August 28, 2024
Marco Carnelos
is a former Italian diplomat. He has been assigned to Somalia, Australia and
the United Nations. He served in the foreign policy staff of three Italian
prime ministers between 1995 and 2011. More recently he has been Middle East
peace process coordinator special envoy for Syria for the Italian government
and, until November 2017, Italy’s ambassador to Iraq.
Conventional
wisdom decrees that the 21st century’s most important geopolitical battle will
be between the United States and China.
In this context,
the western mainstream narrative portrays the US as committed to safeguarding
and enforcing the so-called rules-based world order, which Washington created
and has presided over since its victory in the Second World War.
This rules-based
order should correspond with the international law codified in many covenants
since the birth of the United Nations almost 80 years ago. It does not.
At best, this
rules-based order reflects a US/western interpretation of selected aspects of
international law. At worst, international law has been twisted to suit the
West’s specific interests.
In both cases,
the purpose is to serve the West’s geopolitical interests and justify its
hegemony. Of course, blinded by hubris, western powers believe that because
these “rules” allegedly fit their interests, they also serve the interests of
all humankind. They are wrong.
That same
western mainstream narrative portrays China as the main threat to this
rules-based order, attributing to the Asian nation both the will and the
capability to challenge and modify this order.
That the US and
its allies have come to such conclusions demonstrates the catastrophic
cognitive dissonance characterising western leaders’ analysis and
decision-making.
Diplomatic
failures
It is
extraordinary that western chancelleries attribute such subversive intentions
to Communist China, which – contrary to the US – has not deployed its army
abroad for nearly half a century (the last instance being in 1979, against
Vietnam).
Unlike the US,
China has never interfered in or organised a coup against any other country.
Unlike the US, it has never adopted unilateral sanctions against any country
except those legally authorised by the UN Security Council. Also, unlike the
US, it owns only one military base abroad (in Djibouti), and its navy – again,
contrary to the US – mainly patrols the South China Sea, which constitutes the
country’s most important supply line.
China’s main
territorial claim concerns an island in the Pacific Ocean close to its coast
(Taiwan), which, since 1972, through three joint US-China communiques,
Washington has unequivocally recognised as part of mainland China. To eliminate
any ambiguity, the US doubled down by facilitating Taiwan’s expulsion from the
UN to give its seat to Communist China.
If such
extremely restrained and responsible behaviour qualifies China as a threat to
the rules-based order, how should the behaviour of the US and its closest
allies (particularly Israel) be viewed?
Another
interesting metric for assessing whether the US or China poses the greatest
threat to the rules-based world order is their respective behaviour in the most
troublesome region of the planet: the Middle East.
Since the end of
the Second World War, the US has claimed an exclusive role in allegedly
promoting peace and stability in the region. It has been called “Pax
Americana”, though, in recent times, it has been anything but peaceful.
US diplomacy
once boasted significant successes, from shuttle diplomacy after the 1973 Yom
Kippur War and the 1978 Camp David Accords, which secured peace between Israel
and Egypt, to the 1994 peace deal between Israel and Jordan.
However, over
the last three decades, the US’ magic touch in the region has almost
systematically failed.
China and the
Middle East
These failures
encompass everything from the collapse of an Israeli-Palestinian deal in 2000
and the “war on terror” across the broader Middle East (including Afghanistan
in 2001 and a renewed invasion of Iraq in 2003) to an ignominious withdrawal
from Kabul two decades later and the delivery of Iraq to pro-Iran militias after
2011.
They also
include the “Assad must go” policy in Syria in 2011, followed by the country’s
readmission to the Arab League and the reopening of Arab and western embassies
in Damascus, along with an intelligent nuclear deal with Iran in 2015, followed
by the Trump administration’s ignominious withdrawal from the same deal three
years later.
In addition, the
US’ failures encompass the biased Abraham Accords, which only served Israel’s
interests, and an ironclad and blind support for Israel in its murderous
assault on Gaza, which has led to accusations at the International Court of
Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court (ICC) for genocide and
crimes against humanity.
And then, there
is China, a latecomer to the Middle East.
Unlike the US,
China has no military bases in the region and not a single soldier has been
deployed, except for a few hundred who have been engaged in the UN-mandated
Unifil mission patrolling and surveying the critical border between Israel and
Lebanon.
For decades,
China’s main concern in the Middle East has been developing economic and trade
relations with the countries in the region, and it has been successful on both
counts. China boasts strategic economic agreements with Egypt, Iran and all the
members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), as well as good relations with
Israel.
More recently,
China’s diplomatic efforts have accomplished two major successes.
In 2023, it
brokered a rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia, two of the most
important players in the region, pursuing a very different political path from
the one favoured by the US, which seeks to isolate Iran to trigger regime
change in Tehran.
Earlier this
year, China brokered another important understanding by successfully promoting
reconciliation talks among the different Palestinian factions, especially
between Fatah and Hamas.
Honest broker
This diplomatic
achievement should not be underestimated because the decades-old divisions
among Palestinians have been a significant obstacle to a successful peace
process.
Israel has been
claiming for years that it has no credible partner for negotiations. Of course,
since the 1980s, Israel has actively fomented divisions among the different
Palestinian factions, precisely so it could maintain the narrative that it
lacks a partner for peace talks and thereby continue its annexation of the
occupied territories.
If the
Palestinian factions respect and fulfill the understandings reached in Beijing,
this could be a crucial first step towards a more credible peace process in the
future.
In other words,
while the US has been providing iron-clad support to Israel’s genocide by
sending vast amounts of weapons, shielding Israel’s crimes at the UN Security
Council and trying – so far unsuccessfully – to broker a ceasefire in Gaza and
secure the release of Israeli hostages, China has laid the first necessary
stone for a more credible and durable peace process.
By drawing the
right lessons from history and considering the long list of US failures in
promoting an Israeli-Palestinian deal, China could legitimately claim that its
role as a mediator between Israel and Palestine stands a greater chance of
success.
One thing is
certain: Beijing – again, contrary to Washington – would be an honest broker.
A Chinese
success here could significantly bolster the rules-based order, but the right
one – one that respects international law and international humanitarian law.
The current rules-based order, as often claimed by the US and its allies, is
nothing more than a semantic trick aimed at concealing western hypocrisy and
double standards.
China is not
challenging the Global West’s rules-based order. It is simply joining the
Global Rest in demanding respect for international law, its consistent
application to all states without double standards and the putting aside,
finally, of misleading western terminology.
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