A billboard in Tel Aviv congratulates US President-elect Donald Trump on his victory in the US election. (AP Photo) / CC BY 4.0
The re-election of Donald Trump as the 47th president of the United States (repeating as the 45th man to hold the office) opens up a number of questions regarding the potential direction of his foreign policy in one of the areas of concern to us at Three Cultures: the Middle East.
"During my Administration, we had peace in the Middle East, and we will have it again very soon!" Trump told his millions of followers in a post on Truth Social (his own social network) on 30 October. "I will fix the problems caused by Kamala Harris and Joe Biden and stop the suffering and destruction in Lebanon. I want to see the Middle East return to real peace". These comments, aimed at Michigan's Arab community (the largest in the country), are worth revisiting, as his relationship with the region during his first administration was controversial.
The most contentious action was undoubtedly its promotion of the so-called 'Abraham Accords', a series of bilateral normalisation treaties signed between Israel and two countries in the region in September 2020: the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. Insofar as they did not impose any conditions on Israel regarding the issue of the occupation of Palestine (such as acceptance of an independent Palestinian state), these agreements were widely criticised by public opinion in both the signatory states and the rest of the region, and in some cases were described as a further setback to the Palestinian cause.
Another controversial decision was the US withdrawal in 2018 from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, commonly known as the 'Iran Nuclear Deal', under which Iran agreed to eliminate its stockpile of enriched uranium, among other things, in exchange for relief from sanctions imposed by the United States, the European Union and the United Nations Security Council. Trump announced his country's withdrawal from the deal, and the reinstatement of sanctions on Iran.
But what was probably the most controversial initiative, politically and diplomatically, was the recognition of the annexed Syrian Golan Heights as part of Israel, and above all the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and the consequent relocation of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to the ancient city. Both moves - insofar as they undermine the international legality enshrined in numerous UN resolutions - are a clear demonstration of the inconsistencies of the very person who is supposed to be the arbiter of the issue and promote the two-state solution, a role that the US has claimed for itself for decades. Critics argue that all these policies have had a destabilising effect on the region.
Now, in a very complicated context, with Israel in conflict with the Palestinians and Lebanon, and with several regional non-state actors involved, Trump's re-election places us in a period of uncertainty, between the rejoicing of the Israeli government (Netanyahu himself has stated that the president-elect had achieved "the greatest comeback in history") and the despair and mistrust of the population of Palestine and the rest of the region.
Those who have worked with Trump describe his unpredictability as a diplomatic asset, but in today's volatile Middle East, with a crisis of historic proportions, it is unclear how he will fare. But we will have to hope that his second term will be guided by compliance with international legality and that he will indeed achieve the longed-for solution to the multiple problems plaguing the region.