Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Chris Good Seeing this newsletter as a forward? Sign up here. January 23, 2024 | |
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The Middle East is now rife with conflict.
As The New Yorker's Robin Wright surmised recently, the ongoing fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza threatens to merge with lower-level conflicts into one big war. Among other skirmishes and standoffs of concern are artillery and drone strikes between Israel and the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah on the Israel–Lebanon border; Iran's strikes last week on entities in Iraq, Syria and Pakistan; Iran-backed militias' attacks on US forces in Iraq; and the US and UK air campaign against Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi militants, who have attacked international shipping in the Red Sea.
"If the Middle East were a blank piece of blotting paper and the wars and crises in the region were blots of ink, it would be easy to see that the dots are rapidly multiplying," Christoph Reuter and Monika Bolliger write for Der Spiegel. As a case in point, they note Kurdish anger over Iran's strike last week in the northern-Iraqi Kurdish capital of Erbil, which Iran said was aimed at an Israeli spy headquarters.
On one side of these conflicts, broadly speaking, are the US and Israel. Reports have indicated US President Joe Biden has sought to calm the latter—especially as it trades fire with Hezbollah across its northern border. On the other side are Iran and the so-called "axis of resistance" it sponsors: the anti-Israel, anti-US militias—which act as both terrorist groups and as political parties—across the region. Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis fall under that loose umbrella.
Much more powerful than Hamas, Hezbollah is of particular importance in this delicate situation, Reuter and Bolliger write for Der Spiegel. The group is especially close to Tehran, politically. Such close ties "have thus far helped to keep the situation on the Lebanese-Israeli border halfway under control," they write. "But should a war break out, those ties would likely produce the opposite effect. Tehran would never abandon Hezbollah, even if it came under fire. And a chain reaction would likely ensue, with the Iranian-controlled militias in Iraq, Syria and Yemen launching massive strikes of their own." |
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Economic Trouble Doesn't Help |
As these conflicts have simmered or boiled, The Economist writes, the Middle East's economy has taken a hit. "Intra-regional trade has collapsed," the magazine writes, as "the routes that transported more than half of all goods are blocked." Cash-strapped Egypt has seen its income from the Suez Canal drop 40%, The Economist writes. Israel's tech sector is down, as is tourism in Jordan. In Lebanon, northern Israel and the West Bank, fighting and fear have displaced many, and Palestinians who formerly worked in Israel are now unemployed.
"(I)f much of the Middle East slides into a debt crisis," The Economist writes, "(i)t would hit populations that are young, urban and increasingly unemployed. That is a recipe for even more extreme politics in a large group of strategically important, chronically volatile countries. The consequences would reverberate across the world." |
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Has the Drone War Flipped in Russia's Favor? |
The front lines in Ukraine may be at a standstill, but at the Financial Times, a feature by Christopher Miller notes that Western support for Ukraine has cracked; Kyiv is considering new conscription; and as winter has set in, so has apprehension. "Right now," Miller writes, "it is Russian forces who are on the offensive."
When top Ukrainian commander Gen. Valery Zaluzhny made headlines last fall by telling The Economist that the war was effectively stalemated, he pointed to a particular cause: Ukraine's lack of better technology. Examining one kind of military technology in a Foreign Affairs essay, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt writes that while Ukraine impressed earlier in the war with its cunning and adaptive use of drones, Russia has been catching up.
Ukraine has found success with waterborne drones, pushing back Russia's Black Sea fleet to enable grain shipping and protect Ukrainian territory from ship-launched Russian missiles, Schmidt writes. "In other ways, however, Kyiv has lost its advantages … Russian forces have copied many of the tactics that Ukraine pioneered over the summer, including waging large coordinated attacks that use multiple types of drones. … Since late 2022, Russia has used a combination of two domestically produced drones, the Orlan-10 (a surveillance drone) and the Lancet (an attack drone), to destroy everything from high-value artillery systems to combat jets and tanks. Ukraine surpassed Russia in drone attacks early in the conflict, but it has no combination of drones that match Russia's dangerous new duo." |
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As former President Donald Trump seeks a return to the White House, on Sunday's GPS Fareed examined what his victory would mean for the rest of the world. At issue is Trump's radically different view of America's role on the global stage, which departs from the traditional, bipartisan vision of the US having an expansive function in world affairs.
"The American election is taking place at a crucial moment," Fareed said. "Around the world, we are seeing several challenges to the rules-based international order … If Trump wins in November and rejects that broader view of America in the world, a retreat could create power vacuums, leave allies exposed, and tempt adversaries to accelerate their attacks and heighten their ambitions. And that is why this time around, it is foreigners nervously watching and obsessing about the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary." |
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Trump '24 and America's Role in the World |
As Fareed argued, Trump would drastically alter the foreign-policy tone emanating from Washington—and his return to the presidency could leave US allies like Sweden and Finland, which took a risk by joining NATO on the assumption that the US would continue supporting the transatlantic alliance, newly vulnerable.
Not everyone agrees, as a debate has emerged over whether Trump really would change things so dramatically. At Foreign Policy, Stephen M. Walt argues that when it comes to specific policies, Trump and President Joe Biden might pursue similar courses. After being inaugurated as president in January 2025, Walt argues, either man could end up nudging Ukraine to seek a peace deal with Russia, continuing a trade standoff with China, and supporting Israel in similar fashion.
Foreseeing the kind of fundamental change Fareed does, The Economist suggests that in a second term, Trump would probably expand on US protectionism: "An across-the-board 10% tariff is said to be likely, as is a suspension of 'permanent normal trade relations' with China resulting in even higher levies for it than exist today," the magazine writes. As for Trump's worldview, the magazine writes that he tends to see countries as falling into one of three broad categories and to treat them accordingly: "users," traditional US allies whom Trump derides as freeloaders; "bruisers," the longstanding US adversaries whom Trump approaches disruptively, oscillating between bluster, financial sanctions and opportunities for peace deals; and "losers," the rest of the world, which Trump "doesn't care about" as The Economist sees it. |
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