Geopolitics of terrorism and it’s rising threat

 October 07, 2023 can be considered as a major turning point in the world of terrorism, when Hamas attacked Israel. For the first few hours Hamas terrorists rampaged through the border territory that separates the Gaza strip from Israel and carried out atrocities against humanity through their targeting of civilians, killing over 1200 and kidnapping 248 in this initial attack. Hamas adheres to an extreme ideology of Islamic terrorism blended with Palestinian nationalism that gives a veneer of legitimacy in the Arab world while being dedicated to the destruction of Israel; with its preferred methods to achieve dominance includes rocket attacks, random shootings, kidnappings and suicide bombings. However, since Hamas has not been designated as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, it receives constant funding from Qatar and Iran that allows it to build grassroots support among the Palestinians in Gaza, while constantly upgrading its military capacity.

 Going backwards in time, it was on 15 August 2021, that the Taliban marched into Kabul and took over Afghanistan as the U.S. military and its allies hastily evacuated that country. This victory of the Taliban over the great Western powers was a major morale boost every terrorist organization across the globe. Regardless of the Doha accord that was brokered by Qatar between the Taliban and USA; the consensus between all terrorist organizations is that the Taliban won a protracted 20-years war against the Western military might and most importantly that their modern military could be defeated. In the West, there is a growing consensus that Afghanistan has become a center of terrorist activities that is already affecting the neighboring regions, with terrorists’ groups having greater freedom of activities without any hindrance from the de-facto administrators of that country.  The influence of the Taliban is today an integral part of the global Islamist terrorist narrative.

 Since retaking control of Afghanistan, the Taliban has transformed the schools into religious madrassas (Islamic schools), where boys are indoctrinated by mullahs in extremist ideology that includes hatred for USA, Israel, and Europe. Former terrorists from Arab states are tasked with drilling recruits in military training and ideological instructions. Their efforts are focused on producing a new generation of well-trained and radically educated extremists. In this context, Hamas had been the first to congratulate the Taliban on their victory in 2021 and the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, in a telephone conversation with Abdul Ghani Baradar, the deputy Prime Minister of Afghanistan and a senior Taliban leader had stated that “the end of the U.S. occupation was a prelude to the demise of all occupation forces, foremost of which is the Israeli occupation of Palestine”. Coming to present times, the most surprising part of Hamas’ devastating cross-border attack was its complexity. Rarely in history has a terrorist organization been able to fight from the air, sea, and land; leaving no doubt that members of the Hamas were trained in battle tactics by various experienced terrorists and that a large number of Taliban and other Arab-origin fighters might have been part of the attackers in this operation.

 Terrorism has the power to destroy peace processes, dangerously escalate volatile situations and push countries onto the path of long and destructive wars. It is said that “Those who forget their history are condemned to repeat it.” It was an assassin’s bullet in Sarajevo that resulted in World War I and produced 40 million casualties, and it was the 3,000 persons killed in New York on Sept 11, 2001 that launched the U.S. led global war on terror in which an estimated 3.6 to 3.8 million have since perished. This current Hamas-Israel conflict already has ramifications far beyond the Middle-East. This terrorist attack should be ringing alarm bells across the world. Every country has its own enemies who seek an opportunity to exploit that country’s social and political divisiveness, civil distractions and security challenges. Fomenting domestic political violence would be one of the foremost strategies, alongwith cross-border terrorism.

 Hamas’s terrorist attack on Israel has significant repercussions on the Ukraine-Russia war. While both Russia and Ukraine are seeking political and diplomatic support from international communities, the Hamas–Israel war is taking global attention and resources away from Ukraine’s war efforts. This change of focus by the global community could lead to a diminished economic and military assistance for that country, even though the USA has reconfirmed that it will maintain military and economic support for Ukraine as its strategic priority. Ukrainian President Zelenskyy was quick to condemn Hamas’s actions in an effort to clearly align his policy with that of the USA’s position of supporting Israel, but at the same time he wants to avoid alienating the Arab world, especially Saudi Arabia.

 Russia, as a part if it’s multi-polar sphere of influence policy has not condemned Hamas directly, and has blamed the policies of the USA for this current Middle-East crisis. Russia has a longstanding relationship with Hamas. By offering to serve as a mediator between Israel and the Palestinians, Russia shows that it is aligning explicitly with the global south, seeking to erode the USA led liberal world order and pushing forth the concept of a growing multi-polar world of global politics, calling for a ‘just solution’ to the Palestinian problem, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.

 The two wars of the world; Russia fighting Ukraine, and the Hamas-Israel conflict has pushed up the cost of living across the world and severely diminished the heath and well-being of people, specially those mired in poverty. With growing food insecurity, over 258 million people in 58 plus countries are in a food crisis or in a moderate to severe food insecurity. European countries are facing soaring energy prices, leading to a decline in economic growth. There is also the impact on global financial markets. European countries have suffered large losses, with East Europe affected through disrupted trade links and West Europe affected through their ownership investments. There is no doubt that Europe will feel the long-term financial impact of the war more severely than other countries.

 The Gaza-Israel conflict has already led to a tragic loss of lives and is a severe risk to the fragile peace in the middle-east. The economic repercussions of this crisis will depend on the extent and duration of the fighting, the associated geopolitical effect and the strong possibility of increased terrorist attacks. From the global economic perspective, energy security is the most important issue. The developing situation might lead to severe supply disruption, particularly if the crisis brings Iran into the war directly, or if the general unrest and terrorist attacks in Iraq reduces the oil production there. Apart from the fact that the Middle-east is a crucial supplier of energy, it is also a key shipping passageway. Whether the hostilities remain confined to Gaza and Israel, or escalates to a direct military confrontation between Israel and Iran; the result will be the same; increased cost of energy supplies, slower economic growth and higher inflation.

 Regardless of how this conflict continues, any hope for a stable Middle-East has suffered a set-back, maybe for a long time. The world is today mired in regional conflict that have negative global effects. The two ongoing wars, the US-China trade war, and the rising potential for a conflict over Taiwan, shows that the world is today in a state of constant disruptions, and that geopolitics will drive the economic outcomes across regions.

 The Republic of Bharat (India) has charted its own course during these turbulent times. Bharat has stood firm in its policy of public neutrality towards every country involved in these conflicts, either directly or though the support structure on behalf of the participants. Bharat has consistently called for the “respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of states” and for “an immediate cessation of violence and hostilities”. It is constantly advising that “dialogue is the only answer to settling differences and disputes”. Bharat has ascended to the international stage as a great power without committing to any economic or military alliances that might entangle its progress. This ascent is best guaranteed through the path of peace and goodwill when surrounded by competing power centers that can be leveraged to derive benefits amid their mutual rivalries, while keeping its own interests in mind without forming any alliances to realize its geopolitical objectives. Essentially, Bharat prefers a multipolar global order that allows it to maneuver between several diverse blocs, exploiting their differences depending on the issues-at-hand, to secure gains for itself while avoiding permanent alignments with anyone.

 

References:  

https://foreignpolicy.com

https://warontherocks.com

https://www.amjmed.com

https://www.usip.org

https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/

https://www.economicsobservatory.com/

https://www.bloomberg.com/

https://carnegieendowment.org/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Israeli intelligence failure – or a deep rooted conspiracy?

On Saturday 07^th October 2023, the terrorist group Hamas based out of the Gaza strip caught the State of Israel by complete surprise, breaking through an electronically powered physical fence that is supposed to have cost over a billion US dollars in its creation, to safe-guard the security of Israel. The fence was breached at multiple sites and the entire concept of its existence crashed, along-with the credibility of the Israeli intelligence services.

Three issues are glaring prominent in this attack. The 1^st is the speed, training and focus of the Hamas terrorists when they broke through the fence, invaded Israeli territories, captured and transported hostages back to Gaza while indiscriminately killing civilians. The 2^nd issue is the lack of an immediate response by the Israeli Defense Forces. It took the IDF over six hours to enter this battle-field, stripping away the much-publicized fantasy of the IDF being a professionally trained and highly skilled, mobile fighting force. The 3^rd issue was the global reputation of the Israeli intelligence services. “Mossad”, the civilian–military intelligence and anti-terrorist strike force; the “Military Intelligence Directorate” which is to supposed to inform the Israeli government and IDF with intelligence warnings and alerts on a daily basis; the "Shin bet", the organization charged with maintaining internal security, including in the Israeli-occupied territories; the “Combat Intelligence Collection Corps” which is the newest of the IDF GOC Army Headquarters' five corps, created in April 2000 and tasked with collecting combat intelligence; and “Lekem” (Lishka le-Kishrei Mada) which is tasked to collect scientific and technical intelligence abroad from both open and covert sources, and was supposed to have been disbanded in 1986, but never confirmed to have been so.  

All five of these intelligence services seem to have failed their primary purpose of keeping their government informed of the activities of their immediate enemy, the State of Palestine and its armed factions Hamas (specifically it’s Qassam brigades), Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Palestinian Liberation Front, as-Sa’iqa, Fatah al-Intifada, Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine; etc.

Hamas, which started the current attack on Israel, was created in 1987 as an off-shoot of the Muslim Brotherhood’s political movement. The Muslim Brotherhood identifies itself as a Sunni Islamist organization that was founded in Egypt in 1928, by Hassan al-Banna, and Islamic scholar and school teacher. Hamas has been financed regularly by Iran and Qatar, two counties which are seemingly at odds with each other the former being Shi’a and the latter being Sunni. Yet, both have funded Hamas and other terrorist organizations due to their common hatred against Israel.

Iran has had a complex relationship with Israel. This relationship has changed from military and economic close cooperation before the Iranian revolution of 1979, to complete hostility, with Iran supporting Hamas and the Islamic Jihad for Palestine in Gaza, and the Hezbollah in Lebanon. Before the 1979 revolution, when most Arab countries in Middle-East were in opposition to the existence of Israel, the then Shah of Iran supported Israeli settlers in what was considered as Palestine territories.  The Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi recognized Israel as a sovereign state in 1950. Economic, political and military cooperation between these two countries expanded rapidly while tensions between Israel and the Arab countries escalated in the 1960s and 1970s.

Before the Shah of Iran was deposed in 1979, Israel had undertaken a multi-billion-dollar project to sell advanced, surface-to-surface missiles to Iran. This project, code named ‘Flower’, was one of the six oil-for-arms contract signed in Tehran in April 1977 by Shah Reza Pahlavi and Shimon Peres, the then Defense Minister of Israel. The Flower project, involved the production of missiles with warheads weighing 750 Kgs and a tactical range of 480 kms. This joint missile program envisaged shipping the missiles from Israel to Iran, in the form of components for assembly and testing. Operation Flower was just one of the many joint military projects between the two countries. According to de-classified documents available in the USA’s Library of Congress, other projects included advanced radar systems, converting aircraft for maritime surveillance purposes, and enhancing the missiles program to enable their launch from submarines.

Even after 1979, when the Shah of Iran was deposed by the Islamic Revolution, the Iran-Israel military cooperation continued discreetly with Israel supplying arms, ammunition and military aid to Iran during its 10-year war against Saddam Hussain’s Iraq, in the 1980s. Various sources has estimated that, with the tactic approval of the USA, Iran was provided military aid of approximately US$ 2 billion in that period. The clandestine cooperation did not stop there. During the Iran-Contra affair, Israel played a crucial role as a facilitator of arms shipments from USA to Iran in 1985 and 1986.

All this came to an end when Yasser Arafat, the then PLO Chairman signed the Oslo Accords on 13 September 1993, with Israel Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, in the presence of the then President of USA, Bill Clinton. This prompted the Ayatollahs of Iran to begin their campaign to create new armed Islamist groups in Palestine and Lebanon, while increasing their support to existing ones. While Iran is estimated to be funding US$ 100 million annually to Hamas, it has also publicly acknowledged that it is also supplying the rockets used by Hamas to target Israel. In 2012, Iran’s military commanders disclosed that they had provided over 50 thousand rockets and over half a million anti-tank missiles to militants in Gaza; alongwith the technology to manufacture the Fajr-5 missiles in Gaza itself.

It seems hard to believe that none of this was noted seriously by the five intelligence agencies of Israel.

Now, let us look at the role played by Qatar in their support for Hamas. Throughout the last 60 odd years, Qatar has facilitated and funded radical Islamist ideologies and provided a safe haven to their leaders inside Qatar. The entire leadership of Hamas are permanent residents of Qatar, lavishly hosted and richly funded by Qatar’s ruling al-Thani family. Beyond this, Qatar is funding an assertive Islamist social environment in the West through its investment in Islamic education and academic fields in the UK, funding of British schools, universities, community centers and Islamic centers; essentially funding Islamic extremism. Qatar is an unspoken enemy of Bharat [India] through its acts of liberally funding the Pakistani Army, which in turn funds terrorism in Kashmir. Other terrorists that Qatar has openly supported are the Taliban, the Muslim Brotherhood, certain al-Qaeda affiliates and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

With only 350,000 nationals; but with constant access to enormous wealth through its natural gas reserves, Qatar seeks to exercise an international influence that is disproportionate to its geographical size, not only in the Middle-East, but across the world. Qatar’s protection from any global action is insured by its “investments” in the political parties and politicians in the UK, the USA and the EU. Governments of these countries, regardless of which political party is in power, seek to maintain good relationships with Qatar in order to benefit from its huge energy reserves, to sell defense equipment to it, and to attract Qatari investment into key infrastructure and energy projects. Bharat [India] and its ruling politicians are no exception. They allowed an investment of one billion US dollars by the Qatar Investment Authority into Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Retail Ventures. Beyond this, Qatar has made investments into media houses, real estate, infrastructure, financial institutions and investment funds. So, when thousands of Indian origin construction workers are killed in Qatar under inhuman working conditions or very soon, eight retired officers of our navy are hanged at the whim of Qatar’s ruling family, do not be shocked. According to our Government and our bureaucracy, sacrificing a few Indian lives and our honor and price for the billions in investments; is just the price of doing business with Qatar.  

Qatar’s ruling family, the al-Thani’s have perfected the art of being on all sides of a conflict and supporting everyone against each other. While funding the Hamas and allowing its leaders to enjoy residency in Qatar, it has positioned itself to be a key negotiator for the release of Israeli hostages, and at the same time preserved its close security and economic ties with the USA. Qatar hosts the forward HQs of the U.S. military’s Central Command at the al-Udeid Air base in Doha. This gives Qatar the safety shield that it needs from any military attacks from its neighbors while being publicly praised by USA as its major non-NATO ally, critically important to U.S. foreign policy in the region. This support from USA comes at a cost of tens of millions of dollars that Qatar spends though its lobbyists in Washington DC, and influences the U.S. lawmakers through investments in law-makers constituencies, contributing to their election fund-raising, sponsored visits to Qatar (Minnesota Congress woman Ilhan Omar’s visit to the soccer World cup was fully funded by Qatar) and has been accused of bribing this same Congress woman in exchange for sensitive intelligence information and to influence U.S. policy in its favor.

When caught in illegal acts, Qatar falls back on their policy of threatening to restrict energy supplies to countries that accuse it of corrupt and unethical practices.

The attack on Israel by Hamas has to be considered as a geo-political strategy by Iran and Qatar, working to destabilize the Middle-East peace process for their own gains. The current conflict has successfully stalled and maybe destroyed the Israel–Saudi Arabi Normalization Agreement, allowed Iran to gain prominence in the region’s politics, while putting those Arab states that have signed peace agreements with Israel into a difficult position whereby while trying to honor these agreements they have to deal with the unrest on the ground by their Muslim citizens who are majorly anti-Israel. This works in the favor of Qatar who is opposed to the global influence of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, who have accused Qatar of various crimes in the past. The Hamas offensive has encouraged smaller terrorist groups to attack U.S forces in the region, with rocket attacks on American military installations in Iraq and Syria.

If the current Hamas–Israel expands to become a U.S–Iran conflict, even through the use of proxies, it will affect global economy. Europe which is already under economic recessions due to the Ukraine–Russia war, will be adversely impacted as energy supplies from the Gulf would become scarce. The U.S. economy might also tip into severe recession and higher inflation, leading to a domino effect on other economies of the world that are tied to the U.S. economy. Scarcity of energy resources will mean higher logistics costs, increased production costs and reduced consumer spending.

The first question to be asked is this. At what point will USA, UK and the EU decide to abandon their support to Qatar to stop its funding of terrorists across the world, and try to normalize ties with Iran? Unless the influence of Qatar is removed from the geo-political equation, peace or even a restless peace will not materialize.

Therefore, the unspoken question has to be asked. Did Israel and its allies have complete knowledge of the impending Hamas attack on Israel, but decided to let it happen anyway for a greater geo-political strategy? The other line of thought is that, prior to this Hamas terrorist attack of 7^th October, the politics of Israel was deeply divided. Their current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was on trial for corruption, and was being tried in their Court of Law for fraud, breach of trust, and accepting bribes. Three of his former close confidants have turned State’s evidence and are testifying against him. The current war is a welcome diversion from political problems, even if it has caused the killings of thousands on both sides. So, the moot question arises. Did some interested parties in Israel manipulate intelligence information for party political gains, not realizing that what they might have expected to be nothing more than ‘containable violence’, actually turned out to be a full-scale invasion?

While many will assume these questions to be in the area of an ‘unbelievable conspiracy’, the relationships of the past between the various players in the middle-east, the current relationships between Islamic nations and their fundamentalists, the issues faced by Israeli politicians in their own country, and their singular relationships with the USA; all of these will determine the outcome of the present Hamas–Israel conflict.