Factors Promoting Middle East Conflict
The countries in the Middle East have never had peaceful coexistence for more than a century. There has been series of complicated blood-letting confrontations orchestrated by different factors among them the totalitarian nature of political leaderships, religious diversity and scramble for oil resources. Specific conflicts in the region might have been occasioned by one of these factors or a combination of all of them. This article explores how religious diversity, management of oil resources and totalitarian leadership have contributed to conflicts in the Middle East region.
The Middle East is the territory that has the abundance of totalitarian countries, and that always was the source of the conflicts. Most of the countries in the region are characterised by authoritarian rulers who have consistently limited democratic spaces. In the recent past, there have been notable political developments geared towards reshaping the democratic landscape of various jurisdictions in the region. Recently, Iraqi parliament managed to facilitate the formation of new government. On the other hand, Syria has witnessed an outpouring of violent protests in Lebanon due to troop’s withdrawal impasse and yielding of power to popular pressure by Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. The recent democratic stirrings in the region serve to indicate the pressure of people seeking to free themselves from dictatorial tendencies of their rulers. The prolonged negotiations for a truce by international organizations and countries of interest and on-going insurgencies indicate the challenges that the region has to content with due to its limited democratic space. The Middle East region is known to have had the most tenacious-authoritarian rulers, whose prolonged eras have created unbearable dissatisfaction among the subjects.
In the 1950s and 60s, the authoritarian governments were highly prevalent in third world countries where most Middle East countries and it was not unique to the region. However, a democratization wave that swept the world in the 1970s did not have any much influence in the Middle East countries except for Lebanon and Turkey. In other countries within the region efforts for political liberalization have not borne many results. In some countries, such efforts have stalled, and no leader has been willing to go into competitive elections.
The Arab societies who form a majority of people inhabiting Middle East countries have a cultural argument that facilitates a tribal and patriarchal mentality, which is a great impediment to the nurturing of pluralist values. Arab citizens have been rendered prone to patrimonial leaders, who will later discourage a sense of national unity, a vital component of democratization. The totalitarian regimes are created by the societal approach towards leadership but end up creating disharmony and oppression. Too much oppression compels the subject to opt for non-civil means of regime change over, which often result in conflicts as witnessed in Egypt, Iraq, Syria, and Palestine.
Other than the totalitarian rulers in the Middle East region, religious diversity has contributed to the perennial conflict. There has been religious conflict pitting Muslim Arabs against Jews, Shiites against Sunni Muslims and the western world against fundamentalist Muslims. The three most turbulent relationships in the regions have been blamed for the unending cross-border and internal conflicts.
The Sunni-Shiite conflict is the oldest divide in the Islamic culture, tracing its origin to immediately after the passing on of Prophet Muhammad. Despite being an old divide, it has persistent to the current date. The origin of this conflict is traced to succession tussle between Sunni, who wanted Abu Bakr to be the next caliph, whereas Shiite rooted for Muhammad’s son-in-law Ali. None of these factions were willing to back down in their position and as a result, violence broke out between them. Since Shiites were a minority, they were defeated, and Sunni succeeded in installing Abu Bakr to the position of caliph. Since then, the divide between the two factions of Islam has persisted with the minority settling in southern Lebanon, Southern Iraq, and Iran. This conflict has been on and off and had experienced a long period of the truce until the recent resurgence in for of ISIS, a militant and deadly group of Sunni Muslims targeting the minority Shiites and other religions.
The region has also witnessed a religion-based conflict between Arabs and Jews. Just like the conflict between Shiites and Sunnis evolved, Jews and Arabs conflict is traced to the two sons of Abraham, Isaac and Ishmael. The former begot Jews whereas Muslims trace their lineage to the later. The descendants of the two sons Abraham have been antagonistic towards each other, sometimes leading to deadly confrontations. One of these confrontations was during the World War I during which land belonging to Arab Muslims was taken away and occupied by Turks under European rule. Some of them managed to successfully rebel violently and secured their freedom in Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. However, Palestine was not fully emancipated as it had both Muslim Arabs and Jews inhabitants. Further bloodshed between the two religions saw the east of river Jordan secede and created Jordan, an independent Arab nation. The situation was further aggravated in 1948 when Jewish nation of Israel was created by making the western lands of Jordan independent. This move incensed the Muslim, who believed that the entire region was theirs and creation of Jewish nation within their territories, was meant to undermine them and push Judaism influence. In response to the perceived invasion, Arab nations rebuffed their forces, but Israel resisted successfully, thereby creating Palestinian refugees from the west banks of River Jordan to the famous Gaza Strip.
Since these occurrences, there have been several wars leading loss of thousands and thousands of lives as Arabs fight in earnest to emancipate their land, whereas Israelis keep fighting to protect their borders. This conflict has been at the centre of Middle East region with violent and terrorist activities of either side targeting the other one.
The last religion based conflict in the region is the one pitting the Muslim fundamentalist and the west. There are those believe they are the original Muslims and would resist any influence of the west in their society. The fundamentalist practise faith tenets with strict interpretations, which sometimes result in violence towards those perceived to have been compromised by western influence.
Finally, the Middle East is endowed with oil deposits, which has come with a curse instead of prosperity. The scramble for the management of oil reserves has attracted foreign involvement in the region, which ends up fuelling conflicts. The allure of oil resources control has driven the nations and tribes within Middle East countries to engage in unending conflicts. The control over oil and gas reserves in the region is much more than what meet the eye; it is an indication of how much power a country wields in the global arena. The attractiveness of control of oil reserves is occasioned by the assured demand for the product, which keeps the economies running. The interference of foreigners in the region’s scramble for control of oil resources is associated with the ready market of petroleum product globally and the indirect benefit of the countries which promote the conflict for their vested interests.
Exploitation of the warring faction in the region has seen foreigners supply expensive military equipment, which keeps the ordinance factories running. The foreign nations acknowledge that peace in the region is not good for their business. They are keen on maintaining US dollars as the leading global currency and recycling of petrodollars to gain from the global oil sector. Some of the recent insurgencies in the region as a result of oil resources include the Northern Iraq Oilfields where Baghdad disputes the control by Kurdish Regional Government. Similar tensions and wars have been witnessed Afghanistan in 2011, the Palestinian/Israeli war in 2011, and invasion of Gaza oil fields by Israel in 2009. These are just but a few illustrations of how the strive for oil resources control facilitates un-ending wars of the Middle East.
In conclusion, this article has highlighted the three major factors behind the persistent conflicts in the Middle East. The religious diversity, historical injustices, limited democratic space and scramble for the highly coveted oil resources are the main reasons behind perennial insurgencies in the region. The conflicts are further aggravated when the confrontation is caused by a combination of these factors.
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