The Obama era is finally history in the Middle East
Summary
The threat from Iran is greatly diminished, but Turkey poses new challenges.
The consequences of Bashar al-Assad’s fall from power in Syria will reverberate for years across the Middle East, but one great fact is already clear. The Obama era in Middle Eastern history has, thankfully, come to an end.
Barack Obama’s misguided diplomacy made Iran the de facto master of Syria and Lebanon and massively reinforced Russian power and prestige. Almost every significant authority in the region loathed Mr. Obama’s Middle East order. Israelis detested what they saw as appeasement of a genocidal regime in Tehran. Sunni Arabs abhorred the “Shia Crescent" from Iran to Lebanon that Mr. Obama’s vision was ready to accept. The Gulf Arabs feared Mr. Obama’s Middle East so much that they brushed Palestinian objections aside to form strategic partnerships with Israel. Turkey, which saw the American president deliver Syria and Lebanon on a silver platter to Iran even as he supported Kurdish groups aligned with domestic terrorists, was equally horrified by the world Mr. Obama tried to make.
Turkey and Israel, with a boost from Ukraine, succeeded in killing Mr. Obama’s dream. Benjamin Netanyahu, using American weapons but wisely ignoring Team Biden’s muddled strategic advice, broke Iran’s military power through a succession of attacks on Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan steadily helped anti-Assad forces with roots in extremist Sunni Arab organizations like al Qaeda survive and thrive until the Assad regime was vulnerable. With Iranian power tamed and Russia preoccupied in Ukraine, Assad was exposed, and the Turkish-backed Arab forces moved in for the kill.
Ironically, Team Biden ended up serving as pallbearers at the funeral of a Middle East policy it hoped to save. After trying and failing to restore Mr. Obama’s nuclear deal, Team Biden searched for ways to accommodate Iran, relaxing sanctions and trying to engage diplomatically with the mullahs in Tehran. But in the end, Iran’s support of Hamas’s and Hezbollah’s aggression against Israel was too much. After the Iran-backed Hamas terror attack against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Team Biden, sometimes reluctantly and with much grumbling, provided Israel with enough weapons to beat Hamas and Hezbollah in ways that shocked Iran and dramatically reduced its power. To use those weapons effectively, Israel had to frustrate U.S. efforts to tie its hands, change its government, and dictate what would have been disastrous changes in war-fighting strategy. Even so, the provision of critical military aid may be remembered as the single most consequential use of American power on Mr. Biden’s watch.
What’s dawning in Syria today is a new era of regional and religious competition. Already many Arabs, remembering the centuries of Turkish hegemony under the Ottoman Empire, fear that Turkey will replace Iran as the chief threat to the independence of the Arab world. That’s good news for the strategic partnerships between Israel and some of the Gulf states. Mr. Erdogan’s Turkey is if anything an even greater potential threat to the security of the Gulf states than Iran managed to become. By linking himself to the cause of Sunni Islamist “democracy," Mr. Erdogan can hope to develop a more potent ideological threat to the Gulf monarchies than Iran’s Shia model ever became.
Both Israel and the Gulf Arabs have reason to worry about Mr. Erdogan’s Palestinian policy. Turkey’s alignment with the Muslim Brotherhood is a powerful political weapon for Ankara in any competition with the Gulf states for the position as the leaders of the Sunni world. Supporting the Palestinians can help Turkey polish its political image on the Arab street.
Syria’s future is up for grabs. Until the Assads imposed their dictatorship, it was a tumultuous, coup-prone country. More an artificial creation of French colonial policy than anything else, Syria, like neighboring Lebanon, was deeply divided along religious, tribal and cultural lines. The last murderous decade of bitter civil war made these divisions worse. With armed factions including ISIS remnants, Kurds, pro-Turkish forces and regime loyalists operating around the country, the new government will struggle to impose its authority. Turkey has occupied land in the north, and Israeli forces have seized land in the south. Iran and Russia both still have local associates.
Obama fans may not be popping any champagne corks over Middle East developments these days, but most Americans should rejoice at Assad’s fall, Russia’s discomfiture and Iran’s massive defeats. History, however, isn’t ending in the Middle East just yet. With Iran sinking and Turkey rising, our ability to manage an increasingly complex relationship with Ankara will become more difficult and more important in the years ahead. Keeping Turkey on side while promoting deepening cooperation between Israel and its Arab associates will be the keys to successful American policy in the new Middle East. Let’s hope the new administration can get the job done.
