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Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
The writer is the former head of MI6 and UK ambassador to the UN
We often think of the Middle East as built around the Arab world. Baghdad and Damascus were the historical centers of authority. In the 20th century, Cairo and Beirut became the cultural capitals of the region until they declined and their influence was overtaken by the oil and gas wealth of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.
Today, it is surprising that the three most secure and powerful countries in the region – Israel, Turkey and Iran – are non-Arab nations. Each is led by an aging war horse. Benjamin Netanyahu has been Prime Minister of Israel for 17 of the past 28 years. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been in power in Turkey for almost 22 years and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has been Iran’s supreme leader for 35 years. Like the Bourbons of France 200 years ago, they learn nothing and forget nothing.
After the humiliating disaster of the brutal Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, Israel is back. Its armed forces and intelligence services have turned the tables, not only against Hamas, but Hezbollah and their sponsors in Iran. In the process, Netanyahu has ignored the advice of Israel’s closest friends and shown little regard for protecting civilian lives. Long-term support for Israel has eroded in the west, but its main enemies have been seriously weakened.
Israel has shown itself to be a new Sparta – a small nation with unmatched military strength. But its politicians dispute the idea that a political settlement with the Palestinians is needed if the Jewish nation is to enjoy lasting peace and security. Israel has no plan for Gaza beyond an indefinite occupation, unless it is undeclared to drive the Palestinians there to Egypt while simultaneously annexing as much of the occupied West Bank as possible. One prediction we can make with confidence, unfortunately, is that an independent Palestinian state will be no closer in a year than it is now.
As the new year begins, Israel’s attention turns to Iran, which was the big loser of 2024. Khamenei is getting noticeably weaker, both physically and politically. The main candidate to succeed him is now his son Mojtaba. Second generation autocrats rise to power on the backs of privileges and rights. They do not bear the scars of war and do not learn the hard lessons learned from their fathers. Hafez al-Assad was a ruthless leader of Syria, but he knew the limits of power and when to negotiate. His son Bashar had none of those skills. The result was even more brutality and, over time, the collapse of the regime.
The experience of losing their Syrian ally should make the Iranian military wary of a dynastic succession. They will try to ensure that a new supreme leader is not all-powerful within the regime. But the new leaders of stagnant autocracies may spring surprises. Deng Xiaoping and Mikhail Gorbachev are notable examples. Closer to home for Iran is the transformation of Saudi Arabia under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Each recognized the vulnerability of their country and sought an economic and political strategy, usually involving an opening to the outside world, to sustain the autocratic system for decades to come. This seems unlikely in Iran, but it should not be ruled out.
A weakened regime presents an opportunity for a new negotiation, even if Khamenei’s leadership falters for a year or two. Donald Trump may prefer a political deal to participating in Netanyahu’s preferred military option of destroying Iran’s nuclear facilities. Israel will argue that Tehran will open talks while they make covert progress toward a nuclear weapon, the strategic issue that is now even more compelling to Iran. These are valid concerns. Khamenei also distrusts America even more than American politicians distrust Iran. It may require new leadership in Tehran before Iran reverses course.
The much-welcomed surprise of 2024 was the fall of the Assad regime and the opening of a path to a better future for the Syrian people. Turkey, like Israel, was a winner last year, but it too has problems seizing new opportunities. Erdogan appears to see Syria through the distorting prism of the Kurdish issue, which will make it more difficult for Syrian opposition leaders to come together and create a new constitution that recognizes their country’s diversity — religious and ethnic.
Erdogan, a remarkable survivor, has built Turkey’s power across the region and in Africa. He has shown that a philosophy of political Islam can be successful and does not have to lead to an Islamic state and strict sharia law. In this sense, he may provide a model for Ahmed al-Sharaa, the leader of the Islamist HTS group that now holds power in Damascus.
Here we have a lesson about Western capitals and about Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. We are right to be wary of al-Sharaa’s extremist background. But the young radicals’ journey from political violence to national leadership is a well-trodden path. The diplomatic task ahead of us is to maximize the chances of success in Syria by being bold in lifting sanctions, lifting terrorist bans and doing everything we can to support the Syrian opposition to come together.
The instinct in Western capitals seems to be to pay the rope slowly and resist the Islamists on ideological grounds. But this is a path that will make it more likely that we will end up either fragmented, as in Libya, or with a new dictator, as in Tunisia. Western countries should also avoid the mistakes of the Bourbons.
