Is the "Special Relationship" Becoming Too Expensive?

Saturday 24 September 2011

by: Jamie Stern-Weiner, New Left Project | Op-Ed 

 

The wave of popular uprisings across the Middle East created many new spaces for popular political participation. Even where those new spaces are now coming under counterrevolutionary attack, as in Egypt, many Arab governments have had to modify their policies to better reflect the views of an increasingly assertive public.

From the beginning it was clear that this shift would come at the expense of  “the US-Israeli-Saudi system” in the region. The militant assertion of popular will in Egypt, Bahrain, Jordan, Tunisia, and elsewhere has made it much more difficult for Arab regimes to collaborate with Israel and the U.S., the latter not least because of its role in supporting the former. Israel’s two most important allies in the region have both been forced to take steps against it in an attempt to accommodate public opinion. In Egypt, the not-so-new regime is still very much in bed with both the U.S. and Israel, and continues to value both American aid and security cooperation with its neighbour. But the revolution did make a difference, and the government is having to take public opinion into account to a much greater extent than before.