Category: Saudi Arabia

Saudi Foreign Policy: Unity, Stability, and Responsibility

When the Arab uprisings began in 2010, the future of the Middle East looked more uncertain than usual. In the midst of the turmoil, Saudi Arabia was forced to strengthen and clarify its foreign policy. Since then, the Kingdom has structured its foreign policy leadership and its vision for its future around unity, stability, and responsibility.

Unity

The unity that Saudi Arabia advocates, and the vision it promotes, is the unity of the Arab Gulf. In the past few years, the Kingdom has made great efforts to prioritize the oneness of the Gulf’s Arab countries and their shared interests over small and transient differences. In the struggle to restore the legitimate government to power in Yemen, the Kingdom has forged a coalition of the GCC countries and likeminded Arab and non-Arab countries to achieve that aim. The purpose has been to prevent the usurpers of power, the Houthis and the forces of the deposed president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, from forcing themselves on the Yemeni people.

As sectarian violence deepens rifts and breaks apart homes and communities across the Arab world, Saudi Arabia’s call for unity has become more urgent than ever. Iraq and Syria are among the countries following the same heartbreaking narrative: citizens with the same shared history, religion, and homeland continue to be torn apart by radical groups exploiting sectarian religious and ethnic divisions for their own gain. Groups like ISIS, the Shi‘i militias in Syria and Iraq, Hezbollah, and the Houthis use religious extremism in order to gain loyalty by providing the young a militant identity, a sense of belonging, and a vision for which to fight. But the unity of radicalism is an illusion; it cannot exist without an enemy. It reaches not toward harmony but toward domination and control. ISIS is a symptom of the disease of anarchy in Syria and Iraq.

But the unity of radicalism is an illusion; it cannot exist without an enemy. It reaches not toward harmony but toward domination and control.

Russia has now added to this bloody scene air strikes aimed at Syria’s moderate opposition, which is fighting ISIS and Bashar al-Assad alike. This is a most unwelcome addition to an already combustible situation. Russian representatives state they are there to fight the terrorists. Alas, together with the United States Moscow is ignoring the father of all terrorists in Syria – Assad. In Baghdad, the legacy of Nuri al-Maliki’s sectarian rule disenfranchised the Sunni Iraqis and allowed ISIS to take advantage of the resultant vacuum to establish rule in Mosul and other parts of Iraq. Fix Damascus and Baghdad, and ISIS will wither away.

Fighting sectarianism is far from easy. Sectarianism thrives on the enmity of others. The kingdom asked fellow Islamic countries in 2012 to build a center that will research and help dismantle sectarian ideologies while promoting intersectarian dialogue. But there is only so much that can be done for countries like Iraq and Syria, where sectarianism has become and remains a valuable political currency. The desire for unity cannot come from the outside alone; it must also come from within.

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Riyadh’s View of Tehran: An Accentuated Deficit of Trust

Context and history are necessary to understand Saudi Arabia’s decision earlier this month to sever diplomatic ties with Iran. After the storming of the Saudi Arabian embassy in Tehran – a response to Saudi Arabia’s execution of the Shi‘i leader Nimr al-Nimr on January 2 – Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir announced the cutting of ties. In doing so, he noted that Iran’s aggression is “a violation of all agreements and international conventions” and called it part of an effort by Iran to “destabilize” the region. “We are determined not to allow Iran to undermine our security,” he said.

A sentiment echoing the same tone and spirit while underscoring this Saudi Arabian position of sovereignty and agency in the face of international conflict, and which could just as well have been directed at the recent American media barbs thrown at the kingdom, was conveyed more than two years ago. In an op-ed for the New York Times on December 17, 2013, Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United Kingdom Prince Mohammad Bin Nawaf Bin Abdulaziz Al Sa‘ud explained,

Saudi Arabia has enormous responsibilities within the region, as the cradle of Islam, and one of the world’s most significant political powers. We have global responsibilities – economic and political – as the world’s de facto central banker for energy. And we have a humanitarian responsibility to do what we can to end the suffering in Syria. We will act to fulfill these responsibilities, with or without the support of our Western partners.

The flood of media attacks against Saudi Arabia since the executions has been nonstop. For example, the Iranian policymaker Seyed Hossein Mousavian published an article titled “14 Reasons Why Saudi Arabia is a Failed Mideast Power.” And the New York Times printed an op-ed by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif that provided his view, containing unproven statements, of what transpired and the issues involved.

Flames and smoke rise from Saudi Arabia’s embassy in Tehran during a demonstration on January 2, 2016. Photo: REUTERS/TIMA/Mehdi Ghasemi/ISNA.

Because there has yet to appear a different perspective on these matters except for the op-ed by Foreign Minister al-Jubeir in today’s New York Times, this writer, an American who has visited the kingdom often over the past 46 years, is moved to also contribute to the national dialogue on these matters.

He writes as though he were in the shoes of an observer in Riyadh. What such an observer might argue in reply to the media campaign against their country would likely include the following and should be read as quotations.

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