Iran’s nuclear programme may be shrouded in secrecy, but its role in regional events is not, wrote Ghassan Charbel in the pan-Arab daily Al Hayat.
He said: “Iran is the lead player in Baghdad, but the Iraqi situation is painful and open to all dangers. Iran is the lead player in Damascus, but the Syrian situation is tragic, extremely dangerous and open to all threats. Iran is the lead player in Beirut, but the situation in Lebanon is shaky and could deteriorate. So the Arab world cannot afford to watch Iran playing such a role. Its policy of ruining the balance is meant to redraw maps”.
Iran, he said, rushed to the conclusion that it holds sway in Yemen. But it “faced Arab inflexibility, in the form of the Saudi-led Operation Decisive Storm. More importantly, the Saudi decision to lead a coalition was meant to draw a red line for Iran, rather than letting it take hold of Arab capitals”.
But he cautions that it would be an exaggeration to hold Iran alone to be responsible for the situation. “ Despotism, poverty, marginalisation and illiteracy have had a role to play. That said, Iran poured fuel on to the fire.”
Charbelsaid that “in the face of Iran’s policy of redrawing the maps, Arabs raise the cry of national security, sovereignty and stability. They do not deny Iran’s right to have friends and allies, but they deny it the the right to establish parallel armies and arsenals and sponsor coups.”
He wrote: “Stability in the Middle East requires Iran to play a realistic role, to learn from others’ experiences. The Soviet Union had a massive nuclear arsenal, but its greed and the burdens of an imperial role brought the whole thing to an end. Respecting maps is far better than devouring them.” In Al Ittihad, the Arabic-language sister newspaper of The National, Salem Salmeen Al Nuaimi wrote that one would not understand the current situation in the region without some knowledge of the Sunni-Shiite division. Each regional power is striving to spell out its area of influence, he wrote.
“But the radical currents and organisations that operate at different levels to ignite sectarian and geopolitical conflict lack the courage to move towards a Middle East that would be liberated from its colonial-era dependency on religious, social, cultural and intellectual roots.”
He likened the people in the region to small wooden boats bobbing around on the waves of globalisation.
He also expressed concern at the confusions inherent in the situation. “Whereas the West is offering intelligence against the Houthis and their Iranian allies, they are offering support to Shiites in Iraq and Syria,” he said.
Al Nuaimi remarked that “the Middle East is undergoing drastic changes. Some of these may not be tangible but will have an impact and create a new map of the region.”
* Translated by Carla Mirza
cmirza@thenational.ae
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups
Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.
Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.
Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.
Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, (Leon banned).
Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.
Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.
Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.
Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.
Champions parade (UAE timings)
7pm Gates open
8pm Deansgate stage showing starts
9pm Parade starts at Manchester Cathedral
9.45pm Parade ends at Peter Street
10pm City players on stage
11pm event ends
A State of Passion
Directors: Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi
Stars: Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah
Rating: 4/5
Tuesday's fixtures
Kyrgyzstan v Qatar, 5.45pm
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
More on animal trafficking
THE SPECS
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylinder turbo
Power: 275hp at 6,600rpm
Torque: 353Nm from 1,450-4,700rpm
Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch auto
Top speed: 250kph
Fuel consumption: 6.8L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: Dh146,999
DUBAI%20BLING%3A%20EPISODE%201
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECreator%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ENetflix%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStars%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EKris%20Fade%2C%20Ebraheem%20Al%20Samadi%2C%20Zeina%20Khoury%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
The specs
AT4 Ultimate, as tested
Engine: 6.2-litre V8
Power: 420hp
Torque: 623Nm
Transmission: 10-speed automatic
Price: From Dh330,800 (Elevation: Dh236,400; AT4: Dh286,800; Denali: Dh345,800)
On sale: Now
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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MATCH INFO
Championship play-offs, second legs:
Aston Villa 0
Middlesbrough 0
(Aston Villa advance 1-0 on aggregate)
Fulham 2
Sessegnon (47'), Odoi (66')
Derby County 0
(Fulham advance 2-1 on aggregate)
Final
Saturday, May 26, Wembley. Kick off 8pm (UAE)
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The Bio
Favourite vegetable: “I really like the taste of the beetroot, the potatoes and the eggplant we are producing.”
Holiday destination: “I like Paris very much, it’s a city very close to my heart.”
Book: “Das Kapital, by Karl Marx. I am not a communist, but there are a lot of lessons for the capitalist system, if you let it get out of control, and humanity.”
Musician: “I like very much Fairuz, the Lebanese singer, and the other is Umm Kulthum. Fairuz is for listening to in the morning, Umm Kulthum for the night.”
The story in numbers
18
This is how many recognised sects Lebanon is home to, along with about four million citizens
450,000
More than this many Palestinian refugees are registered with UNRWA in Lebanon, with about 45 per cent of them living in the country’s 12 refugee camps
1.5 million
There are just under 1 million Syrian refugees registered with the UN, although the government puts the figure upwards of 1.5m
73
The percentage of stateless people in Lebanon, who are not of Palestinian origin, born to a Lebanese mother, according to a 2012-2013 study by human rights organisation Frontiers Ruwad Association
18,000
The number of marriages recorded between Lebanese women and foreigners between the years 1995 and 2008, according to a 2009 study backed by the UN Development Programme
77,400
The number of people believed to be affected by the current nationality law, according to the 2009 UN study
4,926
This is how many Lebanese-Palestinian households there were in Lebanon in 2016, according to a census by the Lebanese-Palestinian dialogue committee
