's gift of manna in the wilderness during the Exodus. Jesus fulfills Israel's expectation of a New Moses who would lead a new Exodus and provide heavenly bread for God's people.
The miracle points directly to the Eucharist
Matthew intentionally parallels the feeding of the 5,000 with the Last Supper. Jesus takes, blesses, breaks, and gives the bread using the very same language later used to institute the Eucharist. The miracle prepares the disciples—and us—to understand the gift of Christ's Body and Blood.
The symbolism of the five loaves and twelve baskets
The five loaves represent the five books of the Torah, while the twelve baskets symbolize the twelve tribes of Israel. Together they reveal that Jesus comes first to fulfill God's promises to Israel before extending salvation to all nations.
Why the fish matter
The fish are not incidental. Ancient Jewish expectations associated the coming Messianic banquet with both bread and fish, symbolizing God's final victory over evil and his abundant provision for his people. Jesus fulfills these hopes in a way that points toward the ultimate banquet of the Kingdom.
The miracle invites us to trust God's abundance
Jesus takes what appears insufficient and transforms it into overwhelming abundance. The feeding of the 5,000 reminds Christians that Christ never ceases to nourish his Church, especially through the Eucharist.
Scripture References
Matthew 14:13–21 — The Feeding of the Five Thousand
Matthew 4:12–13 — Jesus withdraws after John the Baptist's arrest
Matthew 12:14–15 — Jesus withdraws as opposition grows
2 Kings 4:42–44 — Elisha multiplies loaves for one hundred people
Exodus 16 — God provides manna in the wilderness
Numbers 11:31–32 — God provides quail for Israel
Isaiah 27:1 — The prophecy concerning Leviathan
Psalm 74:13–14 — God crushes the heads of Leviathan
Genesis 3:15 — The promise of victory over the serpent
Resources
Download the Ascension App
Visit Dr. Sri’s website at www.edwardsri.com and to book online events with Dr. Sri email events.edwardsri@gmail.com
Find more of Dr. Sri’s episodes at www.ascensionpress.com/allthingscatholic
Ascension is pleased to offer our new and improved online bible study programs and sacramental preparation programs digitally to help you minister with flexibility. Go to www.ascensionpress.com to view all our offerings
Fr. Bob's Reflection for the Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time -
David Vetter was born with a rare and severe immune disorder that forced him to live much of his life inside a plastic bubble. Because even the smallest infection could kill him, he lived separated from the ordinary experiences most of us take for granted. Yet David became known around the world, not simply because of his illness, but because of the love and compassion people showed him.
Through television and telephone connections, he was able to attend classes and make friends. At one point, NASA even designed a special spacesuit that allowed him to leave the bubble for a short time. Still, David longed for the simple joys of life. He once said he had never heard rain falling on leaves, never seen the ocean and had only truly felt the touch of one person – his mother. His dream was simply to walk barefoot on the grass.
Eventually, David underwent an experimental treatment intended to strengthen his immune system. Tragically, complications from the procedure led to a fatal infection, and he died at a young age.
After his death, there was an outpouring of grief from people around the world, especially children who had come to know and love him. Yet one article questioned why so much time, energy and money had been spent trying to save one terminally ill boy.
One of David’s nurses answered beautifully: “If you had known him, you would never say such a thing. He was a pearl of great price.”
That phrase brings us directly to today’s Gospel. Jesus says the Kingdom of Heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When he finds one of great value, he sells everything he has to obtain it.
That is how God sees us.
We may see only flaws, weaknesses, failures, or wounds within ourselves. Like a field filled with rocks and weeds, our lives can appear messy and imperfect. But beneath it all, Jesus sees something precious. He sees treasure. He sees beloved sons and daughters worth everything to Him.
And so, Christ gives everything for us – even His own life. Not for an anonymous crowd, but for each person individually. He stopped for the blind man by the roadside, for Zacchaeus in the tree, for the woman caught in adultery, for Lazarus in the tomb and for the thief hanging beside Him on the cross. Jesus always had time for the wounded, the forgotten and the broken.
That same love is extended to us today. And it is the same love we are called to show others.
Every person we meet carries hidden struggles and unseen wounds. Some hunger for bread, others for kindness, forgiveness, understanding, or simply the assurance that someone cares.
One of the great joys in life is realizing that, through our compassion and generosity, we have reflected the love of Christ to another person. When we begin to see others as Jesus sees them, we discover something life-changing: every person, no matter who they are or what they have done, is a pearl of great price.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Robert Warren, S.A.
Spiritual Director
Tuesday, July 28, 2026
Monday, July 27, 2026
[Salon] Algeria Loses its Way - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
Algeria Loses its Way
Summary: a record low turnout in Algeria’s recent election is a reflection of how the North African state has failed its citizens while benefitting a select elite through a crony capitalist system and a stagnant status quo backed by the military.
We thank Francis Ghilès for today’s newsletter. Francis is a senior associate research fellow at CIDOB and a visiting fellow at King’s College, London. You can find his latest Arab Digest podcast Algeria, Libya and Europe’s urgent energy needs here.
Most of the polling stations in the major cities of Algeria were deserted during the general elections on 2 July 2026. As he announced the results the following day, the interim president of ANIE (Autorite Nationale Independente des Elections), Karim Khelfane congratulated himself on the “fairness and transparency” of the vote. Repeated entreaties by President Abdelmajid Tebboune had failed to convince 24m electors to “massively” cast their ballots. As 78% of those entitled to vote refused to do so, Khelfane added insult to injury, by pointing out that elections in Western democracies were also characterised by abstentions.
In 2019 the army, which has held effective power in the country since independence in 1962, had opted for repression after months of peaceful protests. The movement known as the Hirak seven years ago brought millions of Algerians into the streets and forced the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. With Bouteflika gone, army chiefs refused to listen to the millions who week after week shouted “El Djazair jumhuriya, mashi mamlaka” (Algeria is a republic, not a monarchy). Coming after a brutal civil war in the 1990s and twenty years of the immensely corrupt Bouteflika presidency, Algerians hoped against hope that their leaders would treat them as citizens rather than subjects. By refusing to do so, the Algerian army has destroyed the historic legitimacy it once enjoyed thanks to its fight against the French coloniser.
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune casts his ballot amid a record 78% voter abstention, highlighting deep public disillusionment with Algeria’s military-backed ruling elite.
Crony capitalism rules
The low voter turnout is a measure of how the reign of crony capitalism has robbed elections of any legitimacy. Algeria may comfortably live off its oil and gas exports and enjoy a GDP growth rate of 3.5%. But it has become a caricature of its former self as a leader of Third World emancipation and the fight against Western capitalism. The legendary Pan-African Festival of 1969 in Algiers with its passionate debates about the moral and political stakes involved in the creation of a postcolonial culture belong to prehistory (see Analogue Africa: Notes on the Anti-colonial Imagination, Jeremy Harding, Verso 2026). The dead hand of censorship and fear has fallen on a once vibrant capital city.
Crony capitalism today characterises a country which has lost its way economically and diplomatically. According to one Algerian friend “the lacklustre performance of Algeria’s team at the football World Cup symbolises the drift of a country whose leaders have battened down the hatches, and live in constant fear of alleged foreign plots”. Unlike Moroccan and Chinese leaders, those who run Algeria are scared of their diaspora who are well-educated and well-travelled people, keen to experiment with new ideas, build on new technologies and join in the wider world of economic and cultural exchange. Meanwhile private Algerian businessmen close to the president and senior military officers offer perfect examples of crony capitalism.
The huge investment in Saharan agriculture sums up the folly of it all. The state owned Algerian National Fund for Investment (FNI) and private Italian companies have jointly invested in producing durum wheat in the desert of southern Algeria pumping non-renewable water from deep underground aquifers. The wheat is exported to Italy.
The FNI and a private Qatari company are investing US$500m to produce milk near the desert town of Adrar: in such temperatures, according to a leading Algerian expert, each cow requires 800 litres of water a day. The milk produced is transported 600 kilometres to the north to be conditioned and sold. Such absurd policies are strongly supported by Yacine Oualid, an IT specialist appointed Minister of Agriculture in 2025 who proclaims that to “digitalise agriculture” is a priority. The slogan makes many Algerians shake their heads in sheer disbelief.
Lost opportunities
The unwillingness of Algeria and Morocco to cooperate and build a chemical Maghreb explains why Algeria which boasts gas, sulphur and ammonia has failed to build a powerful fertiliser industry, one of the industrial success stories of the Gulf States. Morocco today is the world’s largest exporter of phosphate based-fertilisers and instead of using gas and sulphur from neighbouring Algeria and jointly producing ammonia with it, the kingdom is importing these feedstocks from far afield, including the Gulf. The missed opportunity to create a “powerful chemical Maghreb” has in the words of Amar Drissi, a former executive director of the Office Cherifien des Phosphates (OCP) - Morocco’s state phosphate company - deprived North Africa but particularly Algeria of a major source of jobs, fertiliser production and influence on food production worldwide.
Chemical industries had started moving from Northern Europe to the Southern Hemisphere twenty years earlier. As a result Gulf countries including Saudi Arabia had already built a powerful petrochemical base to take advantage of the “major shift in demand, supply, competitiveness and long term margins that will further reshape the whole industry” Drissi notes. Since 2010, OCP has prospered by positioning itself in the international value chain of fertilisers. It has morphed from a “sleeping beauty” to a nimble international player. However Algeria refuses to insert itself in the global value chain for fear of becoming a “vassal state” in the words of one Algerian economist.
The mining sector offers another illustration of crony capitalism. Foreign investors, essentially from Türkiye and China invest in the extraction of Algeria’s vast wealth in minerals - phosphates, copper, iron ore etc. Minerals are exported to the aforementioned countries without any attempt to add value in Algeria. The contrast with neighbouring Morocco ‘s policy of internationalising its economy has never been greater.
Algerian foreign policy loses its way
Algerian diplomacy was once renowned for its savviness and capacity to intermediate on crises in the Middle East and Iran. Helping release the US diplomats held hostage in Tehran in 1981 was a triumph. No longer. During the war in Gaza and following the US-Israeli attack on Iran, Algeria’s voice has not been heard. Relations remain tense with Morocco but what is new is that relations with Russia, Algeria’s major arms provider, have become tense following the intervention of the paramilitary Russian Africa Corps in Mali and other Sahel countries. Algeria was quick to denounce the intervention of French troops in Mali in 2013 but, in public at least, no criticism of Vladimir Putin is allowed even though events in the Sahel pose a significant threat to Algeria’s security.
Algeria accuses the West of hypocrisy where human rights are concerned in particular on Palestine but remains silent on Putin’s Ukraine war and the presence of the Africa Corps in the Sahel countries.
Meanwhile, young Algerians vote with their feet. A young academic who lives in Bejaia, due east of Algiers remarked that the only people left in the Berber villages in the Kabylia mountains behind this historic port were “old people and thieves”. As for the official fury at President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to shift France’s position on the vexed question of Western Sahara two years ago (which led to a bitter crisis between the two countries), he remarked that “the vast majority of Algerians had never been interested in the question, assuming they even knew where the place was on the map.”
Relations with the US remain good despite Donald Trump’s recognition of the “Marocanité” of Western Sahara. One example: the EU recently bowed to pressure from US and Qatar insistence that Brussels should significantly weaken the enforcement of its flagship methane regulation. The US-Qatari letter to the EU was co-signed by Algeria and Nigeria. The EU’s reversal runs counter to advice from the International Energy Agency which has warned that methane escaping during fossil fuel production - the key issue the EU regulation seeks to tackle – wastes more gas than flows through the Strait of Hormuz (natural gas is predominantly methane). Algeria is making a serious efforts to reduce its own flaring fully appraised of the economic benefits of doing so. Backing the US and Qatar would seem to work against that effort.
Conclusion
In a context of diplomatic decline and economic follies, the details of which political parties won the most seats is pure shadow boxing. President Tebboune has secured a majority in a parliament which is no more than a rubber stamp. He might ask it to approve a change in the constitution so that he can “legally” stand for a third term. The vast majority of Algerians do not care because, since 2019 and the crushing of the Hirak, they consider their rulers with their caricature of democracy to be neither competent nor legitimate. Hence the abysmally low voter turnout of 2 July.
Sunday, July 26, 2026
Saturday, July 25, 2026
Friday, July 24, 2026
[Salon] A deal too far? - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
A deal too far?
Summary: the announcement of a nuclear deal between the US and Saudi Arabia has raised concerns about an arms race in a region riven with war but Donald Trump’s demand that the Saudis join the Abraham Accords has thrown into question whether the deal can go ahead.
Wednesday’s announcement that the US and Saudi Arabia have signed a nuclear cooperation deal has raised concerns that it could trigger a nuclear arms race in the Gulf. As ever with Donald Trump’s deals detail is in short supply. The US Department of State released a statement noting that the agreement will:
Expand American nuclear technology exports
Create high-paying U.S. jobs and long-term economic growth
Strengthen America's energy and national security posture
Reinforce global nonproliferation standards
Deepen the strategic partnership between the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
It is worth noting that the reference to non proliferation comes fourth in a list that sets out the benefits that are intended to accrue to the US. Non proliferation is dealt with under the US Atomic Energy Act Section 123 which details the curbs that any country that enters an agreement on nuclear matters with the US must abide by as set out in nine non proliferation criteria. The 123 though it stops countries from enriching or reprocessing material acquired from the US does not prevent those countries from enrichment of nuclear material acquired elsewhere.
What Trump’s deal ignored was the so-called ‘Gold Standard’ which was part of the deal that the US signed with the United Arab Emirates in 2009. It saw the UAE voluntarily renouncing the pursuit of enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technologies and capabilities. Additionally and equally important the UAE agreed to ratify the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Model Additional Protocol which among other things significantly strengthens the IAEA’s inspection powers. The protocol was included in the 2015 Barack Obama negotiated JCPOA with Iran that Trump walked away from in 2018.
Trump’s deal represents a break from precedent. As noted by the Arms Control Association: “The United States has not in recent years negotiated a 123 agreement with a state that had not signed an additional protocol.”
Trump’s demand that Saudi Arabia join the Abraham Accords in exchange for nuclear tech puts MbS in a tight spot over Riyadh's stance on Palestine.
After the deal was signed Trump announced via his Truth Social platform that the agreement would only go ahead if Saudi Arabia agreed to join the Abraham Accords:
The Civil Nuclear Deal (There will be no enrichment of material!) being made between the United States Department of Energy and Saudi Arabia, which pertains only to non-military use such as the ones that Iran and UAE (and others) already have, will be approved, but is totally subject to Saudi Arabia joining the very respected and successful Abraham Accords.
Setting aside that the president seems to have forgotten that he killed the JCPOA and that he is apparently ignorant of the Gold Standard that the UAE agreed to, the claim that this deal is no different from the ones the US made with Iran and the UAE is demonstrably false.
And what of the Saudis who have stipulated that they will not even consider joining the Abraham Accords unless and until there is a fair resolution to the issue of Palestine? Trump’s transactional bullying may have worked in the US real estate market (though there is much evidence to suggest it did not) but on the world stage and with a volatile region that he has made ever more dangerous and violent such tactics are only likely to further exacerbate tensions.
Already as we have noted in recent podcasts the Gulf states and other Arab countries are casting about for allies more reliable and less likely to plunge the region into all out war than Donald Trump’s America.
And one wonders how the UAE ruler Mohammed bin Zayed is feeling after Wednesday’s announcement. Relations between him and Saudi Arabia’s Mohamed bin Salman have been tense on a number of fronts as they jockey for regional ascendancy. There will be unease in Abu Dhabi that the Saudis appear to have gotten a deal with far less restraints placed upon it than the one the UAE signed in 2009. The Emiratis may push to have the same deal as the Saudis thus increasing the risk of proliferation and that from a state with an assertive and aggressive foreign policy and the moniker of 'Little Sparta.'
Equally though the Saudi crown prince will be affronted by Trump’s near instant decision to use the nuclear deal to force him into joining the Abraham Accords. He has, after all, been very publicly put in the most awkward of situations. To join the accords to acquire the nuclear deal means abandoning the Palestinians. Arabs and Muslims everywhere would see such a step as a betrayal from MbS who strives to project himself as the leader of both camps.
Given the demand he has put on the crown prince whether the deal sees the light of day remains something of an uncertainty but what is not uncertain is that Donald Trump’s slender grasp of the complexities of a region he is attempting to reshape is driving it into deeper and ever more dangerous turmoil.
For more on the situation we urge you to listen to our most recent podcasts from Giorgio Cafiero the CEO of Gulf State Analytics based in Washington DC and from London the Gulf defence and security analyst Andreas Krieg:
Giorgio Cafiero “The GCC, Iran and Trump’s busted flush”
Andreas Krieg “No war, no peace”
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