Nineteen days after Hamas fighters streamed into Israel, slaughtering more than 1,4000 people and taking some 250 hostages, a delegation from the Islamic terrorist group that rules Gaza visited Moscow. Iran’s deputy foreign minister was in the Russian capital at the same time, provoking an official protest from Tel Aviv.
With his war in Ukraine stalemated, Russian President Vladimir Putin is seeking influence in the Middle East, a region where the Soviet Union once held a relatively strong position as it armed and assisted countries such as Egypt in its endless wars against the Jewish state. Today, however, an opportunistic Kremlin’s friends are an unsightly group: the jihadists of Hamas, the ayatollahs of Tehran, Bashar al-Assad’s Syria and Stalinist North Korea — not to mention Xi Jinping’s China.
In this episode of History As It Happens, historians Sergey Radchenko and Vladislav Zubok explain Moscow’s current aims in the Middle East that have surprising continuities with, as well as important differences from, the Soviet era.
“For Russia, nothing is more important than the question of status on the international stage. During the Cold War as well, for the Soviets it was very important to be part of the process … because it was seen as a playground for great powers,” said Mr. Radchenko, a historian at the Henry A. Kissinger Center at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
“I see it like the Phantom of the Opera. Nothing disappears totally,” said Mr. Zubok, referring to Russia’s presence in the volatile region. “For decades, the Soviet Union played the role of ’the other’ in the region, ’the other’ to the West.” Likewise, Mr. Putin’s Russia is cynically exploiting the Israel-Hamas war to attempt to foil U.S. influence, said Mr. Zubok, a scholar at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Also discussed in this episode is the Soviet Union’s initial interest in the post-war (1945) Middle East, its relationships with both Israel and the Arab states that were at war with it during the 1950s through the 1970s, and the collapse of Soviet influence after 1991, helping lead the way to the First Gulf War and Madrid peace conference.
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