Obama lets radicals win
Op-ed: Instead of protecting US interests, president facilitates rise of Mideastern radicals
Despite President Obama’s attempt, through another speech, to portray his Middle East strategy as a balanced approach advancing both lofty American values and US strategic interests, a reality check reveals a naïve and amateurish strategy of missed opportunities, miscalculations and conflicted messages, as well as baseless hopes and dreams.
Instead of ushering in an era of freedom in the Arab world, Obama’s actions - influenced by Western Europe, the media and the academia, will enable undemocratic Islamic radicals such as al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, Iran and its proxies to win, becoming the only beneficiaries of what should have been the so-called Arab spring. If Obama does not intend to change his current course soon and adopt a clear strategy that protects American security and advances US interests, the Middle East is facing a hellish future.
After the US has spent more than 550 million dollars helping the Libyan rebels, the US officer in charge of the war on Libya, Admiral James Stavridis, admitted on Tuesday in a Senate hearing that there are “flickers of al-Qaeda and Hezbollah within the Libyan opposition that NATO is supporting.” He also confessed to possessing insufficient knowledge on the makeup of the rebels. Indeed, it seems the US did not bother to ascertain the rebels’ identity before helping them.
The UK Telegraph revealed that Abdel Hakim al Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, admitted to an Italian newspaper last week that his fighters have al-Qaeda links and that Jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the frontlines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi's regime.
Helping the rebels take over a country like Libya with one of the world largest oil reserves will revive al-Qaeda and undermine US efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, while endangering both American safety and interests.
What about Syria?
Meanwhile in Egypt, after Obama endorsed the toppling of President Mubarak, it seems that the euphoria of transforming the country into Western-style democracy is waning and the worst-case scenario of a post-Mubarak Egypt is coming true. A recent referendum by Egyptian voters on constitutional amendment was a huge victory for the Muslim Brotherhood. It set the date for parliamentary elections in September which the Brotherhood supported and the liberals opposed.
Only the Muslim Brotherhood and the remaining elements of the National Democratic Party, which controlled Egypt for decades, will be ready for elections so soon. The liberal and secular wing of Egyptian politics that led the main protests in Freedom Square will need more time to form an effective political organization and mount a winning campaign.
Now, we are seeing daily killings of protestors in Syria by President Assad’s security forces, but the Obama Administration has made it clear that it does not aim to mobilize the international community to act against Syria, because the US believes that Assad could become a reformist.
This position ignores the fact that the US has at last an opportunity and a strategic interest to break the axis of evil between Iran and Syria, weakening both Tehran and its Hezbollah proxy in the process. Syria is Iran’s closest strategic partner and has played a central role in smuggling weapons to arm Hezbollah and help Tehran take over Lebanon. In the past two years, all US attempts to draw Syria away from Iran through diplomatic means failed miserably.
In the final analysis, following a road map of protecting US strategic interests is the only way to avoid losing the Middle East. But is President Obama up for the job?
Israeli-born and raised Shoula Romano Horing is an attorney in Kansas City and a national speaker. Her blog: www.shoularomanohoring.com
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