Qatar: Indispensable or albatross for US diplomacy?
In diplomacy, details send messages. So, the fact that Secretary of State Tony Blinken visited Egypt and Qatar before Israel recently in the Secretary’s latest bid to hammer out a truce between Israel and Hamas should raise some eyebrows if not alarm bells, especially if Qatar is concerned.
How did Qatar come to occupy such a central position — “indispensable” according to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin — in America’s Middle East foreign policy? Answering that question provides a case study both in the ethical challenges of diplomacy in this corner of the world as well as the general incompetence of the Biden administration in working with those challenges.
Qatar is a comparative newcomer to both the family of nations (independent in 1971) and to American strategic thinking, but its position at the mouth of the Persian Gulf makes it prime real estate for contested power politics. Being a small, thinly populated country sandwiched between the regional heavyweights of Saudi Arabia and Iran, Qatar quickly recognized that maintaining its independence meant balancing between rivals. To facilitate this balancing act, Qatar adopted a “be all things to all people” diplomacy that seeks to appeal to US concerns about terrorism and human rights; Iranian concerns about Israeli dominance; Saudi concerns about Iranian dominance; Islamic fundamentalist concerns about Western influence; and the royal family’s concerns about maintaining its own legitimacy and security. No big deal.
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To achieve these seemingly impossible, and certainly contradictory, objectives, Qatar operates an ongoing public diplomacy campaign in the U.S. Doha seeks to build an image of itself as a global humanitarian through generous financial grants to universities and think tanks, while public figures like Queen Mother Mozza bint Nasser are presented in carefully curated appeals to Western values related to empowering women, educational reform, and technological development to name a few. The results have been stunning. Qatar beat out a regional diplomatic and economic blockade imposed in 2017 by Saudi Arabia and the UAE; locked in US military bases and security aid for the long term; achieved Major Non-Nato Ally (MNNA) status last year; and is now apparently the “indispensable man” in negotiating with Hamas having facilitated a U.S-Iran prisoner swap and obtained the release of two US hostages held by Hamas last year.
In terms of Return on Investment, Qatar has more than made back its investments. But at what cost to American interests?
At best, Qatar’s seeming ability to balance between its competing interests has earned itself the reputation of being something like the Switzerland of the Middle East. However, common sense would dictate that when those interests come into conflict, Qatar likely makes decisions based on preferences it most closely aligns with. When it comes to the Israel-Hamas war and the Israel-Palestinian conflict more broadly, those preferences do not appear to align with American interests or values:
- Qatar continues to provide sanctuary and safe banking for recognized terrorist groups like Hamas, Al Qaeda, and the Taliban.
- State-influenced/semi-owned media juggernaut Al Jazeera takes a clear anti-Israel stance, even going so far as to avoid any criticism of Hamas misrule in the Gaza Strip.
- Queen Mother Mozza bint Nasser’s Facebook page exclusively focuses on Palestinian suffering in Gaza and has made no condemnation of Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, echoing the Qatari government blaming Israel for the current war.
- The initial hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas clearly benefited Hamas more than Israel with a nearly 2-to-1 ratio of Palestinian prisoners for hostages plus a pause in fighting, giving Hamas time to regroup and retrench.
In all fairness, Qatar is not being sneaky, or underhanded. It seems pretty clear where the al-Thani family locates its core interests. Indeed, it makes perfect sense. Like their Arab neighbors, and Islamic co-religionists, the Qataris fear to alienate the oft cited “Arab street” by appearing to be conciliatory to Israel. Unfortunately, this perfectly rational prioritization of regime legitimacy and security puts Qatar at odds with America's national security interests in the region both in terms of supporting Israel and in combating radical Islamist terrorism.
This dynamic has two practical effects.
First, it creates an apparent ethical dilemma for the Biden administration in terms of which allies to prioritize in the region: the terror-linked Qataris or the allegedly genocidal Israelis? Of course, you have to believe the genocide allegation to really make this a true ethical dilemma, but as indicated above the Biden administration appears to have chosen the former.
Second, the Qatari’s alignment with Hamas combined with America’s prioritization of Qatari diplomacy, however cautious, necessarily skews any deal in favor of Hamas, ensuring a sense of Israeli isolation and Hamas entrenchment. The former thinks it has nothing to lose, the latter thinks it has further gains to make. The result is no viable off-ramp for the conflict, which lands Secretary Blinken back in DC with nothing to show for his troubles, but a stern and public rejection of his efforts by the Israeli government.
America’s Qatar-first diplomacy may be motivated by humanitarian concerns related to alleviating civilian suffering in Gaza and obtaining the release of hostages. However, the Qataris are taking a tactically pragmatic, and strategically pro-Hamas position on this war suggesting that Doha’s alignment with Washington is doing more harm than good in getting the warring parties to “yes” on a truce.
The Biden administration’s apparent inability to see these dynamics at play indicates an idealistic naivete that is foolish at best and dangerously prolongs the conflict at worst.
Tim Milosch teaches courses on international relations and national security at Biola University in La Mirada, CA. He writes about international affairs on Substack at Tim Talks Politics.
