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The geopolitical situation in the Middle East is fundamental to understanding the war currently being waged by Israel and Hamas. This region has three great emerging powers and two of them, Saudi Arabia and Iran, have been waging strong competition for years that directly affects Israel and the Palestinian territories.
The regional situation in the Middle East has been very important over the last seven decades to understand the dynamics of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Although originally, Israel had practically all its neighbors in the Middle East region against it, especially the Arab nations, this situation has changed especially since 1978, with a tendency towards international pragmatism among many of the nations. adjacent to Israel.
Initially, only Turkey, a country with a Muslim but non-Arab majority, recognized Israel in 1949. But after the Camp David agreements, several nations such as Egypt, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain have been approaching the Jewish state with the in order to establish diplomatic and commercial relations. A significant change in position that has fully affected the issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and that has generated tensions with other Middle East neighbors.
Furthermore, it must be taken into account that, in recent months, there has been speculation about the possibility that Saudi Arabia, the great Arab economic and oil power, would do the same, something that would open the door for other countries around it to do the same. same.
How to explain this movement from a completely hostile environment to one with more diplomatic possibilities for Israel? Basically the competition between the emerging powers of the region. Currently there are three nations that aspire to dominate the Middle East with their influence: Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
In the case of Turkey, its dispute has been especially focused after the Syrian Civil War and its axis of influence does not directly affect Israel and the Palestinian territories, since it is basically concentrated in northern Syria and Iraq.
However, the key lies in the growing rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The axes of influence dominated by the Saudi monarchy, which are Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf states or a good part of Iraq or Syria, are those that have remained most pragmatic regarding the normalization of relations with Israel. And also those who are more open to external collaboration with the United States.
On the contrary, the Iranian axes of influence, present especially in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, are those that have most tacitly rejected the existence of Israel and those that still maintain sporadic confrontations with this country today. It must be taken into account that Iran, a nation based on a Shiite fundamentalist regime but which is not Arab, is Israel’s greatest enemy in the entire Middle East and that its allies in Arab countries have a political line similar to that of Tehran. Among these partners on the ground we can highlight Hezbollah, in Lebanon, or Hamas itself in the Gaza Strip.
Behind these divergences about Israel and the interests of the two powers in the region is what several analysts have indicated could be the Hamas attack on October 7. The Islamist group that dominates the Gaza Strip may not be interested in a formalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel that would mean definitive support for the Jewish nation in the region.
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