Why Do Great Powers Insist on Wooing Political Islam?

During the past three months, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama has stopped the threat of the most prominent arsenals of weapons of mass destruction in the Arab region: chemical in Syria, nuclear in Iran. Thus, Obama achieved unprecedented strategic security for Israel, security that other American presidents did not offer. Consequently, Israel will live in that comforting security without batting an eyelash.

Do not let Netanyahu’s anger and screaming about the latest nuclear agreement fool you. Although Israel expressed anger, it’s the same as tears of joy. Maybe, if not for modesty, Israel should send a letter of thanks and esteem to Syrian President Bashar Assad and to the Iranian leader Ali Khamenei for this gift, which neither he nor his predecessors as heads of government could even dream about. Add to this the effect on the Arab armies: Syria and Iraq are no longer remembered, especially since the Obama administration has preoccupied the Egyptian army with battles in the Sinai after driving the Muslim Brotherhood from behind the curtain and enabling it to take power.

The nuclear agreement between the P5+1 countries [U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany] and Iran sets two paths that will last six months and will stop Iran from enriching uranium from 20 percent to 90 percent. That is the stage that the project was reaching and the last before the production of a nuclear warhead. On the one hand, the agreement undertakes to dispose of uranium enriched to 20 percent by destroying it or returning it to an unenriched uranium mixture. On the other hand, it relieves economic pressure through the release of $7 billion, including Iranian money frozen abroad.

Two truths on the ground impose on the terms of the agreement. The first is that Iran will obtain a nuclear bomb soon. From an empirical perspective, the enrichment of uranium from 5 percent to 20 percent takes time and many dedicated centrifuges. That is what Iran has been working on in recent years. As for the uranium’s transformation from 20 percent to 90 percent, that is faster and less costly. Iran has supplies of 20 percent enriched uranium that would enable it to produce a nuclear warhead in two years.

The second truth is that Iran itself created this agreement when it — through the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic — chose Hassan Rouhani as its president. This level of change away from radicals such as [preceding Iranian President] Ahmadinejad to more moderate people sends a clear message to the West that Iran wants to get closer and change its foreign policy. In turn, the West picked up the signal and moved a step in that direction. However, under the agreement, Iran is granted $7 billion, which is no small amount to a country that is so large and populous and that has suffered since the previous American administration from economic suffocation due to sanctions. This is especially clear because we know that Iran has been losing $5 million monthly from its inability to sell its oil because of the economic sanctions. This means that to Iran, the amount released is nothing more than hospitality tea in Geneva, in recognition of its response. As for the most important economic sanctions — especially those related to the sale of oil and banking transactions — they remain.

Moreover, the agreement confirmed that the West in general and the Obama administration specifically are still relying on political peace for the stability of its interests in the Arab region. Yet, the American administration ended its interesting experiment with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and returned today to disown the group and implore the Egyptian government for the political participation of the Brotherhood to ward off its wickedness. The experiment this time was not encouraging. However, it relates to the mullah regime in Iran. Washington thinks that might weaken the extremist Sunni Islamist regime al-Qaida or the moderate Sunni Islam that’s represented, in its opinion, by the Muslim Brotherhood or Shiite Iran. Both of them easily made deals. The first option failed in Egypt. It turned out that a faction turned to extremism, and that developed into the second choice as George Bush did in Iraq when he opened the Eastern door to Iranians and turned his back on the Sunnis of Iraq. We see the results today. Iraq is bloody and development is nonexistent, but that is unobtrusive.

In practice, Iran is not reluctant to shake hands with Obama as long as doing so would leave it more free to move in Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Bahrain. That would allow it to be one of the pillars of change in the new Syria. In truth, these Iranian desires are its basic goals in terms of the nuclear project. That is, the end yielded what it wanted for hegemony over the neighboring Arab region surrounded by the Persian Gulf. The Iranian nuclear program is a claw that threatens the heart of the Gulf. It is true that it has not been used yet, but on every occasion, we have heard it rapping on the windows of the Arab region.

The Sunni forces are aware of the seriousness of this situation, particularly in Saudi Arabia, the nursemaid of Sunnis in the Islamic world. Failure of the nuclear agreement — such as failure to reach a final formula for agreement during the ongoing negotiations and the upcoming six months — would mean that the picture will become clearer for Gulf residents and that they will appear as very serious parties to the agreement. Such failure would foretell the return of Israeli military threats against Iran. The Gulf states would be forced to protect themselves from nuclear weapons.

Moreover, what matters is not the failure of the agreement but its success.

What if Iran succeeded in reassuring the West, and it passed the test by acquiescing to every condition and implementing each obligation? What is the Arab region to expect?

The West is not saying that the conflict between Iran and the Arabs is a historical conflict involving nuclear weapons, chemical weapons, American presidential eras, the Syrian issues, Houthis* and Nouri al-Maliki. This conflict is a fixed and eternal truth. Really, it is a powerful war. Its model is similar to the East-West conflict produced by events and origins that are centuries old.

Six months will pass quickly. We are witnessing a new chapter in the place. Rather, the raging conflict will pass and will proceed, and no signatures will stop it.

*Editor’s note: The Houthis are a Shiite insurgent group active in Yemen.