Category: Borders

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IRAN ON THE MOVE: Mullahs Send Warships to Oman, Food to Qatar

The Iranian based Tasnim news agency reported that Iran is sending two warships, an Alborz destroyer and a Bushehr logistics warship to Oman on Sunday.  They will depart from the port city of Bandar Abbas. The move comes as tensions continue to rise between much of the Sunni Arab world and Qatar. The report says that the ships will continue from Oman to the Gulf of Aden, near Yemen.

Iran is continuing to step up its help to Qatar by flying food items to the isolated country.

“Following the sanctions … on Qatar, IranAir has so far transported food and vegetables to this country by four flights,” Shahrokh Noushabadi, head of public relations at Iran’s national airline, was quoted as saying by Fars news agency.

Iran has been sending over 100 tons of food per day since the sanctions took effect.

Qatar only has one land route and that is through Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, it sits completely inside the territorial waters of Saudi Arabia, which means it is completely reliant on the Saudis for imports unless they are made by air.

Will Yemen Heat Back Up?

Although out of the news. The Yemen war, which pits Saudi backed government forces against the Iranian backed Houthis has largely been ignored by the world media.  With Iran on the move again, will their retaliation against Saudi Arabia  be in Yemen? Seemingly Iran has the ability to increase its military adventures in a few areas. One would be against Israel through its proxy Hezbollah and the other is certainly Yemen.

With Iran openly backing the Qataris against Saudi Arabia, the region is quickly moving to war and increased chaos. The challenge for the world community is that this war is taking place in two of the most important shipping lanes, the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea. Any expanded war has the potential to affect shipping as well as spill over into a Sunni/Shiite wide conflict.

Iran has made its move. Are the Saudis ready to invade Qatar?

 

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Will the Saudi Showdown with Qatar Trigger a Broader Conflict?

As the Saudi 24 hour ultimatum to Qatar reaches the final stretch, the broader alliances throughout the Middle East and beyond have begun to harden. Turkey’s parliament passed a law ratifying military cooperation, arms, and training with Qatar.  Cooperation with Turkey and Iran has also broadened into other areas.

“We are in talks with Turkey and Iran and other countries,” said an official, who spoke to Reuters news agency on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the subject, adding that the supplies would be brought in through Qatar Airways cargo flights.

Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov when he visits Moscow on June 10, Russian news agencies cited a Russian diplomatic source as saying on Thursday.

With all of this maneuvering, observers are increasingly of the assumption that a war to push the Thani family out of Qatar is close at hand.  Given Qatar’s growing list of allies, any small war has the potential to turn into something far larger.

Once again Qatar’s allies are not surprising.  After all the Syrian conflict has roots in pushing back at Iranian hegemony as well as thwarting the Turkish-Qatari gas pipeline which was supposed to run through Syria.

There is no question that battle lines are being drawn for a wider conflict.  The only question is whether the Saudi standoff with Qatar will trigger a conflict that no one will be able to contain.

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After Raqqa Falls, Can an Israeli Supported Kurdistan Reshape the Middle East?

With the battle for Raqqa about to get underway, those countries looking to pickup the scraps after ISIS is dead and buried are numerous, but essentially fall into two categories.  The first are Iran, Russia, Allawite Syria, and Turkey.  The second group is made up of the emerging Sunni alliance led by Saudi Arabia, Syrian opposition groups, the Kurds, and Israel.

The emerging strong man in the battle for Raqqa is the YPG, which is the American backed Kurdish militia of Northern Syria.  Just like the Peshmerga in Iraq, the Kurds in Syria fight with the same determination against ISIS.  Yet, with ISIS on the run and the Kurds fully backed by the USA a post caliphate Middle East is already emerging. It is clear as that the Turks have increasing nightmares of a Kurdish state rising on their border from the Mediterranean to Iran. Furthermore, this Kurdish state would be backed by the USA. the irony cannot be mistaken as the plan of the Shiites led by Iran has always been to create a corridor from Tehran to the Mediterranean.

The battle after Rakka will be an attempt to destroy the nascent Kurdistan by Turkish and Shiite forces.  The Turks opposed the US arming of the YPG a month ago.  One Turkish official said the the decision to arm the YPG was “tantamount to placing dynamite under Turkey-USA relations.”

Kurdistan – Image Source – PANONIAN

Israel Must Back Syrian Kurds

With Iran on the march and the US still trying to find its footing in the Middle East, the long standing covert alliance between Iraqi Kurdistan and Israel, must be applied to the YPG and the autonomous Kurdish cantons in Northern Syria.  The only force capable of providing stability East of the Levant are the Kurds. They, like the Jews, Druze, and Arameans have been systematically displaced over the 1400 year Jihad led by arabized Muslims who were only indigenous to Saudi Arabia until they pushed out of the Arabian peninsula after Muhammad died.

ISIS was conceived by the Obama administration, Turkey, and the Gulf States to hold back Iranian influence in the region.  The problem was that this entity turned on its masters and subsequently invited itself to be destroyed.  The Kurds, whom most of the players used and then abused over the years are the only stable option to holding back the rising Shiite influence in the area. The challenge is that Erdogan’s Turkey has decided that Iran is a far better partner than allowing a sovereign Kurdish entity from exposing the myth of Turkish control and historical continuity in the region.

The Trump Administration has clearly opted for the approach that backs a rising Kurdistan despite the threats from Turkey in doing so. The lines are being drawn.

Post Raqqa, the real war will begin.  Israel’s backing of a rising Kurdish state can ensure a totally different Middle East.

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Iran Uses Syrian Chaos to Reach Israel

With reports flowing out of Syria that regime forces are close to recapturing Damascus, the situation in the rest of the country remains fluid and chaotic.  So why the fanfare over the successful Damascus operation?  The recapture of Damascus gives the Syrian-Iranian-Russian axis the ability to easily funnel Iranian troops from Shiite areas in Iraq into Syria proper and even up to the Israeli border.

Given the agreement put into place between Russia, Turkey, Syria, and Iran over the four ceasefire zones literally places the border between Jordan and Syria, as well as the Israeli Golan under range of an increasing Iranian troop presence, it is understandable that Israel and even the US is highly reluctant to embrace the agreement signed in Kazakhstan.

With the creation of four safe-zones, the four countries that have signed on have virtually created a no-fly zone for US fighters.  This has implications for two major spheres: Israel and Kurdistan.

Israel has been relying on tacit Russian allowances to fly over and strike shipments from Iran to Hezbollah. It remains to be seen whether Putin will continue to allow this.  Given the fact Iranian troops are increasing their presence on Israel’s Northern border, an absence of this agreement puts Israeli security in jeopardy.

The Turkish ceasefire zones are all focused on forcing the US-back Kurds from the Turkish border.  Without US -air support and supplies, the Kurds can be pushed back.  Unfortunately they have been the best armed force in combating ISIS.  With Kurds being threatened by Turkey, ISIS can and will grow in Northern Syria, after all it was Turkey that had been their original patron.

With Trump distracted in North Korea and domestic troubles, his team has been slow to react to what has become a fait accompli of near Russian-Iranian control over most of Syria. This not only imperils Israel and Kurdistan, but the broader Middle East.

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While North Korea Draws the World’s Attention, Iran Closes in on Israel

With the Russian, Chinese, and American armed forces now converging on North Korea, another front long thought of as the probable catalyst for a potential world war has seemingly grown quiet. Or has it?

While most of the world awaits some sort of climax to the North Korean standoff, there is something precarious growing around Israel’s Northern border.  The Russians have used the North Korean crisis to allow the Iranians and Hezbollah to tighten their grip on Israel’s Golan border. It is no accident that while everyone is focused on staving off a nuclear war on the Korean peninsula, the Turks, Russians, and Iranians have agreed to create safe-zones in Syria.

The Southern most safe zone buttresses the Golan heights allowing for Iranian troops to reach Israeli territory unhindered. Furthermore the agreement which was struck in Kazakhstan last week ensures that US air coverage cannot fly over these zones.  Israel is now essentially on its own.

As we reported in April, the long known alliance between North Korea and Iran has become more apparent as President Trump seems intent on stopping the North Korean regime from creating havoc in Asia. When North Korea starts, Iran always follows.  With the bellicose statements of Kim Jong-un growing more war like by the day there is a distinct possibility, that this has been a pre-planned diversion.  After all Iran seems has been keeping the North Korean economy afloat through the buying of its nuclear technology.  The Obama administration’s cash infusion into Iran has been moved over to North Korea in order to make sure both programs develop without hindrance.

The noose is tightening with Russian approval around Israel.  Putin of course wants Israel to beg for his protection.  Israel seems intent on going it alone. After Trump’s trip to the Middle East expect the shoe to drop. When Trump moves to take out Kim Jong-un, Israel will be on its own.