Iran tries charm-offensive in
Cairo By Richard Javad
Heydarian
Facing a potentially explosive
sectarian conflict in Syria and battered by a
barrage of ever-tightening transatlantic
sanctions, Tehran is recalibrating its regional
foreign policy and vigorously reaching out to the
Arab world, particularly Cairo.
Early this
year, Iran dispatched its most articulate and
affable diplomat, Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar
Salehi, to meet leaders in Egypt, including the
increasingly powerful Egyptian President Mohammed
Morsi.
Salehi's visit aimed to achieve
three key goals: firstly, elevate relations with
the Islamist government in Egypt by building on an
emerging Iran-Egypt entente after the fall of
Hosni Mubarak; secondly, explore actual and
potential common grounds on
resolving the ongoing crisis
in Syria before it is too late; and lastly,
project a post-sectarian Iran by showing more
flexibility on Bashar al-Assad's fate and reaching
out to Egypt's varying religious leaders.
The decision to send the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology-trained Salehi for such a
crucial mission wasn't taken in haste. He is not
only known for his well-measured statements and
composed demeanor, devoid of the provocative
bombast common among other Iranian leaders, but is
also a flawless Arabic speaker who happens to be
among Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's favored political
stars ahead of presidential elections to be held
on June 14.
The visit underscored the
degree to which Iran senses its growing regional
isolation against the backdrop of an emerging
Turkey-Qatar-Saudi Sunni axis hell-bent on
supplanting Assad with an anti-Iranian
post-revolutionary government, probably under the
Syrian Muslim Brotherhood (SMB).
Egypt is
extremely crucial to Iran because President Morsi
in many ways represents a "third way" in regional
politics, despite his roots in the Egyptian Muslim
Brotherhood. Given Egypt's outsized regional
profile, it represents a critical (potential)
partner, both economic and strategic, and a bridge
to the broader Arab world for Iran.
However, differences over Syria abound and
the more radical Salafi elements within the
Egyptian government and civil society have
tirelessly sought to undermine Salehi's
charm-offensive and further fan the flames of
anti-Persia propaganda. Meanwhile, Persian Gulf
monarchies, namely Qatar and Saudi Arabia, have
also aggressively courted Morsi's favor, seeking
to dissuade him against any rapprochement with
Iran.
The Iran-Egypt
entente While the advent of the 1979
Iranian revolution transformed Iran-Egypt
relations into an increasingly overt rivalry, with
Cairo supporting Saddam's invasion of Iran in 1980
and toeing the US-Saudi-Israel line in the broader
regional efforts to contain a resurgent Tehran,
the 2011 Egyptian revolution opened new
possibilities for a lasting rapprochement.
What is interesting to note is how prior
to the Arab uprisings, there were already calls by
many prominent leaders in Egypt and across the
Arab world, to explore normalized relations with
Iran. During Mubarak's last years, Iran and Egypt
began to consider the resumption of direct flights
between the two nations, after 32 years of frozen
bilateral ties.
Also in 2010, the head of
the Arab League then, Amr Moussa, who is among
Egypt's most prominent secular opposition figures
today, urged Arab states to pay close attention to
new geopolitical realities in the Middle East:
namely, the rise of non-Arab powers of Turkey and
Iran. He touched on the thorny issue of Iran-Arab
tensions by stating, "I realize that some are
worried about Iran, but that is precisely why we
need the dialogue."
After the 2011
revolution, he reiterated his position ahead of
his plans to run in the Egyptian presidential
elections: "Iran is not the natural enemy of
Arabs... We have a lot to gain by peaceful
relations - or less tense relations - with Iran."
His statements opened up a floodgate of repressed
nostalgia for normalized, if not cordial,
Egypt-Iran relations dating back to the first half
of the 20th century.
Just weeks after the
downfall of Mubarak, the newly empowered military
junta, the Tantawi-led Supreme Council of the
Armed Forces, sent a strong signal of a new dawn
in Iran-Egypt relations in particular and Egyptian
foreign policy in general by allowing Iranian
warships to transit the Suez Canal, provoking
uproar in Israel and even Washington. In
succeeding months, post-revolutionary Egypt pushed
the envelope when Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil
El-Arabi stated that Egypt was "turning over a new
leaf with all countries, including Iran".
Salehi immediately reciprocated Cairo's
gestures of goodwill, expressing his country's
appreciation of El-Arabi's comments by expressing
his wishes for "expansion in relations". Salehi
and El-Erabi also met on the sidelines of the
Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) in Bali,
where the OIC expressed its support for
improvement of ties between the two Muslim powers.
However, when the Syrian crisis took an
increasingly sectarian color - with Sunni powers
of Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia pouring all-out
operational-diplomatic support to anti-Assad
forces - and Egypt headed for its crucial
presidential elections in 2012, Iran-Egypt
relations took a momentary pause.
When the
MB's Morsi took over the Egyptian presidency in
June 2012, and gradually dislodged the military
junta from power, Iran faced a mixed picture of
opportunities and challenges: Morsi comes from an
organization which has strong ties with the
fiercely anti-Assad SMB, but he also represents a
more "moderate" Islamist strand, focused on
reviving Egypt's historical prominence in regional
affairs and maintaining an independent foreign
policy line beyond the dictates of any other
regional and international power, namely the US
and Israel.
When Morsi - after
consolidating domestic power - begun to strike a
"political solution first" tone on Syria - in
contrast to other Sunni powers openly calling for
regime change - and express growing disenchantment
with Israel's policies on Palestine, Tehran
sniffed a tremendous opportunity for a tactical
alliance with Egypt. When Morsi - in contrast to
all other major Sunni leaders - agreed to attend
the Iran-hosted Non-Aligned Movement Summit in
August, Tehran was jubilant.
However,
Morsi dished out even more surprises when, during
the summit, he openly lashed out at Assad, calling
him to step down from power, in the presence of
vexed Iranian leaders, including Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. But the silver lining to the
Morsi visit, in Iran's estimation, was his
expressed plans of establishing a new "contact
group" on Syria, which would bring in all relevant
regional actors, including Iran - a well-known
"red line" for Washington, Ankara, and Riyadh.
Yet, despite Morsi's failure to
consolidate the contact group, with Turkish
leaders constantly snubbing proposed high-level
meetings, he created a new opening for Iran,
allowing Tehran to explore new channels of
communication with Sunni powers and reinforce its
"political solution-based" policy on Syria.
Morsi also refused to cave in to pressure
by the Sunni powers of Turkey, Saudi Arabia and
Qatar. He cleverly played Qatar and Saudi Arabia
against each other when they sought to influence
Morsi by generous offers of aid and loan packages
to rescue Egypt's flailing economy. Morsi's
organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, also refused
to join the Arab euphoria over the so-called
"Turkish model" under Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan's Justice and Development Party, which
claims to fuse secular constitutionalism with
pragmatic-Islamist parliamentary democracy. The MB
even went as far as openly criticizing Erdogan's
call, during his 2012 speech in Cairo, for a
"secular state". [1]
Bridging sectarian
divisions Crucially, an Iran-Egypt modus
vivendi on Syria allows Tehran to project a
post-sectarian foreign policy, ameliorating a
growing tide of anti-Iranian sentiment across the
Arab world. This issue is extremely important to
Iran because successive regimes in Tehran
throughout the 20th century have sought to
overcome the country's inherent "minority status"
as the sole "Persian-Shi'ite" nation-state in the
region through varying strategies.
While
the Pahlavi monarchy joined Turkey and Israel in
the so-called "alliance of peripheries", against
the backdrop of a pan-Arabist euphoria led by
Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser, the Islamic Republic
of Iran viewed its growing support for the
Palestinian cause and varying resistance movements
across the Arab world as a springboard to reach
out to the Arab street.
When the Arab
uprisings erupted, Iran's initial response was
jubilation, the downfall of US' allies in Egypt,
Yemen and Tunisia boosted Iran's strategic
position, while the unfolding revolution in
Bahrain reignited concerns with a Shi'ite-led
uprising across the fiercely anti-Iranian Persian
Gulf monarchies. But, the rise of Sunni Islamist
powers in the post-revolutionary vacuum as well as
Assad's slipping hold on power in the Levant
represented a huge challenge to Iran.
What
the Arab uprisings provided was some change in the
strategic dispositions of certain
post-revolutionary Arab states, namely Egypt, but
Syria has precipitated a new sectarian showdown
with Persian-Shi'ite Iran.
Tehran can't
afford a confrontation with Sunni powers of Turkey
and the Persian Gulf because it is already under a
barrage of transatlantic sanctions, undermining
its very economy and industrial prowess. Iran
needs Turkey for energy trade and diplomatic
influence vis-a-vis Western powers, while the
Persian Gulf monarchies are a critical node in the
increasing displacement of Iran in the global
energy markets, due to Western
(insurance-provision, financial-access and oil
embargo) measures against Tehran.
Iran is
also interested in solidifying ties with Egypt,
given its importance within the Arab world and
huge energy needs. There are already reports of
Iran-Morsi cooperation on the
intelligence-internal security front [2], while
others have pinpointed Cairo's weak response to
Iran's alleged shipment of armaments to radical
elements in Gaza.
During his recent trip,
Salehi met - amid much fanfare - with Egypt's top
political and religious leaders leaders, namely
the heads of the state, foreign ministry, the
Al-Azhar University, and Coptic Church, while
entertaining interviews in Arabic by Egypt's state
news agency. It was an ambitious effort by Iran to
make up for lost time, given three decades of
frozen bilateral relations prior to the Egyptian
revolution, and build a cross-ideological,
broad-based relationship with the Egyptian state
and society.
Yet, Salehi's attempts met
huge obstacles, if not disappointments. Salehi and
Morsi are said to have discussed Syria thoroughly,
but Cairo hardly endorsed Iran's "six-point plan"
on Syria [3], which favors a political solution to
the crisis, withdrawal of arms support to the
rebels, an immediate ceasefire, and Assad's stay
in power until 2014. Meanwhile, radical, Salafi
elements - including Morsi's own assistant for
community outreach, Emad Abdel Ghafour - lashed
out at Iran and hosted a parallel conference
calling for the freedom of Arab population (in the
Southern oil-rich Iranian province of Ahwaz) and
Sunni citizens within Iran.[4]
Nonetheless, Salehi's main takeaway was to
project a softer image of Iran across the region,
reiterate Tehran's peaceful vision for Syria, and
reinforce the general impression that at least the
political moderates in Egypt are willing to
normalize ties with Tehran.
Richard
Javad Heydarian is a foreign affairs analyst
focusing on Iran and international security. He is
the author of the upcoming book The Economics
of the Arab Spring: How Globalization Failed the
Arab World, Zed Books, 2013. He can be reached
at jrheydarian@gmail.com
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