{"id":22975,"date":"2012-10-27T20:10:42","date_gmt":"2012-10-27T16:10:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/?p=22975"},"modified":"2012-10-27T20:10:49","modified_gmt":"2012-10-27T16:10:49","slug":"a-contrarian-streak-on-qatar-and-hamas-in-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/middle-east-politics-analysis\/a-contrarian-streak-on-qatar-and-hamas-in-gaza\/","title":{"rendered":"A Contrarian Streak: On Qatar and Hamas in Gaza"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A deeply contrarian streak has taken hold in Qatar these days.<\/p>\n

Insulated by U.S. security guarantees, eager to use its burgeoning fiscal reserves, and propelled by its elites\u2019 reformist zeal, Doha continues to exert a disproportionate influence on regional politics. Emir Hamad bin Khalifah Al Thani\u2019s latest move was\u00a0a dramatic visit<\/a>\u00a0to the Gaza Strip, becoming the first head of state to visit the Palestinian territory since Hamas wrested control of it in 2007.<\/p>\n

Unlike some of its less imaginative Arab rivals, Qatar saw Hamas\u2019s regional isolation as an opportunity rather than a problem. Despite its alliance with the United States, Doha has been nurturing its ties with the Palestinian Islamist group for some time: Its worst kept secret is that Khaled Meshal, Hamas\u2019s leader, has had a house there for many years and has been increasingly seen in Doha since Hamas was\u00a0forced to leave<\/a>\u00a0Syria in early 2012. Doha has also opened its pocketbook to Hamas,\u00a0pledging<\/a>\u00a0$250 million in February \u2014 a gift that was increased to $400 million upon the emir\u2019s visit.<\/p>\n

The injection of funds, however, is not the most important aspect of Sheikh Hamad\u2019s trip. By breaking Hamas\u2019s regional isolation and explicitly recognizing its rule over Gaza, Doha has strengthened the militant group\u2019s hand against its Palestinian rivals. An official from the Palestinian Authority, which is in charge of the West Bank, begrudgingly welcomed the visit while\u00a0noting<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cno one should deal with Gaza as a separate entity from the Palestinian territories and from the Palestinian Authority.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unlike the Palestinian Authority, Israel felt no need to soften its criticism. An Israeli spokesman carped bitterly about the emir\u2019s trip,\u00a0saying<\/a>\u00a0that the emir was \u201cthrowing peace under a bus.\u201d<\/p>\n

The visit further highlights Israel\u2019s loss of influence with Qatar. Relations between the two countries warmed with the opening of an Israeli trade office in Doha in 1996 (reputedly close to Meshal\u2019s house) as the two sides looked to ship Qatari gas to Israel, with Enron\u00a0acting<\/a>\u00a0as the intermediary. The deal failed, however, and relations ebbed and flowed until December 2008, when Qatar cut ties in protest of Israel\u2019s offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Rumors that Doha was attempting to restart relations were finally put to rest with a leaked memo from Israel\u2019s Foreign Ministry\u00a0labelling<\/a>\u00a0Qatar as a \u201cleading activist\u201d against Israel, decisively cutting whatever informal relations remained.<\/p>\n

The Iranian angle<\/strong><\/p>\n

Iran, with whom Qatar maintains cordial official relations, joins Israel and the Palestinian Authority in an unlikely triumvirate watching proceedings in Gaza with glum resignation. Tehran officials are doubtlessly looking back nostalgically to happier times only a few years back, when their proxy Hezbollah all but defeated the Zionist Entity \u2014 winning Iran no small degree of Arab support for its material support to the Lebanese militant organization. Back then, Hamas was also still ensconced in Iran\u2019s camp, and Syria was a stable ally that appeared to be gradually increasing its influence in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

Indeed, while Israel and the Palestinian Authority may view Qatar\u2019s embrace of Hamas with chagrin, it is Iran that is the central loser in this drama. The emir\u2019s visit is part of a larger Qatari policy to unseat and reorient crucial Iranian allies around the Middle East \u2014 and by extension, amputate a long-used, effective limb of Iranian foreign policy. This is a remarkably forthright policy, for Iran will not \u2014 and cannot \u2014 take it lying down.<\/p>\n

This new policy is most evident in Syria, where Qatar is explicitly and unashamedly\u00a0supporting\u00a0<\/a>the 19-month insurgency with money, equipment, and at the very least light weaponry \u2014 little less than a declaration of war against President Bashar al-Assad, Iran\u2019s core ally.<\/p>\n

But Qatar\u2019s new activism is also apparent in Gaza, where Doha has likely decided to take action precisely because of Hamas\u2019s break from Iran. When Tehran\u00a0stopped\u00a0<\/a>sending money to Hamas after the group failed to publically support Iran\u2019s embattled ally in Syria, Qatar saw an opportunity to split the Palestinian group from its long-time sponsor. While its $400 million donation is earmarked for humanitarian development, not only is such support fungible, but there are doubtless other financial arrangements being made between Qatar and Hamas on this trip \u2014 further strengthening the ties between the Palestinian Islamist movement and Doha.<\/p>\n

This move will, of course, catalyze another round of speculation that Qatar is supporting the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood across the Arab world. That Qatar\u2019s supports the Brotherhood is not in doubt \u2014 indeed, it hardly tries to conceal its efforts at engaging with the Islamist movement in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Syria and now with Hamas, another Brotherhood offshoot. Yet Qatar is not nefariously trying to replace the Shia Crescent with a Brotherhood Banana, curving from Syria through Gaza, Egypt, and on to Libya and Tunisia. Doha is much more pragmatic and less Machiavellian than that: It is leveraging its relations where they exist, and looking to bolster popular, effective, moderate Muslim parties with whom it has relations.<\/p>\n

Qatar\u2019s vanguard role in weakening a key plank of Iranian foreign policy indicates that Doha must feel deeply secure with its relationship with Tehran, for it would hardly undertake such aggressive moves if it felt imminently threatened. Indeed, there is an obvious flashpoint between the two regional powers: Qatar and Iran share the world\u2019s largest gas field, which has been responsible for Qatar\u2019s recent spike in wealth. Traditionally, this has meant that Qatar treated Iran with a great deal of respect. Relations were carefully improved in the 1990s as the field was being developed, as Doha sought to avoid an escalation after\u00a0numerous instances<\/a>\u00a0of Iran attacking and stealing equipment from unmanned Qatari gas rigs.<\/p>\n

Today, Qatar\u2019s relations with Iran are as pleasant as ever on the surface. However, the fact that Qatar is overturning one of the key tenets of its foreign policy by antagonizing Iran is a surprising and forthright move by the Qatari elite, which clearly does not accept conventional limits on what is and what is not possible in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

— xx —<\/p>\n

\u00a0This article first\u00a0<\/a>appeared on ForeignPolicy.com<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DAVID ROBERTS: While Israel and the Palestinian Authority may view Qatar\u2019s embrace of Hamas with chagrin, it is Iran that is the central loser…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":22976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[154,82,60,152],"tags":[18306,18297,18307],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22975"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22975"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22975\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mideastposts.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}