Middle East from perspective of Arab League Summit Analysis by Nasibova

Azerbaijan is full of important regional and international political events this week. Today, immediately after the Sochi summit, [Azerbaijani] President Ilham Aliyev, at the invitation of his Algerian counterpart Abdelmadjid Tebboune, arrived in this country, where he will take part in the summit of the League of Arab States (LAS).

Such a rich agenda is due to the fact that Azerbaijan adheres to a balanced foreign policy course both in global politics as a whole and in regional bilateral and multilateral relations with Arab countries. The organisers considered Azerbaijan's participation in this summit expedient as our country is the leading one in the South Caucasus region.

It is expected that during the two-day meeting in Algeria, Arab leaders will consider the situation around Palestine, the Ukrainian crisis's impact on the Middle East region, food and energy security issues, and finally, the consolidation of Arab countries in the face of various external threats.

For reference: The League of Arab States (LAS) is a regional intergovernmental organisation consisting of Arabic-speaking countries of the African and Asian continents. According to the LAS charter, any Arab country has the right to become a member of the organisation. The league does not have strict requirements for the state system, political orientation, religious worldviews or cultural values of the participating countries - they all differ from each other. All joint decisions are taken by voting in the Council of the Arab League, where each of the countries has one vote. The LAS was established on March 22, 1945. In Cairo, at the conference of the Arab States, which was attended by seven countries: Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Transjordan (now Jordan) and Yemen. In 1950, the Arab League was recognised by the UN as a regional organisation and received observer status. Currently, the LAS consists of 22 states: Algeria, Bahrain, Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Yemen, Qatar, Comoros, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, UAE, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Tunisia.

Against the background of global challenges, including the Ukrainian crisis, the political situation in the Middle East is influenced by several factors. Firstly, despite the fact that the Middle East countries are striving to remain neutral towards the Ukraine war, this in no way reduces the impact of the Ukrainian crisis on the regional processes. Washington's calls to isolate Moscow, addressed to Middle Eastern countries, have a very limited effect, which indicates a decrease in the role of the United States itself in this region. Secondly, paradoxically, but the essential role in this vast region is played not by Arab countries, but by Israel, Türkiye, Iran and Russia. For example, new trends have emerged in Israel's policy in the Middle East, and the main event of recent years has been the normalisation of its relations with several Arab countries at once, as a consequence of this policy, Tel Aviv's influence has increased here. As an example, we can cite a certain improvement in relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. An exceptional, little–expected event occurred this July - the Saudis officially opened their airspace to Israeli civil aviation, lifting the previously existing ban on flights. At the same time, Israel withdrew all objections to the transfer of the Egyptian islands of Tiran and Sanafir to Saudi Arabia at the strategically important exit from the Gulf of Aqaba to the Red Sea. Both of these events took place during the Middle East tour of American President Joe Biden, which tacitly confirms that the US approves and fully supports the actions towards each other taken by their closest regional allies.

There is no doubt that establishing a dialogue between the Saudis and the Israelis is one of Washington's global goals, primarily to create an anti-Iranian coalition in this strategically important region. At the same time, it is possible that the Americans would like to compensate for the weakening of their positions in the Middle East by forming a new alliance between Israel and some Arab states.

On the other hand, warming has begun in relations between Israel and Türkiye – the most important region, without which it is impossible to imagine any configuration.

It is worth noting one more important point. Currently, there are plenty of disagreements between Arab countries, for example, the tense relations between Algeria and Morocco can be called simply indicative in this sense.

Earlier this year, the French newspaper Opinion reported that Algeria is so concerned about the growing military cooperation between Morocco and Israel that it is seriously thinking about preparing a war with Rabat. Even the personal envoy of the UN Secretary-General for Western Sahara, Stefan de Mistura, arrived in the region to de-escalate the situation. It is known that for several decades the struggle for regional leadership has been going on between Morocco and Algeria, and for the last few years the countries have actually been living in a state of undeclared war. Against this background, the participation of King Mohammed VI of Morocco in the upcoming Arab League summit in Algeria inspires cautious optimism that the dialogue between the two far-from-friendly Arab countries will still begin.

But to date, this is the only example that gives hope that external threats can bring the Middle East's conflicting countries to a more peaceful position towards each other and unity in the League of Arab States.