Will Obama's parting shots hit targets?

Washington

FOLLOWING the news that emanated from Washington last week, an objective observer may conclude that two of the most dramatic foreign policy crises of Barack Obama's presidency occurred during his last 30 days or so in office. Indeed, the major American newspapers carried screaming headlines about "escalating tensions" in US-Israeli relations and highlighted a major "diplomatic crisis" on the American-Russian front.

So forget Syria, Brexit, US presidential elections. We've never seen anything like these in our lifetime: Washington joining criticism of Israeli settlement policy and expelling Russian diplomats!

Relax and take a big diplomatic breath, guys. The world as we know it will survive. The Israeli-American friendship will remain intact even after the Obama administration decided to abstain in a vote in the United Nations Security Council that condemned the continuing build-up of Israeli settlements in occupied Arab territories, a move that was followed by a 70-minute speech by Secretary of State John Kerry who blamed Israel for the failure to revive the so-called peace process.

And Russia will continue to be neither a friend nor an enemy, but a "frenemy" of the US, notwithstanding the move by President Obama to eject 35 suspected Russian intelligence operatives and impose sanctions on Russia's intelligence agencies in retaliation for its alleged attempt to influence the 2016 election by hacking into American computer servers.

You can compare US foreign policy to a huge ship that moves very slowly and rarely makes big turns. It's steady as she goes. And short of an event that poses a direct and immediate threat to American security - like the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour on Dec 3, 1941, or the Al Qaeda terrorist strike against New York and Washington on Sept 11, 2001 - US administrations seldom move to dramatically reverse current US policies towards either friends or enemies.

Still, one shouldn't play down the significance of what some pundits describe as President Obama's parting shots at his least favourite foreign leaders - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin ("Bibi") Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who also happens to be one of president-elect Donald Trump's Bestest Best Friends (BBFS).

Call it the clash between the purported Man of the Future and the so-called Men of the Past - between an American leader who is relatively young, liberal, cosmopolitan and cool, and who has welcomed the process of globalisation and multiculturalism while rejecting the forces of nationalism and tribalism, and two older leaders who are more conservative and "identitarian" in their view of the world which, they believe, remains dominated by the fierce power struggle between nation states.

Mr Obama has embraced the notion that we need to put the past (nationalist contests over territories that are driven by ethnic and religious antagonism) behind us and enter into an age of progress dominated by the principles of the Western Enlightenment, such as political freedom, religious liberty and peace between nations.

These principles have provided the foundations for much of the kind of global strategy that Mr Obama decided to pursue when he entered office, including the policies vis-à-vis Israel and Russia.

Hence Mr Obama took diplomatic steps to end American military intervention in the Middle East and improve US relations with the Arab and Muslim worlds while setting the US relationship with Russia onto a new course in the form of a diplomatic "Re-start".

Neither Israeli PM Netanyahu nor President Putin shares Mr Obama's progressive vision of the international system; they see it in more realpolitik terms, where military power (and not peaceful diplomacy) is the main currency.

A former combat soldier who is committed to Israel's Zionist/Jewish ethos, "Bibi" places Israel's security at the top of his agenda, believes that Israeli weakness invites Arab aggression and that his country's margin of security remains narrow, and leads a right-wing government which includes political parties that aren't willing to make major concessions to the country's enemies.

And Mr Putin - an ex-operative of the KGB, the Soviet-era intelligence agency - is first and foremost a Russian nationalist whose main goal is to protect and strengthen his country, which has been in a downward spiral since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and who suspects that the US and the West are determined to thwart its re-emergence as a great power.

It's not very difficult to figure out why Mr Trump - a conservative, nationalist and realpolitik-oriented leader - imagines "Bibi" and Mr Putin to be his political soulmates. Like him (and unlike Mr Obama, whom he suspects recites John Lennon's Imagine at least twice a day), they view the world through national security glasses.

It would not be fair, however, to depict Mr Obama as a spacey idealist. In the Middle East, he decided to adopt a renewed activist US role in trying to bring peace between Israel and the Palestinians, which was supposed to lead to an agreement on the establishment of an independent Palestinian state alongside the State of Israel. But Mr Obama discovered during his two terms in office that contrary to his hopes of permanent peace, much of the Middle East continues to live in the past where national, ethnic and religious identities remain the driving forces.

The so-called Arab Spring that was supposed to usher in a liberal and democratic era to the region degenerated into sectarian civil wars and new regional conflicts, making it even more difficult than in the past to reach an accord on how to divide the Holy Land between Arabs and Jews.

As Mr Obama's chief diplomats, including Mr Kerry, shuttled between Israelis and Palestinians, both sides seemed to be gravitating to less conciliatory positions. The Israelis have been arguing that at the core of the conflict is the refusal of the Palestinians to accept the reality of an independent Jewish state. The Palestinians countered that the main stumbling block to peace is the continuing buildup of Jewish settlements in territories that were expected to be part of an independent Palestinian state.

But affecting the American posture in the negotiations and their aftermath has been the strained personal relationship between the American president and the Israeli prime minister. To suggest that there is no personal chemistry between the two leaders would be an understatement.

The two detest each other. Mr Obama thinks "Bibi" was intent on scuttling his Middle East policy, including the US nuclear deal with Iran and the two-state solution. Mr Netanyahu suspects that Mr Obama maintains more sympathy for the Arab and Muslim side and that he and Mr Kerry are "anti-Israeli", as was supposedly demonstrated by the American abstention during the UN Security Council vote.

It's safe to say that Mr Putin shares Mr Netanyahu's animosity towards Mr Obama, and in both cases, the feeling is mutual. From the Russian nationalist perspective, the decision to isolate Ukraine and invade Crimea made sense in terms of history (Crimea was once ruled by Russia) and interests (the need to neutralise Ukraine as a threat). Mr Obama saw the steps as violations of international norms that run contrary to his vision of a world where diplomacy, not military power, should resolve problems, and decided to impose harsh sanctions on the Russians.

And as with the Israeli-American relationship, things have been getting worse and worse on the Russian-American front during Mr Obama's last months in office, while presidential candidate Trump has kept bashing the White House occupant for "betraying" Israel on Iran and the Palestinian issue and for failing to work with the Russians in fighting radical Islam.

Mr Trump has pledged that when he takes office, things are going to be different. He will revoke the nuclear deal with Iran and stop criticising Israel over the settlements. At the same time, he will resolve the differences with Russia over Crimea and other issues and cooperate with Mr Putin in a military campaign to destroy ISIS.

Last week's decisions by the White House may have been part of an attempt to box in the incoming president by making it more difficult for him to begin his diplomatic love fests with Mr Obama's foes in Jerusalem and Moscow.

But it's doubtful that the message from the lameduck US president to the president-elect and his Israeli and Russian buddies is going to make a big difference after Inauguration Day.

But then, any personal effort on the part of President Trump to dramatically transform US relations with Jerusalem and Moscow will face strong opposition from Congress, the bureaucracy and interest groups as well as from international allies. At the end of the day, interests - not personal sentiments - will determine US foreign policy.