A few days ago, it emerged that some of the leaders of Hamas went to Moscow, to speak with high-ranking officials at the Kremlin. Considering of the two ongoing wars in Ukraine and Israel, this news clearly could not go unnoticed. It raises a number of questions.
Let’s recap the positions “on the field”, so to speak. There’s an ongoing war in Ukraine due to Russia’s unjustified invasion of the south-eastern regions of that country. Russia managed to conquer around 17% of Ukrainian territory, after the Ukrainian army won back some of the land that had initially been lost. Ukraine’s widely anticipated counter-offensive took place during the spring and summer of 2023, and it did achieve some results, though likely more modest ones than were anticipated at the outset. The arrival of the winter probably will mark another pause ahead of a new offensive by the Russians or a new counter-offensive by the Ukrainians starting from spring next year. At the moment, there is a stall on the ground, relatively speaking, which may favour a crystallisation of the conflict for the near future.
In the Middle East, there is a composite situation, which could be simplified as follows. The traditional division is between the Sunni Muslims, spearheaded by Saudi Arabia, and Shia Muslims, led by Iran. The two countries have been arch-enemies for decades, but recently marked a rapprochement by signing an agreement in Beijing, the content of which remains unclear. Virtually all countries in the Middle East are against Israel, which is not officially recognised by the vast majority of them. Currently, Iran provides financing to the operations of Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Hamas has been tolerated by Israel until now because its aims run contrary to the “two peoples, two states” solution for Israel and Palestine.
During the Obama presidency, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was signed by several countries with Iran, to provide an environment that would favour a gradual re-entering of the country into the international community. But Trump pulled the US out of it, in effect killing the agreement. At the same time, during the Trump Presidency, the Abraham Accords were signed between Israel, Bahrain, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, and Sudan. As we have discussed in recent columns, there was an attempt by President Biden to favour a rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia. The missing piece was clearly Iran.
Russia has strong ties with Iran and Syria, whose dictator/leader Assad is protected by both Moscow and Tehran. Russia has also made advancements in Africa, in particular in Libya and the Sahel.
The war in Israel may expand and become regional if Hezbollah directly enters the conflict. Last week’s declaration by Hezbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah remains vague: it affirms that Hezbollah is already fighting Israel but refuses to endorse Hamas’ action, attributing their full responsibilities to “the Palestinians.” Hezbollah can be unleashed only by Iran. Was the trip to Moscow by Hamas leaders perhaps meant to convince the Kremlin to put pressure on Iran to unleash Hezbollah? It is a fact that, on the same days that Hamas leaders were in Moscow, a deputy foreign minister of Iran was also in Moscow, meeting with his Russian counterpart.
Clearly Russia could put itself in the middle of the game with an offer of mediation, to attempt to convince the international community that it holds the key for the de-escalation or the containment of the conflict in the Middle East. If it was able to do this, Moscow would then for sure want to have a “free hand” on Ukraine, in exchange for convincing Iran not to unleash Hezbollah, or in any case, for Iran not to join the conflict. This would make Ukraine’s situation almost intractable. On the back of all this, last week EU Commission President Von Der Leyen flew to Kiev to discuss Ukraine’s accession to the EU, to reassure the invaded country about its prospects. The real question is: what portion of Ukraine would eventually join the EU, in this scenario?
