In Saudi Arabia, Davutoğlu had the opportunity to discuss Iran, Yemen and the Gaza Strip. No one must expect the Palestinian leader to come to Turkey to discuss European Union issues, so it won’t be surprising if his agenda matches up with Mr. Davutoğlu’s Saudi Arabia agenda.The Iran-Yemen-Gaza triangle, to which one must add Pakistan and Afghanistan, is a wide area of political struggles. Not only regional powers, but “outsiders” as well are pursuing rival policies there which often give the same result: scores of deaths. Breaking this vicious circle seems difficult, especially when most of the regional actors are convinced that this turmoil is the unique responsibility of the US. No one can deny the US’s share of the responsibility, and this country’s hands are far from being clean; however, accusing foreign powers for every possible misfortune avoids looking for real remedies for the region’s problems.
The recent aborted attack on an American airplane, concocted by a Nigerian citizen trained in Yemen, was an open invitation for the US to increase its military pressure on the region. However, it’s obvious that violence calls for more violence, so now the US is testing a new policy: It encourages regional powers to regulate their rivalries by agreements and not by violent means.
The three main players of this rivalry equation are Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia, and all of them are using, directly or indirectly, violent methods to support their regional ambitions. That’s why the US is asking them to bring essential modifications to their foreign policies. Iran is forced to change its Middle East policy through “nuclear pressure”; and those in Iran who are willing to do so pressure their government through street protests. However, even an overall regime change in Iran won’t be sufficient to settle things in the region, as other players should also alter their respective policies. Nevertheless, Israel still resists changing, so its regional isolation increases. Thus it feels the need to reinforce its security, it enlarges settlements in the West Bank and these moves provoke more international criticism in return. The Gaza situation has become an unbearable problem for Israel as this territory offers a serviceable ground for Saudis and Iranians when they want to put pressure on Israel.
The US directly acts to pressure Iran and use every possible tool for this. As for Israel, the US prefers to use Turkey and Syria to influence this country’s actions. However, this policy has apparently reached its practical limits. Besides, it is not easy to predict what the outcome will be if the US increases the level of the pressure in the region, especially when Saudi Arabia has built its foreign policy over the principle of destructive agitation. Perhaps Turkish and Saudi decision-makers’ discussion of strategic matters shows that the Saudi regime believes that its ambivalent relationship with radical religious groups in Afghanistan, Yemen and Pakistan has lost its efficacy. Maybe the US has preferred to not deal with Saudi Arabia directly because of their complex interdependence. The US must be perfectly aware that the recent incidents of terrorism were an open invitation, but even if it doesn’t intend to respond favorably to this, it will at least demand that Saudi Arabia do its best to tackle al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other similar issues. This is what the first diplomatic visits of the year tell us.
