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Middle East: A Rare Moment of De-esclation?

“Approaching each other with a clear and direct agenda, mostly revolving around the mutual benefits of boosting trade, investment, and business in a win-win situation, was determinant.

The power fatigue resulting from following highly contrasting geopolitical and ideological agendas and the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in the post-2011 era encouraged the conflicting regional players to follow pragmatic behaviour and prioritise the economy, business, trade, and interest-based agendas rather than ideological ones.

The regional and international dynamics that have led to this rare moment of de-escalation and reconciliation among the different regional players, in particular, are not constant and subject to sudden changes.

Besides Egypt, several Arab countries are severely exposed. If the war is set to prolong, then one should not rule out that a looming food crisis coupled with skyrocketing food prices would trigger uprisings.

Despite the very positive regional atmosphere resulting from the normalisation processes, it is hard to anticipate whether some of the relevant players are charting this new path out of genuine desire, or they are just being pragmatic ….

The economic space is a de-politicised space by nature, which can easily help establish a win-win formula for the involved parties.”

Yet the author of this article seems at the end to endorse the counter-revolutionaries realignment for stability, suggesting some measures in order to sustain such a ‘de-escalation’. His vintage point is the regime and what they should rather than the plight of the majority, the class dynamic and who benefits from the ‘win—win’ situation he is talking about. One is make to understand that a win for an X regime is also a win for the majority of the people under that regime.

The irony is that the writer has put aside his knowledge as a research assistant professor for Humanities and Social Sciences at a centre named after the founder of sociology.

The article ignores the domestic situation of the states in discussion; their socio-economic problems (Egypt and Turkey) and the surplus capital they have to export (UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar). Turkey and the UAE, for example, are rivalries in competing for projects abroad from Egypt to Afghanistan. 

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