Category: Regional Analysis

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China Will Be Determining US Middle East Policy Under Biden

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With the establishment of the Abraham Accords, President Trump has made the impossible happen in the Middle East. The accords brought a series of peace and normalization agreements between Israel and the UAE, Bahrain, and even Sudan; along with increased interaction and dialogue with Saudi Arabia.

The question arises, given the potential for an incoming Biden administration – will they continue to support the Abraham Accords?

Publicly, Biden has expressed support for the Abraham Accords in a prepared statement:

“I welcome the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain taking steps to normalize ties with Israel. It is good to see others in the Middle East recognizing Israel and even welcoming it as a partner.”

“A Biden-Harris Administration will build on these steps, challenge other nations to keep pace, and work to leverage these growing ties into progress toward a two-state solution and a more stable, peaceful region.”

At first glance, this is promising, yet as we know “personnel is policy,” so it is important to dig deeper and understand that while publicly Biden will continue to express support for the Abraham Accords, it is the people that are running the actual foreign policy that will drive the actual direction and relationship to the Middle East.

The Biden team is made up of people bent on returning American foreign policy back to the Obama era.

Biden’s pick for Secretary of State, Antony Blinken said that he would “seek to build on the nuclear deal and to make it longer and stronger if Iran returns to strict compliance.”

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s incoming National Security Advisor was also a key architect of the Iran Nuclear Deal, known as the JCPOA. More than that though, Sullivan is known as backer of rapprochement with China and is seen favorably by the Chinese Communist Leadership.

It was Sullivan who said the following on China:

“We need to strike a middle course – one that encourages China’s rise in a manner consistent with an open, fair, rules-based, regional order,” Sullivan said. “This will require care and prudence and strategic foresight, and maybe even more basically it will require sustained attention. It may not have escaped your notice that these are not in ample supply in Washington right now.”

Sullivan has actually blasted the Trump administration over moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem and pulling out of the JCPOA in an interview on CGTN, a Chinese Communist controlled media outlet in December 2017.

“This was a political decision, not a foreign policy decision. This was about Trump and his supporters. It was not about moving the peace process forward. I think Donald Trump has been playing games with the Iran nuclear deal. He’s been raising questions about whether he’s going to stay in or leave. And in doing that, he has created a situation in which the rest of the world is more worried about the risk Washington poses than they are about the risk Tehran poses. And that is not in America’s strategic interest.”

Of course history has proven Sullivan wrong about Trump’s strategy on peace in the Middle East and the need to suck up to China.

Along with the above pro-Iranian-Chinese advisors, Biden has appointed far left and anti-Israel Karine Jean-Pierre as Deputy Communications Director and Linda Thomas-Greenfield a known globalist as UN Ambassador.

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China Will Be Behind Every Biden Decision On Iran And Israel

With Biden’s team clearly sinophilic and internationalist and given the Chinese Communist Party’s coopting of Joe Biden through his son Hunter, it is not far-fetched to see ahead and understand that any foreign policy decision Biden will make in the Middle East would be run through Beijing.

After all, corruption aside, the Biden team believes whole-heartedly in the need for Chinese dominance on the world-stage. Chinese preeminence has been a hallmark in globalist policy for at least two decades and it is certainly a foundational aspect of the incoming Biden administration.

More importantly, for Israel and its newly formed alliance with moderate Sunni Arab countries, Chinese dominance means that a Biden administration would return back to the failed policy of encouraging Iranian dominance in the Middle East.

I wrote the following last week on this issue:

“If Joe Biden holds off President Trump’s legal challenges he will essentially be a compliant partner in allowing the China-Iran Axis to hold sway over the Middle East. It cannot be overstated how much Biden and his team are influenced by the CCP controlled China.”

However, I believe that the issue runs deeper than the words I chose to use there. It seems that Biden’s entire foreign policy will be directly decided by those interests that align with the CCP in Beijing.

Look for a complete partnership in restoring Iranian hegemony over the Persian Gulf as well as a hyper development in China’s Belt and Road Initiative allowing Iran and Pakistan to give the CCP access (militarily) to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. China is also in dispute with Kenya, with the former looking to exploit its economic investment into Kenya’s port as a means to exert control, as it has done elsewhere.

On all of these and more, the Biden administration will not only stand passively by as CCP run China marches forward, but it appears ready to work with it as Obama did in allowing it to break down what is left of regional sovereignty for these countries.

There is no doubt that Biden’s team sees Israel and the other signees to the Abraham Accords as the “real bad actors” in the region. After all it is Israel and its allies who are actively blocking Iranian expansion in the region – something China wants desperately and which is something the Biden administration is willing to give them.

So while Biden may publicly claim he is pro-Israel or pro the Abraham Accords – his real policy is the opposite. Already, those related to the incoming Biden administration (assuming he is inaugurated) and the former Obama administration are insinuating that is actually Israel that is the terror state.

As has been noted by many the following tweet by John Brennan, Obama’s former CIA director inferring that Israel is the bad actor and terror state in relation to Iran is all anyone needs to know about what is coming.

Given all of the above, after Jan 20th 2021, assuming Biden holds off President Trump in the Electoral College and the President’s many legal challenges, Israel and the moderate Sunni countries will be in the Biden team’s crosshairs. Not because it makes sense or because Biden is really interested in making peace, but because Beijing says so.

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Is Jordan In The Middle Of A Coup?

ArabNN is reporting that the rumors surrounding the disappearance of Jordan’s King are picking up steam as even Eddie Cohen of the Jerusalem Post appears to be confirming them.

Jordanian Opposition Leader Mudar Zahran has been agitating for full Palestinian rights in Jordan. 80 percent of Jordan’s populace are Palestinian Arabs and yet the King and his clan, along with the Muslim Brotherhood have essentially monopolized the country’s wealth and disenfranchised the majority of the populace. There has been growing discontent over the last year and calls for overthrowing the monarchy have grown.

“Jordan is facing unprecedented financial turmoil and COVID 19 death toll is rising at a staggering rate,” Jordanian Opposition Coalition (JOC) Leader Mudar Zahran said. “The ruling Hashemite family has systematically destroyed the country, and because no one has seen him in days, many are now asking: “Where’s Waldo?”

“Abdullah is clearly missing in action, and over 9 million Jordanians are searching for Waldo,” Zahran continued. “One thing is certain, he is running away from his duties, he brought this economic distress upon us, he lied to Jordanians juts three months ago telling them Jordan was almost COVID19 free, and now he left Jordanians to face their fate, while he is refusing to face the music.”

Intelligence website JAFAJ states the following:

“While the king’s whereabouts and conditions remain a mystery, Uncle Hassan has been frantically trying to fill the vacuum left by Abdullah’s absence, while drumming up political support.”

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How Does Jordanian Uncertainty Affect Israel

Israel has spent years propping up the Hashemite family in Jordan, to the point where despite King Abdullah’s partnership with Muslim Brotherhood terrorists, Israel still includes the monarchy in its security umbrella.

The thought has always been that despite the King’s two-faced policy, his “Kingdom” was necessary to provide a buffer to first protect against Iraq and then later Iran. Yet, with the recent deal between Israel and the UAE and Bahrain, as well as the growing possibility of Saudi Arabia, Jordan’s Monarchy has become a liability.

Is Saudi Arabia Helping To Depose the “Royal Family?”

There has been a long standing feud between the Hashemite and Saudi royal families dating back to when the Hashemites lived in what is now Saudi Arabia. The British placated the Hashemites by giving them what is today Jordan, leaving the Saudis in charge of the Arabian peninsula. Both dynasties have laid claim to being descended from Muhammed and both Kingdoms claim custodian over major shrines special to Islam. In Jordan’s case they control the management of the Temple Mount, which is within Israel’s security apparatus and sovereignty.

The last point is important and must be taken into account onto why Saudi Arabia sees the need to finally depose the Hashemites once and for all. The Hashemite claim to leadership of the Islamic world is essentially a farce. It resets on the fact that after 1967 the Israeli government was weak and allowed the Waqf to remain in charge. Thats it. Thats the whole claim King Abduallah and his family have.

The Saudis control Mecca and Medina, the two holist sites in Islam. They are a power player in the Middle East and see themselves as the rightful leaders of the Muslim world. Most of the world regards them that way as well.

So what is their interest in toppling the Jordanian Monarchy?

Simply put – peace.

With 80 percent of the Jordanian population made up of Palestinians and these Palestinians needing a State, the Saudis can ink a final deal between a Palestinian Jordan and Israel while signing a peace agreement themselves with the Jewish State. The Saudis would see their family replacing the Waqf as custodians of the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa and do away with a wannabe king who finds the Muslim Brotherhood in direct contravention of both American policy and Saudi interests.

So is Jordan’s King now on the way out? If he is, the Saudis are the most probable reason why – and that is a good thing for Israel and peace in the Middle East.

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Lead Iranian Nuclear Scientist Assassinated, But Did Israel Really Do It?

Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the Iranian scientist considered to be the mastermind behind Iran’s nuclear weapons program was gunned down Friday in Tehran.

Iran wasted no time blaming Israel: “Once again, the evil hands of global arrogance and the Zionist mercenaries were stained with the blood of an Iranian son,” Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said during a cabinet meeting early Saturday.

This was no doubt a major blow to Iran. This was on par with the Trump Administration’s targeted killing of arch Iranian terrorist Qasem Soleimani last year.

So while Israel is assuming there will be an Iranian response and rightfully raising alert levels at embassies around the world, the real question is – did Israel actually pull off such a high level assassination?

“I have no clue who did it. It’s not that my lips are sealed because I’m being responsible, I really have no clue,” Hanegbi, a confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told Meet the Press, Israel political TV show.

However, Prime Minister Netanyahu indicated the opposite on a video he posted on Facebook after the assassination: “I did a lot of things this week, not everything can be told.”

The truth is, while it is easy to believe that the Mossad has a team on the ground in Iran, it is also far more possible that Israel has made inroads into some of the non-Persian ethnic groups agitating against Iran and with their help have been able to penetrate deep within the Iranian security services in order to pull this attack off

Although the Mossad was directly involved in 2018, when it was able to break into Iran’s nuclear archives and remove 55,000 paper files and 183 CDs with another 55,000 files on them. No one doubts the Mossad’s prowess, but these sorts of attacks involving moving targets, explosives and gunmen are nearly impossible to pull off unless there was wide spread involvement by locals.

What Happens If They Never Left

When viewing the sorts of operations that the Mossad carries out, especially visa vi Iran, it must be assumed there is not one team who enters Iran, carries out the operation and then leaves. Rather, there is an obvious need for a team to remain there. Yet, Iranian intelligence is very good and so how is it possible this team has not been found yet?

Two possibilities come to mind.

Either the Mossad team is so good it just blends into the populace – disguised and all – or it is only one part of the team. The other part as mentioned above is made up of indigenous ethnic groups currently occupied by Iran.

Wikipedia

Above is a map detailing the various minority groups within Iran. It has long been known that the Kurds to the West and Baluchs to the South East are itching for independence. Any Mossad team could either come and go through KDP run Kurdistan into Western Iran or easily just blend into the local population there.

Furthermore, the Mossad may not be carrying out these sorts of assassinations, but rather work with disaffected groups by offering intelligence.

Iranian Kurds have been actively trying to separate since 1918. As recent as 2016 there have been armed clashes between Iranian Kurdish separatists and the Iranian Armed Forces. It would not be a stretch for any of these resistant groups to be fighting along side Western intelligence against Iran.

Either way, the actual success of the operation shows Iran’s intelligence services are lagging behind, not only because the Mossad has penetrated high enough up to be able to successfully carry out this operation, but because it has more than likely coopted locals to help it out.

Iran claims it will retaliate for the assassination of its top scientist, but it may not have much of a choice but to grit its teeth and focus on internal opposition instead.

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In Order To Stop China, Trump Must Go Through Iran

President Trump has largely used his four years as president to refrain from foreign interference and regime change that had marked both President Bush’s and Obama’s foreign policies.

However, there are two areas where Trump has successfully held the line and utilized a strong approach in order to wield results.

Over the last four years we have seen the President use the might of the USA and proper diplomacy to push back on both Iran and China.

He has been emphatic on holding Iran accountable for its drive towards nuclear weapons and its strategic regional destabilization activities, namely in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.

On China, he pushed back using tariffs and held strong during trade negotiations. Furthermore, he strengthened America’s relationship with India, Japan, and others directly surrounding China.

With all of this in mind, it is important to understand the relationship these two American adversaries have. By doing so, one can understand why the potential for an attack on Iran before Biden takes over has merit.

The Growing Iran-China Partnership

What was once only a geopolitical convenience, both countries have now seen the necessity behind their growing alliance.

So why do these two countries form such a symbiotic relationship?

Firstly, China’s energy needs are one of the largest in the world. The challenge for China is that its domestic source of oil or gas no longer covers its needs. It relies heavily energy imports.

So where does it import oil and gas from?

Source: The Observatory of Economic Complexity

On the face of it, China’s energy imports are pretty varied. However, there is another component, which makes Iran a key part to China’s equation. This is the Belt and Road initiative. China sees Iran as a key component in its ability to influence the Middle East. After all, while China may get energy from Iraq, Oman, and Kuwait, these countries are heavily influenced by policy decisions on Iran.

As an example, Oman has yet to join the Abraham Accords, because it fears retribution from Iran. Kuwait is heavily Shiite and although dislikes Iran, it is equally threatened by them. The same goes for Shiite controlled Iraq as well as part of the Kurdish North.

The latest cooperation agreement signed between Iran and China in June illustrates this. The cooperation agreement was further cemented this past October with a visit by Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif.

While the agreement focuses on economic and cultural ties, the use “terrorism” as a reason to partner together for security reasons or join support in international bodies should be understood as far more than just passive cooperation. Furthermore, the agreement stipulates China’s resolve to back the JCPOA nuclear deal and also help Iran with energy development, including nuclear.

While China has followed a policy of non-intervention in the Middle East, its growing alliance with Iran allows it to partner with someone who for its own reasons will be able to enforce Chinese hegemony in the Persian Gulf and over the rest of the region, thus ensuring a steady source of energy for years to come for Beijing.

In turn, Iran can rely on Chinese backing, both militarily and diplomatically for its drive to conquer Israel and the Sunni world.

Biden Will Strengthen The Chinese-Iranian Axis

If Joe Biden hold off President Trump’s legal challenges he will essentially be a compliant partner in allowing the China-Iran Axis to hold sway over the Middle East. It cannot be overstated how much Biden and his team are influenced by the CCP controlled China.

Jake Sullivan, Biden’s potential National Security Advisor was noted as saying that China’s rise is a foreign policy success.

He said the following in full remarks: “We helped create the conditions of stability and security in East Asia that allowed China to have this remarkable economic rise. So that it’s rising, in a way, is not the failure of American foreign policy; it’s the success of creating those stable conditions.”

Biden has issued positive statements as well about China’s rise.

Iran’s ability to act as China’s forward base and arm in the Middle East is perhaps Trump’s actual reason for considering a limited but serious strike on the Islamic Republic. Any action President Trump carries out or allows the new Israel-Sunni Alliance to carry out before he potentially leaves in January should be seen through a prism that takes China into it as well.

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PREPARING FOR BIDEN: Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Meet To Plan Next Moves

The news is awash with rumors of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s face to face meeting with Muhamed bin Salman, the Saudi Crown Prince, also known as MBS. Now confirmed, the meeting took place on Sunday in the desert city of Neom.

Under construction as a $500 billion showcase of technological innovation, the Israeli leader spent nearly five hours with MBS, Saudi Arabia’s heir to the throne. The Prime Minister was joined by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Mossad Director Yossi Cohen.

While the setting of Neom was a fitting place for this groundbreaking meeting, it was not the technology or environmental aspects of Neom the two leaders were discussing. More than likely, they were discussing the incoming Biden administration and the dangers it brings to the region.

It is also true that with less than two months left to President Trump’s term full normalization may be on the table. Such a move is necessary in order to block the potential return of the JCPOA (Iranian nuclear deal), which threatens the safety of both the Sunni Arab Gulf States and Israel.

However, the JCPOA is only one worry. The immediate change in status for Iran in dealing with the White House is what scares Israel and its new Arab allies. Iran, backed by China and a compliant America will be able to demonize the Persian Gulf and beyond.

Biden’s incoming administration is more like a third term for Obama and it is this third term, which seeks to truly transform the world. From faux climate change to reengaging China and Iran, the Deep State and globalists who now find themselves moments away from active control of the USA are salivating for the opportunity to push back on Israel and the Saudi-UAE-Bahrain alliance.

Remember, it was the Obama administration who enabled ISIS and thus created a vacuum of power in Iraq that allowed Iran to march into.

Antony Blinken is Only Tip Of The Iceberg

Antony Blinken the incoming Secretary of State was one of the backers and architects of the JCPOA. He will have full control of America’s foreign policy and appears ready to reengage with Iran. With Biden, largely expected to take a back seat to decision making, Blinken’s role will be magnified.

Another Obama-Clinton retread is Jack Sullivan, who served as Deputy Chief of Staff for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Biden has appointed him as incoming Director of the National Security Advisor (NSA).

Finally (at least for now), Avril Haines who worked at the White House starting in 2010 as a national security lawyer and then in 2013, then CIA Director John Brennan appointed her deputy director for the CIA. Brennan was the one who brought us drone assassinations, an expanded Iran, and a decimated Libya among other things.

The above appointments and more show which direction the Biden team plans on heading on Jan. 20th.

Bibi and MBS Building An Alliance

The 1 hour trip to Neom was in essence a path forward for both Israel and Saudi Arabia. The ascendancy of Biden to President means a possible reversal of the gains the Trump Administration accomplished. This is why Israel and Saudi Arabia may have no choice but to forge a path together and build a new Middle East with or without America. By doing so, they will have the ability to hold back the Mullahs and in many ways the coming Biden Administration.