A Biden doctrine for the Middle East is forming. And it’s big

There are two things I believe about the growing crisis in the Middle East.

We’re about to see how to new strategy of the Biden administration to address this multi-front war involving the Gaza Strip, Iran, Israel and the region, which I hope will be a”Biden Doctrine“that responds to the gravity and complexity of this dangerous moment.

And if we don’t see such a big, bold doctrine, the crisis in the region will metastasize in ways that will strengthen you Iranthey will isolate Israel and leave America’s ability to positively influence events in ruins.

A Biden doctrine – as I call the convergence of strategic thinking and planning that my reporting has gathered – would have three aspects.

One of these would be a firm and determined position towards Iranthat would include strong military retaliation against Iranian proxies and proxies in the region in response to the killing of three American soldiers at a Jordanian base by a drone apparently launched by a pro-Iranian militia in Iraq.

The second way would be an unprecedented US diplomatic initiative promote a Palestinian state – NOW.

It would imply some form of US recognition of a demilitarized Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that would only see the light of day once the Palestinians had developed a set of defined and credible security institutions and capabilities to ensure that this state it was vital and could never threaten Israel.

Biden administration officials have consulted experts inside and outside the U.S. government about the different forms this could take. recognition of the Palestinian state.

In the third way there would be a security alliance of the United States with Saudi Arabia, which would also imply the normalization of Saudi relations with Israel, if the Israeli government was willing to accept a diplomatic process leading to a demilitarized Palestinian state led by a Palestinian Authority transformed.

If the administration gets its way – a huge “if” – the Biden doctrine could become the largest strategic realignment in the region since the 1979 Camp David Treaty.

However, for the Biden Doctrine to succeed, it is absolutely necessary that the three tracks are united.

I think American officials understand this.

For this reason I am certain that: October 7 is forcing a fundamental rethink on the Middle East within the Biden administration, given Hamas’ barbaric attack on Israel; the massive Israeli retaliation against Hamas that killed thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza; the increasing attacks against Israeli and American personnel in the region; and the failure of Israel’s right-wing government to articulate any plan to govern Gaza the morning after the war ends with a Palestinian partner other than Hamas.

The ongoing rethink indicates that we understand that we cannot continue to allow Iran to attempt to expel us from the region, to drive Israel into extinction and our Arab allies into intimidation by acting by proxy – Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and the militias . Iraq – while Iran sits happily and you don’t pay any price.

And, at the same time, it signals an understanding that the United States will never have the global legitimacy, NATO allies, and Arab and Muslim allies it needs to confront Iran more aggressively unless we stop allowing the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahulet’s hold our politics hostage and begin to build a credible and legitimate Palestinian Authority that can one day govern Gaza and the West Bank effectively and as a good neighbor to Israel along the last borders they will negotiate together.

Nader Mousavizadeh, founder and CEO of geopolitical consultancy Macro Advisory Partners and senior advisor to then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, describes this emerging Biden doctrine as “the double reckoning strategy.”

“Strategically, it attracts Iran’s attention and, at the same time, takes an unprecedented initiative to lay the foundation for a demilitarized Palestinian state, which the United States has never done before,” Mousavizadeh said.

“Each path requires the other to succeed. Each strengthens and justifies the other. Counterattacking Iran and its allies more decisively and sustainably strengthens Israel’s security and that of our Arab allies.

If we add to this a courageous and genuine commitment from the United States to a Palestinian state, we will gain the legitimacy to act against Iran and the allies we need to be more effective. “It also isolates Iran militarily and politically.”

“It also isolates Iran militarily and politically.”

I think this is exactly right.

It’s time for the United States to expose both Iran and Netanyahu.

Netanyahu is why I coined this rule for reporting on the Middle East:

“What people say to you in English in private is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is what they say in public in their language.”

Netanyahu whispered to Biden privately that he might one day be willing – perhaps – to consider some sort of demilitarized Palestinian state, while in public he said in Hebrew just the opposite.

Fortunately, Biden has thought about the issue enough to know that Netanyahu is just trying to fool him.

Sometimes age is an advantage.

It’s time to clarify the games of Netanyahu and the ayatollahs at the same time.

A Biden doctrine is the right way to do it.

Time

We have tolerated Iran destroying every constructive initiative we have tried to build in the Middle East, as long as Tehran remained below the threshold to attack us directly.

And at the same time, we tolerated a Netanyahu government determined to permanently prevent any form of Palestinian statehood, to the point of strengthening Hamas for many years against the Palestinian Authority to ensure that there was no unified Palestinian partner.

“On October 7 it became clear that our policy towards Iran had failed and that our policy towards Israel and Palestine had failed,” Mousavizadeh said.

“These policies have allowed and empowered Hamas to savagely attack Israel. They have allowed and empowered the Houthis to paralyze global shipping, and they have allowed pro-Iranian Shiite militias to try to expel US forces from the region, forces aligned there to prevent the return of ISIS. and help keep the region reasonably stable.”

All of this happened, he added, without anyone holding the Iranian regime accountable for the way it “deploys its poisonous and destructive non-state actors across the region against the constructive goals of our allies,” who are trying to build a more inclusive region. . .

For all these reasons, I believe, hope and pray that a Biden doctrine for the Middle East will come, and the Israelis should too.

Israel is now losing on three fronts.

He lost the narrative war on Gaza.

Even though Hamas killed and raped Israelis, it was Israel that was taken to the International Court of Justice in The Hague for the civilian casualties it caused in Gaza while trying to eliminate Hamas fighters who were encroaching on civilians.

It is losing the ability to maintain Israel’s security without feeling overburdened, in the long term, by invading Gaza without any plan to find a legitimate Palestinian partner, not Hamas, to govern there effectively, so that Israel can withdraw.

And it is losing on the regional stability front.

Israel is now the target of an Iranian attack on four fronts: by Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and Shia militias in Iraq – but it cannot generate the Arab or NATO allies it needs to win that war, because it refuses to do anything to cultivate a credible and legitimate Palestinian partner.

If a Biden doctrine emerged, Mousavizadeh concluded, “it would be good geopolitics abroad and good politics at home.”

It could deter Iran both militarily and politically by stripping Tehran of the Palestinian card.

It could promote the creation of a Palestinian state on terms compatible with Israeli security and, at the same time, create the conditions for the normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia on terms that the Palestinians can accept.

And it’s a strategy that could work with the Arab Americans of Lake Michigan and the Arab allies of the Persian Gulf.

It’s a strategy that could force a reckoning within Iranian politics, within Palestinian politics and within Israeli politics.

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