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2 Iran moving in from the
cold By Kaveh L Afrasiabi
Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's
one-day trip to Saudi Arabia last weekend was a
landmark event that set a new tone for the
hitherto elusive "Islamist solution" to the
multiple crises devastating the Middle East and
even the broader Muslim world.
The two
countries have joined hands in their common
struggle to end the growing Sunni-Shi'ite strife
posing the "greatest danger facing the region", to
paraphrase the Saudi official news agency. The
so-called "twin pillars" of regional stability
have now put a premium on the strategic
considerations of Israel and its policy
supporters in Washington. The
latter's aim is to align "moderate Sunnis" led by
the Saudi kingdom against perceived radical
Shi'ites led by Iran. Clearly, the regional powers
operate by their own national-security calculus
and not those drawn in Washington or Jerusalem.
On his return to Tehran from what is
obviously a major foreign-policy plus bound to
quiet some of his internal critics, Ahmadinejad
stated that he had discussed the regional crises
with King Abdullah and offered "assisting the
kingdom's efforts to calm the situation in Lebanon
and end its political crisis".
Saudi
Arabia may have received Iran's backing over
Lebanon in exchange for stepping back from any
major initiative on Israel. This is in light of
Ahmadinejad's explicit misgivings while in Riyadh
about an earlier "Islamist" meeting in Pakistan
centered on the Palestinian crisis. Apart from the
host, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey,
Malaysia and Indonesia were invited to Islamabad.
Iran was not.
Iran has denied reports in
Arab papers that Ahmadinejad "voiced support for
the Arab peace initiative endorsed at an Arab
summit in 2002". This calls for the simultaneous
recognition of Israel and an independent
Palestinian state. Similarly, Iran has been
pressuring Pakistan, and to a lesser extent
Indonesia, to retreat from taking any initiative
on the Arab-Israeli front without the
participation of key regional players.
"We
have a lot of questions about the Islamabad
meeting," Ahmadinejad bluntly said in Saudi
Arabia, referring to the gathering of the seven
Muslim states to discuss "the Palestinian crisis,
the situation in Iraq and US-Iran tensions", per a
report from Pakistan. It quoted a senior Pakistani
official explaining that Iran was not invited
because it "has its own position on the
Israeli-Palestinian row".
From Iran's
point, the curious timing of this initiative
deserves scrutiny. Tehran is seriously disquieted
by Washington-Jerusalem talk of an Arab-Israeli
strategic cooperation against Iran. In the words
of Javad Vaeedi, the deputy director of Iran's
Supreme National Security Council, "The Sunni
Arabs [Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia] feel a
common threat, and in order to neutralize the Iran
threat, seek a common interest with Israel. One
way to pursue this is to establish peace between
the Palestinians and Israel ... Progress on the
Palestine front can establish future cooperation
with Israel for a potential alliance against
Iran."
Vaeedi's boss, Ali Larijani, who is
also the country's chief nuclear negotiator, has
stated that while Iran cooperates with Saudi
Arabia on the Palestinian issue, it prefers to
work behind the scenes compared with the Saudis'
more open approach.
The Saudis are,
however, far ahead of Iran in conflict management,
and Tehran can and should be Riyadh's junior
partner in this endeavor. This depends to some
extent on Riyadh's willingness to pay close
attention to Iran's own national-security worries.
A proposed Mecca summit of the leaders of
the same seven Muslim nations who met in Islamabad
is now under a cloud after the
Ahmadinejad-Abdullah meeting, which was seen by
Tehran as a "circuit breaker".
What is
certain, however, is a closing of the cognitive
gap with respect to Iraq, given Ahmadinejad's and
King Abdullah's joint statement calling for
"Iraq's independence, national unity and equality
between its citizens". In turn, this raises the
issue of the security meeting in Baghdad
involving, among others, the US, Syria and Iran.
Agenda-setting for
Baghdad Iran's officials have ruled out the
possibility of direct talks with the US at the
meeting scheduled for Saturday. Foreign Minister
Manouchehr Mottaki has hinted that he will not
participate and a "deputy foreign minister" will
attend. The US, on the other hand, has left open
the possibility of direct dialogue with Iran and
Syria, while insisting that the meeting will be
exclusively about Iraq.
Iran's main
position with respect to the Baghdad meeting
revolves around three issues: reiterating support
for the Iraqi government, demonstrating its
commitment to Iraq's stability by offering
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