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Nuclear Proliferation and the Middle East
the only two Middle East countries containing all three of the key resources required to be a regional power - oil, large population, and water - are the two most consistently demonized (put down, attacked) by the US which is the primary global power operating in the area. • Iran and Iraq
These two countries remain “locked in contention for future regional hegemony” and nuclear weapons could prove useful to them in this regard.
“Military collaboration between Pakistan and Iran is longstanding, and Tehran would be a likely customer for Islamabad if (and this is a very big “if”) a decision were made to sell nuclear weapons technology or equipment.”
In Iraq “the emergence of two new nuclear states close by may well spark a popular and/or government-orchestrated call for nuclear renewal in an Iraq devastated by the sanctions and angry at the Permanent Five members of the UN Security Council - not coincidentally the same countries as the Nuke Five.”
“In the run-up to the 1995 diplomatic conference on extending the NPT, Egypt joined India, Mexico, South Africa and other countries to challenge the Nuke Five. But quickly Egypt's president overruled the foreign ministry's efforts, and Egypt ultimately signed the NPT as a non-nuclear signatory.”
“The danger now is that public opinion in Egypt could begin to shift, to demand that the government renew its long-abandoned nuclear program. With a collapsed economy, massive unemployment, growing discontent, and a growing Islamist insurgency, Cairo could ill afford to simply ignore this kind of political pressure.”
“Elsewhere in the Arab world, even in the [oil] wealthy and usually quiescent Gulf states, anger is growing at the latest version of the nuclear powers' double standards: the willingness to overlook Israel's powerful nuclear arsenal, while imposing harsh and unforgiving sanctions on other Middle Eastern countries' efforts to catch up.”
there is currently only one Middle Eastern nuclear power • Israel. • 15-year-old nuclear capacity ... semi-acknowledged • "strategic ambiguity": creating a nuclear arsenal but with the fiction (unchallenged by the West) that "Israel will not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons in the region."
In 1981 Israel attacked and destroyed Iraq’s fledging nuclear weapons program. • In 1986 Israel’s nuclear weapons program was revealed. • 200+ weapons, 6th largest in the world • but Israel has never been challenged or punished for its nuclear weapons program
Especially alarming to Israel’s Islamic neighbours is the growing relationship between the right wing extremist government of India, which tested their bomb, and the government of Israel. • Both see themselves as being "surrounded by Muslims.”
The concern now is that Israel may feel the need to increase its arsenal and that given the country’s international clout, especially in the US, Washington and its allies may turn a blind eye to the escalation.
This in turn would further infuriate the Arab states in the region and lead to unchecked proliferation in the region. • This why the leaders of the US and the West attach so much importance to securing a realistic and permanent peace between the Palestinians and Israel.
