President-elect Trump will inherit very serious geopolitical and geostrategic challenges as he steps into his second term. The Indo-Pacific confrontation and trade war with a rising, increasingly confident China, the proxy war with a resurgent Russia through Ukraine, Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and the expanding theatre of war in the GMER will demand his attention straight away. However, it is in Gaza-Palestine and GMER at large that he needs to re-visit his policies. His idea of peace there is that Israel must achieve its objectives, military, territorial, diplomatic and political swiftly and be done with this war expeditiously!
Will President Trump pursue a reincarnation of the Abraham Accords or will he try a different approach this time?
The Abraham Accords have had partial success thus far. Only the UAE, Bahrain, Morrocco and Sudan signed up during his first term in office. KSA was being similarly courted when Hamas brought the Abraham Accords to a screeching halt through its audacious raid into Israel. It was a colossal military and intelligence failure that emphatically dented Israel’s and its IDF’s bloated pride and sense of invincibility. PM Netanyahu’s government and the IDF have since run amok in Gaza, killed about 44000 Gazans-Palestinians including over 17400 children, wounded 105000 plus and have literally blown Gaza and its inhabitants to bits. Yet they have not achieved any of their stated military, territorial, political or diplomatic objectives - the Gazans remain defiant, undefeated, unconquerable; Hamas survives yet; the hostages remain unrecovered and the Arab-Muslim worlds are adamant on not recognizing Israel! Critically, the frustrated IDF has suffered an ominous mission creep. Its war on Gaza has expanded into what is a now clearly a seven-front war - Gaza, West Bank, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and Iran with no end in sight! The multidimensional threats that Israel perceives for itself have not waned or diminished by any measure. What is then Israel’s desired end state of this expanded war? Can it bludgeon or browbeat the entire GMER into submission? Does it have the necessary manpower to ostensibly occupy and hold such large territories, (Greater Israel!)? Or will it, in its frustration, just lay the whole region to waste without achieving any meaningful geopolitical or geostrategic objectives? Incredibly, the US-led West continues its macabre pantomime of pretending to run with the hare too while in reality it is only hunting with the hound! It is directly complicit in the wanton genocide of the Gazans-Palestinians!
Of late, there has been a perceptible paradigm shift in the geopolitical-geostrategic dynamics of the region. One, as opposed to President Biden’s approach, President-elect Trump is likely to try a revitalization of the dormant Abraham Accords process, without prejudice to Israel’s hegemony, military preponderance and territorial ambitions. Two, China has engineered a diplomatic coup by bringing about a rapprochement between KSA and Iran. Iran is thus no longer the designated enemy in the GMER. Its relations with the other Gulf states have improved. KSA and Iran are carrying out joint military exercises. This will have a very sobering effect on the regional geopolitical-geostrategic environment. Three, all Muslim and Arab countries have reiterated their uncompromising support for an independent Palestinian state in recent conferences. Four, KSA consistently demands the implementation of the 2002 Arab Peace Plan as a precursor to any relations with Israel. That translates into an independent state for Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital and Israel withdrawing back to pre-1967 borders. Five, it is incumbent upon Israel now to create the desired geopolitical-geostrategic environment for peace and the implementation of the Abraham Accords. Till it brings the war to an end (and Palestinians get statehood) no Arab-Muslim country can realistically consider acceding to the Abraham Accords. Six, the unrestrained military, diplomatic, economic and political support given to Israel by the US-led West has literally wrought its ostensible moral standing, superiority and authority to nought. Its blatant hypocritical duplicity has cost it its credibility. It is now reduced to coercive measures - diplomatic, economic, military - to get its way in the GMER!
Peace in the GMER is contingent upon a peaceful, mutually acceptable and internationally guaranteed settlement of the Palestinian issue. It can not be founded upon an unjust solution that is to the absolute detriment of the Palestinians and the outright advantage of Israel. A balanced, fair, just solution based on mutual compromises (a two-state solution, for example) that takes into account the aspirations of the Jews and Muslims together is inevitable. Such a peaceful settlement of the Palestinian issue will essentially be predicated upon an accord between Israel and the Palestinians. The Abraham Accords did not address this basic aspect as they seemed to favour a top-down approach which sought to coerce all Arab-Muslim states to recognize Israel and thus create the environment and the attendant pressures for the Palestinians to accept their fait accompli - recognize Israel and its territorial excesses ...or else!
President Trump might want to try a different approach this time. Instead of a top-down approach a bottom-up approach might be more appropriate and successful. He should engage the Gazans-Palestinians first and offer a just, fair, humane and peaceful solution to them. Israel should be on board too, “divine injunctions” notwithstanding. This alone will lay the foundation for lasting peace in the region. If the Arab-Muslim worlds see a just and fair solution taking shape they will promptly fall in line. There is no other alternative. Else, the world will keep going around in endless circles in fruitless pursuit of a peace that never will be!
Does President Trump have it in him to grab this historic opportunity and stamp his legacy in history, for all times to come!
Imran Malik
The writer is a retired brigadier of the Pakistan Army. He can be reached at im.k846@gmail.com and tweets @K846Im.
