JN-1053

Jerusalem News (3 April, 2014, 3 Nisan, 5774)

Contents:
1. Will China replace the U.S. in the Middle East? by Paul Rivlin
2. DUTCH MEP SAYS THE PRO-ISRAELI CAMP IS GROWING
3.  Iraqi Shias with Iran and Syria Versus Sunni Muslims
War Across  the Borders by Jonathan Spyer

================================
================================
1. Will China replace the U.S. in the Middle East? by Paul Rivlin
From: Dayan Center <dayancen@POST.TAU.AC.IL>
Subject: IQTISADI: "Will China replace the U.S. in the Middle East?" - Vol. 4,
 No. 3, March 25, 2014
Editors: Paul Rivlin and Yitzhak Gal    Assistant Editors: Brandon Friedman and Gal Buyanover
Vol. 4, No. 3    March 25, 2014

Extracts:

Is the U.S. pulling out of the Middle East while China's role in the region grows? The U.S. has withdrawn its troops from Iraq and is withdrawing them from Afghanistan. It is also becoming less dependent on imported oil, especially that from the Persian Gulf. U.S. reluctance to get involved in the fighting in Syria or to go beyond economic sanctions in the conflict with Iran also suggests its desire to retreat from the region. On the other hand it remains the main interlocutor between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet, numerous U.S. military bases, and approximately 40,000 troops remain in the Gulf.

China's interests are mainly economic: it needs oil if its economy is to continue growing. The imminent emergence of China as the world's largest net oil importer has been driven by steady growth in demand, trade, power generation, transportation sector shifts, and refining capabilities and flat demand for oil in the U.S. market. China is undiscriminating in its relations with other states and so has close links with some of the worst regimes in the region, such as Sudan, and is willing to trade with Iran as well as Iraq and others. While this is largely explained by its need for oil, the reality is more complex.
..  China's merchandise trade with the Middle East (including Israel but not North Africa) has grown much faster than that of the U.S. In 2012, its exports to the region were 23 percent larger than those of the U.S. while its imports were 21 percent higher.

The main reason for this growth was that China imported more oil from the Middle East than any other part of the world and these imports increased rapidly.  In 2011, it imported 2.9 million barrels per day (mb/d) of Middle Eastern oil, which accounted for 60 percent of its oil imports. In the same year, the United States imported 2.5 million barrels per day of oil from the Middle East, accounting for 26 percent of its total oil imports.

According to China's Development Research Center of the State Council, if consumption is not curbed by 2030, China will then import about 75 percent of its oil. China is set to surpass the United States this year as the world's largest oil importer and much of this will come from the Middle East. ..

Despite their rivalry, U.S. - China relations are quite different from those between the two Cold War superpowers: the U.S. and U.S.S.R. The U.S. and Chinese economies are much more interdependent: the two countries are massive trading partners. In 2013, China's exports to the U.S. came to $439 billion while U.S. exports to China totaled $120 billion. China therefore has a huge merchandise trade surplus with the U.S. and it is also a major holder of U.S. bonds. It therefore has a vital interest in the health of the dollar as well as the U.S. economy more generally. In December 2013, China held $1.27 trillion worth of U.S. government bonds, an eight-fold increase over the last decade. The United States is in effect borrowing from China to pay for the fact that its imports from the latter are much larger than its exports to it. The U.S. is, of course, interested in China maintaining this holding while China has interests in U.S. prosperity and stability. This is always a factor when China considers its policies in the Middle East.

The fact that China has surpassed the U.S. as importer of Persian Gulf crude has added to tensions because it means that the U.S. military is protecting China's growing oil shipments in the region at a time Beijing resists pressure to back U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.

The U.S. dominates military security of Middle East oil exports as the U.S. Fifth Fleet patrols the Persian Gulf. For years, China and other oil-consuming nations have benefited as Washington spent billions of dollars a year to police chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz and other volatile parts of the Middle East to ensure oil flowed.

According to Professor Roger Stern, on an annual basis the Persian Gulf mission now costs about as much as the Cold War did. Stern has estimated the cost of the U.S. military presence in the Gulf from 1976 to 2010 at $8 trillion, or $235 billion a year. The Persian Gulf mission pins down the U.S. military and limits its ability to project force elsewhere. Major General Yin Zhuo, director of China's navy information committee, has noted that it would take the United States time to return forces to Asia and China needs to grasp this strategic opportunity presumably by maintaining its strength in East Asia while the U.S. protects fuel sources in the Middle East. Anti-terrorist wars still constrain U.S. power. Without the extensive long-term U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf, it seems an open question whether anti-U.S. suicide terrorism such as the USS Cole and 9/11 attacks would have taken place, Stern has noted.

China's rise as a dominant buyer of Middle East oil presents a conundrum. The Chinese economy has become partly dependent on oil from a region protected by the U.S. military. When tankers leave Persian Gulf terminals for China, they rely in significant part on the U.S. Fifth Fleet policing the area.

For the U.S., China's oil demand means justifying military spending that benefits a country many Americans see as a strategic rival and that frequently opposes the U.S. on foreign policy.

Signs of tension are surfacing. Beijing has asked for assurances that Washington will maintain security in the Persian Gulf region, as China doesn't have the military power to do the job itself. This is despite the fact that China's military spending is rising. In March 2014, China announced a 12.2 percent increase in defense spend over last year, to almost $132 billion, the second-largest military budget in the world after the United States (which remains far larger at $523 billion). According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, between 2002 and 2012, China's military spending rose three-fold per cent in real terms while that of the United States increased by about 50 percent.

China maintains a three-ship antipiracy task force in the Indian Ocean and occasionally sends military ships to the Mediterranean. It has also contributed troops to the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon. Turkey's decision to acquire the Chinese FD-2000 missile defense system for $3.4 billion rather than rival U.S. or European systems may be a sign of things to come.

Chinese officials are reported to have sought to ensure continued U.S. commitment to the region, particularly as the Obama administration has tried to increase its strategic focus on East Asia.

In return, U.S. officials have pressed China for greater support on issues such as its foreign policy regarding Syria and Iran. U.S. officials in private discussions have pressed China to lower its crude imports from Iran.

The U.S. has other interests in keeping a large presence in the region, including protecting Israel and shoring up shipping lanes for allies such as Japan and South Korea. It is not clear whether the U.S. would soon welcome greater Chinese military involvement in the Middle East, which could challenge America's role in the region.

================================
================================
2. DUTCH MEP SAYS THE PRO-ISRAELI CAMP IS GROWING
by Arutz Sheva
Bastiaan Belder, a Dutch politician and Member of the European Parliament, said Monday that anti-Israel sentiment is "mostly on the Left."
Belder is a Dutch politician and Member of the European Parliament with the SGP, part of the Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group. He spoke to Arutz Sheva about anti-Semitism in his country.
Belder sits on the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs. He himself is a member of the SGP, the Reformed Political Party .

================================
================================
3.  Iraqi Shias with Iran and Syria Versus Sunni Muslims
War Across  the Borders by Jonathan Spyer
PJ Media
March 28, 2014
http://www.meforum.org/3803/middle-east-borders

Extracts:
It has become a commonplace to claim that the unrest in the Arab world is challenging the state borders laid down in the Arab world following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1918.



This claim, however, is only very partially valid. It holds true in a specific section of the Middle East, namely the contiguous land area stretching from Iran's western borders to the Mediterranean Sea, and taking in the states currently known as Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.

In this area, a single sectarian war is currently taking place. The nominal governments in Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut may claim to rule in the name of the Iraqi, Syrian and Lebanese peoples. But the reality of power distribution in each of these areas shows something quite different.

In each of these areas, local, long suppressed differences between communities are combining with the region-wide cold war between Iran and Saudi Arabia to produce conflict, discord and latent or open civil war.

In each case, sectarian forces are linking up with their fellow sect members (or co-ethnics, if that's a word, in the case of the Kurds) in the neighboring "country" against local representatives of the rival sect.

Let's take a look at the rival coalitions. These are not simply theoretical constructs. The cooperation between the relevant sides is largely overt, and has been extensively verified.

On one side, there are the Shia (and Alawi) allies of Iran. These are the Maliki government in Iraq, the Assad regime in Syria, and Hizballah, the Iranian proxy force which dominates Lebanon.

Both Hizballah and the Maliki government, at the behest of Iran, have played a vital role in the survival of Bashar Assad and his current resurgence.

Hizballah's role is well-documented. The movement maintains around 5,000 fighters at any one time in Syria. They have just completed a spearhead role in a nearly year long campaign to drive the rebels from the area adjoining the Lebanese border. They are also deployed in Damascus.

Assad's Achilles heel throughout has been the lack of committed fighters willing to engage on his behalf. Hizballah, working closely with Iran, has played a vital role in filling that gap.

In addition, Hizballah is working hard to suppress any Sunni thoughts of insurrection in Lebanon itself. Its forces cooperated with the Lebanese Army in crushing Sunni Islamists in Sidon in June, 2013. It also offers support to Alawi elements engaged in a long running mini-war with pro-Syrian rebel Sunnis in the city of Tripoli.

Maliki's role on behalf of Assad is less well-reported but no less striking.

It is first of all worth remembering that the Iraqi prime minister spent from 1982-90 in exile in Iran, and his political roots and allegiances are, unambiguously, to Shia Islamism.

Regular overflights and ground convoys have used Iraqi territory since the start of the Syrian civil war to carry vital Iranian arms and supplies from Iran to Assad's forces in Syria.

A western intelligence report obtained by Reuters in late 2012 confirmed this, noting that "planes are flying from Iran to Syria via Iraq on an almost daily basis, carrying IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps) personnel and tens of tons of weapons to arm the Syrian security forces and militias fighting against the rebels."

It also asserted that Iran was "continuing to assist the regime in Damascus by sending trucks overland via Iraq" to Syria.

In addition, Iraqi Shia volunteers from the Abu Fadl al-Abbas Brigades and other formations have helped to fill Bashar's gap in available and committed infantry.

The Maliki government has made no effort to stop the flow of such fighters across the border even as it engages in a UU.S.-supported counter insurgency against Sunni jihadis in western Anbar province in Iraq.

So the Iran-led regional bloc is running a well-coordinated, well-documented single war in three countries.

The Sunni Arab side of the line is predictably more chaotic and disunited. On this side, too, there are discernible links, but no single, clear alliance.

Unlike among the pro-Iran bloc, only the most radical fringe of the Sunnis cross the borders to engage in combat. There is no Sunni equivalent to the Qods Force cadres active in Syria and Lebanon.

Among the Sunni radicals, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group now controls a single contiguous area stretching from eastern Syria to western Anbar province in Iraq, and taking in Fallujah city in Iraq.

Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian franchise of al-Qaeda, is now active also in Lebanon. It has on a number of occasions penetrated Hizballah's security sanctum in the Dahiyeh neighborhood of south Beirut.

More broadly, Saudi Arabia is the patron of the Sunni interest in both Lebanon and Syria.

It is currently backing rebel forces in the south of Syria, and pro-Saudis dominate the Syrian National Coalition, which purports to be the political leadership of the rebellion.

It also supports and promotes the March 14th movement in Lebanon, and recently pledged $3 billion for the Lebanese Armed Forces,  presumably in a bid to build a force that could balance Hizballah.

But both Qatar and Turkey also play an important role in backing the Syrian rebels, and have their own clients among the fighting groups.

Saudi and Turkish fear and distrust of radical Sunni Islamist fighting groups prevent the emergence of a clear "Sunni Islamist international" to rival the Shia international of Iran.

Still, it is undeniable that cooperation exists among the various Sunni forces in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.

It's just that it's a complicated and sometimes chaotic criss-crossing of various rival interests and outlooks on the Sunni side, rather than a coherent single bloc.

And finally, of course, there is a single contiguous area of Kurdish control stretching from the Iraq-Iran border all the way to deep within Syria. This zone of control is divided between the Iraqi Kurds of the Kurdish Democratic Party and the Syrian Kurds of the rival, PKK-affiliated Democratic Union Party (PYD).

Once again, it is a contiguous area of control based on ethnic affiliation.