Obama’s foreign policy short-falls keeps Europe vigilant on MENA front

The European Role and the Aspirations of the Arab People
Posted: 7/22/11 06:12 PM ET

For Europe, both the declining U.S. interest in international affairs and the fact that Russia’s approach to international diplomacy has reverted to the Soviet mentality, represent an opportunity for the continent to play an exceptional and effective role, both internationally and regionally. In truth, the Middle East, the Gulf region and North Africa are all geographically proximate to Europe, in addition to being the theater where many European strategic and economic interests come together. In the past few decades, the European role was merely that of a proxy, in the era of the American and Soviet superpowers during the Cold War, despite the historical relations between Europe and the Arab region, stretching from the Middle East to the Gulf and North Africa.

However, this decade has seen a shift in the relations with Europe, with the wave of change that swept the region with the beginning of the year. Yet the sovereign debt and Euro-zone crises have both held back the European Union, and brought many European countries into a shortfall of, or even to reneging on, the promises and pledges they had made.

The idea of applying the principle of a Marshall Plan-like initiative, in order to ensure the success of the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, has regressed, leaving only promises behind and an absence of the means to execute them. But the European interest in the events of Libya, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain, Iran and Lebanon, as well as in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, has not regressed. On the contrary, every time the United States has lagged behind in Libya or in Syria for example, the European countries have helped resuscitate American interest, so that it may not fall into the slumber that usually comes when it fixates itself upon its domestic affairs, especially during an elections period.

For instance, when the Obama Administration made a faux pas two weeks ago, which could have otherwise come at an exorbitant cost, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs of the European Union — Catherine Ashton — took charge and succeeded at reversing a terrible draft statement by the Quartet on the Middle East. Further, Europe plays an equally important role in light of that played by Russia in the Security Council and at the regional level, providing, for example, absolute protection for the regimes in Tripoli, Damascus and Tehran, with total disregard for the demands of the people in those countries. …more