WRegardless of the truth behind the New Year’s atrocities in New Orleans, the incident serves as a reminder of how foreign conflicts, especially those in the Middle East, can have deadly effects at home. Dew.
The pickup truck driver who died in a shootout with police may have been a problematic individual who used the ISIS emblem as a mere flag of convenience, despite his background, military past, and history. . A look at his contacts and the weapons at his disposal might suggest otherwise.
But the connections are drawn. The ghosts that are evoked are not of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, but of the rather similar pickup truck attack carried out in the name of ISIS in New York City in 2017, and the ever-looming memory of 9/11. It is.
And the effect, intentional or not, will be a devastating rebuke of outgoing President Joe Biden’s largely failed Middle East policy and a warning to the incoming administration of Donald Trump.
The question, then, is how President Trump will decide to respond if New Orleans is seen as a possible harbinger of a resurgence of Middle East terrorism, and how U.S. policy in the region will change more than ever before. At a time of flux, the question is what plans the United States will make for its policy in the region. Since the Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1979.
The overthrow of Bashir al-Assad’s regime in Syria left enormous uncertainty in the heart of the region, which could develop into a new haven of stability, or vice versa. The balance of power between a strengthened Turkey in the north, a weakened Iran in the east, and the Kurds in between, which also holds thousands of former IS fighters, is changing.
Further east is Afghanistan, which is under Taliban control. To the West, we have a leaderless Palestine with a destroyed Gaza Strip and a hard-pressed Israel that is certainly more willing to destroy both Hezbollah and Hamas than it would have liked. Existing uncertainties are further exacerbated by the aging and instability of leadership across the region.
It is not an easy or unproblematic succession for any US administration, to say the least. But that’s probably not what President Trump envisioned as a central concern — at least not yet.
When he left office in 2021, his successor as secretary of state believed the Middle East was as peaceful as it has been in recent years. President Trump may have wanted the conflict between Israel and Hamas to end long before he took office, but a ceasefire and hostage release still hang in the balance.
The next president must therefore combat U.S. involvement on three fronts. the country’s support for the war against Russia in Ukraine; His own interests in China and the high level of concern in Congress about China’s intentions toward Taiwan. And now, with power dynamics in the Middle East constantly changing, there is a possibility that jihadist terrorism, including on the U.S. mainland, will return.
President Trump may intend to treat the Ukraine war as a foreign policy priority, but fate may have other ideas. The Middle East could soon be in an equally, if not more, state of emergency. Based on Trump’s handling of “overseas” during his first term in the White House, here are some tentative outlooks for the future.
In the very short term, President Trump will use forces already in the area and remote drone strikes to limit the impact of attacks against Islamic State and other groups seeking to take advantage of the shifting power vacuum. There is a possibility that a counterattack will be decided. He has ordered highly targeted attacks against the Syrian army in the wake of the reported chemical attack and may decide to take similar action against anti-Western terror groups, but Such attacks could have the opposite effect if they encourage recruitment to IS and its allies.
Trump has often been described as an isolationist. However, this is not strictly true. It would be more accurate to say that he was very selective in all his actions. This includes the 2020 assassination of Qasem Soleimani, said to be a spymaster in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, for which Iran has threatened and may threaten to retaliate. be.
President Trump considers individuals, rather than organizations or governments, to be important, and even in a negative sense, such as with Soleimani, President Trump has held controversial meetings with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un and failed rapprochement with North Korea. It may also be observed that it has a positive meaning, as in Vladimir Putin. The same can be seen in his response to Volodymyr Zelensky and the increasingly positive references to him by the Ukrainian leader.
A similar approach in the Middle East could call for early talks between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Saudi crown prince. It was during President Trump’s first administration that the so-called Abraham Accords were signed, in which several Gulf states recognized the state of Israel. The next step was supposed to be a Saudi-Israeli deal, but it was derailed by the Gaza conflict, but was not completely shelved.
Given the ongoing shifts in power in the region, President Trump has announced a breakthrough for Iranian President Massoud Pezeshikian, whose tentative overtures to the West (at last year’s UN General Assembly) were widely ignored. We may also consider inviting others.
If Trump is not an isolationist, he is in that he is reluctant, almost refusing, to send U.S. troops overseas, and indeed in his strong desire to bring them home. is a non-interventionist. After all, it was he who was instrumental in the withdrawal of the United States from Afghanistan, who was executed in disorder by his successor.
It should also be noted that neither of the current conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza began on his watch, an electoral advantage. And this may just be a sign of Trump’s more ambitious policies toward the Middle East.
Perhaps, at the end of its four-year term, the United States radically reduced, if not actually ended, its active military presence in the Middle East, thereby shifting its long-promised “pivot” to the Pacific. Will he be able to make a change of foot? east?
There are two main reasons why the United States maintains a substantial military presence in the region. One was to secure oil exports to the United States. The other reason is to protect Israel. The United States is now more than energy self-sufficient, and the former has lost much of its effectiveness unless the country sees itself as the world’s policeman for other supply routes. Once the Iranian threat is reduced and Israel is fully recognized regionally, the need for a second one could be greatly reduced, which is why the Abraham Accords were the starting point.
Apparently, if U.S. diplomatic and security assistance to Israel becomes more problematic domestically and Israel’s political climate changes, a more hands-off approach on the U.S. side could be better for both sides. be. as helping to ease other tensions in the region.
Donald Trump, an ardent defender of Israel and famous for his transactional mindset, may be the president to do just that.
