WHY I DON'T TAKE SIDES IN THE WAR IN GAZA

 It may come as a surprise to readers of my geopolitics blog  that I have avoided - and will continue to avoid - taking sides in the conflict pitching Israelis against Palestinians in Gaza. 

The reasons are however quite simple. As a Romanian-Australian historian having specialised in Toulouse in international relations and geopolitics, my professional interests are exclusively focused on developments happening around Romania and, by extension, in Eurasia. This is why I have devoted most of my professional attention to the war in Ukraine in the past twenty months, as well as before that, since 2014. Sadly, Romania still has more than half a million ethnic Romanians living, or dying on the battlefields in Ukraine, and unfortunately it has been flooded with hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees since February 2022. 

As Romania was for more than two decades a satellite of China during the Ceausescu regime, I have also paid special attention to China's spreading influence in Eastern Europe, before and after 1989.

By the same token, Russia was an important actor in the evolution of the Romanian principalities during the Middle Ages, as well as a leading power involved in the major developments affecting the history of the modern Romanian state since the unification in 1859. 

My professional interest in the major events happening within the EU has  deepened since 2007, when Romania was admitted as a member. 

My acquired knowledge of events from parts of the Arab world dates back to 2010-2011, when I was studying for my masters degree at Sciences Po in Toulouse. My research thesis then was concerned with the evolution of the EU's relations with the Maghreb countries. My thesis did not include research or references to events in the Mashreq ,nor did I acquire the necessary in-depth historical information about these areas.

After World War II, the US replaced European powers - the British and the French- in the Middle East, becoming its sole peace and security provider. Consequently, I have usually paid only scant attention to developments there. I have always considered it a huge mistake,for example,  and an illustration of his megalomania the fact that Ceausescu had cultivated political leaders from the Middle East, like Yasset Arafat , or that he tried - albeit unsuccessfully - to play the role of peacemaker between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

A comparative analysis of the way major powers have governed the Arabs from the Middle East over the past few hundred years reveals the fact that the Ottomans were by far much more adept at keeping the peace among Arabs than the West has over the last  hundred years. Naturally, having the same religion as the Arabs in the Middle East or North Africa has helped the Ottoman Turks keep the peace in those regions until 1918 when the Sultanate imploded. Unfortunately, the skills of various Western administrators, including the Americans, were not up the task of keeping the Middle East stable and the Arabs pacified .

This above comment, however, should not be understood as an endorsement of President Erdogan's latest speech in Istanbul on behalf of the Palestinians from Gaza. Although his first decade in power was very successful, Erdogan has slowly but surely torpedoed his main achievements during his second decade at the helm. Trying to bask in the glory of his Ottoman predecessors, or of that of Kemal Ataturk, will not help the efforts to stabilise the Middle East or put an end to the conflict in Gaza. 

Should the EU Agree to the Partition of Libya ?

 April 13, 2017

News has it that White House foreign policy aides are toying with the idea of partitioning Libya in three, roughly copying the Ottoman Empire’s former administrative entities in the region. As the “America First” political philosophy seems to have lost its appeal for the Trump team’s policymakers, there is now a flurry of initiatives on the foreign policy front. Needless to say, most such initiatives are misguided and, according to French and American experts, the grand strategy is not even decided upon in Washington, but in Israel.

The idea of partitioning Libya is yet another example of an amateurish approach to international relations which does not bode well, either for Libya or for its neighbour across the Mediterranean, the EU.

It would be useful at this point to remind readers that for at least 50 years before the September 11 attack, North Africa’s Maghreb had been the special responsibility of European powers, especially France, whereas the problems of the Middle East had for obvious reasons, for better or for worse, been handled by the United States. Since the start of GW. Bush’s “war on terror” however, the Americans have decided to enlarge their footprint in the Arab world. Consequently, a new strategic region was created to that end, commonly known as MENA (Middle East + North Africa). The Pentagon’s Africa command started to interfere in the way Maghreb countries were being run, the plan to partition Libya being only the culmination of such meddling.

European foreign policy experts and political representatives should, however, insist on adopting statecraft solutions for Tunisia, Libya and Algeria that are consistent with the region’s past and options for the future without any interference from America’s foreign policy operatives or from the Pentagon. Failing that, this region of the Arab world which has been reasonably peaceful until recently risks being engulfed in the same intractable conflicts that have characterised American leadership in the Middle East.