JORDAN SEEKS CHINA’S HELP FOR NASCENT NUKE PROGRAM…
A “legal and political framework” for peaceful nuclear cooperation has been signed between Jordan and China, adding to the recent surge of interest in nuclear technology in the Middle East. Ostensibly the agreement is aimed at “electricity generation and water desalination” as well as the “operation of nuclear stations and reactors, exploration of minerals and disposal of nuclear waste.” However, many in the region see the rush to nuclear power in the Sunni Arab Gulf as a specific counterweight to, and hedge against, Shiite Iran’s nuclear quest. The nuclear agreement will be the fourth this year for Jordan, which has already inked deals with Canada, Britain, and France. (Phnom Phen Cambodian Times, August 19, 2008)
… AND OPENS A LONG-CLOSED DOOR TO HAMAS
Nuclear talks with China are not the only conversations in Amman raising eyebrows, however. This month Jordan’s intelligence chief reversed a longstanding freeze on ties with the Hamas militant group by holdings talks with Mohammed Nazzal, a Hamas politburo member. The re-establishment of diplomatic ties was accompanied by an agreement by Hamas not to “take public positions on Jordan’s internal affairs” – of particular interest to Amman given Jordan’s own popular Muslim Brotherhood-linked Islamist party. Relations between Hamas and the Hashemite Kingdom, though cold for years, hit an all-time low in 2006 when Jordanian officials accused the terrorist group of smuggling weapons into the country. (Tel Aviv Yediot Ahronot, August 15 ,2008)
EXTREMISTS UNITE IN LEBANON
Hizbullah, Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Shiite militia, has signed an accord with a Sunni fundamentalist organization in Lebanon committing both groups to a ban on “any aggression by a Muslim faction on another Muslim faction.” Inked by Hizbullah’s politburo chief, Ibrahim Amin al-Sayyed, and Hassan Shahhal, the head of the Belief and Justice Movement, a Salafist organization, the accord also commits both sides to confronting the “American agenda” and serves as a mutual defense pact “in case either Hizbullah or the Salafis was subjected to injustice by domestic or external sides.” Not all Salafis are enthusiastic about the accord, however. Dai al Islam al-Shahhal, the highest Salafi authority in Lebanon has called the document “harmful to the Sunni community.” “The Salafi movement totally rejects this document,” he said, “and who signed it has no right to claim belonging to the Salafi movement or representing it.” (Beirut al-Nahar, August 18, 2008)
SYRIAN QUEST FOR LONG-RANGE MISSILES DENIED
A complex web of arms negotiations now underway in Eurasia is serving as a proxy for a four-way political chess match between Russia, Georgia, Israel, and Syria. As Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency puts it, Israel’s training and equipping of Georgian commandos – some of which Russian forces have recently met in battle – was potentially leading Russia to reconsider a 2001 decision not to sell Syria offensive Iskander missiles. Hoping to seize on Russia’s change-of-heart, Bashar al-Assad traveled to Moscow in August on a “purchasing spree,” seeking a range of weapons on display at Russia’s MVSV-2008 arms show. Yet Syria – which still owes Moscow some $3 billion for previous arms purchases – ended up being disappointed; Russia was only willing to provide defensive weapons that “do not upset the balance of strength in the region,” in the words of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Assad was able to open negotiations on contracts for Pantsyr and Buk missile systems, however, as well as Sukhoi and MiG fighters. Syria and Russia also spoke about the possibility of expanding a Russian naval base at Tartus, a Syrian port on the Mediterranean. (RIA Novosti, August 26, 2008)
THROUGH VENEZUELA, IRAN ENTERS AMERICA’S BACKYARD
Long-running suspicions of Hezbollah’s penetration into Latin America are being reinforced by a series of developments that have seized the attention of U.S. counterterrorism officials. Chief among Washington’s concerns is an apparent shift of Hezbollah’s operational focus from the lawless tri-border area joining Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina, to Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela, an anti-American bulwark on the continent. U.S. officials point to a number of troubling signs: “intensified” flights between Iran, Syria, and Venezuela; reports of the initiation of a “special force” supported by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah to kidnap Jewish businesspeople; and the establishment of a $2 billion joint Iranian-Venezuelan program to fund “social projects” throughout Latin America. The relationship, in the words of one western counterterrorism official, is “becoming a strategic partnership.” (Los Angeles Times, August 27, 2008)