On Sept. 9, Israel’s air pressure bombed a residential neighborhood in Doha, Qatar, to take out Hamas’s senior political management. In line with Hamas, 5 members had been killed, however not its main leaders. Doha, a key U.S. ally, strongly condemned the assault. Even U.S. President Donald Trump lamented the strike on Fact Social: “I view Qatar as a powerful ally and pal of the U.S., and really feel very badly in regards to the location of the assault.”
Will Doha proceed to play a task mediating between Hamas and Israel? And does Qatar nonetheless imagine its pursuits lie in its broader position in peace negotiations world wide? I spoke with Majed al-Ansari on the Concordia summit on Monday, Sept. 22, on the sidelines of the eightieth annual United Nations Basic Meeting. Ansari is an advisor to the prime minister of Qatar and the spokesperson of its ministry of international affairs.
On Sept. 9, Israel’s air pressure bombed a residential neighborhood in Doha, Qatar, to take out Hamas’s senior political management. In line with Hamas, 5 members had been killed, however not its main leaders. Doha, a key U.S. ally, strongly condemned the assault. Even U.S. President Donald Trump lamented the strike on Fact Social: “I view Qatar as a powerful ally and pal of the U.S., and really feel very badly in regards to the location of the assault.”
Will Doha proceed to play a task mediating between Hamas and Israel? And does Qatar nonetheless imagine its pursuits lie in its broader position in peace negotiations world wide? I spoke with Majed al-Ansari on the Concordia summit on Monday, Sept. 22, on the sidelines of the eightieth annual United Nations Basic Meeting. Ansari is an advisor to the prime minister of Qatar and the spokesperson of its ministry of international affairs.
What follows here’s a condensed and edited transcript.
Ravi Agrawal: Let’s begin with Israel’s assault concentrating on Hamas management in Doha on Sept. 9. There are studies that your prime minister has demanded an apology from Israel. Is that appropriate?
Majed al-Ansari: The problem right here shouldn’t be who’s going to difficulty an apology. The problem is that there was a grave assault on sovereignty. An assault on the idea of mediation. An assault on peace, that passed off at a time when my nation was mediating in 12 completely different areas, together with between Hamas and Israel.
The assault occurred in a residential space that homes 5,000 folks and a lot of colleges. Children—together with American children—needed to shelter in place. On the time of the assault the neighborhood had 13 completely different embassies working from the identical neighborhood. This was not an remoted incident. It’s not an assassination of a dissident. It’s not an assault inside a battle zone.
It was an assault on the idea of mediation between adversaries; the idea of fixing battle by peaceable means; the idea of worldwide diplomacy.
RA: What does this do to Qatar’s relations with Israel now? Are they recoverable?
MA: This can be a paradigm shift for the entire area. After the Oslo Accords, Qatar was one of many first international locations to start out participating Israel within the area. We noticed at that time an opportunity for peace. We noticed an opportunity for our kids and our kids’s youngsters to stay in a neighborhood that isn’t synonymous with battle. We noticed an opportunity for the Palestinian folks to understand, lastly, a state—and for the Arab-Israeli battle to be resolved with diplomatic means. Sadly, that didn’t occur and the state of affairs received worse every single day. Israel was by no means seen as a direct risk to any Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nation.
RA: You simply used the previous tense there. You’re saying Israel is, now, a risk?
MA: In fact. I imply, if considered one of your countrymen is killed by an airstrike by any nation, and if that nation does it unilaterally even behind the backs of their very own intelligence companies, to assault a residential neighborhood, are we not entitled to view that nation as a nationwide safety risk?
Should you learn the GCC assertion that got here out of the assembly that occurred on the sidelines of the Arab-Islamic summit, with the participation of 57 international locations in Doha, it says very clearly this assault places each settlement within the area in danger.
RA: Qatar is a detailed ally of the US. There are studies that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knowledgeable U.S. President Donald Trump in regards to the assault forward of time. Do you imagine these studies, and if that’s the case, what does that imply for the Doha-Washington relationship?
MA: The primary name his highness received after the assault was by Trump, who knowledgeable him personally that the US was not consulted, and was not knowledgeable, and he stated the US would ensure, by his management, that an assault like this by no means occurs once more.
That is the unilateral motion of Netanyahu. We’re working very intently with the US to guarantee that that doesn’t occur once more.
Right here in New York, there shall be direct conferences with President Trump to speak in regards to the risks of an unhinged management taking such a unilateral determination in our area, throwing stability and the prosperity of the Center East—and particularly the Gulf Cooperation Council states—into chaos.
RA: You sound very offended about Israel. You simply stated they’ve an “unhinged management.” Do you suppose the US has leverage, and talent to make use of that leverage, to alter Israel’s actions within the area?
MA: Effectively, the identical week that Qatar was bombed, seven international locations within the area had been bombed by Israeli airstrikes. The extent of regional spillover of this battle has reached a tipping level.
We are actually at some extent the place Prime Minister Netanyahu decides to bomb Damascus, decides to bomb south Lebanon, decides to ship his troops into south Syria, bomb Yemen, and now bomb Qatar, with full impunity.
But when which means you could have completely no respect for worldwide legislation or the sovereignty of different international locations, then the worldwide neighborhood has to intervene. And because of this we instantly went to the [U.N.] Safety Council and to the Human Rights Council in Geneva and are working very intently with the Group of Islamic [Cooperation] and with the Arab League—
[interrupts]
RA: I’ve to ask: Does any of that matter? Right here we’re, sitting in New York on the eightieth anniversary of the United Nations, and everybody’s asking: Do guidelines matter?
MA: That is the best hazard in right this moment’s world, Ravi, and you place your finger on an important factor proper right here. Is the worldwide rules-based order dying beneath the stress of leaders who resolve they don’t care in regards to the guidelines? They don’t care about peace; they don’t care in regards to the world order that was based to cease us from working towards a 3rd world battle.
It’s our purpose proper now to push for the safeguarding of the worldwide system. Should you ask the folks of the world basically, there’s numerous frustration with the incapacity of the worldwide neighborhood to do something in regards to the myriad of conflicts that simply maintain piling. However what’s the different? Is it a power-based worldwide system that provides any regional hegemon the best to do no matter it desires in its area? Effectively, if that occurs, then we’re all in danger.
RA: Let me ask you a broader query. It strikes me that not everybody is aware of the position that Qatar has been enjoying for the final a number of a long time. You could have mediated a number of conflicts world wide. My understanding is that Doha has accomplished so, partially as a result of it’s a noble calling, but in addition as a result of it desires to be indispensable to international locations world wide as a part of a method to safeguard its pursuits. Now, that imaginative and prescient was born in an period when guidelines actually mattered, when there was much less of a way of impunity for breaking guidelines. If we agree that we’re in an period that resembles a bit just like the legislation of the jungle the place may is true, then does the Qatari mannequin not work?
MA: , Ravi, on the time once we had been attacked on [Sept. 9], we had been conducting 12 completely different mediations. That is what Qatar is, that is what we imagine in, and it’ll take rather more than a bully to drive this away from folks.
RA: However once more, I’ll remind you, in the previous few months, you could have had Iran ship missiles at you for an American navy base, Al Udeid, that America requested you to put in. You could have had numerous public recrimination over the truth that you had initially, you understand, brokered talks with the Taliban and the US, now between Hamas and Israel and the U.S., and also you’re paying the prices for it. You’re being attacked.
MA: Peace shouldn’t be low-cost. The dedication to peace shouldn’t be a luxurious. The truth that we’ve got been attacked solely proves the significance of the position of mediator and peace facilitator on the earth right this moment. The actual fact is that there are these world wide that discover these duties threatening to their agendas. It’s the essential motive why we want extra peace facilitators world wide right this moment.
, one of many essential causes we’re singled out like it is a lot of states world wide have the capability to be peace facilitators. However they don’t. They don’t due to political issues internally. They don’t as a result of they’re risk-averse. However except we’ve got different international locations stand in solidarity with the mediators, this may all the time be a difficulty as a result of it’s straightforward to single out one mediator when it doesn’t suit your agenda and while you don’t need a peace deal to occur.
We’re not doing it alone. We’re working with our European counterparts; we’re signing agreements with international locations over these points in Asia, in Africa, in Latin America. We’re working with companions to see how we are able to construct these consortiums of nations which might be prepared to work for peace. The danger is all the time there. We pleasure ourselves on taking that danger.
You possibly can’t take with no consideration the truth that my technology and my youngsters reside in peace and prosperity and hope that the remainder of the world will maintain that peace and prosperity for our kids. We’ve got to do no matter we are able to do, and sure, at instances we’ve got to take the chance.
