Middle East Roundtable: Iran-Oman Power Hour.

Hello and welcome to the Middle East Roundtable here at Fronts.co. This is Evan Maloney. I am here with Wilfred Miner, Africa correspondent for Fronts, War Fronts and all our associated media properties.

Kyle Moran, a staff writer here at War Fronts.

And we're going to start today with the good old Hormuz Strait, where we just can't seem to get away from it, given that recent reports, if they are to be believed, show that Oman has been in discussions and negotiations with the Islamic Republic and may have reached a deal that involves stopping coordination and cooperation with the United States to escort

Ships through the southern part of the Strait along the Omani coast.

And we have seen a report here in Reuters that Gulf ship traffic via the Strait hovers below the 10-day average.

The interesting thing about that is there was actually a spike previously where shipping was going up as more ships were going past via the Omani route. And now it seems that there may have been sort of a stoppage on that front as well.

If true, that would be a massive loss for the U.S.'s push to maintain open shipping in the Strait, given that the Omani route was kind of the last chance at this avenue.

But we're also monitoring the situation coming out of Syria, where we've seen some really explosive fireworks going down in Idlib province. And I know we'll certainly have plenty to say on that later in the episode. Yes, we will.

And so there's a little bit of ambiguity here that we should point out at the start about this Oman deal. So a couple of days ago, the IRGC in Iran announced that Oman had agreed to an agreement to manage trade jointly with Iran for the long term, which would essentially just shut down the Omani side of the shipping for incoming traffic.

Oman then kind of lightly disputed this Iranian sources told a few foreign outlets that there is not yet an agreement to govern the Strait.

But that was a couple of days ago. More recently, we've seen a number of open source intelligence accounts suggesting that the Omani route That is not something that larger news outlets have picked up on yet and run with publicly. So the claim basically is that there have not been any ship crossings on the Omani side within at this point, well past 24 hours.

But as of now, we want to be very clear that is a that is on the open source side that is not yet made the rounds to larger media, which could be for any number of reasons. But it's important to really caveat that at the start. So Wilfred, let's go to you.

What do you make of the situation?

And what do you see happening here? weird situation yesterday so just to give our audience a sense of time we're recording this podcast on thursday the 27th of august around 9 a.m eastern time u.s so yesterday that would be wednesday iran and oman came out put out a joint statement talking about how they had reached some sort of argument that's what kyle was

Alluding to at the start and i'm very cautious when it comes to start to such statements because we don't really have a clear picture of what's happening in august it's it's one of the most confusing situations i have seen because we have seen multiple reports where your shipping has surged we saw barak ravid from axios reporting that about 40 40 million

Barrels or something to that effect oil had passed through through the street at you at one point or if not 40 million barrels 40 ships it's something with the number 40 but then it was disputed really really quickly by open source intelligence analysts and you just people within the community that we are part of it's such a complicated place to monitor

Because ships are switching off their transponders to try and avoid to try and avoid you're being bombed by iran and no one wants to come out and say that hey we transited through hormuz now if you've been listening to the middle east roundtable for long enough you know that evan we have sent evan out there to go and check it out he was supposed to go this

Time but radcliffe cia director jim radcliffe took the c17 and went to moscow that's why we don't have a clear picture of the situation but on a serious note it's it's a very difficult place for us to just look at and analyze because we are dealing with very little information and you're having no information is one of the worst things for people like us

Because we want to know we want to be able to say this is what's going to happen so in such a state i really can't say but one thing that's interesting to me is that iran is conducting meetings about hormuz at the very highest level so on tuesday this week for minister basa gachi met with his omani counterpart badra abul saidi saidi is the guy who came to

American tv basically to beg the u.s not to bomb iran and to give negotiations a chance the fact that he is now the one having these conversations with agachi to discuss the future of you know the street of hormuz and as we are seeing we're seeing claims from the open source intelligence community that oman and the u.s have reached an impulse and oman is

Considering not working with the u.s to allow ships to transit i think that's such a big failure on the part of american diplomat to keep the Omanis, who have been vital mediators, happy. course, Trump saying he's going to bomb the shit out of Oman didn't make him any friends, obviously. that it would be a pretty massive loss and potentially sort of

Unrecoverable in terms of bypassing Hormuz if that was to be the case. have some nuance here for that, though, because the concern being that if Iran felt as though its control over Hormuz and shipping going through it was in question, which they were increasingly feeling, as we saw, shipping via the Omani route was increasing, be more likely to escalate and

Kick off another series of attacks given that this basically is the ace up their sleeve.

So this sort of just maintains the long status quo that we're in of both the U.S. and Iran claiming complete control over Hormuz. as Jonathan Schanzer of FDD put it, both might be telling the truth. both Iran and the United States are telling the truth, it sounds like we have an oil crisis on our hands. man certainly has a sense of humor there.

But more broadly, I have to imagine that moving forward, if we do have further coordination with the Omanis, this is going to be a serious sticking point. very tough situation there because it's already been bombed by Iran. threatened to be bombed by the United States.

And then Iran's expectation is essentially that Oman becomes sort of a foreign or an international pariah to some extent for the Islamic Republic because they want this toll system. has thus far not gone along with it. But at a certain point, they may have to say, you know what, this may just be sort of the status quo.

So I have a question for you guys based on just something that Kyle has said. feels like its control of Hormuz was threatened, would have escalated the war. you're not to bring in another theater of war. this is something that reminds me of a threat that Putin kept making, right? So at some point, the war seemed to have really turned in Ukraine's favor.

Putin, there was a wide, wide belief that Putin was preparing to use tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine just to try and turn the war back.

And apparently, the Biden administration put together a coalition that convinced Putin not to do so. there were reports, I believe it was in the Financial Times, that Iran was considering strikes on American bases in Europe if its control of Hormuz was threatened to the point where it didn't really have it anymore. do you see a strike on Europe, and that

Will be a very, very big escalation, something that Iran could necessarily do? you see it as, you know, as I see Putin's constant threat or nuclear war as just something they say, you know, to keep journalists printing stories to make them, you know, look scarier than they are? don't necessarily think that an Iranian strike on Europe is likely, only for kind

Of tactical and practical reasons. we've seen Iran try to really broaden the scope of this conflict before with long-range strikes.

We saw that against the Diego Garcia base in the Indian Ocean in the earlier phases of the conflict where Iran basically kind of revealed that it, practical purposes, is a much larger missile range than it had initially advertised, which it had advertised, to be fair, for political reasons, right?

It was not so much that Iran was known not to have missiles of a certain range.

It was more just that Iran committed not to using its missiles at the range that they probably could have hit all along. of that is to say, was a demonstration of capacity that Iran could hit much further.

Iran also didn't keep up those strikes because there were a lot of other, much more kind of vulnerable, but also closer range targets in the Middle East, right?

I think if Iran were to launch couple of missile strikes to demonstrate capacity to hit Europe, that's one thing, right? don't believe is out of the realm of possibility. think those would have to be carefully calibrated. they would, you know, splash down in the Baltic Sea or the North Sea or something if Iran could even reach that far and they were to not

Be intercepted, which would be a whole other issue.

But I doubt that would be able to translate into any sustained campaign, especially when you have Gulf infrastructure right there, you have desolation plants right there. mean, if you're going to do a concerted campaign against Europe, can do a concerted campaign against Iran's neighbors at much closer range with much larger volumes of munitions.

So I would expect to see that happen long before any kind of real Iranian escalation against Europe. Yeah, so I am a bit more skeptical as to comparison via Russia, especially in terms of Iran hitting Europe.

What I think that they are much more likely to do would just be to lash out against other countries in the region. Like Evan said, it's just a better return on investment for the Iranians.

And there is a very much lower barrier to entry to, If they feel that they're losing control of the Strait of Hormuz, because as we saw after the U.S. and Israel started this campaign, they had very little reservation about hitting just about everybody across the region.

So moving forward, if they feel as though Hormuz is slipping out of their control, I have to imagine the opportunity cost of not entering versus actually entering again into kinetic action is heavily, heavily tilted, shall we say.

And let's talk little bit more about Strait control, because one of the things we've seen this week are some more meetings between NATO members, not necessarily the NATO alliance, right? But European members of NATO, as well as Canada, starting to lay the foundation for a Strait security mission after there's some kind of a peace agreed with Iran.

It's unclear when or if that will ever happen, but purportedly, if it does, these European powers are hoping to be ready for whatever comes next and to kind of step into the gap and fill a security role in the Strait. do you believe at this point that mission has any real chance of starting anytime soon?

And if it does, do you think it has any chance of being successful? I think if Europe and Canada were serious about protecting the Strait of Hormuz, they would have joined up when Trump explicitly asked them, hey, let's do something about this.

Them taking their time, doing whatever background they were doing, that has really dented my faith in Europe's ability to actually amass a force that can protect Hormuz. And not just that, but you have a bunch of Europe's actions that I won't get into this podcast because it's the Middle East podcast and not the Europe podcast.

I don't really have much faith in Europe's willingness and ability to launch such a mission.

And not just that, but if Europe were to try and bring about this peacekeeping mission, let's call it that, into the Strait of Hormuz, wouldn't it just, you'd necessitate an Iranian attack, an Iranian response? Because Iran fundamentally sees the Strait of Hormuz as its territory.

It's sharing it with Oman, but that's more out of need than anything else. could control it on their own, they would.

They would gladly kick Oman out. And I don't see them just smiling and letting Europe come in with their ships to try and protect traffic. also don't see Europe as being particularly motivated to jump into this. Just given their opposition to it previously, as well as there's not whole lot to be gained for them from it.

But also, having anything along those lines does inherently make peace a tougher sell for Iran as well.

Because if the concern in Tehran is, okay, if we get a ceasefire that actually sticks, or a new MOU or whatever, that allows free shipping in Hormuz, and then Europe or other international powers come in and set up shop, then there's not really going to be a whole, like, what's the incentive for them there?

That's essentially, like, waving the white flag, which is explicitly what the hardliners in the Islamic Republic are saying anyway.

So you're essentially just shooting yourself in the foot if you're one of the more reformist-minded politicians that are going about that approach. So I do have to think, like, if the international community does enter the fray in any significant way, it probably should be without some new deal.

Because I understand for stuff in the past, things, if you were to jump into Hormuz, it would be seen as, like, backing up the U.S. campaign against the regime there.

But moving forward, at certain point, like, you sort of have to start wondering, like, okay, how long is this going to just drag on for? nobody steps up, then we just may be in this for a very, very long time. So then, thinking about Europe potentially coming in, and obviously there's some questions as to whether or not any of this will happen.

Europe were to come in and try to take control of the strait just for security purposes, is there a world in which Iran tries to deter that deployment through direct attacks?

Or does that then raise the risk of Europe getting much more involved in this war in a way that would be directly contrary to an adversarial to Iran's position? This takes us right back to question I asked you guys a little bit earlier, do you see an Iranian attack on Hormuz, an Iranian attack on Europe being possible?

I don't think Iran will go as far as attacking Europe directly.

We've already this in the U.K., networks that are capable of causing a lot of harm. And not just that, Iran can take advantage of Europe's seeming inability to, pardon my French here, get its shit together, and they can just wait them out. That's my perspective of it.

So there's a Farsi expression that I cannot tell you in Farsi, but it's essentially never underestimate the silliness or foolishness of the mullahs. And ultimately, I think it's more unlikely than likely that they actually hit Europe.

But I have to say that the history of the Islamic Republic's foreign policy… is not one of necessarily advocating its best interests and I think the we may ultimately see that if Europe does decide to enter the fray so then in that case do you believe that Europe would kind of just take that as an indication to step back and to get out of the region or do

You believe that would pull Europe in a way that's more substantive than what we've seen before well if they jump in and get hit then that would pull them in further but I just don't think that coming in then moving on from this a little bit let's talk about the Red Sea where we've seen different security issues from the Houthis now also start to boil over

So over the last week Yemen's Houthi rebels have targeted several times the Saudi port of Yambu in the Red Sea that is an important port for a number of reasons most important it is the terminus point for the east-west oil pipeline which allows Saudi to export its oil from the Red Sea instead of the Persian Gulf which means that it can basically bypass the

Strait of Hormuz.

The Houthis have been very enthusiastic about targeting both Yambu and Saudi shipping around the Bab al-Mandeb Strait which is the southern end of the Red Sea where you kind of go down into the Gulf of Aden and then the Indian Ocean so as the Houthis step up their attacks right let's let's keep it with the idea of international coalitions before we really

Get into the Houthi issue do you see any role for a larger international force to try and lock down the Red Sea where hopefully right ideally the threat bit less intense because you're with this rebel organization that does hold land but is not you know is not a nation state like Iran certainly doesn't have the funding or the means that Iran does do you

Think that there's any room for greater international cooperation there to lock down that part of the world so that at the very least this doesn't spiral further I actually do because Saudi Arabia is leading a joint effort on that one so far I think I think we're still waiting to hear back from a few members including a few European ones but they do have

Some important countries in the area who have stepped up and some of them I mean they're not necessarily the most like militarily advanced countries but just having the ability to put pressure in the region on it could make a difference it includes Somalia and Egypt so far as well as a few others overall like the region has moved decisively against this idea

Of tolling shipping as well as the Houthis just sort of setting up shop and pulling in Iran off the coast of Saudi Arabia and Yemen I see I generally do see a role for the international community in protecting the Red Sea from the Houthis but I am doubtful of effectiveness because when I think about international community protecting shipping, first thing

That comes to mind is the success that they had in Somalia in curbing piracy.

The Houthis are not like the Somali pirates in that these are not ships that are attacking, these are not pirate ships that are attacking the tankers moving through the area. It's drones, it's missiles, that kind of stuff.

So unless they were to put boats on the ground in Yemen to actually dislodge the Houthis from their territory and neutralize them as a threat, that is the most viable path to protect the Red Sea. But I don't see them having the commitment to make such a decision. Yeah, I completely agree with that.

I think that's a very solid read. Yeah, and there has been some talk about that as well. So Saudi Arabia apparently has been leaning hard on the internationally recognized Yemeni government to basically form the main thrust of a coastal offensive, which apparently is being discussed for ground operations along the Red Sea coast.

The Houthis have taken over the capital and also most of western Yemen. So this is a densely populated area. It's where most Yemenis live.

And over the course of the last few years, they've taken the coast. Now they didn't always have the coast. That's a relatively newer development.

And there may be some room for Saudi backed, but ultimately Yemeni offensive to kind of cut up from the south or cut down from the north using Saudi territory and try and cut off at least a buffer zone between the Houthis and the Red Sea.

So my question to you guys, looking at that, is that something that seems like a viable path for other nations to step in and maybe lend indirect forms of support? Or does that of like just more chasing windmills and Middle Eastern interventions that we've seen where those go over time?

We all know the polling around Middle Eastern intervention. I don't think there's any country, any Western country rather, right now where the idea of sending troops to the Middle East where they'll be facing a militia group that, yes, is not a nation-state actor, but is one of the most capable groups when it comes to using drone technology.

And we all know just how badly Europe is doing against drone technology.

If you don't, we have a whole video on warfronts discussing the results of a war game where Europe was decimated by Ukraine just using a couple of drones. I don't think any country has the stomach to send troops in, even if the Yemeni army is going to form the tip of the spear.

The last time Saudi Arabia had such troops, such international diverse groups in Yemen.

They brought in the RSF, the rapid support forces from Sudan. And the RSF right now is bogged the SAF. I don't see them being able to dedicate enough troops to make a difference.

And I don't see any Western nation being willing to come in. Kyle? Yeah, I completely agree.

I think that the hopes writ large here of international forces just stepping in here is slim to none. Yeah, to be clear, that's not the part that's under discussion. So Saudi Arabia, it looks like, would be trying not to even put its own troops on the ground.

This would instead be backing the Yemeni internationally recognized government, which would probably have some assistance from southern Saudi tribes, which then would probably take plenty of munitions and supplies and money and so on from Saudi Arabia and any other foreign backers.

But it's very unlikely that this would involve even Saudi troops on the ground, let alone an international coalition. The interesting thing about that, so the Saudi or the Saudi-backed government is, I mean, they've just been so ineffective actually winning this for such a long period of time.

I'm just so skeptical that they'd actually be able to bring this home in any meaningful way. Yeah, I am really, really skeptical as well. I don't know.

I don't really rate Saudi Arabia's military capabilities. So I don't see it still. Yeah, nor do I.

And that kind of sets up a tough situation for the entire world in the Sea, where it's not like there's not a test case for how this goes. Starting in 2023 and 2024, the Houthis had their campaign against the Red Sea and against Red Sea shipping, this time going after vessels that were toward Israel.

At that time, the multinational coalition in the region was Operation Prosperity Guardian, which was, I mean, it was certainly present, and it intercepted some incoming preceptiles, but it was very, very far from an unrequited success.

And that was much more a containment mission, let alone something to go in and actually degrade Houthi capability, which we did see from the US and Israel, neither of which really had very much of an impact. There was some discussion, discussion, obviously, about whether the Houthis would need to really reconstitute and take some time to do that.

But this conflict has shown very clearly that they, even if they didn't need to do some repairs afterward, that they retained at least manufacturing capacity to build weapons at home, and probably a fair portion of their stockpiles as well.

So that was what the kind of the sheer force of global efforts against the Houthis failed to achieve when Iran wasn't a distraction.

So it is, I think, a little bit troubling to look at the Red Sea situation now and see so little international engagement and so few options, because it really does beg the question, how do you stop the Houthis from taking over this area and deciding that they can do what they want with it?

Well, I think that's the importance of what's going on in Hormuz, because my whole point for months at this point i think has been just the terrible precedent that would happen if the u.s just like withdraws from hormuz and just allows iran to run the show and so you have to evaluate the pros and cons here as well as the opportunity costs but overall even

Though we are stuck in hormuz the point here being like okay if we just quit then this just sends such a clear message that not only do we not have the inclination to stick this out we don't have the ability to either and i think that's something that would be very difficult to come back from i think the u.s is already demonstrating that at a at some level

Not you to that very extreme degree but it's been how many months since the war in iran started when august about five six months right the fact that the u.s has lost control of hormuz is being bogged down in this war it's such a big indictment of american power i don't think unless the u.s is willing to put troops on the ground i don't think the u.s is

Capable of coming back from this well i said i may disagree there because the basically the my argument in the piece i wrote for fronts on the case for keeping up the blockade here is i mean it would be one thing if the u.s had committed forces to forcing hormuz open and failed but another entirely that the current president just doesn't seem to have it like

He basically started this exclusively planned for a very short-term thing and is now just trying to avoid any long-term painful engagement so that's that's more of an indictment of the current war strategy relative to actual if committed because the most we've seen on that was project freedom which lasted i think 16 hours and just like was given up on so

It's not something like the u.s has fully ever committed to and failed to achieve it's something we haven't gone after so when it comes but that's what i mean in terms of or moves like if we do just unilaterally withdraw that would be a different story that would be like okay we do currently have troops committed in the region in the theater and if we just

Withdraw then that would be quite a precedent so i agree in principle with what you're saying but i do want to push back a little bit just on the basis that yes obviously if the u.s had committed troops to the straight and had failed that would be much worse than the current situation but i guess the other side to that coin would be is there any credit

Threat that iran has to face that a future u.s administration would actually take that step if this one hasn't i mean you would think that of any u.s president of any u.s administration especially where you know we tend to see a very back and forth control of the white house right and we're coming up on 2028 and the next you know two-ish years is there

Really any world where iran needs to seriously consider the idea that a successor administration would try and commit that force when the guy who started this war is unwilling to take that step no i don't think that there is i my point was less that this would be a real world threat and more of just a discussion about actual like abilities so the point i was

Responding to is about like does this does this show the u.s does not have the actual ability to do that but no i don't see any future either democrat or republican administration just like steaming into hormuz and using forces against iran there but we'll have to see on that but writ large i my main point being like we have not committed forces to trying to

Control hormuz that's probably a good thing and if we did and failed that would be something else entirely kyle i disagree i think i think a future administration would consider sending troops to go let me let me just explain why the foreign policy of the u.s isn't necessarily as rigid as you know the two-party system would like to make it seem right we've

Seen instances where one administration does something and you it ripples into the next administration not because they agree with it necessarily but because it will be such a great indictment of american power if they fail to follow through on what's what the previous administration started look at the war in afghanistan a lot of people in barack obama's

Administration didn't agree with it but they continued with it if the state of almost is still closed if it's still under iranian control you know by the time of the next administration and iran is charging tools it is making life difficult for the international energy markets i don't see any administration coming in and saying oh well trump tried we're

Going to walk away evan are you which side of that equation are you on by the way yeah i actually would be very surprised if the u.s were to commit troops i hear what you're saying that you know there would be a mess left in the middle east but at the same time i mean if you look at trump's reason or at least what the reasoning seems to be right if we're

Reading the tea leaves or reading between the lines the reason why the u.s has not committed troops to open the strait is a matter of risk aversion essentially and loss aversion low pain tolerance call it what you will right but the u.s does not want to lose troops and It certainly doesn't want to lose warships trying to take the straight.

And, I mean, if you're going to commit that level of force within a few dozen kilometers of the Iranian coastline, that is what you're signing up for.

There's a distinct risk of just relentless attack by sea drones, by aerial drones, by missiles, by, you know, fast boat forces, whatever. can't go into that thinking that there's not going to be any substantial loss when Iran has all of the troops at its disposal.

And all the equipment and it's supposed to cause those losses. bring that up to say, I don't necessarily where a future U.S. administration, or at least an immediate successor, would have a much lower pain tolerance.

Sorry, have a much higher pain tolerance when they can just kind of point at what has been a mismanaged, poorly thought out, catastrophic war and essentially say, you know, this never should have happened. was foolish that we ever got to this point.

But now that we're here, right, there's no, you know, we're not going to waste more life to solve a problem that Donald Trump made, I think would be the line, certainly from a Democrat and also quite possibly from a Rubio if he were to take over.

I don't know about Vance so much, but Vance is also much less interested, seems, in foreign interventions anyway, if we were to just go with his native, you know, internal politics or whatever exists of them.

So, yeah, I would be very surprised if a future administration chose to kind of take up the flag on this one. would honestly even raise you on that one, given, and basically say, like, if the blockade is still in effect come 2029, then it's, I would find it more like, just given how much the political winds have shifted.

And, Wilfred, I completely hear you on the Obama-Afghanistan thing, but it's just such a different time at this point, given just how much the winds have shifted. I would almost say that it's more likely that the next administration would just quit the blockade outright than it would be to actually move into any engagement with Iran militarily.

Now, I'm not saying that the next administration will have a lower pain tolerance than the Trump administration.

Anyway, I'm not even implying that they would be willing to sacrifice lives to fix the mess that the Trump administration has made. simply a realization that if the Strait of Hormuz is still under Iranian control, one of America's biggest, what's it called, foreign policy objectives, just having free navigable waters, is under significant threat.

But isn't that worth enough to dedicate at least some kind of military force to try and restore? believe it's restorable, which personally, I'm looking at the situation, I don't, I mean, there is a way, if you just look at the military capability that all nations in the world have at their disposal, right, there is an argument to say, with, sufficient

Commitment with sufficient international support, so on and so forth, the U.S. could retake this trade. do think the costs of that are so prohibitively high at this point that, and quite frankly, I think the precedent has been set for the U.S. imposed international maritime trade order to fall apart anyway, regardless of what happens here.

I think that precedent has already been set so fully and completely that it's highly unlikely that the U.S. would even take the risk.

I mean, you look at what Turkey is going to probably very soon start doing with access to the Black Sea, where Turkey is really looking to build up as much maritime and aerial powers as it possibly can to lock down the Black Sea and be the sole arbiter of who goes in and out.

You look at China's ability to move into and control more and more of the South China Sea and establish its own trade and security order there.

You're even going back to the Houthis and the Red Sea, right? The Iranians are not the only threat to an international waterway, and it's not as if there's no precedent for nations that are very close to a narrow waterway controlling that waterway. Look at Egypt. at what Malaysia and Indonesia and Singapore do in the Strait of Malacca.

Look at what the U.S. does in Panama, right? This is, in many ways, an atypical situation in the Strait of Hormuz, and it always has been, where this is a deliberately untold, there's no nation that has been assigned direct control of the Strait. That is certainly advantageous to most of the world, but it's a uniform norm, if that makes sense.

I heard Turkey being mentioned. it time, Evan? Before we switch over, Wilfred, do you have anything to note on that? Because by all means, like, I'm not, you know, if I'm reading the situation wrong, please let me know. no, no. I completely agree.

I just think it's something we have to watch over the course the next administration, and I hope I'm still here with you guys so that whatever happens, I'm right, the two of you owe me a glass of whiskey. I'm wrong, I'll buy you your drink of choice.

That sounds good to me, and Kyle, I know you were chomping at the bit to get into Turkey, so I'm going to just step back and get out of the blast zone.

Do your thing. So this has been something that's just ticking all the boxes for me in terms of just being so interesting, because, so basically for some context, on August 18th, after Israel bombed Syria's Abu al-Dahir base in Idlib province, did so arguing that Turkey was eyeing sending its own forces to basically set up shop there.

U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, as well as Special Envoy to Syria, Tom Barak, immediately stepped in and said that the United States is deeply concerned that the confirmed Israeli airstrike constitutes an unnecessary escalation that does not advance regional stability. set off basically a huge wave of criticism with Israeli politicians, as well as some of the

More hardline pro-Israel people here in the U.S. jumping in to basically... condemn him for siding with Turkey.

And honestly, in terms of the Israeli side, that's fair. Israel is well within its rights to disagree with the framing of an operation that they carried out. far more concerning was the treatment he received stateside. Laura Loomer, of all people, has basically started this online movement to get him fired.

She called him, hands down, the most retarded ambassador, and that he always sides with the bad guys. More broadly, the criticism of him, including from the Wall Street Journal's editorial board, has been that Barack is basically pursuing his own foreign policy when he criticizes Israel.

So less than a week after those airstrikes, though, Secretary of State Rubio formally removed Syria from the state sponsor of terrorism list and Shiraz HTS group from the global terrorist list as well.

So to be absolutely clear from where I'm sitting, Barack is pursuing policies set out by President Trump and Secretary Rubio. So this is Barack not making his own thing, but pursuing US interest. So the fallout has just been fascinating to me.

I have so many thoughts on this, specifically on just the reaction within the American, and I don't want to call it a diplomatic call, but basically within Washington to Tom Barack's statement. I was genuinely really, really confused to see Laura Loomer, who is someone who doesn't have any official position, but has a lot of influence in the White House.

She has a lot of influence in terms of who Trump hires and fires, and just the cost of American policy.

I was genuinely so confused to see her criticizing this because one, who is she criticizing it as? She has no insight into high level meetings that determine American foreign policy. And two, this is one of the US's top officials in the region.

At the very least, back your people. So for me, that is just insane. And on the other hand, the pro-Israeli lean to a lot of institutions in the US to the point where Turkey is a NATO ally.

Yes, the US and Turkey disagree on a lot of issues, but isn't the US supposed to back its NATO allies at the very least, at the bare minimum?

So one of the points there, so like, when it comes to NATO membership, I almost view that as like, not at this point, just given how much fallout there's been with NATO, I almost view this as less insightful than some of the more like region-based stuff where the US is genuinely moving in a more pro-Turkey direction.

Turkey has enormous influence over Syria as well.

And given that we have been moving to establish better relations with Syria, we lifted sanctions, we removed them from the terrorist watch list, as was saying.

So pursuing a closer relationship with Turkey is resolutely in the United States' interests, at least in the Middle East. at the forefront of that. you've seen him pushing for Turkish membership in the F-35 program, which they were kicked out of during the first Trump administration.

And more broadly, the biggest criticism of him has really not even been that he's in some way being like anti-US or something. basically been whenever he criticizes Israel, which is where this sort of comes in.

So like Senator Rick Scott has been blasting him. we mentioned, I read out a tweet last week, and I'll read it just one more time here. After the Israeli attack, he used Israeli intelligence against U.S. intelligence.

Barack was the one using U.S. intelligence. posted, it's clear Israel gave Turkey advanced warning and Ankara ignored it. has the right and duty to defend itself from threats. needs to stop playing around, stop shilling for terrorists, and start acting like the NATO ally they pretend to be.

So overall, this is just like when people are so embedded in the pro-Israel camp, it just, I don't want to say blinds them, but it's been such this enormous point of a doctrine of quote-unquote Israeli self-defense just escalates into Israel being able to do almost anything in the region.

Yeah, I do want to flag a little bit of caution around interpreting the U.S. taking Syria off the international terrorism sponsors list as just a unilateral act in support of Turkey. both see Syria as this kind of proxy battleground for the next long while. obviously has its buffer zones. has very, very deep ties with the Druze community in the south.

I mean, that could easily be an hour-long discussion of its own just to get into all the details there. and Turkey had aspirations and ambitions for Syria that would seem to be much more within reach for both of them with that sponsor designation taken away.

So I would just add a little note of ambiguity around exactly who that serves, because in a way, it does serve Turkey and Israel at once by kind of transitioning Syria into this nation-state that U.S. is willing to do a lot more business with, regardless of who is kind of pulling the strings in Damascus.

Well, the interesting thing about that is, you're right, that they both have a lot going on in Syria, but it's that the two of them have a very divergent view of what that should be. while the U.S. administration... has been, because it has people who are on both sides here.

So you'll have people who are resolutely backing the Israeli approach, and then others like Barak who are backing the Turkish approach.

And I would argue that this is backing the Turkish approach for Syria. Because when you look at, for example, Sueda, Israel is not exclusively backing this for its own domestic Druze population, though that certainly plays a part.

So I mean, if you look at a piece, reports from the Washington Post that interviewed Israeli officials, the exact quotes that on why they were backing Druze in Sueda was, I quote, this was part of an effort to weaken the country's national cohesion and thus complicate Shara's efforts to unify the country after its long civil war.

This is why Israel has also been relatively supportive of the Kurds. They want a decentralized, rather ethnically fragmented Syria, while Turkey is pursuing a one country, one army approach instead. And those are two very mutually exclusive approaches.

You cannot have a centrally run Syria that also has Sueda basically outside of the country, as well as the Kurds doing their own thing. And we've seen that Shara's government has completely embraced the Turkish approach. been making big strides, especially with the Kurds. The SCF just essentially disbanded the other day.

And again, now Barak played a big role in that as well. So when it comes to that clash of views of what to do with Syria is really at the heart of this. And for what it's worth, Israel wants that decentralized Syria so that it's able to essentially guarantee that there's not going to be any threat like Assad was on its border.

But at the same time, like, Syria is a sovereign country and has the ability and right to exercise its own interests. Yeah, I'm glad that you brought up the point about the SDF dissolving this week. Because as it stands right now, Turkey does very clearly have the upper hand in Syria.

I mean, it has very close ties with the government in Damascus, including before the people in charge now or ever anything more than provincial leaders.

And Turkey does see Syria, as well as Cyprus, as well as some of these other countries in the immediate vicinity of the Mediterranean, as points of power projection, Turkey wants to, as we said before, really lock down the access route to the Black Sea and be a security arbiter in this part of the world. And Israel obviously is not going to stand for that.

And it is interesting that Israel's approach to Syria kind of holds that if Syria can unify into a consolidated federal government, then that federal government will kind of find its way, no matter who's in charge, to what Israel deems an anti-Israeli position.

But I do want to raise the escalation threat here because there was a lot of kind of very breathless commentary over the last few days that Israel and Turkey could end up in a direct confrontation. on the table, I don't believe that is in any way likely in the new future.

There is just too much to lose on both sides and I think a little bit too much geopolitical and geostrategic acumen on both sides to really kind of fall for that kind of bait opportunity here.

But do you believe that maybe there's a little bit more to the escalation risk that Turkey and Syria could find themselves directly confronting each other in some way in the near future? I absolutely do. I a piece for Warfronts the other day, Is War Between Turkey and Israel Inevitable?

So totally hear your point. When people hear that question, they may think, okay, like, is Israel going to be bombing Istanbul? No, it's not, just to be clear on that one.

But moving past that in terms of like, there's a lot of other things, just as we discussed here with Russia, if Russia's testing NATO and clashing with NATO, that does not mean a full all-out invasion of on the ground that marches into Berlin, right? So there's a lot of gray zone between here and there.

And Syria is where almost all of it plays out because increasingly, the two of them are at odds where Turkey is at least arguably seeking to expand its military presence even further. has actually denied that they were going to set up in this Idlib base.

But, you know, they have been seeking to deepen its presence along inside the country there. And Israel has basically said, hell no. And so we've seen four separate bases bombed in just over a year now inside of Syria, one of which missed Turkish forces by a matter of, I think, two hours.

So when it comes to that, it does not, I mean, we're playing it extremely close here.

I just have to emphasize the importance of ideology in both of these guys' thinking. So I completely understand that cooler heads may prevail in terms of, okay, all-out war is not in the cards here.

But there's a reason somebody like Danny Centrinowicz, who's a current researcher at Israel's INSS think tank, is basically saying that an all-out military clash between Israel and Turkey is, in his view, either imminent if not inevitable.

I have to agree. These guys are only going to continue to escalate, especially inside of Syria. And as Ambassador Barak posted, Turkey did not know that Israel's planes were heading towards specifically Idlib.

So they had on their radar a bunch of Israeli fighter jets heading due north if they had assumed that this was going to be a clash that was heading to them they could have scrambled jets to intercept and again you're just inching ever closer to the precipice there i agree with kyle i don't think a conflict where you know we see israel bombing istanbul is

Going to happen anytime soon but yeah there's a lot of grays on stuff that both sides can do and there's theaters where they can try and outmanover each other there's syria obviously as you know we've talked about ad nauseum but there's also somalia that's one of the areas where we really need to look at when we talk about how the war of influence at least

That's how i'm shaping it the war of influence between turkey and israel will continue to show up and the view within turkey itself is that some form of escalation is going to happen between it and israel so i'm going to briefly read from the nordic monitor so this is an article titled turkey plans for war scenarios amid expanding israel trace defense ties

Official letter revealed in case anyone is interested in you're looking up of the resources that we use for this podcast so turkish defense ministry has disclosed that it is conducting preparations for scenarios ranging from crisis and heightened tension to i to outright war as ankara closely monitors a rapidly expanding military partnership between israel

And greece according to an official government document in a letter sent to a lawmaker in the turkish parliament on the 10th of august and signed by defense minister yasser gheela the ministry said working work concerning possible crisis and war in turkey's surrounding region is continuing in close coordination among all relevant state institutions then

Usually explicit reference to war came in a response focus specific specifically on greece's military posture in the agency and its growing defense relationship with israel so they are very aware and they're they're preparing for all manner of scenarios but for me just the threat of greater proxy wars specifically in somalia that's that's my big thing yeah i

Would agree with that i think the risk of proxy confrontation between israel and turkey is sky high whether we're talking about you know as you said somalia whether we're talking about syria we could even talk about ethiopia we could talk about parts of egypt that still there are these kind of militant groups that would like to start a conflict with israel

At some point in the future we could talk about libya sudan so on so forth yeah in that regard i think that there's certainly a high likelihood of proxy confrontation and maybe some small unit direct showdowns there i do think if you look at turkey's conduct for example the syrian civil war turkey was very good at taking fairly broad actions and sustaining

Setbacks but staying very quiet about that I don't know that there is a bone in Israel's political body that can kind of fight that much quieter conflict in the mid-2020s in the way that Turkey, I think, would want to.

For that reason, I think Turkey, which does kind of have the larger advantage in Syria right now, will likely avoid any direct confrontation if they can, particularly just because Israel, I mean, Turkey wants to keep its place in the NATO alliance.

It wants to not really rock the boat so much as it wants to kind of just assert itself in its own area and be unchallenged, which is a subtle distinction, but it really does matter on the Turkish side.

Like they don't want to pick fights if they don't have to, so much as they just kind of want to make themselves into too powerful of a force to challenge outright. that there is an incompatibility in the way that Turkey and Israel would want to go about smaller scale direct conflicts that I do believe will cause Turkey to hold back and pursue other really

Proxy focused means of getting that done. no, the proxies are definitely a big factor there.

So, I mean, like I said, I think one of the biggest risks for any clash between the two would be via proxy, specifically Syria. also mentioned the Somali aspect there because they're also feuding over an honestly similar situation there.

So, Israel backing the semi-autonomous region in Somaliland, whereas Ankara is backing the centrally run government, or they want a central government in Mogadishu there.

So, a similar sort of showdown. The situation that differentiates it, though, being Israel has proven since October 7th that it is resolutely committed to the no enemies on our border approach and is willing to back it up with military force, no matter what the cost, essentially.

And even if Netanyahu loses in November, I don't see that really de-escalating at all. excuse me, October. see that de-escalating at all.

So, we move forward with this, like, this is only going to become more of an issue with time because as Syria, and you can see it is progressing. al-Shara was just using a visa card for the first time. You can use them now in Syria. used to have to use cash everywhere because of sanctions. was just lifted.

So, the government there is expanding its powers and becoming more of an actual state as opposed to, you know, a sort of rebel group that set up shop in the capital. country moves to be more of a centrally run country out of the capital there, it's going to be, like, Israel is not going to be able to forever ignore the centralization going on in the country.

Glad you brought up election. because I do want to talk about that point. you mentioned, Netanyahu is looking at an election in October. in Turkey is also facing an election at some point.

It's not quite clear when he has to hold it by mid-2028, but he can call it much sooner. And there's a lot of speculation right now that in kind of a difficult political time for Erdogan in Turkey, where if you follow domestic Turkish politics, there's been really intense repression of the opposition for a long time.

The opposition have now formed this very large new party, literally called the new party, think, I'm thinking of somebody else's domestic crisis, which is always a possibility because we track so many of those.

But all that is to say, Turkish opposition is aligning right now in a way that may pose real problems for Erdogan when he does choose to call that election. Netanyahu obviously is looking at an election coming up soon.

So how much do you think both of these guys might have something to gain politically by trying to get kind of a rally around the flag effect, by casting each other as a major and long-term threat that really, you know, whether it's Erdogan or Netanyahu, they say, I'm the only one who can deal with these guys.

I'm the only one who can keep you safe from them. Enormously.

Because, and I make sure always in my videos, but on the, both calling about the Cold War between Israel and Turkey, but also yesterday's one talking about war between them, I always nuance any view with that because overall we have to be cautious not to just be constantly falling for whatever they're saying.

There is certainly a lot of nationalism going on there. sides have domestic populations that kind of hate the other one. And it plays really well to the base to say, like, they're going to be taking this very seriously, going to be doing all of this strong stuff, blah, blah, blah.

So Hasan Fikan, the foreign minister of NATO's second largest military, recently described Israelis as a burden the world can no longer bear.

Erdogan, excuse me, Netanyahu for his part has been very frequently calling Erdogan either an Islamist terrorist or anti-Semitic dictator, blah, blah, blah.

You get the idea. have to kind of look past that because Erdogan and Netanyahu have this relationship where they can kind of benefit from just throwing bombs at, verbal bombs at each other without actually escalating to actual conflict.

It's so weird for me to see just how the relationship between Netanyahu and Erdogan has evolved to the point where right now we're discussing whether there's, you know, some kind of mutualism, some kind of symbiosis between them in ensuring that the other's political career survives.

It just goes to show that in politics and especially geopolitics, there's no permanent friends, there's no permanent enemies, there's only, interests that align. And right now, both of them, their interests align.

As you've rightly said, Evan, the opposition in Turkey is lining up in such a way that whenever the next elections are held, they will be able to present a credible threat to Erdogan's ability to come back to power.

And of course, we've spoken at length about the issues Netanyahu is facing domestically. it's very strange to see just the lengths that they will go if, you know, this is true, if they're sort of playing off against each other, and you're trying to rally the citizens around the flag.

It just goes to show you how much of an influence politics can have on a security situation. Now, the issue becomes if it escalates, because with a situation like this, it's very easy to misread someone's intentions.

Erdogan can say something, or Israel can do something, and it's misread. Like Kyle said, Turkey just saw a bunch of Israeli jets on its radars. It didn't have any information on where they're going.

If they had chosen to react, this will be a much, much podcast right now. bring it back to Iran for our final question before we wrap up for the day.

As we see this growing Cold War between Turkey and Israel, where do you see Iran fitting into that, and also fitting into the other growing Cold War dynamics that we've seen across the Middle East, North Africa, the Islamic world, whether it's Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, whether it is Ethiopia and Egypt, and so on, in these coalitions that we're kind of

Seeing come together over time, as we've covered in depth war fronts.

Where do you see Iran kind of asserting itself in the future, and how much do you believe the strain of homeless control is going to weigh into that? think Iran's place is secure, because all of these countries, all of them are middle powers.

They are all rising in a much, much different world, where the U.S.'s influence in the Middle East will continue to decline, because American security guarantees have been called into question multiple times. And the U.S. seems, at the very least, to be interested in moving away from the region.

So, for Iran, its place, it will most likely try to align itself with Turkey, because they both have a common enemy in Israel.

And at the same time, it will try to ensure its own strategic strength, in that it has hot moves, it also has its proxy network, and its missile and drone system. So, it will try to retain its position as one of the most capable militaries in the Middle East. So, my perspective.

Yeah, there's this interesting symbiosis between Ankara and Tehran. So back in late March, I think, I wrote a piece for France, and I'm sorry to keep Turkey maxing if that's a term, but yes, in the new Middle East, all roads lead to Ankara.

Iran certainly has its strengths, but it has an enormous number of weaknesses, many of which are completely self-inflicted.

Turkey is fundamentally leagues ahead of Iran in terms of actually being able to stand up to Israel. together, but I saw Wilfred's comment. we'll have to cut that. Okay.

So moving forward in the Middle East, no matter what happens with Iran, and was saying this way back in March, so if Iran comes out of this weakened, Ankara has the ability to step in and fill that gap.

Whereas even if Iran is still kicking and going strong, Ankara is now in the position of both having a closer partner to work with in Tehran, while having more even rationale as to oppose Israel's force in the region.

So no matter what happens with the Iran war, Turkey really comes out of this looking really good. reason, Iran shot rockets at Turkey as well in the earlier stages. basically told them, like, stop or we're going to start responding and you don't want us to start responding. But overall, they have largely been able to stay out of it.

Turkey has such a good drone game, as well as a counter drone game. their domestic arms manufacturing capacities is really, really impressive. something we are talking about for some time to come on the Middle East Roundtable. I think we may have more Turkey maxing ahead of us. I think we do.

And speaking of things we're going to be talking about for a long time to come, I would love to hear what you guys are going be keeping watch on in the next week. think we all, as international observers, should be paying attention to and what's going to go wrong next. for me, I am watching the situation in Iran, specifically around their economy. governor

Of Iran's central bank recently came out and did an interview on CTV talking very candidly for the very first time about just how dire the situation has gotten the Iranian real continues to crater against the dollar.

Inflation continues to rise. There are long lines forming for basic goods. situation does not look good.

So that kind of economic crisis. Pressure is usually what leads to widespread riots.

Alternatively, it can also lead to people rallying around the flag because if they feel that this is caused by the US, this isn't our government trying to punish us, then we're looking at a situation where people who might have supported an American intervention in Iran or just America's operation against the government in Tehran more generally, we might see

Them shift their support towards the government because they see it as trying to protect them. that's what I'm watching right now, the situation inside Iran.

And then on my part, definitely going to keep Lebanon front and center here. may be working on a piece later this week on that. been, unfortunately, a return to clashes. sort of losing faith in this pilot zone approach.

This was always a problem at outset, given just that there was no timeline attached to it. seen, to date, in the past, what, two, three months at this point, we've seen one village, one town, Zartar al-Gharbia, which is where Nawaf Salaam had his Iwo Jima moment. And admittedly, it was a great photo op.

But beyond that, not a lot to show for it, guys. lot of the country is still displaced. It's not looking too good. it is not. And on my part, I'm going be watching Iraq to try and see how these militias in southern Iraq are going to start weighing in a little bit more of the conflict.

We're seeing the scope of this war broaden pretty quickly with the Houthis getting involved.

So I'm very, very curious about the signs and signals coming out of southern Iraq, because as of now, that is kind of the biggest card, as I see it, that Iran has left to play and has not really started to do so. until that happens, we will be here in the Middle East Roundtable week after week, as you know, covering this conflict.

So please do join us in the future. gotten to this point in the episode, you are almost certainly one of our premium subscribers. very much for your support, especially in this week of all weeks, where we've published about how we're attracting some attention from someplace, who knows where, but somewhere with a lot of money and a lot of access to spyware.

You know, fighting the good fight over here, doing our best, keeping ourselves and our team safe to the extent that anybody in, you know, 21st century conflict reporting can do so.

But, you know, fighting the good fight as we do. thanks to Kyle and Wilford, of course, as always, for everything they do. thanks to everybody who is listening into the Middle East Roundtable and who keeps on coming back week after week to listen to a group of, you know, very, very, very tired geopolitical analysts watching everything happening the world for

The last six months and just watching more and more and more and more of it and just trying our best to keep up. share some stuff with you.

So thank you very much. We appreciate you.

And we will see you next week on the Middle East Roundtable.