A Difficult and Dangerous Chess Game

By: Daniel Brumberg

April 19, 2009

Yesterday, someone called on the Egyptian people to take to the streets...This person also called on the Egyptian Armed Forces...The Egyptian Armed Forces are there to defend Egypt. If need be, they will also protect Egypt against people like you.
—Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmad Abu al-Gheit December 29, 2008.

Abu al-Gheit issued the above warning to Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hizbollah, as Israel was pounding Gaza. Assailing Egypt's effort to stem the flow of weapons to Hamas, Nasrallah went so far as to assert that the "Egyptian position is the cornerstone of what is going on in Gaza." Outraged Egyptian officials retaliated by accusing Hizbollah of sending a "sleeper cell" into Sinai to prepare attacks against Egyptian targets.

Nasrallah denied any such activity. But after Egyptian officials announced the arrest of some 25 Hizbollah suspects, he acknowledged dispatching operatives while insisting that their sole aim was to help Hamas against Israel.

Whom to believe? Gheit's accusations are hardly convincing. Would Hizbollah be so reckless as to send operatives to threaten Egyptian targets? I doubt it. Nor am I reassured by Egyptian promises to provide "surprising" details of such an operation. Having repeatedly invented evidence to justify jailing regime critics, I would be surprised if Egypt's judiciary failed to concoct a detailed report of Hizbollah's supposed conspiracy.

Still, I am not satisfied with Nasrallah's explanations either. His words highlight Hizbollah's contempt for sovereign borders, not to mention its readiness to discredit the Egyptian government by appealing directly to the "people."

Cairo, of course, sees one supreme culprit behind Hizbollah's actions. As Abu al-Gheit put it last week: "Iran, and Iran's followers want Egypt to become a maid of honor for the crowned Iranian queen when she enters the Middle East."

So here we get to the core issue. The scuffle over Gaza is part of a Middle East cold war that could quickly heat up. Worried by Washington's opening to Tehran, unable to wield the regional clout it once commanded, and fearful that the doors are slamming shut to any two-state solution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Egypt is determined to show that it is leading the moderate Arab charge against the Islamic Republic.

These developments come at a difficult moment for the region, and for Washington. The sentencing of American journalist Roxana Saberi to eight years in an Iranian prison signals the ruthless determination of Tehran's hardliners to prevent a détente with the U.S. In Lebanon, a fractured polity is preparing for parliamentary elections that might widen the sectarian divide. And in Iraq, the reassertion of Sunni political power is making Shi'ite and Kurdish leaders very nervous.

The region's escalating cold war will only magnify these local sectarian conflicts. In the coming months, watch for further efforts by Cairo and its Arab allies to deflect Iran's influence by supporting like-minded groups in Lebanon, Iraq and elsewhere. Watch as well for more dramatic stories from Cairo and other Arab capitals about Iranian perfidy.

Seeking to expand its diplomatic maneuverability, the Obama administration has chosen to engage some of the region's toughest players. Whether this strategy can (or should) survive Iran's jailing of a U.S. citizen on trumped up charges remains to be seen. But Washington should not play into the hands of Iranian hardliners by suddenly jettisoning its approach to the Islamic Republic, or by uncritically accepting every charge that Cairo hurls at Tehran. After all, the game has just begun.

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