DUBAI: The war between Israel and the Lebanese militia Hezbollah ended in early August. The five-week war once again exposed the inherent divisions among members of the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and gave Qatar an opportunity to use the row to score diplomatic points against its detractors.
A political maverick in the oil-rich, six-country GCC bloc, Qatar has low-level trade ties with Israel. It is also a key ally of the United States and hosts a major US military base at Al-Udeid. More importantly, it has had a running diplomatic feud for some years with the most dominant player in the region, Saudi Arabia.
In this complex backdrop, the Lebanon crisis resulted in a number of contradictory opinions, which served as the perfect setting for Doha to prove wrong its Arab critics who accuse it of cosying up to Israel. When Saudi Arabia disapproved of Hezbollah's tactics by saying: “it is necessary to make a distinction between legitimate resistance to occupation and ‘irresponsible adventurism’ adopted by certain elements within the state” -- a view that was also endorsed by Egypt and Jordan -- Qatar hit back.
“The Arab position was part of the problem in reaching a resolution to achieve a ceasefire,” Qatar -- the only Arab country on the United Nations Security Council -- said, referring to the countries which criticised Hezbollah for the capture of two Israeli soldiers and triggering Israel's offensive against Lebanon. “Some of these (Arab) countries were in favour of accomplishing this (Israeli) mission.”
Qatar then followed up its words with action after a ceasefire deal was agreed upon by the warring parties on the ground -- it pledged to rebuild the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil, where Hezbollah estimated that 600 houses were destroyed. Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani was the first Arab leader to visit the war-torn country immediately after the fighting ended; it was the first Arab country to offer troops for the United Nations International Force in Lebanon tasked with enforcing the fragile ceasefire under UN Resolution 1701; and a Qatar Airways passenger jet flew to Beirut international airport from Doha despite an Israeli air and sea blockade of Lebanon.
Further, Sheikh Hamad even sought to mediate between Syria and Lebanon, a significant move in breaking the ice between the two neighbours after the Syrian pullout last year in the wake of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Al-Hariri's assassination. Analysts say Qatar's decision to send troops to Lebanon is not so much about enforcing a US-Israel agenda, as much as it is about furthering peace and reconstruction -- it is also a small state playing its cards well to project itself on the world stage. In doing so, Qatar got ample publicity to further its ambitious and diversified economic interests among a wide spectrum of countries.
Says Prof Abdulkhaleq Abdulla of the Emirates University: “Qatar is trying to make the most of its current Security Council affiliation. This position comes once in a while and gives room to be visible. Qatar is also making the most of its relation with the US. Doha is better at it than the other Arab friends of the US in the region.”
In a clear statement against Israel, the emir of Qatar surprised most by hailing Lebanese resistance for the first Arab victory against the Jewish state, saying it could improve prospects for peace in the Middle East. He also said preventing Hezbollah from getting weapons while Israel is arming itself more and more is definitely unacceptable. “He who believes in this theory wants to put Lebanon in a cage so that it could be easy prey for Israel at any time”. Qatar's proactive role throughout the crisis could be seen as part of the political realignment process taking place in the region. During the last five years, the gas-rich country of less than a million people, and Saudi Arabia have traded more barbs than ever before. Though both are followers of the strict Wahabi sect of Islam, Qatar has been much more flexible than Saudi Arabia in terms of practicing its religious ideology.
The two countries have had innumerable differences over issues relating to the Doha-based Al-Jazeera TV channel's coverage of Saudi affairs, road to political reform in the region, and unconfirmed Saudi objection to the Qatar-UAE Dolphin gas project, among others.
Analysts feel that in a way, Qatar is trying to limit Saudi hegemony in the region at a time when Saudi-US relations are not at their best after 9/11. This also means that Qatar has had to try and fill in wherever Saudi Arabia lost out in its widening gap with the US. The most important shift was Qatar accommodating US forces at the Al-Udeid air base in 2002, immediately after they were forced to leave the Prince Sultan air base in Saudi Arabia.
According to PV. Vivekanand, political analyst and editor of the UAE-based daily The Gulf Today, the Saudi-Qatari spat could be a fallout of the resolution of the 2001 row between Qatar and Bahrain over the Hawar islands -- claimed by both mainly for its potential as a tourist destination.
“Qatar was peeved at the Arab backing that Manama received in the Hawar legal case, which was finally settled in favour of Bahrain with the involvement of the International Court of Justice. Unable to vent its anger in any other form, Doha used Al Jazeera,” Vivekanand told IPS. “Qatar is a riddle of sorts in Arab politics. The Saudi factor is important to understand Qatar's behaviour, but it is not the only factor,” Abdullah of the Emirates University told IPS. “There is no problem with Qatar, except regarding its relations with Israel. This is perhaps the weakest point and the most troubling. They can do without it.”—Dawn/IPS News Service
