This article was written by Bashar Jarrar, a part-time speaker and trainer with the Public Diplomacy Program – US State Department. The views expressed below are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of CNN.
Good news and a thunderbolt. The news of the Chinese-Saudi-Iranian tripartite agreement in Beijing on Friday was herald of the success of major international mediation, which Moscow and Washington did not lose sight of, in one way or another, and the success of two regional mediations, Baghdad and Muscat.
If someone likens the “Abraham Accords” to a geopolitical earthquake in the Middle East, what we are witnessing if the agreement is implemented will be a geopolitical tsunami. Beijing’s entry as a guarantor to end four decades of tension that became violent, at least by proxy, between Saudi Arabia and Iran nearly two decades ago, in four Arab arenas, the closest of which are geographically Yemen and Iraq, and politically Syria and Lebanon.
This is the second Middle Eastern arena that Washington and the West in general lose, after the Russian influence in Syria, which is embarrassing for the White House administration, which caused its “weakness” in an atmosphere similar to the year 1936, according to the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy, in an interview with Fox News Sunday. McCarthy, after receiving the council hammer from Nancy Pelosi, who provoked the Chinese dragon by visiting Taiwan at the end of her service, became more and more closer to the right of the party, and to the wing of former President Donald Trump, who repeatedly warned against the policies of President Joe Biden and his predecessor, Barack Hussein Obama. Obama lost the war in favor of Russia in Syria and Ukraine, and now Biden is losing it in favor of China, and they have become two closer allies after the Ukraine war, contrary to what NATO wanted of a “double deterrence” for Russia and China together.
Just as the policy of “dual containment” that the Republican and Democratic parties pursued with the rulers of Iran failed since Khomeini assumed power in Tehran in 1979, coming aboard a French Airbus from Paris. Naturally, the White House anticipated everyone’s concerns, internally and externally, and considered, in the words of General John Kirby, the Chinese agreement as the result of “Washington’s pressure” and its support for Saudi Arabia’s armaments and military to deter Iran and the Houthis.
It is natural for Beijing and Moscow to glorify the agreement, and to welcome it with caution and some skepticism from Washington and its European and Atlantic allies, but the lesson, as Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan said, is in “commitment to what was agreed upon.” Opening a “new page” is not along the lines of “growing beards” reconciliations, but rather mutual “confidence-building measures”, foremost of which are the provisions of the agreement: “respect for the sovereignty of states”, “non-interference in internal affairs”, and “the promotion of regional and international peace and security”. An equilateral triangle is, in fact, a broad red line crossing out proxy wars and wars of attrition, which include militias, terrorism and drugs.
Russia won a round in Syria and is working hard to win it in Ukraine, while the political solution was absent from the two arenas. China is now presenting itself as an alternative and more importantly as a guarantor of the most intertwined security, economic and political files in the region, which is the Iranian file, which is approaching zero hours and no one knows its due: the nuclear program and the uprising that began as a youthful feminism and became comprehensively popular in Iran.
The big question: Did the language of mediation succeed away from economic sanctions and threats to use force, or was Beijing implicated, as Russia was implicated, in what Washington wanted to redeploy and re-engage regionally and internationally? Yemen, ending the intractability and security and political takeover in Lebanon, and stopping the war of attrition with poisons called drugs.
The winners are many, led by the parties to the tripartite agreement, but there is no consolation for the losers who got involved in the proxy wars. We will not mention them by name, because “the mark on their faces” is in their speeches, which turned one hundred and eighty degrees as soon as the agreement was announced!
The post Opinion.. Bashar Jarrar writes to CNN about the success of Beijing’s mediation between Riyadh and Tehran: The winners are many, and there is no consolation for the losers! appeared first on Gatto Presss.