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Email this citationCIAO DATE: 03/03
Security Factors and Responses in the Emerging Mediterranean Strategic Setting
July 2002
Abstract
During the Cold War, threats coming from across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe and the Western world in general were strictly related to the East-West confrontation. National security was not endangered by possible attacks from the Mediterranean or Middle Eastern countries as such but by the East-West escalation South-South conflict could be able to give way to. In this sense, the Arab-Israeli conflict was a central threat to Western security. What was frightening was not the military power of the regional countries but their alliance with the Soviet Union and the possibility of what at that time was called horizontal escalation (as opposed to East-West direct vertical escalation).
With the end of the Cold War and the 1990-91 Gulf War, South-South instability ceased to be a threat to Western and European national security. Crises in the Middle East could not give way to escalation any more. Furthermore, the likelihood of a war between the states of the Middle East was drastically reduced, first, by the end of the Soviet support to a number of Arab states and, second, by the successful intervention by the US-led international coalition against Iraq. As a consequence of the change in the balance of power of the region, the Arab countries and the Palestinians had to accept the establishment of a negotiating framework with Israel. The Madrid process was also reinforced by the Oslo accords between the Palestinians and Israel.
Instability in the Southern countries did not come to an end, however. It shifted from inter-state to intra-state sources. Arab governments proved to be too weak to be able to proceed to the necessary reforms in the economic as well as political realms. Governments resulted to have few popular support and weak legitimacy.
It must be noted that the Arab governments were opposed by their people not because of their authoritarian character and the lack of democracy but because they were considered responsible for having proved and still proving unable to oppose Western and Israel intrusion. As just noted, after the change brought about by the end of the Cold War and its implications, governments felt compelled to negotiate with Israel. Arab people, though, looked at these negotiations as an evidence of the defeat suffered by the Arabs at the hands of Israel and the West. This opposition, although nationalist in its character, was led by the growing influence and activism of religious parties and groupings.
A number of elections, in particular those in Algeria, made clear that incumbent authoritarian governments risked to be replaced by religious or nationalist extremists. The process of political reform was therefore stopped with the silent consensus of the Western governments. This development prevented extremists from going to power but left power in the hands of weak governments unable to proceed to badly needed political
