Donald Trump will be the next US president, becoming only the second American in history after Grover Cleveland (1885-1889 and 1893-1897) to serve two non-consecutive terms. But unlike Cleveland, Trump's election will have a major impact on the Middle East, and not just Israel.
Iran will be fearful for the fate of its nuclear program, Saudi Arabia and the UAE fear the Islamic Republic and Turkey, which did not know which candidate would be worse for it, must now accept Trump who in his previous terms threw Turkey out of the F-35 program.
Iran is suffering from a worsening economic crisis, which gained momentum following Trump's decision to walk away from the nuclear agreement in 2018 and to renew sanctions. This is reflected, for example, in the erosion of the currency. In 1978, a year before the Islamic revolution, one US dollar was worth 70 rials. Before leaving the nuclear agreement, the exchange rate had risen to about 40,000 rials to the dollar, and now it is already more than 705,000.
Dr. Sharona Mazalian Levi of Tel Aviv University's Alliance Center for Iranian Studies says that when Ron DeSantis dropped out of the race as Republican party candidate last January, paving the way for Trump's leadership, the rial depreciated sharply. "The headlines in Iranian newspapers warned of the grave economic consequences that might strike Iran if Trump was elected for a second time."
President Joe Biden's entry into the White House was accompanied by optimism among supporters of the nuclear deal that its resumption was imminent. However, the current administration, including Kamala Harris, failed in this goal. Moreover, in the war, the US continues to aid Israel on a huge scale, despite the international delegitimization. After Israel's retaliatory attack on Iran attack last month, the US administration stood, once again, stood alongside Israel and warned the Ayatollah regime against further escalation.
In contrast, J.D. Vance, Trump's vice president elect, was recently interviewed on Tim Dillon's podcast and made an unusual statement about his views on a possible war with Iran. "This will result in a tremendous diversion of resources and will be costly to the state," Vance said. "A war with Iran is not in the interests of the US at the moment."
However, Dr. Mazalian Levi points out that Trump's first term left deep scars on the Islamic Republic. "He canceled the nuclear deal and imposed unprecedented sanctions on the Iranian economy and its senior officials."
Saudi Arabia and the UAE prefer stability and continuity
"Saudi Arabia and the UAE do not necessarily prefer either Trump or Harris, they prefer stability and continuity," says Dr. Yoel Guzansky, head of the Gulf Program at Tel aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). "It's hard for them when a new president comes along and completely changes the policy." In Trump's first administration, there were many developments on the Saudi front. The seeds of normalization with Israel were planted, but on the negative side, Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.
"Trump was comfortable because he didn't meddle with domestic policy, and even defended the Saudis in the Khashoggi case before Congress. On the other hand, Biden started the term in a bad way and leaked the Khashoggi report to the CIA," notes Dr. Guzansky.
He believes that "with Trump, there will be some continuity. He will not criticize them on internal issues and will give them freedom. He will be harsh in his rhetoric against Iran, a topic they like and will want to complete normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia."
Deterioration in relations between Ankara and Washington
There are few countries whose foreign policy has failed so much that their relationship with the US has deteriorated both under a Republican administration and the Democratic administration that came after it. Turkey, however, has managed it. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sees his country as a major power, and repeats his perception that "the world is bigger than five" - by which he means the five permanent members of the UN Security Council having the right of veto.
The deterioration in Ankara-Washington relations, which continues to this day, began in 2019, with Erdogan's insistence on procuring S-400 air defense batteries from Russia. As a result, Turkey was removed from the F-35 project and sanctions from the Countering America's Adversaries through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) were imposed on it.
"The damage of the S-400 deal is greater than a democratic or republican administration, because it was Congress that decided on CAATSA," explains Dr. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak, an expert on Turkey at the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University and the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security. "If you equip yourself with Russian weapons, you enter the list that the US is forced to impose sanctions on and are defined as an adversary of the US. Now, Turkey is both an ally and an adversary."
Over the past year, there have been two developments that have exacerbated the differences between Washington and Ankara. In September 2023, President Biden presented the IMEC corridor plan to link Europe, through Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE to India, while skipping Turkey. The use of Greece at Turkey's expense angered Erdogan, who decided to develop a rival corridor plan with Iraq. On the other hand, Turkey, a member of the NATO alliance, aspires to join the pro-eastern BRICS alliance, which is an economic rival to the West. Dr. Cohen Yanarocak says that this step and others are due to Erdogan wanting to show everyone that he has an independent foreign policy . "I don't think that Ankara is enthusiastic or has expectations of an improvement in relations between the countries."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on November 6, 2024.
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